Apple's got lots of New HD Trailers

[fight2win]

Check out www.apple.com/trailers , it looks ultra slick!

[Mug Funky]

best played with something other than QT 7 :)

mplayer gives me in excess of 100fps if i push it (and turn sound off obviously), where QT 7 struggles to give realtime, and doesn't even use overlay :(

[edit]

i'm totally hanging out for Doom. too bad there's no HD trailer for that. it's about time hollywood embraced first-person perspective as an action device.

[Elias]

Wow, that sure was a boost. Well, H.264 is better than Sorenson :)

[kurt]

stupid question: how can i save the HD-trailers to a special folder? (without buying qt-pro)

[Elias]

stupid question: how can i save the HD-trailers to a special folder? (without buying qt-pro)Play them in QuickTime (not Pro), and check the movie info, the link is shown, just copy it buy hand (can't copy>paste), and then type in the url in Firefox.

[kurt]

thx for the tip, it helps me for the next time ... :)

but I already downloaded the complete jarhead trailer (176mb) with qt and can't find it. (windowssearch is useless) .

When i went back to the apple website and click the same file it loads in qt without downloading again from the web. ---> so it has to be on my PC, isn't it?

I deleted firefox cache and windows cache but the jarhead trailer is still playable in qt. :confused:

[Joe Fenton]

I use the mplayer plugin for Firefox - which saves the movie into /tmp before playing it. After it's loaded, I just copy it from /tmp to wherever I want it. :)

[SeeMoreDigital]

Nero's and/or FFdshow's filters can play any of these high-def AVC in MOV trailers, without the requirement of having to install QuickTime

Although... don't you need QuickTime player to download the trailers in the first place?

[hpn]

Although... don't you need QuickTime player to download the trailers in the first place?
Not really. Just go to a trailer page, for example Jarhead, then right-click->"view source" and in the HTML source search for ".mov" and you'll find a few .mov file links (the HDs are 1080p, 1080i), for example
http://movies.apple.com/movies/universal/jarhead/jarhead-tlr_1080p.mov

jarhead-tlr_1080p.mov is not the real trailer, but a small metatag file that contains a reference to the URL of the trailer, so download this dummy metatag file (120 bytes or something), then open it with notepad and somewhere inside you'll see the real trailer name "jarhead-tlr_h1080p.mov", so replace the dummy file name in link above with the real file name, like this
http://movies.apple.com/movies/universal/jarhead/jarhead-tlr_h1080p.mov

and this is the link you need.

These 1080p are the best things I've ever played on my PC :) Play the .mov (without renaming) with mplayer (http://www.aziendeassociate.it/cd.asp?dir=/mplayer) only. Media Player Classic doesn't perform so well with HD). While playing with mplayer press "F" for full screen.

[SeeMoreDigital]

Thanks hpn, that's useful to know,

As someone who bought QT7 Pro, I have to admit it is useful at de-muxing MPEG-4/AVC with AAC audio in MOV to MP4 ;)


Cheers

[SeeMoreDigital]

Blimey.... there's no way my PC can play that JarHead (1888x816) trailer properly, even after de-muxing to MP4 and playing with FFdshow's filters!


Cheers

[hpn]

You can't see the trailer at all, or it's simply slow/dropping frames? (which is normal if 1080p runs even on a fast computer)

Here mplayer reports "Your system is too SLOW to play this", but then plays the file almost fine, at about 70-80% real time on my Athlon XP 2600+, so the video is lagging behind the audio, but it's is perfectly watchable.

It's somewhat unexpected that all trailers have different resolutions, for example Ice Age has 1904x1056, Da vinci code 1920x912, Jarhead 1888x816, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire 1920x816, etc.

For the lazy ones I compiled the complete 1080p link list.

