Apple Enabled GPU Hardware Decoding of h.264 on New MacBooks, Pros and Airs?

[Wolfpup]

Who would rate this news negatively? I mean it's bad it wasn't supported before I guess, but...

This is really good news! Particularly since Apple's just using H.264 anymore for video (which IMO is a great move, since relatively speaking it's non-proprietary, at least compared to Windows Media or old Apple formats). Plus of course WHEN THEY FINALLY SUPPORT BLU RAY...

 

[wizard]

Not going to let myself get excited.

Hi guys;

Frankly it would be nice to see my 2008 MBP supported with video acceleration but I'm not going to loose sleep over it. Pertly because I didn't buy the machine soley as a video machine and it does work as is. In any event sure it would be nice but frankly I'd like to see them put a lot of work into other software for the next update. Everything from Dictionary to XCode could use a little work.

Also for all those whining about video support in older cards do realize that there are various levels of help that a video card can offer ip to a video decoder. More importantly there are various levels related to the quality of results returned. Part of the reason for Apple being slow to switch to GPU acceleration may revolve around the fact that the have more control over the end results by riling their own. As GPUs become more programmable this becomes less of an issue. I'd really be surprised if Apple where to bother supporting some of the older GPUs and their video acceleration capabilities at all.

In any event I'm really impressed with both the new Mb and the MBP. I know they have only been out a few days now but I think they are the most underated product Apple has every deliviered. I really see Apple having a hard time keeping up with demand once words start to circulate. It's been a long time since I've been so impressed by an Apple product.

On the MBP it looks like we could have one GPU ruining CUDA code and another handling video work all at the same time. That can't happen now apparently but might be a system update away. MBP could end up being very game changing in the portables market. Especially if they can get SLI to work at a reasonable power level.

Dave

 

[Rorikynn]

I wonder why nobody has jumped onto NVIDIA CUDA and built a decoder and encoder for OS X.

I am pretty sure we will se stuff like that on 10.6, but based OpenCL. With NVidia, ATI and Intel chips used on Macs and Larrabee in foreseeable future it would not be a wise decision to invest too much in a proprietary technology like CUDA.

...and it's hard.

 

[huntaaar]

So can I ask.... If I run Vista on my mbp 2.4 8600 will it play HD video better than when runnng L?

 

[rrijkers]

I've put the new drivers and frameworks in my 10.5.5 and can't really say I get a better performance...

 

[kamm]

In Windows the decoding is off-loaded to your video card, while in OS X (well until we either get the special 10.5.5 or the next 10.6) it's done by the CPU.

And it's exactly why I say OS X is STILL painfully behind even Windows XP in a lot of ways.
Here I hope Snow Leopard will be a kickass new version, bringing lightning-fast operation and all the missing features: full hw-acceleration, DFS support, built-in Cedega/Cider for games etc.

Actually it depends on what you're looking at. In Task Manager, the general number is the total usage yes, but in the processes, it's per core, so you can have 8 threads at 100% on the processes page and that means 800% in OS X.

Use sudo top so that you can get an accurate number for your playback

When you're in Activity Monitor the number is only the percentage of the user space resources, right? Otherwise it wouldn't add up...

 

[VoR]

The drivers in windows might be better than osx, but they're still awful

Who uses their gpu to decode video anyway? I don't want to be forced into using specific (paid for) software and hardware combos to save cpu usage. I can't stand win/powerdvd, I don't use qt, all the video players I use are based on ffmpeg. Decode performance often increases in big jumps, sliced based decoding and being able to use more than one cpu was a recentish one.

 

[Wolfpup]

The drivers in windows might be better than osx, but they're still awful

Who uses their gpu to decode video anyway?

Everyone? That's been standard for YEARS. Sure when some new format comes out it may take a while for the software/drivers to catch up, but then it's just normal.

 

[kamm]

The drivers in windows might be better than osx, but they're still awful

Who uses their gpu to decode video anyway?

Ummm... everyone, you know... more shocking news for you: did you know that even encoding is hardware-accelerated with newer cards in Windows?

I don't want to be forced into using specific (paid for) software and hardware combos to save cpu usage.

WTH are you talking about? It's free in Windows.

Yes, it's FREE, comes in the driver. You only pay for the apps

This is another area where Apple is miserably cheap, these n'dime charges for every little thing that sould be included in the OS price.

I can't stand win/powerdvd, I don't use qt, all the video players I use are based on ffmpeg. Decode performance often increases in big jumps, sliced based decoding and being able to use more than one cpu was a recentish one.

Priceless...

You are hopelessly confused about OS X and Windows, PowerDVD and decoders - it's Apple who charges you TWICE to get every feature in Quicktime work properly... and it was the (otherwise absolutely correct) anti-monopoly push that made MS to back off from including all codecs by default.

You know, yours is the kind of mentality that always dragged down Apple - this is whay it took a ****in' decade to switch to Intel and let the frakin' PPC behind.

