Slow laptop?

Obin Olson · August 28th, 2006, 06:31 PM

SiSoftware Sandra

Benchmark Results
Drive Index : 34 MB/s
Results Interpretation : Higher index values are better.
Random Access Time : 20 ms
Results Interpretation : Lower index values are better.

Performance Test Status
Run ID : OBINLAPTOP on Monday, August 28, 2006 at 8:30:59 PM
Processor Affinity : No
System Timer : 3.6MHz
Use Overlapped I/O : Yes
IO Queue Depth : 4 request(s)
Block Size : 1MB

Volume Information
Capacity : 73GB

Benchmark Breakdown
Speed at position 0% : 30MB/s (88%)
Speed at position 3% : 34MB/s (100%)
Speed at position 6% : 31MB/s (90%)
Speed at position 10% : 31MB/s (91%)
Speed at position 13% : 33MB/s (97%)
Speed at position 16% : 31MB/s (90%)
Speed at position 20% : 30MB/s (89%)
Speed at position 23% : 31MB/s (90%)
Speed at position 26% : 30MB/s (89%)
Speed at position 30% : 29MB/s (86%)
Speed at position 33% : 31MB/s (91%)
Speed at position 36% : 27MB/s (80%)
Speed at position 40% : 28MB/s (83%)
Speed at position 43% : 30MB/s (87%)
Speed at position 46% : 27MB/s (79%)
Speed at position 50% : 26MB/s (77%)
Speed at position 53% : 28MB/s (82%)
Speed at position 56% : 26MB/s (75%)
Speed at position 60% : 24MB/s (72%)
Speed at position 63% : 24MB/s (71%)
Speed at position 66% : 24MB/s (72%)
Speed at position 70% : 25MB/s (75%)
Speed at position 73% : 25MB/s (72%)
Speed at position 76% : 23MB/s (68%)
Speed at position 80% : 22MB/s (64%)
Speed at position 83% : 22MB/s (65%)
Speed at position 86% : 21MB/s (62%)
Speed at position 90% : 19MB/s (55%)
Speed at position 93% : 19MB/s (57%)
Speed at position 96% : 18MB/s (52%)
Speed at position 100% : 16MB/s (49%)
Random Access Time : 20 ms (estimated)
Full Stroke Access Time : 19 ms (estimated)

Performance Tips
Notice 5008 : To change benchmarks, click Options.
Notice 5004 : Synthetic benchmark. May not tally with 'real-life' performance.
Notice 5006 : Only compare the results with ones obtained using the same version!
Tip 2 : Double-click tip or press Enter while a tip is selected for more information about the tip.

Obin Olson · August 28th, 2006, 06:34 PM

SiSoftware Sandra

Benchmark Results
Integer x8 iSSE2 : 26924 it/s
Float x4 iSSE2 : 36679 it/s
Results Interpretation : Higher index values are better.

Performance Test Status
Run ID : OBINLAPTOP on Monday, August 28, 2006 at 8:34:17 PM
NUMA Support : No
SMP Test : No
Total Test Threads : 2
Multi-Core Test : Yes
Cores per Processor : 2
SMT Test : No
Dynamic MP/MT Load Balance : No
Processor Affinity : P0C0T0 P0C1T0
System Timer : 3.6MHz
Rendered Image Size : 640x480

Processor
Model : Genuine Intel(R) CPU T2250 @ 1.73GHz
Speed : 1.73GHz
Performance Rating : PR5878 (estimated)
Cores per Processor : 2 Unit(s)
Type : Mobile, Dual-Core
L2 On-board Cache : 2MB ECC Synchronous, ATC, 8-way set, 64 byte line size, 2 threads sharing

Features
(W)MMX Technology : Yes
SSE Technology : Yes
SSE2 Technology : Yes
SSE3 Technology : Yes
SSE4 Technology : No
EMMX - Extended MMX Technology : No
3DNow! Technology : No
Extended 3DNow! Technology : No
HTT - Hyper-Threading Technology : No

Performance Tips
Notice 5008 : To change benchmarks, click Options.
Notice 5004 : Synthetic benchmark. May not tally with 'real-life' performance.
Notice 5006 : Only compare the results with ones obtained using the same version!
Warning 5009 : Mobile processors yield lower indexes in power management modes. Check power settings if index is low.
Tip 2 : Double-click tip or press Enter while a tip is selected for more information about the tip.