http://www.apple.com/trailers/

Ice Age 2 - 1904x1056
http://movies.apple.com/movies/fox/ice_age_2/ice_age_2-tsr_h1080p.mov
Da Vinci Code - 1920 x 912
http://movies.apple.com/movies/sony_pictures/da_vinci_code/da_vinci_code_h1080p.mov
V for Vendetta - 1920 x 816
http://movies.apple.com/movies/wb/v_for_vendetta/v_for_vendetta_h1080p.mov
Barnyard - 1408 x 768
http://movies.apple.com/movies/paramount/barnyard/barnyard_h1080p.mov
The New World - 1904 x 800
http://movies.apple.com/movies/newline/the_new_world/the_new_world_h1080p.mov
Casanova - 1920 x 816
http://movies.apple.com/movies/touchstone/casanova/casanova_h1080p.mov
Rumor Has It - 1904 x 1080
http://movies.apple.com/movies/wb/rumor_has_it/rumor_has_it_h1080p.mov
The Ringer - 1920 x 816
http://movies.apple.com/movies/fox_searchlight/the_ringer/the_ringer_h1080p.mov
King Kong - 1920 x 1080
http://movies.apple.com/movies/universal/king_kong/king_kong_h1080p.mov
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (1) - 1920 x 816
http://movies.apple.com/movies/wb/harry_potter_goblet/harry_potter_goblet-tlr2_h1080p.mov
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2) - 1920 x 816
http://movies.apple.com/movies/wb/harry_potter_goblet/harry_potter_goblet_h1080p.mov
Walk The Line - 1920 x 816
http://movies.apple.com/movies/fox/walk_the_line/walk_the_line_h1080p.mov
Bee Season - 1920 x 808
http://movies.apple.com/movies/fox_searchlight/bee_season/bee_season_h1080p.mov
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang - 1920 x 816
http://movies.apple.com/movies/wb/kisskissbangbang/kisskissbangbang_h1080p.mov
Chicken Little Trailer 2 - 1920 x 1048
http://movies.apple.com/movies/disney/chicken_little/chicken_little-tlr2_h1080p.mov
Jarhead - 1888 x 816
http://movies.apple.com/movies/universal/jarhead/jarhead-tlr_h1080p.mov
North Country - 1904 x 784
http://movies.apple.com/movies/wb/north_country/north_country_h1080p.mov
Syriana - 1920 x 1080
http://movies.apple.com/movies/wb/syriana/syriana_h1080p.mov
In Her Shoes - 1920 x 816
http://movies.apple.com/movies/fox/in_her_shoes/in_her_shoes_h1080p.mov
The Fog - 1920 x 1056
http://movies.apple.com/movies/sony_pictures/the_fog/the_fog_h1080p.mov
The Greatest Game Ever Played - 1920 x 1016
http://movies.apple.com/movies/disney/thegreatestgameeverplayed/greatestgameeverplayed_h1080p.mov
Roll Bounce - 1920 x 816
http://movies.apple.com/movies/fox_searchlight/roll_bounce/roll_bounce_h1080p.mov
Transporter 2 - 1920 x 816
http://movies.apple.com/movies/fox/transporter_2/transporter_2_h1080p.mov
A Sound of Thunder - 1920 x 816
http://movies.apple.com/movies/wb/asoundofthunder/asoundofthunder_h1080p.mov
Supercross - 1920 x 1056
http://movies.apple.com/movies/fox/supercross/supercross_h1080p.mov

[SeeMoreDigital]

You can't see the trailer at all, or it's simply slow/dropping frames? (which is normal if 1080p runs even on a fast computer)Playback appears to be slow!

By-the-way, have you checked to see if any of these MOV's have been encoded at 30fps.... For some reason some of Apples earlier HD samples had.

And thanks for providing all those direct links...


Cheers

[hpn]

By-the-way, have you checked to see if any of these MOV's have been encoded at 30fps.... For some reason some of Apples earlier HD samples had.
They are all 23.976fps. Mplayer seems to play them all almost fine (50%-80% real time and pretty watchable) except for "Barnyard" and "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2)". Most likely some mplayer bugs.

Barnyard error message:
MPlayer interrupted by signal 11 in module: decode_video
- MPlayer crashed by bad usage of CPU/FPU/RAM.

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2) error message:
FAAD: error: Unable to find ADTS syncword, trying to resync!
FAAD: Failed to decode frame: Unable to find ADTS syncword

Media Player Classic plays everything, including Barnyard and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2), but is dropping more than 80% of the frames and is practically unwatchable.

[wmansir]

Downloaded the king kong trailer.

I received this error when using Mplayer:
MPlayer interrupted by signal 11 in module: decode_video
- MPlayer crashed by bad usage of CPU/FPU/RAM.

QT7 was a slideshow, maybe .5 fps.

MPC was exactly the same as QT7.

Nero Showtime did the best, giving almost watchable results until the final minute when the action kicked in and it really started dropping frames.

[SeeMoreDigital]

Given the playback issues we are all experiencing with these HD trailers.... It kinda makes me wonder, who can play them.... perfectly?

