Does anyone know if my system should be okay playing back 1080p? It's just that my Alu MacBook with 2.0Ghz Core 2 Duo, GeForce 9400m and 2GB memory looks to be struggling.
Playback is very smooth with no jumps or stuttering, however the fans ramp up very quickly and stay that way for a good 5 minutes after playback has stopped. I know that 1080p can be quite demanding but I wondered if anyone knows if this is normal for my spec?
Would upgrading the memory to 4GB help and how can I tell if it's the CPU or GPU that's working hard? I'm running 10.6.4 and Dhama Beta 4. I've also noticed that Beta 4 stutters a lot more than Beta 3 with menu animations and general responsiveness. Anyone else also experiencing this?
Put in a Crystal HD instead of the wireless card if you don't use it. It will off load the CPU. Can't see that extra memory should help
The fan ramping up is normal, not ideal, but normal. The CPU you have can handle 1080p without any issues, but it will be very demanding on the CPU, extra memory won't help much.
Since you're running the latest betas for Dharma, why not give the VDADecoder a try? If you're using H264 encoded content, you should see your CPU usage drop significantly. I think it's enabled simply buy turning on "Allow hardware acceleration" in the Video subcategory under settings.
Thanks to both of you for replying. I don't realy want to have to remove my wireless card as I still use my MacBook as a laptop from time to time.
With regards to hardware acceleration this is enabled by default. I have however tried unchecking and rechecking just in case but it doesn't seem to make a difference. I take it this option only relates to H.264 files and not MKV's but the Crystal HD does? What about MKV files that are encoded with H.264 will this benefit from XBMC's hardware acceleration?
Sorry for all the questions but I'm new to XBMC on a Mac. Been running it for years on my old Xbox and finally moved over to the world of HD.
Yeah, the container doesn't matter at all, just the underlying video codec. H264 movies wrapped in MKV will work fine, however it's possible you are unknowingly playing a VC1 or MPEG2 encoded movie.
Thanks for all your help. I'll take a look at what the codec is and let you know if I have any further problems.
CrystalHD should make no difference for you, you allready have hw accellaration with your 9400. Like phil is saying, VC1 and MPEG2 arent supported yet, just h264 for now. So if youre playing back pirated mkv`s you should be all set. If youre ripping your own blurays however, results may vary.
So are the formats supported by hardware acceleration dictated by the OS or XBMC? In other words will VC1 and MPEG2 ever be included?
afaik, the hardware supports all 3 formats but so far apple only released support for h264 through their api. Someone correct me if im wrong.