obobskivich wrote:

Actually that 12% load is probably dead-on; decoding/acceleration video playback is "nothing" to a modern USM GPU (consider the floating point power of a USM GPU - decoding of a 2-4Mbit 720p stream is relatively nothing). ATi cards, if I remember right, tend not to report "video engine load" like nVidia cards will, so you're just seeing a raw average of the card's loading (especially if you're going from CCC, which only reports "GPU Load" as an averaged stat - it isn't showing the break-down between MEMIO, Shaders, etc).

But feipoa mentioned that he had seen the GPU load of 12% when playing windowed Flash videos. Invariably the windowed mode uses software rendering AFAIK, atleast with my setup. So for a stutter-free playback in old P3 systems, you need both decoding and rendering to be accelerated which doesn't seem to be the case here. This was my point actually. However I made a mistake in my previous post by mentioning 'only rendering and not decoding' whereas it should have been the reverse. Yeah you are correct in saying that the decoding of 720p stream is nothing for a modern GPU. I have seen the video engine load(HwINFO tool) never crossing 18% for 1080p(full screen) in my case. So there is a lot of juice left in the video core of my nvidia GPU to tackle Blu-ray like you said.

obobskivich wrote:

Depends on the stream, the source, etc. Something that isn't being mentioned at all here is that resolution != bitrate. Something else that isn't being mentioned is that not all "video decode acceleration" is created equal

Yeah I do understand the bitrate thingy and the different levels of acceleration dependent on various factors & setups, points accepted.

Standard Def Steve wrote:

So...yeah. Go ahead and download Flash 14. It actually sucks a bit less!

Thanks for the heads-up Standard Def Steve. I will test it on my system when I get back in a few days. Fortunately I have some earlier test results on Win XP, FF 28(probably flash 13) which I can compare with Flash 14.

Clip used was BBB loves CC(140 seconds). I only tested 144p, 240p & 1080p. CPU load observed with performance tab of Windows task manager. GPU load observed with HWiNFO32 sensors and GPU-Z. In one GPU load measurement case, the GPU-Z utility was in 'overlay' mode with fullscreen flash video and in the other case, a sample CSV file was generated by logging with HWiNFO utility to note down the GPU load.

1) 144p(Window mode, both decoding & rendering in S/W mode):
FPS: Varies from 6 to 13 and mostly hovers around 11.
Dropped Frames: 393.
CPU load: 100% MAX.
GPU load: 15% MAX

2) 144p(fullscreen mode, S/W decoding & Accel. rendering):
FPS: Varies from 14 to 16 and mostly hovers around 16.
Dropped Frames: 5.
CPU load: 40 to 60%, with 1 or 2 spikes to 80%.
GPU core load: 5 to 7% after initial hiccup.
GPU Video engine load: 1%

3) 240p(Window mode, Accel. decoding & S/W rendering):
FPS: Varies from 9 to 12 and mostly hovers around 11.
Dropped Frames: 1962 (inlcudes initial hiccup).
CPU load: 100% MAX.
GPU core load: 19%.

4) 240p(fullscreen mode, Accel. decoding & Accel. rendering):
FPS: Varies from 24 to 26 and mostly stays at 25.
Dropped Frames: 13 (excludes initial hiccup).
CPU load: 39 to 64%, with 1 or 2 spikes to 90%.
GPU core load: 20 to 30% after initial hiccup.
GPU Video engine load: 3%

5) 1080p(fullscreen mode, Accel. decoding & Accel. rendering):
FPS: Varies from 24 to 27 and mostly stays at 25.
Dropped Frames: 32 (excludes initial hiccup).
CPU load: 40 to 60%, with 1 or 2 spikes to 90%.
GPU core load: 9 to 12% after initial hiccup.
GPU Video engine load: 18% approx.

Minor Observations(most must have noticed):

1. window mode always defaults to software rendering.
2. fullscreen mode always defaults to accelerated rendering.
3. 240p & above upto 1080p always resorts to accelerated decoding in both window & fullscreen modes.
4. Only 144p resorts to software decoding in both window & fullscreen modes.

gandhig wrote:

But feipoa mentioned that he had seen the GPU load of 12% when playing windowed Flash videos. Invariably the windowed mode uses software rendering AFAIK, atleast with my setup. So for a stutter-free playback in old P3 systems, you need both decoding and rendering to be accelerated which doesn't seem to be the case here. This was my point actually. However I made a mistake in my previous post by mentioning 'only rendering and not decoding' whereas it should have been the reverse. Yeah you are correct in saying that the decoding of 720p stream is nothing for a modern GPU. I have seen the video engine load(HwINFO tool) never crossing 18% for 1080p(full screen) in my case. So there is a lot of juice left in the video core of my nvidia GPU to tackle Blu-ray like you said.

I can't speak to an AMD setup (I actually have an HD 4000 series card sitting in storage, but it isn't hooked up and I don't have a machine to setup just to test it), but on my nVidia and Intel setups acceleration seems to be pretty consistent (I say "seems" because I've never measured it with the Intel setups, but I don't notice any stutter/lag/dropped frames, so I assume they're doing their job) between windowed and FS. Some folks have reported the AMD driver not doing accel in windowed mode, which is certainly a problem as you point out.

Yeah I do understand the bitrate thingy and the different levels of acceleration dependent on various factors & setups, points accepted.

I wasn't meaning to specifically single your reply out with that 😊 - just to bring it up as a point for the thread in general.

feipoa wrote:

Does anyone have first hand, everyday computing experience with a dual PIII-S Tualatin 1.4 GHz computer on Windows 7? I have two such computers that I am unwilling to retire. One has 2 GB RAM, the other has 3 GB RAM. Both systems fit the system requirements for Win 7 as specified by Microsoft, however I am looking for anecdotal accounts of their performance and usability. The purpose of these computers is primarly for browsing, paying bills online, e-mail, etc. In my mind, they are sufficient for these purposes with XP Pro but I'd like to find out if everything is going to be, say, 50% slower in Win 7.

I am already aware that Youtube and other Flash-based websites can be a dog, especially when using Chrome in XP. This does not bother me. I don't watch videos online much, but if I have to, I can still play Youtube videos on Firefox 3.6.24 without any noticable loss of frames.

EDIT: For the sake of this thread, a new computer, motherboard or other new hardware is out of consideration.

with the right video card some videos might actually off load in to the video card.

What is interesting is that I can play 720p videos in *.mov format without any GPU decoding/rendering, however *.mp4 files show skipped frames.

Even though I see a 12% utilisation for windowed Flash videos in Firefox and 50% CPU utilisation, it does not buy me anything. On my dual Tualatin with a Parhelia graphics card, I also get 50% CPU utilisation. On both systems, windowed Flash videos play without skipped frames.

Windowed Flash video acceleration is all I was hoping to achieve with this HD4350. If this is unachievable, then this graphic card is useless for my purposes. I am never going to have the need to play 1080p offline videos, which seems to be the only instance when the graphic card becomes useful.

My goal here is to extend the life of my dual PIII Tualatin for everyday use. Upgrading my motherboard is irrevalent for my sick/twisted stubborn desires. After switching to Firefox from Chrome, the web has become a lot faster, and this graphics card crusade of mine has become less important.

I'm up to my ears in Mercedes grease, so I likely won't be doing any more exploration with this topic. For anyone considering a vintage car hobby - it is a lot more expensive and a lot more frusturating.