I also wonder how Mac users are getting on with them ;)


Cheers

[hpn]

Downloaded the king kong trailer.

I received this error when using Mplayer:
MPlayer interrupted by signal 11 in module: decode_video
- MPlayer crashed by bad usage of CPU/FPU/RAM.

The King Kong trailer plays fine with mplayer (tested with mplayer2005.10.09.Athlon-XP.7z). You can try with some latest mplayer build from
http://www.aziendeassociate.it/cd.asp?dir=/mplayer


Given the playback issues we are all experiencing with these HD trailers.... It kinda makes me wonder, who can play them.... perfectly?

I'm able to play most trailers at about 18-20fps on my Athlon XP 2600+ (1.92Ghz real clock speed), so with a high end PC (Athlon 64 4000+ or Athlon 64 FX-55 or Pentium 4 3.77Ghz) I guess they will play in real time at only 60-70% CPU :). Unfortunately I can't confirm it.

[SeeMoreDigital]

I'm able to play most trailers at about 18-20fps on my Athlon XP 2600+ (1.92Ghz real clock speed), so with a high end PC (Athlon 64 4000+ or Athlon 64 FX-55 or Pentium 4 3.77Ghz) I guess they will play in real time at only 60-70% CPU :). Unfortunately I can't confirm it.I think it would be useful if some people could confirm this...

Can anybody speak for Mac users?


Cheers

[Backwoods]

I get full playback but no audio with MPC. 2.8ghz

[SeeMoreDigital]

I get full playback but no audio with MPC. 2.8ghzI have a straight 2.8 P4 with 512MB of RAM coupled with a 256MB video card and I'm unable to play to vieo element without dropped frames!

I don't seem to have any problems with 1280x720/23.976/24/25 or 60p MPEG-4/AVC content though :)

[IgorC]

Well QT7 AVC isn´t best one but wow trailers are defeanetly better than blur Divx HD content.
Thanks for direct links.

[kolak]

Dual Xenon 3.2 GHz, 2GB RAM Matrox Parhelia(128 MB-AND i THINK THAT IS THE PROBLEM) and on Quicktime 7 for Pc still problems with speed :(
720P WORKS PERFECTLY:)

[hpn]

I'm not an expert, but here's my short guide on how to test your hardware. Doing all this will eliminate any possible interference during these HD trailers playback (post-processing if any, slow/buggy splitters, sound synchronization etc, etc), providing you with the highest possible fps:

1. Download a trailer, for example asoundofthunder_h1080p.mov because it's the shortest of all (1min, 75MB)
http://movies.apple.com/movies/wb/asoundofthunder/asoundofthunder_h1080p.mov

2. Rename the .mov file to .mp4 (like this: asoundofthunder_h1080p.mp4)
3. Download and extract the latest Yamb version (now 1.3.1, but will change in the future):
http://kurtnoise.free.fr/Yamb/
(Info about the latest version at http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=719195#post719195 )
4. Download the latest MP4Box build from
http://www.aziendeassociate.it/cd.asp?dir=/gpac/dev
5. Extract MP4Box.exe into the Yamb folder.
6. Start Yamb, go to the "Extract" tab, click Input and open the mp4 file (asoundofthunder_h1080p.mp4)
8. Check "Extract Track ID 1 in raw format" (the top-left check box)
9. Click extract button and in a few seconds you'll see a file named "asoundofthunder_h1080p_track1.h264" in your Yamb folder.
11. Copy mplayer.exe to the Yamb folder and play this raw file with mplayer (in DOS prompt type: mplayer [options] raw_file_name ). Always use the latest mplayer build from
http://www.aziendeassociate.it/cd.asp?dir=/mplayer

Now you could "internally" benchmark your PC without video output (null renderer) by using -vo null -benchmark like this:
mplayer -vo null -benchmark asoundofthunder_h1080p_track1.h264

With my hardware (Athlon XP 2600+, 1.92GHz clock speed) I get these results:

VO: [null] 1920x816 => 1920x816 Planar YV12
V: 0.0 1403/1403 69% 0% 0.0% 0 0

BENCHMARKs: VC: 39.215s VO: 0.000s A: 0.000s Sys: 1.535s = 40.750s
BENCHMARK%: VC: 96.2331% VO: 0.0000% A: 0.0000% Sys: 3.7669% = 100.0000%

It means that 1403 frames were rendered for 40.750s or it's 34.42 fps (faster than real time!), but the resolution of this trailer is not so impressive (1920x816)