 

[VoR]

hmm, I'm not sure either of you understand

Anyways, I'm looking forward to seeing how (some of) the gsoc h264 and gpu projects work out - maybe then your idea of 'software and drivers catching up' will come true - I'd certainly like to see platform/gpu independent decoding on all hardware.

 

[Wolfpup]

Understand what? Hardware video acceleration has been standard for years and years.

 

[kamm]

hmm, I'm not sure either of you understand

But I'm quite sure you don't understand anything here...

Anyways, I'm looking forward to seeing how (some of) the gsoc h264 and gpu projects work out - maybe then your idea of 'software and drivers catching up' will come true - I'd certainly like to see platform/gpu independent decoding on all hardware.

It's been always there, it's square #1 a.k.a. software encoding/decoding - the basis of ALL application.

I suggest you to go and read about the subject before you start making very funny posts like this...

 

[Mtn Tamale]

Can somebody test convert movie in iTunes?

I love to see if there is any video encoding acceleration by looking at how long iTunes takes to convert a movie to use on an iPod. If somebody could do that with an old Macbook and then the new one, while watching CPU usage, that would be awesome!

M Tamale

 

[Wolfpup]

It's not going to support that. Not yet. Apple seems to be hinting at a strategy of using a GPU too though, so we may well see that down the line. Although...fast Core 2 CPUs actually do surprisingly well against low end GPUs. But still, something like video encoding is really well suited to a parallel set of processors as exist on GPUs.

 

[MAC@LEX]

Under Windows on your old Macs with ATI hardware like ATI Radeon HD 2400XT or 2600 hardware acceleration of h.264 decode has been at least for a year. The same video of YesMan in QuickTime on the my iMac Core 2 Duo 2Ghz 4Gb RAM under Win XP Pro SP2 it just takes 20-30% of CPU time.
Windows sucks but it's better supported.
Under MacOS X 10.5.5 and last QT it's takes from 70% to 100% of CPU time.
It's not about QuickTime, it's about drivers for your hardware. Apple doesn't provide normal drivers with hardware acceleration and ATI doesn't care about MacOS X that much.

 

[wallstreetcrash]

So will other programmes be able to make use of this?
Or can QuickTime now play HD x264 files easily?

 

[twoodcc]

let's hope this is in fact true. we need these features

 

[Earl Urly]

Who would rate this news negatively?

Windoze users

 

[840quadra]

Sadly the GMA X4500HD is the first mobile Intel IGP solution that offers full AVC/h.264 hardware acceleration.

The best that the GMA X3100 can offer is MPEG-2 and VC-1. Apple should at least use the hardware features for improving DVD playback. They did in OS 9.

And in the AV line for some features using the DSP. They still do some neat tricks that no macintosh has since been capable of.

 

[wallstreetcrash]

So will other programmes be able to make use of this?
Or can QuickTime now play HD x264 files easily?

Anyone?

 

[Eidorian]

Anyone?

Quicktime seems to be it for h.264 hardware decoding. Even that is going to be limited. Everything else seems to brute force via the CPU.

 

[iLearnIT]

GPU Hardware Accelerated h.264 decoding...

...IS old news.

Since Geforce 6600, Full HD h.264 (1920x1080 30/fps) decoding has been officially available for the consumer. It's just not enabled on the software side (Driver<->API).

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2006/01/07/nvidia_decode_h264/1

That's over 4 years old news.

The reason WE did not see the functionality in our personal computing devices was money. The hardware capabilities for it has been around for a long time. The entertainment industry is a heavy wheel. New formats take a long time to standardize, and HD h.264 was the "new thing". If the software in everyones "legacy" personal computing devices would utilize the full capabilities of the hardware and play HD, who would buy new hardware? If GPU would take all the workload it could, why would people need faster CPU:s?

Ever wondered why ATI/AMD & Nvidias GPU's are so close with each other in price and performance, all the way up to their release dates? It's just saturating the markets with continuous product updates.

The process of developing, say a GPU, takes years, but still during that time the company needs revenue. Tech industry is about selling new stuff, and hardware that'll run content for a good decade or so just does not fit in.

Anyway, companies are settling cartel lawsuits with money all the time. So in other words, justice can be bought

..And the money for it comes from the working consumers, whose rights are violated in the first place. How ironic is that

Capitalism rules!

 

[Cave Man]

...IS old news.

So is this thread...

 

[iLearnIT]

h.264 GPU decoding old news?

So is this thread...

So the situation has changed? Awesome !
So, what are the news on the Apples stand on GPU decoding h.264?

Will it work as it can, on capable "legacy" hardware? Or do we need to buy an "updated model" with essentially the same capabilities to have it working?

 

[Mackilroy]

So the situation has changed? Awesome !
So, what are the news on the Apples stand on GPU decoding h.264?

Will it work as it can, on capable "legacy" hardware? Or do we need to buy an "updated model" with essentially the same capabilities to have it working?

Hardware acceleration for H.264 under OS X requires the 9400M, as you can find out directly from Apple.