Choppy 3D Bluray playback on AMD A8 Llano HTPC-Help!!!
#1
Hello guys,

I have an issue for the esteemed forum members and would appreciate any suggestions.

I recently built an Htpc. here is the summary of my specs:

AMD A8-3820 ( 65W TDP, 2.4 GHz, Quad Core, 6550D igpu)
Asrock A75 mitx mobo
Kingston HyperX Red 8Gb DDR3-1600MHz ram
Samsung 830 64GB SSD
Win 7
AMD Catalyst 12.10

BAsically, I am using TMT5 and PD11 for bluray playback( and obviously XBMC for all my mkv rips) . So far , I get smooth playback with all my full bluray rips through TMT5 and PD11.

However, 3bluray is a totally different story Sad . I am constantly getting dropped audio and stuttering every 5 or so secs , and the cpu usage is jumping to 99% at times!! I have DXVA enablled in TMT5 which is my preffered player and only have "Enforce smooth playback" selected in AMD vison CC.

From my research on the forum, most people are getting smooth 3d playback with A6-3500!! and A8-3820 is a superior apu. I really dont understand why this is happening and I am presently contemplating getting a Trinity apu, but cant afford to get a new apu and mobo so soon after spending a small fortune building this htpc !!

Please any suggestions would be most welcome as this is driving me mad!
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#2
For 3d, you might want to visit TMT5 website for tips- How to Set Viewing Environment for 3D Movie....
>Alienware X51- do it all HTPC
>Simplify XBMC configurations
>HOW-TO Bitstreaming using XBMC
I refused to watch movie without bitstreaming HD audio!
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#3
I have experienced similar problem - in June I made general upgrade for my media storage/playback system - I made 9 tb dedicated NAS, based on E350 (decision I regret now as processor lacks power to decode HD content on the fly for ipad) and HTPC based on A6-3500, gigabyte mb, 4 gb ram, hd-plex case and patriot pyro 60 gb ssd (very happy - unvervolted apu ended up with total idling consumption 18-22w, bluray playbcak up to - 35w). From the start I had no problems with regular content, but experienced constant stuttering on bluray rips through TMT5 that were streamed from NAS (latest drivers+hardware acceleration enabled).

My first thought was to blame 100mbit lan connection and recently I fixed it to 1gbit.

Problems with some bluray rips were gone - smooth playback of 3d content. However, some rips were still stuttering periodically - I decided to check cpu activity through amd utility and windows task manager and AMD utility showed that both cpu and gpu were in use during playback, cpu use was 40-44%, so no bottleneck. However I got surprised when I checked load on cores through windows task manager - first core was always 100% loaded, remaning two - 5-15%, that gives us 40% total cpu load and stuttering. It seems that TMT is not distributing load on all cores and instead uses only one.

I played same rip through mpc-hc - no stuttering, even load through cores, total cpu load around 44%, but picture was definitely better on TMT5.

Then I boosted turbo in BIOS from 2400 to 2800 and stuttering was gone, but as it is fanless case, apu temps were approaching 60oCwhen watching movie - I can live with that, but it is not what I would like to see.

So, my conclusion is that I have to thank for above mentioned situation either arse-handed arcsoft programmers or arse-handed bluray rippers and the solution - overclocking apu to frequency that is enough to cope with load on single core or buy intel Smile
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#4
(2012-11-22, 11:40)woofwoof Wrote: I have experienced similar problem - in June I made general upgrade for my media storage/playback system - I made 9 tb dedicated NAS, based on E350 (decision I regret now as processor lacks power to decode HD content on the fly for ipad) and HTPC based on A6-3500, gigabyte mb, 4 gb ram, hd-plex case and patriot pyro 60 gb ssd (very happy - unvervolted apu ended up with total idling consumption 18-22w, bluray playbcak up to - 35w). From the start I had no problems with regular content, but experienced constant stuttering on bluray rips through TMT5 that were streamed from NAS (latest drivers+hardware acceleration enabled).

My first thought was to blame 100mbit lan connection and recently I fixed it to 1gbit.

Problems with some bluray rips were gone - smooth playback of 3d content. However, some rips were still stuttering periodically - I decided to check cpu activity through amd utility and windows task manager and AMD utility showed that both cpu and gpu were in use during playback, cpu use was 40-44%, so no bottleneck. However I got surprised when I checked load on cores through windows task manager - first core was always 100% loaded, remaning two - 5-15%, that gives us 40% total cpu load and stuttering. It seems that TMT is not distributing load on all cores and instead uses only one.

I played same rip through mpc-hc - no stuttering, even load through cores, total cpu load around 44%, but picture was definitely better on TMT5.

Then I boosted turbo in BIOS from 2400 to 2800 and stuttering was gone, but as it is fanless case, apu temps were approaching 60oCwhen watching movie - I can live with that, but it is not what I would like to see.

So, my conclusion is that I have to thank for above mentioned situation either arse-handed arcsoft programmers or arse-handed bluray rippers and the solution - overclocking apu to frequency that is enough to cope with load on single core or buy intel Smile

Thanks a lot for this insightful comment. I have noticed i do not have this stuttering now on PD11 but the picture on TMT5 is much better in my opinion for 3d Bluray.

So my next question is , how and where do i do this "turbo boost" ?

cheers
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#5
(2012-11-22, 11:40)woofwoof Wrote: Then I boosted turbo in BIOS from 2400 to 2800 and stuttering was gone

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#6
isnt this, what ffmpeg-mt is for? I dont know, if it is integrated into xbmc, maybe some delay due to all that libav stuff?

edit: sorry, didnt read your first post thoroughly enough, depending how your software decodes the movies, what I said may still apply
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Choppy 3D Bluray playback on AMD A8 Llano HTPC-Help!!!0