Because 34.42fps is much faster than real time (23.976) I could safely make the same test, but this time with video output (null renderer disabled) at full screen by adding -vm -benchmark like this:
mplayer -vm -benchmark asoundofthunder_h1080p_track1.h264

I still get faster than real time result (~28fps):

V: 0.0 1403/1403 71% 15% 0.0% 0 0
BENCHMARKs: VC: 40.021s VO: 8.451s A: 0.000s Sys: 1.669s = 50.141s
BENCHMARK%: VC: 79.8169% VO: 16.8545% A: 0.0000% Sys: 3.3286% = 100.0000%

So now to play the trailer at its native 23.976 fps, just use
mplayer -vm -fps 23.976 asoundofthunder_h1080p_track1.h264
or for windowed playback
mplayer -fps 23.976 asoundofthunder_h1080p_track1.h264

I also tried with syriana_h1080p (converted to raw .h264), because it's one of the few trailers that has 1920x1080 resolution (32% more pixels than asoundofthunder) and because of that it's even harder to play.
http://movies.apple.com/movies/wb/syriana/syriana_h1080p.mov

This time even without video output I get slower than real time result (20.42fps):
mplayer -benchmark -vo null syriana_h1080p_track1.h264

VO: [null] 1920x1080 => 1920x1080 Planar YV12
V: 0.0 3399/3399 120% 0% 0.0% 0 0

BENCHMARKs: VC: 163.138s VO: 0.016s A: 0.000s Sys: 3.252s = 166.406s
BENCHMARK%: VC: 98.0361% VO: 0.0096% A: 0.0000% Sys: 1.9543% = 100.0000%

20.42fps means that if I play the same trailer with video output enabled, I'll get even slower playback:

mplayer -benchmark syriana_h1080p_track1.h264

V: 0.0 3399/3399 122% 20% 0.0% 0 0
BENCHMARKs: VC: 166.674s VO: 27.245s A: 0.000s Sys: 13.175s = 207.094s
BENCHMARK%: VC: 80.4823% VO: 13.1559% A: 0.0000% Sys: 6.3618% = 100.0000%

So 3399 frames ware rendered for 207.094s or it's about 16.41 fps

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Just for comparison I benchmarked a "normal" (no HD, no H.264) 768x544 DivX 5 video (don't forget to disable the sound) like this:

mplayer -nosound -benchmark Mccools.avi

V: 38.0 951/951 12% 25% 0.0% 0 0
BENCHMARKs: VC: 4.762s VO: 9.578s A: 0.000s Sys: 1.535s = 15.875s
BENCHMARK%: VC: 29.9969% VO: 60.3339% A: 0.0000% Sys: 9.6693% = 100.0000%

951 frames for 15.875s, or my CPU is able to render and play this video (video output enabled) at 59.90fps.
-----------------
With video output disabled I get 234fps (!) :
mplayer -nosound -vo null -benchmark Mccools.avi

V: 38.0 951/951 10% 0% 0.0% 0 0

BENCHMARKs: VC: 3.874s VO: 0.000s A: 0.000s Sys: 0.189s = 4.063s
BENCHMARK%: VC: 95.3483% VO: 0.0000% A: 0.0000% Sys: 4.6517% = 100.0000%

[SeeMoreDigital]

Well I've learnt something new today!

I had no idea MP4Box.exe could be used to de-mux streams out of the MOV container by simply changing the file extension to MP4 :eek:

Anyway.... I've tried it and it works.... how embarrassed am I :o

[hpn]

I didn't know it either until yesterday when I tried to demux a .mov file with Yamb, but couldn't find the .mov extension among "all supported files" and because of that I wasn't able to open it at all (!), so I decided to change the extension and see what would happen and it worked. Yamb is a nice little GUI, and only needs some small tweaks to become a great tool.

[SeeMoreDigital]

I didn't know it either until yesterday when I tried to demux a .mov file with Yamb, but couldn't find the .mov extension among "all supported files" and because of that I wasn't able to open it at all (!), so I decided to change the extension and see what would happen and it worked. Yamb is a nice little GUI, and only needs some small tweaks to become a great tool.I wonder if Kurt is aware!

I've just tried using YAMB to de-mux other types of streams from out of the MOV container.... Such as Apple Lossless audio, Sorenson video, PCM audio, MP3 audio, WAV audio, etc.... and it could de-mux these streams too - Not that I was able to play some of them!

