Is my computer too slow for playing 720p ?

[Hazizo]

First file (6112 kbps) starts lagging after few minutes of clean play. Second file (5060 Kbps) is lagging in certain parts of the movie, if it played previously for few minutes, but if i start the player and go straight to the problematic part, it goes through smoothly.

CPU usage goes up to 90%-100% when it lags.

Files trying to play

6.56 GB MKV
Video : 1280×696 | x264 | 6112 kbps
Audio : English | DTS 5.1 | 1536 kbps

6.55 MKV
Video # 0: AVC at 5060 Kbps
Aspect: 1280 x 536 (2,388) at 23.976 fps
Audio # 0: DTS at 1510 Kbps
Infos: 6 channels, 48.0 KHz

Software

CCCP + CORE AVC PRO 2.0.0.0
MPC-HC 1.3.1264.0

Or

VLC with "skip the loop filter for H.264 decoding" set to "all" (better results with the above)

Computer Details

Microsoft Windows XP Professional, Service Pack 3
Intel Pentium 4, 3000 MHz (15 x 200)
Asus P4P800 SE (5 PCI, 1 AGP, 1 WiFi, 4 DDR DIMM, Audio, Gigabit LAN)
512 MB PC3200 DDR SDRAM (2.5-3-3-8 @ 200 MHz)
NVIDIA GeForce FX 5700VE (256 MB)

What can be done?
Thanks in advance.

[redwudz]

Not really familiar with that particular video card, but I suspect a upgraded video card would give you the biggest improvement for the price. Your PC could also benefit from a bit more RAM, though that likely has little to do with your playback problem. I usually recommend 1GB RAM, even with XP. If you see a lot of hard drive activity, that may be the PC utilizing the hard drive if it runs short on RAM. Unfortunately, RAM is still a bit expensive at present, so I would probably just upgrade the video card for now.

It looks like you have a AGP card, so faster cards may be a problem. Others may be able to give you some better advice on a specific card that may help playback. If your playback software is configured properly, that's about all you can do. MPC-HC and VLC both should be able to handle HD MKVs. Hardware improvements would be the next step. 90% CPU is definitely a sign that you are lacking processing power with either the CPU or the GPU on the video card.

But I would probably also be saving up for a quad core CPU on a PCI-E MB if you really want the best performance for HD playback. Many of the newer Micro-ATX motherboards can handle HD MKVs with just their on-board video.

And welcome to our forums.

[jagabo]

Yes, your computer is too slow. Look for a graphics card with hardware h.264 decoding (starts at Nvidia 8000 series or ATI 2000 series) or upgrade to a dual core CPU.

[Soopafresh]

I don't know if they make AGP cards in the Nvdia 8000 series which means DXVA playback (which is so great at offloading the work to the graphics processor) might be out of the question. The P4P800 is a 7 year old motherboard. New PCs are cheap.

[oldfart13]

Not cheap enough for me. My units power up and the Bios says 2001 and 2002. They work great for everything I need them to do. A cheap MKV player like a modified XBOX (the old one) is about $20CAD used or a Curtis DVD 1102 Blu Ray player costs $100CAD on sale. Both are part of my playback equipment shelf....

[jagabo]

I don't know if they make AGP cards in the Nvdia 8000 series which means DXVA playback (which is so great at offloading the work to the graphics processor) might be out of the question.

There are lots of ATI AGP cards with h.264 hardware decoding.

[edDV]

If you don't want to upgrade the display card, you can try recoding the AVC to high average bit rate Mpeg2 or WMV-HD (~8000Kb/s). I recall being able to play 1280x720p with a P4 using those codecs.

[usually_quiet]

This one would be an example of an ATI AGP video card capable of playing back HD video: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125281

[dragonlady726]

I know this is an old thread but I'm reactivating it because the question here is uncannily similar to my situation.

I have basically the same setup as OP, same mobo, slightly faster P4 (3.2 GHz) 2 GB RAM and recently upgraded to the Gigabyte video card mentioned in this thread (got a big flatscreen and wanted the HDMI output). I'm running Win7 Ultimate 32-bit and using CCCP/MPC with default settings.

My problem? I still have lagging when I try to play 720p avis... I'm considering upping to 4GB RAM, but I'm not sure if that is going to do the trick. What am I missing? Is there anything else I can tweak?

[jman98]

I know this is an old thread but I'm reactivating it because the question here is uncannily similar to my situation.

I have basically the same setup as OP, same mobo, slightly faster P4 (3.2 GHz) 2 GB RAM and recently upgraded to the Gigabyte video card mentioned in this thread (got a big flatscreen and wanted the HDMI output). I'm running Win7 Ultimate 32-bit and using CCCP/MPC with default settings.

My problem? I still have lagging when I try to play 720p avis... I'm considering upping to 4GB RAM, but I'm not sure if that is going to do the trick. What am I missing? Is there anything else I can tweak?

We REALLY REALLY REALLY don't like it when people reactivate old threads. It's not in our official rules, but it's how things are around here. Every board is different, but around here we'd really prefer you start a new post and just leave the old threads alone.

You really should have enough of CPU and memory for 720 AVI playback. I have a PC with an AMD 3200+ CPU in it. That CPU is roughly equivalent to yours, but perhaps somewhat less powerful. I could play even 720p H.264 fine in it, but anything above that with H.264 and I had too many problems to play it. Try using VLC to play your files and you will probably find that they work. Other players, such as WMP, will give poorer performance. VLC often works on underpowered systems like yours when other players fail.

[dragonlady726]

Thanks for the tip on VLC and sorry for breaking the rules. If I have other problems I'll be sure to start a new thread. Thanks again.

[dragonkeeper]

P4 (3.2 GHz) 2 GB RAM and Gigabyte video card mentioned in this thread. I'm running Win7 Ultimate 32-bit and using CCCP/MPC with default settings.

I'm considering upping to 4GB RAM, but I'm not sure if that is going to do the trick. What am I missing? Is there anything else I can tweak?

I wouldn't run CCCP or any other codec pack. Codec packs are the devils playground, gremlins live there and they often cause things to go fubar with out warning. At most i would only install FFDShow and enable DXVA. DXVA will off load the work to your GPU instead of your CPU.

You should be fine on RAM and depending on Your MB and Bios buying 4 GB could be a waste of money. Last that i reseached it a 32-bit os had a problem addressing 4GB of RAM. A lot of motherboards would report back just over 3 GB when 4GB of RAM was installed.

[jman98]

To follow up on dragonkeeper's post, VLC comes with any codecs it needs actually built into the player itself, so it doesn't install anything in your PC. Various codec packs can cause problems, which is why I suggested VLC. If it can't play your AVI files, something is seriously wrong with your PC. It should work because it will ignore any codecs you have installed or not have problems because you didn't install ones you need.

I don't know if DXVA is supported on your video card or not, but typically on systems as old as yours, you can't get a video card for them that supports it because as far as I know those video cards all need PCI-E slots to install in and older systems just don't have them.

[jagabo]

You really should have enough of CPU and memory for 720 AVI playback.

It depends on the frame rate. 720p60 will probably have problems. 720p30 and 720p24 will probably play OK.