DVD/DivX on a Sparc...What's it take?

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IronTek · Post by **IronTek** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 8:06 pm

I just installed Gentoo on my Ultra 10 and was curious as to what I could do with it in the way of leisurely activities.

I installed xine and tried to play a DivX file. Alas, it seems as if the UltraSparc 440 in my box might be a little underpowered for it (though I'm hoping there might be some optimizations to make it run better). Though I figure if I could get DivX playing properly, DVD's would decode without a problem (no DVD drive in yet though).

At any rate, I'm curious as to what kinds of systems people can decode MPEG2/4 on without any problems.

stonent · Post by **stonent** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 9:55 pm

I think the x86 versions of Mplayer and Xine use the windows codecs which have been heavily optimized. What CFLAGS are you using?

IronTek · Post by **IronTek** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 10:59 pm

CFLAGS="-mcpu=ultrasparc -O3 -pipe"

I would like to think MPEG2 would decode just fine, but I would also think that MPEG4 *should* decode just find given that I would think a 440MHz UltraSparc IIi should perform around a PII 500 (more-or-less). A 500MHz P2/3 can decode DivX...

...though granted, they could just be that heavily optimized.

stonent · Post by **stonent** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 12:26 am

There might be a problem in your xf86config file as well. If it us using a framebuffer driver rather than the Mach64 driver. Can you post the contents of it?

Are you using DMA on your hard drive?

What does xvinfo say?

http://www.geekounet.org/powerbook/driplusxv.html

Here is some info on getting Mach64 accelleration working under Linux on non-intel systems.

Weeve · Post by **Weeve** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 1:12 am

This is most likely due to the fact that the only output driver available to you is x11. xv would most likely enable smoother playback but it isn't working out of the box at the moment.

IronTek · Post by **IronTek** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 1:37 am

Well, right now, I'm using a Creator3D and not the onboard ATI adapter.

...but, given the right settings, a 440MHz UltraSparc IIi should be able to play MPEG4 just fine, should it not?

stonent · Post by **stonent** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 2:02 am

Yes, but if the acceleration isn't working/enabled on the Creator3D card it will be offloading the image rendering to the CPU (cpu will be drawing the video after decoding vs the card drawing the video after decoding) and do a software video overlay. If possible try to see if trying the onboard ATI video shows a difference in video speed.

Some other stuff I found: Google groups

IronTek · Post by **IronTek** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 3:12 am

Oh...to answer some of your earlier questions, I am using DMA on my hard drive (and 32 bit IO).

Also, xvinfo says:

X-Video Extension version 2.2
screen #0
no adaptors present

(I'm using the sunffb driver)

...with regards to your more current posts, I'm not sure how one can enable acceleration since (AFAIK) I have to use the sunffb driver (which I assume, perhaps wrongly, is as accelerated as it's going to get)

stonent · Post by **stonent** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 3:50 am

Well, I'll admit, I don't know as much about the Creator cards vs the ATI ones. But having some things missing in the config file could cause some slowness.

I found this on google groups for an example:

Code: Select all

Section "Module"
 Load "GLcore"
 Load "bitmap"
 Load "dbe"
 Load "ddc"
# Load "dri"
 Load "extmod"
 Load "freetype"
 Load "glx"
 Load "int10"
 Load "pex5"
 Load "record"
 Load "speedo"
 Load "type1"
 Load "vbe"
 Load "xie"
EndSection

I'm not sure why he disabled dri, but you could try either one. Just back up your current settings to see if it makes it better.

For the next section, try once with the fbdev enabled and once without. It depends on if you are using the kernel framebuffer driver.

Code: Select all

Section "Device"
 Identifier "Generic Video Card"
 Driver  "sunffb"
 Option  "UseFBDev"  "true"
EndSection

stonent · Post by **stonent** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 4:59 pm

I'm installing Gentoo on my 300MHz Ultra AXe system. I'll let you know how well it decodes video.