This is very interesting find. And one that's going to make my life quite a bit eaiser....


Many thanks

[LordRPI]

Given the playback issues we are all experiencing with these HD trailers.... It kinda makes me wonder, who can play them.... perfectly?

I also wonder how Mac users are getting on with them ;)


Cheers

~ 125% CPU use on a Dual 2.0GHZ G5 with QuickTime 7. No playback problems at all. Decent performance with MPlayer (not real time) and it seems to kill VLC.

Seems to offer roughly symmetrical decoding on each processor. However this is slightly skewed with the Nero Digital 1080p trailers and real time playback is not possible. I will look into why this happens, with the two main differences are loop filter, multi-slices and CABAC/CAVLC.

With one processor turned off, however, MPlayer gives the best results for playback.

[DIggedy]

[QUOTE]Can anybody speak for Mac users?[QUOTE]


I'm on a Dual 2Ghz G5 with 2GB RAM and unsuprisingly the 1080p trailers play without a single dropped frame in Quicktime 7.

[LordRPI]

[QUOTE]Can anybody speak for Mac users?[QUOTE]


I'm on a Dual 2Ghz G5 with 2GB RAM and unsuprisingly the 1080p trailers play without a single dropped frame in Quicktime 7.

Could anybody make a comment on Windows with regard to 1080p trailers with a dual processor or dual core machine?

[Joe Fenton]

Could anybody make a comment on Windows with regard to 1080p trailers with a dual processor or dual core machine?

I run Fedora Core 3 64bit on a dual Opteron 240 system (1.4 GHz), and the Apple trailers play great in xine. They drop a few frames in high action scenes, like a few of the dragon scenes in the HP trailer, but most of the time plays full speed. Mplayer chokes bad on the trailers... it consumes 100% of both CPUs and just fills memory (including the scratch drive) until you reset the machine.

[videomixer9]

Apple's H264 Decoder for Windows is a big piece of shit, since XP or so there should be a .mov splitter be with the OS, at least it was so for me, with this one and ffdshow and e.g. zoomplayer or mpc (set quicktime to use directshow, zp decheck use quicktime activex under filters) I can even play many of those 1080p trailers from apple just fine on my athlon 3000+ without major frame dropping. Apple's very own decoder doesn't manage that at all, I think Apple made the Quicktime decoder a piece of shit on purpose to boost sales on new machines that may decoder such stuff, while most of the current players can actually play it without any problem. No wonder then that most *nix players got no problem with it, they use the way faster h264 decoding of libav by default and thus don't have major framedropping on modern machines unlike with apple's decoder crap. The Quality of Apple's Decoder isn't even any better, imo it's worse than what libav outputs to my screen.

Apple is one of the most overpraised companies out there, most of their software has sloppy code and isn't fast at all, or not even a single bit opzimized, and if it's only the variants for their own OS but not the windows stuff, as they can brag then how much faster their shit is.

For 1080p it says you need a dual G5 which is imo almost total bullshit. Whoever tries to watch those trailers, just fuck off apples recommendation and just never use quicktime but libav. On any OS, even OS X.

[fight2win]

i have winxp with sp2 and qt 7.0.3, those apple hd trailers decode fine, i think apple ain't shit, apple is pretty good! what's with the people here, all they can say is that companies suck, and open source is good, just because it is free, what are u guys, soviets or something?

[videomixer9]

nah apple is just shitty fanboy stuff, like anybody buys crap like the ipod which is expensive with less features than many others players ... alone the fact the apple website generally hides 1080p videos for windows users is such a loser behaviour, now guess what, apple recently released new dual core G5s that are exactly within the specs ... there's so many ppl dissing microsoft for the same stuff they let apple do without any problems ... and imo that's stupid. Apple interest is making money, if the software is too fast the consumer doesn't buy their new stuff ... as simple as that, the same thing microsoft did the last years to get pc sales upwards incl. the bonus for their OEM windows the vendors make as reward ...

besides, I won't pay for fullscreen playback or other simple stuff and they even don't even mention somewhere viewable that there still is a version without itunes, besides that someone else did a stripdown in form of quicktime alternative.

[SeeMoreDigital]

Okay guys.... I think now's a good time as any to stop the bashing before it gets out of hand... Please!

Many thanks

[Elias]

Okay guys.... I think now's a good time as any to stop the bashing before it gets out of hand... Please!