David Newman · August 28th, 2006, 06:46 PM

TMI. Disk looks fine though. Sounds Premiere is now working fine anyway. If MediaPlayer is glitching it might be because you didn't go for the graphics module. Nothing more I can add. I'm now hitting the road.

Richard Leadbetter · August 29th, 2006, 03:27 AM

Obin,

I used to have that exact same laptop with the T2400 1.83GHz Core Duo and X1400 Radeon GPU. My CineForm 720p/59.94fps AVI files would playback between 50 and 55fps.

Therefore this notebook can definitely do what you want it to do, provided the spec is right...

Questions/Notes/Observations/Suggestions:

1. Do you have a dedicated graphics card installed or the Intel integrated solution? The latter is not good news for CineForm performance.
2. Your CPU is the slower 533MHz FSB version. CineForm performance thrives on a faster FSB, so this will definitely have an effect. However, I still see no reason why you should not be able to run at full speed/ 24fps.
3. Download Graphedit from here. Open it and drag and drop your CFHD AVI onto the graphedit window. Which CineForm decoder module is being used to run the footage? CineForm Decoder, Decoder-2? Which?

This should give us a much better idea of what's going on.

Obin Olson · August 29th, 2006, 07:26 AM

HA, This is news. It does not drop any frames on playback in the graphedit proggy, read's 23.976 fps playback and 0 dropped.....

using decoder 2

Obin Olson · August 29th, 2006, 07:30 AM

I am using windows media player 11 could that be a problem?

Obin Olson · August 29th, 2006, 07:35 AM

Intel(R) Graphics Media Accelerator Driver for Mobile Report

Report Date: 08/29/2006
Report Time[hr:mm:ss]: 09:34:07
Driver Version: 6.14.10.4446
Operating System: Windows XP* Professional, Service Pack 2 (5.1.2600)
Default Language: English
DirectX* Version: 9.0
Physical Memory: 1270 MB
Minimum Graphics Memory: 8 MB
Maximum Graphics Memory: 224 MB
Graphics Memory in Use: 15 MB
Processor: x86 family 6 Model 14 Stepping 8
Processor Speed: 1729 MHZ
Vendor ID: 8086
Device ID: 27A2
Device Revision: 03

* Accelerator Information *

Accelerator in Use: Mobile Intel(R) 945GM Express Chipset Family
Video BIOS: 1264
Current Graphics Mode: 1920 by 1200 True Color (60 Hz)

* Devices Connected to the Graphics Accelerator *

Active Notebook Displays: 1

* Notebook *

Monitor Name: Plug and Play Monitor
Display Type: Digital
Gamma Value: 3.54
DDC2 Protocol: Supported
Maximum Image Size: Horizontal: Not Available
Vertical: Not Available
Monitor Supported Modes:
640 by 480 (60 Hz)
800 by 600 (60 Hz)
1024 by 768 (60 Hz)
1920 by 1200 (60 Hz)
Display Power Management Support:
Standby Mode: Supported
Suspend Mode: Supported
Active Off Mode: Supported

* SDVO Encoder Report *

** Encoder 1 **
Vendor ID: Silicon Image
Device ID: 170
Device Revision: 3
Major Version: 1
Minor Version: 1

* Other names and brands are the property of their respective owners.

Richard Leadbetter · August 29th, 2006, 08:41 AM

Well the jury's out on the Intel accelerator. It's not a dedicated graphics chip, and integrated solutions on desktop boards are notoriously poor for playing back CineForm content.

However, a colleague of mine has one of the dinky XPS M1210s with a T7400 Core 2 Duo/Merom and the same graphics processor as you and he's able to play some of my 720p/60 clips without sound and video falling out of sync. I almost fell out of my chair when I heard that result.

Your CPU, even with the lower FSB, should easily be able to cope with 24fps content and if you are running Decoder-2, that means playback is using both cores.

As you suspect, this does tend to suggest it's a problem with Media Player 11, especially if GraphEdit can playback your clips at full speed.

Give Media Player Classic a go and see how you get on. You'll want the second file down, the one with almost a million downloads.

EDIT: One thing I am noticing with really challenging content is that GraphEdit runs footage extremely cleanly whereas Media Player and even Media Player Classic have some performance issues.

Obin Olson · August 29th, 2006, 11:18 AM

It does a bit better then windows media player, still it seems to skip a frame here and there...what the heck is going on?

I mean this is 24fps 720p..this is EASY stuff to play, or sure should be!

WHen I play it more then once it seems to work better. but still dropping frames!

