when you say MP4 do you mean H.264 as the current standard in 2020. Or do you mean MP4 as in the many non standardized early implementations.

VLC works for this albeit slowly.

Old PCs do not have the processing power to decode modern video codecs in real time. This is probably only useful in a VM.

Warlord wrote on 2020-01-20, 18:48:

when you say MP4 do you mean H.264 as the current standard in 2020. Or do you mean MP4 as in the many non standardized early implementations.

mp4 is a container format, it can contain a mpeg2 or mpeg1 video stream for example, so yeah, codec would be more relevant ^^ but I assume that is what was meant.

imi wrote on 2020-01-20, 19:07:

Warlord wrote on 2020-01-20, 18:48:

when you say MP4 do you mean H.264 as the current standard in 2020. Or do you mean MP4 as in the many non standardized early implementations.

mp4 is a container format, it can contain a mpeg2 or mpeg1 video stream for example, so yeah, codec would be more relevant ^^ but I assume that is what was meant.

exactly my point, becasue mp4 as a container could always be played. AAC could always be played, but it was older version of AAC. Since there are many versions of AAC also.

Warlord wrote on 2020-01-20, 18:48:

when you say MP4 do you mean H.264 as the current standard in 2020. Or do you mean MP4 as in the many non standardized early implementations.

I believe the standard version, youtube videos in the MP4 format worked just fine 😀

keenmaster486 wrote on 2020-01-20, 18:51:

VLC works for this albeit slowly.

Old PCs do not have the processing power to decode modern video codecs in real time. This is probably only useful in a VM.

Are you sure? The player is by far the most lightweight I've ever seen! My Virtual Machine was ran on an Intel Core Duo e8300.

Software decoding, even in Windows 9X, would really boil down to compression formats and resolution. Ya know, assuming the basic 'Program worky in 9X at all' hurdle is passed.

When I was first playing with XBMC on a classic modified Xbox, 480p h.264 MKVs were 'mostly possible' with a few updates, this was using a glorified Celeron 733 with a faster FSB (The Xbox CPU was a mobile Intel CPU, with the L2 cache of a Celeron but the FSB of a Pentium) So a higher end Win9X machine should perform more or less as well as even am equivalent Win10 machine at the task of software decoding.

I remember playing divx around 2001 in a PII with 98se at decent speeds,

I think I loaded some h264son my P3 with 98se a few years back but it was very slow

well the Xbox with XBMC (Coppermine 733) was also pretty good for watching, 480p divx and such but not so much for h264

edit: I loaded an mpeg4 AVC video on my p3 750 with 9x and vlc, it's an old rip meant for PSP (364x272 res 700kb/s, audio aac 128kb/s), it runs at full speed but over 80% CPU usage, h264 would probably be a lot worse, but I'm sure a much better result is possible with the right player/codec

I did a bunch of video playback benchmarks a while ago. With an efficient software decoder, such as an older version of CoreAVC running through MPC-HC, a PIII-866 can do 852x480 res H.264 (main, L3.1) at around 70-90% CPU load.

A PIII-S @ 1628MHz can pull off 720p H.264 (high, L4.1) as well.

All of the results I recorded were from Win2000 to Win10. Can't remember if I tested anything under 9x.

when i get the time to test it, I'll give it a shot.

H264 on period correct hardware, is a lot different than running 98 on a VM on a core 2 duo.

A core 2 duo is already strong enough to play 1080p just because it runs on 98 doesnt mean that a computer that was meant to run 98 will play h264 above 480 without framedrop.

The ram size means lots less than the CPU.

The reason the AAC plugin was taken down was due to the patent holders wanting money. Giving the codec away for free became impractical and was one of the reasons behind TCPMP being transformed into the commercial product known as CorePlayer. Both the AAC codec and the H264 codec were available as separate products known as CoreAAC and CoreAVC.
CoreAVC was designed with underpowered hardware in mind, when used inside TCPMP/CorePlayer it can detect when the playback rate is dropping below realtime and dynamically disable deblocking. So the decoded pictures may not be 100% correct but it's preferable to dropping frames.

Does this marvelous player play streaming video (YouTube, Twitch.tv)? I am using VLC Player under Windows 98 for these purposes at this time, but I am somewhat annoyed by its voracity (Any version from 2.0.0 and higher to 2.2.8 inclusive, earlier ones play Twitch.TV smartly, but choppy. Apparently not optimized for receiving the stream in "chunks" (Twitch.TV is giving it now), while later versions do it right now, but the CPU eats very well). I am looking for a universal alternative for VLC. Less gluttonous. Thanks for any support.

^VLC.. Ugh, yeah. I'm using it too, since it available on Linux (on ARM, too). And because it can be used as a converter (though batch conversion still doesn't work for ~10 years).
I don't like it for watching DVDs (MPEG-2), though. Quality wasn't good compared to Power DVD XP or Power DVD v6 (last to run on 98SE ?) last time I checked :
More than often, I saw graphical glitches (pixelation, green blocks etc). And basic things like Inverse Discrete Cosine Transform and others seemed not to correctly working.
Also, I could see de-interlacing issues. Whereas Power DVD had little issues with fast moving scenes and interlacing, VLC was quite rudimentary, IMHO.
I guess it only does weaving or so it seems. Anyway, I'm getting off-topic. 😅 What I meant to say: Why does VLC get so hyped ?
From what I do remember, XMBC (?) and Winamp weren't glorified half as much.

DoZator wrote on 2020-01-21, 19:10:

Does this marvelous player play streaming video (YouTube, Twitch.tv)? I am using VLC Player under Windows 98 for these purposes at this time, but I am somewhat annoyed by its voracity (Any version from 2.0.0 and higher to 2.2.8 inclusive, earlier ones play Twitch.TV smartly, but choppy. Apparently not optimized for receiving the stream in "chunks" (Twitch.TV is giving it now), while later versions do it right now, but the CPU eats very well). I am looking for a universal alternative for VLC. Less gluttonous. Thanks for any support.

A bit late, but according to an MSFN post, yes. This player does work on youtube!

I downloaded the program on windows 98SE.
I started an mp4 video, but it doesn't play properly. The screen is black, and only audio is heard. Even with the classic mpeg format it gives the same problem and this MP format plays it quietly. I also installed the K-lite codec Pack.
I'm running it on an IBM 330, 160MB of ram, 200Mhz processor.
Solutions?

I am having the same issue as above on Windows 95, 512MB Ram, Pentium 3 866Mhz.