Many thanksIt's really not bashing when he's bringing up valid points. I like the fact that Apple follows the MPEG-4 standard (unlike Micro$oft with their wmv), but other than that, what's good about QuickTime? Apple wants you to pay for FULLSCREEN! That's what I call getting out of hand.

[SeeMoreDigital]

Apple wants you to pay for FULLSCREEN! That's what I call getting out of hand.Yes.... but that's not "the only" reason why Apple want you to pay for the Pro version!

The Pro version contains many muxing and encoding options that the basic version does not have.... (that's why I bought the Pro version).

For the last few years I've been using MediaPlayer Classic to play QuickTime files in full screen ;)

[LordRPI]

It's really not bashing when he's bringing up valid points. I like the fact that Apple follows the MPEG-4 standard (unlike Micro$oft with their wmv), but other than that, what's good about QuickTime? Apple wants you to pay for FULLSCREEN! That's what I call getting out of hand.

Actually iTunes let's you play the downloaded vidoes in full screen for FREE!

I actually spoke to Frank Casanova years ago regarding this. He said there's actually no reason to charge for full screen-ability, but then again, he hasn't given the order to put it in.

[videomixer9]

Now I wonder what some ppl would do if you just replace the name Apple with Microsoft, prolly they diss MS for only making fullscreen available for free with bought videos. Seriously, I wonder why ppl love Apple and why they also love their mediocre mediaplayer and their quite boring iPods ... the way Apple thinks is just like MS. They hopped on the train of standards as it's
a. stupid to use sth. else than H264 nowadays where PSP, DVB-S2 etc. already use it as a standard
b. it's something that has a chance against Microsoft

Other than that they just have Quicktime etc. available for Windows as itunes would prolly be a total flop if only some Apple users could buy stuff there. Their decision to not sell Mac OS X as an version for anything else but Apples PCs even with a x86 version coming shows how they plan. They are as propiertary as MS, they just pack around a maybe nicer design and everyone praises them. If you're trying to replace Microsoft with another Microsoft (just with an apple as their logo) you're prolly the consumer who'd be happy about them. Everyone boosts around about software being not worth much money anymore in the private consumer sector, yet everyone seems to see Apple with their ancient concept of Software only for our PCs as a future concept? If MS should ever die because of most software being free, Apple will even die before that as a PC company and will be an mediocre mp3 player builder that got a bonus for design and less for functionality. The only thing Apple got with open software is that they regularly steal it (well things under BSD license aren't really stolen) and pack it in a nice design, and even then, I used Mac OS X on a friends Powerbook G4 for quite a while, and I wondered when I last had a so many default components crash regularly on my crappy windows ...

It's funny that just because Apple got that hip image and still most of their shit is mediocre or even bad (just as quicktime and it's crappy encoding/decoding etc. features) ppl will love them, with most of their stuff even being propietary shit just like MS. The design is not everything, while ppl diss that on MS stuff Apple does it more like anyone, their software is all design, nothing else, the rest is plain bad, and I have tried it out ...

[Elias]

Now I wonder what some ppl would do if you just replace the name Apple with Microsoft, prolly they diss MS for only making fullscreen available for free with bought videos. Seriously, I wonder why ppl love Apple and why they also love their mediocre mediaplayer and their quite boring iPods ... the way Apple thinks is just like MS. They hopped on the train of standards as it's
a. stupid to use sth. else than H264 nowadays where PSP, DVB-S2 etc. already use it as a standard
b. it's something that has a chance against Microsoft

Other than that they just have Quicktime etc. available for Windows as itunes would prolly be a total flop if only some Apple users could buy stuff there. Their decision to not sell Mac OS X as an version for anything else but Apples PCs even with a x86 version coming shows how they plan. They are as propiertary as MS, they just pack around a maybe nicer design and everyone praises them. If you're trying to replace Microsoft with another Microsoft (just with an apple as their logo) you're prolly the consumer who'd be happy about them. Everyone boosts around about software being not worth much money anymore in the private consumer sector, yet everyone seems to see Apple with their ancient concept of Software only for our PCs as a future concept? If MS should ever die because of most software being free, Apple will even die before that as a PC company and will be an mediocre mp3 player builder that got a bonus for design and less for functionality. The only thing Apple got with open software is that they regularly steal it (well things under BSD license aren't really stolen) and pack it in a nice design, and even then, I used Mac OS X on a friends Powerbook G4 for quite a while, and I wondered when I last had a so many default components crash regularly on my crappy windows ...