Obin Olson · August 29th, 2006, 11:22 AM

70-80% cpu usage while playing

Audio: PCM 48000Hz stereo 1536Kbps [output]
Video: CFHD 1280x720 23.98fps 58581Kbps [Video 0]
Audio: PCM 48000Hz stereo 1536Kbps [Audio 1]

above taken from the media player properties

Obin Olson · August 29th, 2006, 11:34 AM

here is the weird part. the new player does not show dropped frames when I turn Stats on under "view", but I can see missing frames as it plays, it's not smooth, I can see missing frames...what the heck?

David Newman · August 29th, 2006, 11:55 AM

You probable dealing with the integrated graphics no being able to refresh the display. When you use integrated graphics, HD bandwidth suck cycles away for the rest of the computer. Can you return the laptop?, I did the first I accidental purchased a laptop without separate graphics memory.

Obin Olson · August 29th, 2006, 12:56 PM

aaa haaaa! that sounds like it!! so I will send it back and get an Invida card?

Obin Olson · August 29th, 2006, 01:15 PM

would an ATI card be ok? it's $90 instead of $300 extra for the Nvidia!!

Richard Leadbetter · August 29th, 2006, 01:16 PM

Obin,

The 7900GS you can specify for the Dell is an excellent graphics card, one of the most powerful money can buy. However, as I said, even the base dedicated graphics card - the Radeon X1400 - is perfectly adequate for CineForm playback as I do not believe any of the 3D rendering technology is being used.

Indeed, my desktop machine is using a 128mb Radeon X300SE which I bought from eBay for £15.

If you're re-speccing your machine, may I suggest a T7200 Core 2 Duo? The leap from Core Duo to Core 2 Duo is absolutely immense with CineForm technology.

Richard

August 28th, 2006, 06:46 PM	#18
David Newman CTO, CineForm Inc. Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Cardiff-by-the-Sea, California Posts: 8,095	TMI. Disk looks fine though. Sounds Premiere is now working fine anyway. If MediaPlayer is glitching it might be because you didn't go for the graphics module. Nothing more I can add. I'm now hitting the road. __________________ David Newman -- web: www.gopro.com blog: cineform.blogspot.com -- twitter: twitter.com/David_Newman

August 29th, 2006, 03:27 AM	#19
Richard Leadbetter Major Player Join Date: Dec 2005 Posts: 323	Obin, I used to have that exact same laptop with the T2400 1.83GHz Core Duo and X1400 Radeon GPU. My CineForm 720p/59.94fps AVI files would playback between 50 and 55fps. Therefore this notebook can definitely do what you want it to do, provided the spec is right... Questions/Notes/Observations/Suggestions: 1. Do you have a dedicated graphics card installed or the Intel integrated solution? The latter is not good news for CineForm performance. 2. Your CPU is the slower 533MHz FSB version. CineForm performance thrives on a faster FSB, so this will definitely have an effect. However, I still see no reason why you should not be able to run at full speed/ 24fps. 3. Download Graphedit from here. Open it and drag and drop your CFHD AVI onto the graphedit window. Which CineForm decoder module is being used to run the footage? CineForm Decoder, Decoder-2? Which? This should give us a much better idea of what's going on. __________________ Company Website: Digital Foundry Ltd Video Games HD Blog: Digital Foundry@Eurogamer

August 29th, 2006, 08:41 AM	#23
Richard Leadbetter Major Player Join Date: Dec 2005 Posts: 323	Well the jury's out on the Intel accelerator. It's not a dedicated graphics chip, and integrated solutions on desktop boards are notoriously poor for playing back CineForm content. However, a colleague of mine has one of the dinky XPS M1210s with a T7400 Core 2 Duo/Merom and the same graphics processor as you and he's able to play some of my 720p/60 clips without sound and video falling out of sync. I almost fell out of my chair when I heard that result. Your CPU, even with the lower FSB, should easily be able to cope with 24fps content and if you are running Decoder-2, that means playback is using both cores. As you suspect, this does tend to suggest it's a problem with Media Player 11, especially if GraphEdit can playback your clips at full speed. Give Media Player Classic a go and see how you get on. You'll want the second file down, the one with almost a million downloads. EDIT: One thing I am noticing with really challenging content is that GraphEdit runs footage extremely cleanly whereas Media Player and even Media Player Classic have some performance issues. Last edited by Richard Leadbetter; August 29th, 2006 at 10:34 AM.

