As the title says, my Macbook Pro cannot handle the video files coming off of my Canon T3i. It's ridiculous! they stutter and hardly play at all, whether in quicktime or VLC. I just upgraded from Snow Leopard to Mavericks to try to fix this, but it is not even one iota better. My girlfriends Dell can handle these files for crying out loud, can anyone tell me what's going on? Working with video is very important for me
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2.4ghz MBP cannot handle 1080p0 .MOV files
- Thread starter hirschab
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You might want to see about getting this thread moved to the video section as there are lots of folks who work in the area and have a lot more experience with what you are asking.
I do not have an answer, just a suggestion on how to get you an answer.
I do not have an answer, just a suggestion on how to get you an answer.
I assume yours is the mid-2010 2.4GHz C2D 13" MBP with the NVIDIA 320M card. The C2D just won't cut it anymore. Neither will the GPU.
That CPU and GPU is more then enough to handle 1080p video. I can run 1080p on my C2D without an issue.
I have this exact machine, with Mavericks. 1080P MOV from a 7D plays perfectly, even presented directly from Lightroom. Anything dual core can handle HD, theres something else going on. Load up Activity Monitor and see if it shows you the bottle neck.
I agree with the other posters - your hardware should be sufficient - there is probably something wrong with your software or you are running additional processes.
fwiw, I am running on a 2.53GHz 2009 13" mbp without issues, but I did used to run into stuttering when I tried to stream on a congested network...
fwiw, I am running on a 2.53GHz 2009 13" mbp without issues, but I did used to run into stuttering when I tried to stream on a congested network...
It's not a 2010 MBP, few years before that actually. It has the Geforce 8600M GT 256 MB, 2gb of ram, 2.4ghz. Is this seriously not powerful enough?
One thing I should mention, don't know if this is it or not - I am running off an external monitor, and it is mirrored. I didn't know how to make my external the primary and just not use the laptop monitor at all. The backlight died on my screen so I've been using an external monitor since. My only though after upgrading to Mavericks was that possibly this was creating extra strain on the system.
One thing I should mention, don't know if this is it or not - I am running off an external monitor, and it is mirrored. I didn't know how to make my external the primary and just not use the laptop monitor at all. The backlight died on my screen so I've been using an external monitor since. My only though after upgrading to Mavericks was that possibly this was creating extra strain on the system.
Hey now...
I'd suggest bumping the ram up as high as it can go. That should help with most things, but it still might not cut it. Also, your GPU is likely one of nVidias bad set that are highly prone to failure. I might not want to push it that hard.
But yeah, your specs would barely cut it, sorry man.
That macbook pro is very capable. Even my 2.26GHz macbook with the 9400m is capable of viewing those vids.
As for the OP, it could be your vid card. like Astroboy said, you probably have a bad one.
Agree with dylin that you should be able to play 1080p. How is the battery?
For comparison, this is what a Geekbench run would look like for a 2007 model 2.4GHz C2D MBP with no battery:
http://browser.primatelabs.com/geekbench2/1875106
For comparison, this is what a Geekbench run would look like for a 2007 model 2.4GHz C2D MBP with no battery:
http://browser.primatelabs.com/geekbench2/1875106
Ah, well the battery is dead, so I only use direct power. It's more of a desktop computer at the moment. And, should have mentioned this, it used to run 1080p videos just fine. Then it slowly started getting... ********. iMovie started to work less and less well, and even youtube got worse. I can't pin it down to any one event.
I'll buy some ram and give that a go I suppose. I have a feeling it wont solve the issue.
I'll buy some ram and give that a go I suppose. I have a feeling it wont solve the issue.
Well, there's your problem right there! Your machine is capable of much more than you're currently experiencing. You're currently in the performance range of a high end G4 or low end G5. Either, of course, would struggle playing 1080p. More RAM or SSD will not help.