It's funny that just because Apple got that hip image and still most of their shit is mediocre or even bad (just as quicktime and it's crappy encoding/decoding etc. features) ppl will love them, with most of their stuff even being propietary shit just like MS. The design is not everything, while ppl diss that on MS stuff Apple does it more like anyone, their software is all design, nothing else, the rest is plain bad, and I have tried it out ...Hey, I'm on your side. I love Open Source Software. Anyway, this thread really isn't about Apple. Want to bash them? Start a new thread.

[Teegedeck]

Just to bring something into the discussion that hasn't been mentioned, yet: download-times.

I know, these trailers look great; but even the '480p' versions take ages till they're complete. It's a gain in quality but my personal viewing enjoyment has suffered - it would benefit more from lower bitrates. Is the coding-efficiency of Apple's AVC that bad? Their ASP codec wasn't anything to write home about, and that was a shame since we aren't offered more choice than 'Real or Apple or M$' when it comes to movie trailers. Again a disappointing showing that far.

[Elias]

Their ASP codec wasn't anything to write home aboutSince when did Apple start offering ASP in mp4?

[Teegedeck]

Ah, sorry; their MPEG-4 implementation was 'simple profile', not 'ASP'.

[Elias]

Ah, sorry; their MPEG-4 implementation was 'simple profile', not 'ASP'.I thought so. And yes, it was (still is) a very bad one at that.

[Czarek Kwasny]

Speaking of perfromance issues, I'd definitely recommend metioned earlier MPlayer compilation for playback, no other player is optimized as well IMHO. Have you tried tuning MPlayer with command line options?
I've made a shortcut:
"c:\Program Files\MPlayer\mplayer.exe" -vfm ffmpeg -lavdopts lowres=0:fast:skiploopfilter=all

and play smoothly the HD files just by dropping it on the shortcut, with full V-A synchronization on my Athlon64 3000+ (@1,8GHz). I had similar problems you mention before too. Now the only file I'm having problems with is FallenArt, a short movie by Tomek Baginski, but this one is encoded with 25mbps bitrate (AVC, 1920x1080) :) so i guess you really need a strong machine to decode the stream without losing sync. On the contrary the same XviD encode at 50mbps (I've made it for preformence-testing purposes) plays fine with such tuned MPlayer.

Here are the benchmark results:

c:\Program Files\MPlayer>mplayer -benchmark -vo null d:\DVD_ROM\FALLEN_ART_HD_1080.MOV -nosound
V: 360.0 8640/8640 146% 0% 0.0% 0 0

BENCHMARKs: VC: 526.379s VO: 0.000s A: 0.000s Sys: 21.792s = 548.171s
BENCHMARK%: VC: 96.0246% VO: 0.0000% A: 0.0000% Sys: 3.9754% = 100.0000%

giving ~15fps

And after applying -vfm ffmpeg -lavdopts lowres=0:fast:skiploopfilter=all


c:\Program Files\MPlayer>mplayer -benchmark -vo null d:\DVD_ROM\FALLEN_ART_HD_1080.MOV -nosound -vfm ffmpeg -lavdopts lowres=0:fast:skiploopfilter=all

V: 360.0 8640/8640 88% 0% 0.0% 0 0

BENCHMARKs: VC: 320.085s VO: 0.014s A: 0.000s Sys: 26.040s = 346.139s
BENCHMARK%: VC: 92.4730% VO: 0.0040% A: 0.0000% Sys: 7.5230% = 100.0000%



which gives around 25fps I guess the parameters optimize the decoding for realtime playback.... Of course in reality the playback is not perfectly synchronized as there are simply too complicated fragments, which cause desync, but overall the effect is very optimistic :).

For syriana_h1080p.mp4 I get these values:
c:\Program Files\MPlayer>mplayer -benchmark syriana_h1080p.mov -nosound
V: 142.1 3409/3409 87% 9% 0.0% 0 0

BENCHMARKs: VC: 123.975s VO: 13.573s A: 0.000s Sys: 0.900s = 138.448s
BENCHMARK%: VC: 89.5463% VO: 9.8037% A: 0.0000% Sys: 0.6501% = 100.0000%


~24 fps

c:\Program Files\MPlayer>mplayer -benchmark syriana_h1080p.mov -nosound -vfm ffmpeg -lavdopts lowres=0:fast:skiploopfilter=all
V: 142.1 3409/3409 68% 9% 0.0% 0 0

BENCHMARKs: VC: 97.838s VO: 13.261s A: 0.000s Sys: 0.814s = 111.913s
BENCHMARK%: VC: 87.4233% VO: 11.8494% A: 0.0000% Sys: 0.7274% = 100.0000%


~30fps :cool:

My configuration: Athlon64 3000+ 9x213MHz (1,9GHz), 2x512MB in dual channel @ 213Mhz, WinXP 32bit.