August 29th, 2006, 11:55 AM	#27
David Newman CTO, CineForm Inc. Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Cardiff-by-the-Sea, California Posts: 8,095	You probable dealing with the integrated graphics no being able to refresh the display. When you use integrated graphics, HD bandwidth suck cycles away for the rest of the computer. Can you return the laptop?, I did the first I accidental purchased a laptop without separate graphics memory. __________________ David Newman -- web: www.gopro.com blog: cineform.blogspot.com -- twitter: twitter.com/David_Newman

August 28th, 2006, 06:31 PM	#16
Obin Olson Trustee Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Wilmington NC Posts: 1,414	SiSoftware Sandra Benchmark Results Drive Index : 34 MB/s Results Interpretation : Higher index values are better. Random Access Time : 20 ms Results Interpretation : Lower index values are better. Performance Test Status Run ID : OBINLAPTOP on Monday, August 28, 2006 at 8:30:59 PM Processor Affinity : No System Timer : 3.6MHz Use Overlapped I/O : Yes IO Queue Depth : 4 request(s) Block Size : 1MB Volume Information Capacity : 73GB Benchmark Breakdown Speed at position 0% : 30MB/s (88%) Speed at position 3% : 34MB/s (100%) Speed at position 6% : 31MB/s (90%) Speed at position 10% : 31MB/s (91%) Speed at position 13% : 33MB/s (97%) Speed at position 16% : 31MB/s (90%) Speed at position 20% : 30MB/s (89%) Speed at position 23% : 31MB/s (90%) Speed at position 26% : 30MB/s (89%) Speed at position 30% : 29MB/s (86%) Speed at position 33% : 31MB/s (91%) Speed at position 36% : 27MB/s (80%) Speed at position 40% : 28MB/s (83%) Speed at position 43% : 30MB/s (87%) Speed at position 46% : 27MB/s (79%) Speed at position 50% : 26MB/s (77%) Speed at position 53% : 28MB/s (82%) Speed at position 56% : 26MB/s (75%) Speed at position 60% : 24MB/s (72%) Speed at position 63% : 24MB/s (71%) Speed at position 66% : 24MB/s (72%) Speed at position 70% : 25MB/s (75%) Speed at position 73% : 25MB/s (72%) Speed at position 76% : 23MB/s (68%) Speed at position 80% : 22MB/s (64%) Speed at position 83% : 22MB/s (65%) Speed at position 86% : 21MB/s (62%) Speed at position 90% : 19MB/s (55%) Speed at position 93% : 19MB/s (57%) Speed at position 96% : 18MB/s (52%) Speed at position 100% : 16MB/s (49%) Random Access Time : 20 ms (estimated) Full Stroke Access Time : 19 ms (estimated) Performance Tips Notice 5008 : To change benchmarks, click Options. Notice 5004 : Synthetic benchmark. May not tally with 'real-life' performance. Notice 5006 : Only compare the results with ones obtained using the same version! Tip 2 : Double-click tip or press Enter while a tip is selected for more information about the tip.

August 28th, 2006, 06:34 PM	#17
Obin Olson Trustee Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Wilmington NC Posts: 1,414	SiSoftware Sandra Benchmark Results Integer x8 iSSE2 : 26924 it/s Float x4 iSSE2 : 36679 it/s Results Interpretation : Higher index values are better. Performance Test Status Run ID : OBINLAPTOP on Monday, August 28, 2006 at 8:34:17 PM NUMA Support : No SMP Test : No Total Test Threads : 2 Multi-Core Test : Yes Cores per Processor : 2 SMT Test : No Dynamic MP/MT Load Balance : No Processor Affinity : P0C0T0 P0C1T0 System Timer : 3.6MHz Rendered Image Size : 640x480 Processor Model : Genuine Intel(R) CPU T2250 @ 1.73GHz Speed : 1.73GHz Performance Rating : PR5878 (estimated) Cores per Processor : 2 Unit(s) Type : Mobile, Dual-Core L2 On-board Cache : 2MB ECC Synchronous, ATC, 8-way set, 64 byte line size, 2 threads sharing Features (W)MMX Technology : Yes SSE Technology : Yes SSE2 Technology : Yes SSE3 Technology : Yes SSE4 Technology : No EMMX - Extended MMX Technology : No 3DNow! Technology : No Extended 3DNow! Technology : No HTT - Hyper-Threading Technology : No Performance Tips Notice 5008 : To change benchmarks, click Options. Notice 5004 : Synthetic benchmark. May not tally with 'real-life' performance. Notice 5006 : Only compare the results with ones obtained using the same version! Warning 5009 : Mobile processors yield lower indexes in power management modes. Check power settings if index is low. Tip 2 : Double-click tip or press Enter while a tip is selected for more information about the tip.

