Forgot to mention, I tried Media Player Classic MPC Ver 6.4.9.1. It works but is very stuttery and audio jumps a stalls.

Old version of Cyberlink PowerDVD?

I'm running a commercial software (old one) that runs quite well on a K6-III+ 400 (software rendering).
But I don't think you could play anything smooth on that processor by software rendering (And for that I mean I tested a Pentium MMX250 trying to play dvds)

The software that I'm running is InterVideo WinDVD 1.3.5c2
it's kinda of hard to find 🙁 ...
and if that's a super socket 7 system, maybe only using 64mb or 128mb of ram will speed things even more than 512mb (cacheable área, it depends of your chipset and cache)

This text file lists a couple of players optimized for the Rage Pro: http://www.digital-digest.com/dvd/support/pcdvd11.txt

I had trouble with certain DVDs on my K6-2 400. Most of the time using Intervideo DVD player, Version 3 (I think) It ran OK. The only thing I can think of is to get a DVD Decoder card or some ATi DVD player which supports hardware playback (providing the ATi rage assists)

I remember using an Asus bundled player: Asus DVD 2000. It was a customized version of Cyberlink Power DVD.

I used an older version of Klite Codec Pack on 98SE. It comes with Media Player Classic and includes a version of PowerDVD's decoder. If you have a card with DXVA capability it can use it. That worked pretty well.

Cinemaster 99 might work well too if you can find it. I was using that for some experimentation too. The OEMs sometimes customized it (ie ATI DVD Player).

foey wrote:

I had trouble with certain DVDs on my K6-2 400. Most of the time using Intervideo DVD player, Version 3 (I think) It ran OK. The only thing I can think of is to get a DVD Decoder card or some ATi DVD player which supports hardware playback (providing the ATi rage assists)

I did too on my K6-2 533. It's a good thing I'm such a packrat because I still had my Creative DVD ROM drive and decoder card that I had been using in the Pentium 150 system that I had prior to that so I was able to throw it in there and never had a problem with DVD playback with that machine again.

ibm5155 wrote:

The software that I'm running is InterVideo WinDVD 1.3.5c2
it's kinda of hard to find 🙁 ...
and if that's a super socket 7 system, maybe only using 64mb or 128mb of ram will speed things even more than 512mb (cacheable área, it depends of your chipset and cache)

If my research is correct, the ALi Aladdin V will cache up to 512 MB if you have 512 KB cache.

BSA Starfire, curious what your main use of this system is for? I don't hear of many people setting up a system based on the Cyrix MII.

feipoa wrote:

ibm5155 wrote:

The software that I'm running is InterVideo WinDVD 1.3.5c2
it's kinda of hard to find 🙁 ...
and if that's a super socket 7 system, maybe only using 64mb or 128mb of ram will speed things even more than 512mb (cacheable área, it depends of your chipset and cache)

If my research is correct, the ALi Aladdin V will cache up to 512 MB if you have 512 KB cache.

BSA Starfire, curious what your main use of this system is for? I don't hear of many people setting up a system based on the Cyrix MII.

Thanks for the replies everyone! So realistically I need a hardware DVD decoding card it seems.

In answer to feiopa's question, the system is an OEM Time computers system from late 1998/ early 1999.They were VERY common here in the UK at the Time with retails shops in most high streets. Apart from the upgraded memory and swapped out optical drive it is as originally shipped. I've always had a soft spot and interest in the Cyrix 6x86 cpu's along with the other more unusual chips of the period. Been playing through Sub Culture on it recently.I also own and use a DOS based system fitted with a IDT Winchip C6 200mhz(have also used AMD K6 166 & Cyrix 6x86 MX200 in that one too). Not being a QUAKE fan makes it easy to enjoy these non intel CPU's just fine, the slower FPU is no real hinderance & I just like the fact they are different.
All the best,
Chris

BSA Starfire wrote:

the slower FPU is no real hinderance & I just like the fact they are different.

If you really wanted to play in left field, try a RiSE MP6. They work in socket 7 motherboards. I have never run into anyone who had a used this CPU back in the day.

I have a system built around a Cyrix MII-433 (300 MHz) and will test software DVD decoding the next time I have it out.

If you don't want to use a hardware DVD decoder card (you only have one free PCI slot, and it's shared with the ISA slot) you could also try a Rage 128 video card instead of the Rage Pro. Of course you still need a player software that supports its iDCT. The link Kamerat posted is useful, though I suppose that newer versions of some player may include Rage 128 support when only Rage Pro support is mentioned on the list.
It looks as if your mainboard doesn't have AGP, though. Rage 128 is much more common a AGP, PCI cards are somewhat rare and more expensive, possibly more expensive than a hardware DVD decoder.

Yeah for some reason the realities of playing DVD on a MII didn't come to mind before. That will probably need a full decoder card. I'm not sure even a Rage 128 would be sufficient.

I have begun testing software DVD playback on my Cyrix MII, however I am having the most difficult time finding a freeware DVD MPEG-2 decoder (or WMP 6.4 codec), for WinNT4, W2K, or Win98SE. It as if computers before WinXP didn't exist. Could someone recommend a DVD deocder codec or DVD Player program (w/decoder) which will work with these operating systems? VLC 0.86f, which is the latest for NT4, and VLC 1.1.11, which is the latest for W2K, try to open the DVD disc, then crash. This makes me wonder if VLC requires an SSE-capable CPU.

I could not get Media Player Classic MPC Ver 6.4.9.1 to function in Windows 2000 for DVD playback. It reports, "Failed to query the needed interfaces for DVD playback". I tried a few suggestions found online, like regsvr32 qdvd.dll and to tick the MPEG-2 box in the options. Perhaps my Toshiba DVD-ROM drive is not supported in some way. I did download the trial version of PowerDVD version 3 trial, which ran fine in NT4. I played the movie Red Heat. It used from 86-100% CPU usage during playback. PowerDVD version 4 trial runs well in Windows 2000 with CPU usage at 100%. I did not hear any audio skips or see any jerky motion. It does seem that an MII at 300 MHz is on the edge of playability though.

Try the Ati DVD Player 3.2.0.1 which has hardware acceleration support for the Rage Pro. It ran well on P2 233 MHz in my DVD acceleration comparison. (Win 9x)
It is either on the Rage Pro driver CD: ftp://78.46.141.148/driver/ATI/cd_images/
or part of the ATI DVD Player package: ftp://78.46.141.148/driver/ATI/dvd/
It is the same package as used for the Rage128.

This is the exact K-Lite Codec Pack that I used on 98SE to do some DVD tests on a K6-3 and Pentium 3.
http://filehippo.com/download_klite_codec_pack/3194/

Elianda's ATI DVD Player could be less CPU intensive, however. I believe it is based on Cinemaster 99.

I also used a version of Cinemaster 99 found here:
http://www.cdrinfo.pl/download/1187044644

Thanks for all the help everyone, will try out both the ATi & Cinemaster 99 players today 😀 will report back with results.