[hpn]

For syriana_h1080p.mp4 I get these values:
c:\Program Files\MPlayer>mplayer -benchmark syriana_h1080p.mov -nosound
V: 142.1 3409/3409 87% 9% 0.0% 0 0

BENCHMARKs: VC: 123.975s VO: 13.573s A: 0.000s Sys: 0.900s = 138.448s
BENCHMARK%: VC: 89.5463% VO: 9.8037% A: 0.0000% Sys: 0.6501% = 100.0000%


~24 fps

c:\Program Files\MPlayer>mplayer -benchmark syriana_h1080p.mov -nosound -vfm ffmpeg -lavdopts lowres=0:fast:skiploopfilter=all
V: 142.1 3409/3409 68% 9% 0.0% 0 0

BENCHMARKs: VC: 97.838s VO: 13.261s A: 0.000s Sys: 0.814s = 111.913s
BENCHMARK%: VC: 87.4233% VO: 11.8494% A: 0.0000% Sys: 0.7274% = 100.0000%


~30fps :cool:

My configuration: Athlon64 3000+ 9x213MHz, 1GB RAM @ 213Mhz, WinXP 32bit.

Your command line seems to work great. My results with it:

F:\trailers>mplayer -benchmark syriana_h1080p.mov -nosound

V: 142.1 3409/3409 118% 19% 0.0% 0 0

BENCHMARKs: VC: 168.993s VO: 27.477s A: 0.000s Sys: 7.590s = 204.060s
BENCHMARK%: VC: 82.8153% VO: 13.4652% A: 0.0000% Sys: 3.7195% = 100.0000%


F:\trailers>mplayer -benchmark syriana_h1080p.mov -nosound -vfm ffmpeg -lavdopts lowres=0:fast:skiploopfilter=all

V: 142.1 3409/3409 104% 19% 0.0% 0 0

BENCHMARKs: VC: 148.485s VO: 27.327s A: 0.000s Sys: 10.094s = 185.906s
BENCHMARK%: VC: 79.8710% VO: 14.6994% A: 0.0000% Sys: 5.4296% = 100.0000%


Seems Athlon64 performs extremely well compared to my Athlon 2600+ (@1.92Ghz) 768MB RAM, so it's time to updrage to a 64-bit CPU :)

[Czarek Kwasny]

Yes, this seems to be true. Both configurations have almost identical CPU clock, so it goes about the architecture perhaps. I wonder if MPlayer is going to take advantage of 64-bit computing and dual core technology.

[kothrush]

Given the playback issues we are all experiencing with these HD trailers.... It kinda makes me wonder, who can play them.... perfectly?

I also wonder how Mac users are getting on with them ;)


Cheers

It seems PC Quicktime is not as optimized as Mac Quicktime. I have 20" iMac G5- 2Ghz. 720p playback is just fine, no drop frames. It consumes around 60% CPU. Playback in VLC is same as QT 7, although I like color rendering of QT.

I can playback 1080p with 15 fps or so for simple (not fast moving action) trailers. I think 2Ghz G5 is roughly equal to Athlon64 3200-3400+ (I dont know for sure, but whichever athlon64 has 2Ghz clock spped is very close to 2Ghz G5). So anyone with same or higher CPU should be able to playback 720p. If you can not then use better software, as hardware is capable of playing it for sure. ;) .

QT (esp. QT Pro) is very nice and feature packed software, too bad it has lot of problem on windows. If anyone has ever done editting in QTPro knows that its the best bang for your $30.

[SeeMoreDigital]

Thanks for your post kothrush, much appreciated ;)

....and welcome to the forum.


Cheers

[Elias]

Yes, QuickTime for PC is not nearly as optimised as on Mac. Anything beyond 320x240 MPEG-4 Simple Profile in QuickTime is slow on my PC.

[Joe Fenton]

Well OF COURSE QuickTime isn't optimized on the PC. Microsoft can't very well have QT competing with Windows Media format after all. I'm positive the driver development info MS gives Apple guarantees QT is considerably slower than WMV through DShow. It's how MS treats all their competitors.