Edit: Maybe do a quick Geekbench run to verify. If your score looks like the one posted above, a working battery would probably be very helpful.
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Hmmm. T3i? That's all h.264, right?
For now, try this in VLC:
In VLC preferences, click on "Input & Codecs" at the top. Near the bottom of the window, look for "Skip the loop filter for H.264 decoding" and set the pull-down menu to "All". Then click "save". Then close & relaunch VLC. Any difference?
For now, try this in VLC:
In VLC preferences, click on "Input & Codecs" at the top. Near the bottom of the window, look for "Skip the loop filter for H.264 decoding" and set the pull-down menu to "All". Then click "save". Then close & relaunch VLC. Any difference?
Well, its an early 2008 machine - it makes it 6 years old now. There is a good chance that the hardware has started failing. At this point, I would recommend agains any upgrades - investing money and time in such an old machine is a waste of resources. If money is an issue, get a used 2011 or later MacBook Air or something like that - they can be had for a reasonable price and offer a very healthy performance boost over your machine.
This is the post that makes most sense to me.
Like you wrote yourself: It used to play 1080p. Then it started to work less and less.
Your macbook is getting old.
Theoreticaly your hardware should suffice, despite what some of the "experts" are saying.
I was able to play 1080p on single cores with 512mb / 256mb ram and gpu not worth mentioning without a problem.
Computers get old.
I would not upgrade the ram or put an ssd in.
None of these two upgrades should have anything to do with playing videos.
You posed this like a yes / no question: is the hardware good enough. And we've all answered one or the other. But the first step in troubleshooting is A / B: figuring if the problem is hardware or software.
Plug in an external drive, build an OS from scratch, and run the test again. If it works, the issue is what's on the internal drive (software), not what's around it.
I second that. Its good troubleshooting advice.
Its still very likely that your computer is failong because its getting old.
Geekbench would be another good troubleshooting step in this case. And it only takes a couple of minutes. Let's see how your CPU is performing. Running without a battery (or with a bad battery) will drop your CPU significantly (not sure on this model, either 50% of rated speed or a flat 1GHz, but either case could easily account for what you describe). It's designed to work this way. It's normal. Otherwise it would be unstable with a bad battery (the battery acts as a buffer when the charger cannot meet a sudden spike in power requirements, so the entire system is throttled down if no battery is detected).
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That laptop should handle 1080p easily. Even my iPad 3 and iPhone 5s runs 1080p without a problem.
What could be a problem as well is that the internal hard drive could be dying (6 years is a long time) and can't handle the I/O operations to display the video. Apart from that you have a laptop with a known defective GPU so that could be a factor as well.
I had an 2008 iMac that was slowed down to the point that it was unusable opening Safari would take a good minute. Playing videos was impossible. The only way I got it back to life was by upgrading the HDD to an SSD and adding the maximum allowable RAM (6GB). That made a night and day difference.
First try to see if it is Software related (bloatware and the like) a clean install would give you a good indication. However if it is hardware related in all honesty I think it would be cheaper and wiser to sell it and buying a refurbished model if you are strapped for cash, then trying to find out the cause of the problem. There are a number of factors that can increase the costs to at least half a 2nd hand laptop.
I had an 2008 iMac that was slowed down to the point that it was unusable opening Safari would take a good minute. Playing videos was impossible. The only way I got it back to life was by upgrading the HDD to an SSD and adding the maximum allowable RAM (6GB). That made a night and day difference.
First try to see if it is Software related (bloatware and the like) a clean install would give you a good indication. However if it is hardware related in all honesty I think it would be cheaper and wiser to sell it and buying a refurbished model if you are strapped for cash, then trying to find out the cause of the problem. There are a number of factors that can increase the costs to at least half a 2nd hand laptop.
Did you do a clean install? If so, try install Windows 8.1.
If it is still bad with Windows, then
1. Convert your 1080p movie in an other format.
Or
2. Buy a new computer