August 29th, 2006, 07:26 AM	#20
Obin Olson Trustee Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Wilmington NC Posts: 1,414	HA, This is news. It does not drop any frames on playback in the graphedit proggy, read's 23.976 fps playback and 0 dropped..... using decoder 2

August 29th, 2006, 07:30 AM	#21
Obin Olson Trustee Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Wilmington NC Posts: 1,414	I am using windows media player 11 could that be a problem?

August 29th, 2006, 07:35 AM	#22
Obin Olson Trustee Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Wilmington NC Posts: 1,414	Intel(R) Graphics Media Accelerator Driver for Mobile Report Report Date: 08/29/2006 Report Time[hr:mm:ss]: 09:34:07 Driver Version: 6.14.10.4446 Operating System: Windows XP* Professional, Service Pack 2 (5.1.2600) Default Language: English DirectX* Version: 9.0 Physical Memory: 1270 MB Minimum Graphics Memory: 8 MB Maximum Graphics Memory: 224 MB Graphics Memory in Use: 15 MB Processor: x86 family 6 Model 14 Stepping 8 Processor Speed: 1729 MHZ Vendor ID: 8086 Device ID: 27A2 Device Revision: 03 * Accelerator Information * Accelerator in Use: Mobile Intel(R) 945GM Express Chipset Family Video BIOS: 1264 Current Graphics Mode: 1920 by 1200 True Color (60 Hz) * Devices Connected to the Graphics Accelerator * Active Notebook Displays: 1 * Notebook * Monitor Name: Plug and Play Monitor Display Type: Digital Gamma Value: 3.54 DDC2 Protocol: Supported Maximum Image Size: Horizontal: Not Available Vertical: Not Available Monitor Supported Modes: 640 by 480 (60 Hz) 800 by 600 (60 Hz) 1024 by 768 (60 Hz) 1920 by 1200 (60 Hz) Display Power Management Support: Standby Mode: Supported Suspend Mode: Supported Active Off Mode: Supported * SDVO Encoder Report * Encoder 1 Vendor ID: Silicon Image Device ID: 170 Device Revision: 3 Major Version: 1 Minor Version: 1 * Other names and brands are the property of their respective owners.

August 29th, 2006, 11:18 AM	#24
Obin Olson Trustee Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Wilmington NC Posts: 1,414	It does a bit better then windows media player, still it seems to skip a frame here and there...what the heck is going on? I mean this is 24fps 720p..this is EASY stuff to play, or sure should be! WHen I play it more then once it seems to work better. but still dropping frames!

August 29th, 2006, 11:22 AM	#25
Obin Olson Trustee Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Wilmington NC Posts: 1,414	70-80% cpu usage while playing Audio: PCM 48000Hz stereo 1536Kbps [output] Video: CFHD 1280x720 23.98fps 58581Kbps [Video 0] Audio: PCM 48000Hz stereo 1536Kbps [Audio 1] above taken from the media player properties

August 29th, 2006, 11:34 AM	#26
Obin Olson Trustee Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Wilmington NC Posts: 1,414	here is the weird part. the new player does not show dropped frames when I turn Stats on under "view", but I can see missing frames as it plays, it's not smooth, I can see missing frames...what the heck?

August 29th, 2006, 12:56 PM	#28
Obin Olson Trustee Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Wilmington NC Posts: 1,414	aaa haaaa! that sounds like it!! so I will send it back and get an Invida card?

August 29th, 2006, 01:15 PM	#29
Obin Olson Trustee Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Wilmington NC Posts: 1,414	would an ATI card be ok? it's $90 instead of $300 extra for the Nvidia!!

August 29th, 2006, 01:16 PM	#30
Richard Leadbetter Major Player Join Date: Dec 2005 Posts: 323	Obin, The 7900GS you can specify for the Dell is an excellent graphics card, one of the most powerful money can buy. However, as I said, even the base dedicated graphics card - the Radeon X1400 - is perfectly adequate for CineForm playback as I do not believe any of the 3D rendering technology is being used. Indeed, my desktop machine is using a 128mb Radeon X300SE which I bought from eBay for £15. If you're re-speccing your machine, may I suggest a T7200 Core 2 Duo? The leap from Core Duo to Core 2 Duo is absolutely immense with CineForm technology. Richard