Hoow can I improve DVD playback on this old B&W?

[acedickson]

I'll be using this old B&W G3 for another month or so. I've been trying to use it as my DVD player, my DVD players are in Tennessee, but DVDs play back very choppy and out of sync with the audio.

I'm not sure if it's the slow processor (300MHz), Memory(320MB), the Video Card (ATI Rage 128), or a combination of all of them. I've turned off things like magnification and I don't run any other programs while trying to playback movies. I use MPLAYER OS X 2 to view the DVDs. When I use OS X's DVD player the computer always freezes.

Thanks for any help!

 

[kgarner]

Not sure, but it may be that it can't handle full screen. TV resolution is actually only 720x468 (or very close to that). Maybe try reducing the resolution to 640x480 if you want full screen video, or just settle for watching in the window. If it is choppy in the window, then I don't know what could be the problem.

 

[FoxyKaye]

Try upgrading your video card - although there is a new Radeon9200 PCI out there with 128MB VRAM (which sells for about $120), it has driven down the price of the older Radeon7000 PCI with 32MB VRAM to very reasonable prices. I've got one in my system, and DVDs play back fine even in full screen. I'm honestly not sure how much processor speed contributes to DVD playback, since even the really old G3s could have a DVD player in them.

Hope this helps!

 

[Jigglelicious]

Its not the video card, its the processor. Perfect playback of a DVD requires 300-400mhz. A long time ago, people with computers slower than that used to have to buy MPEG2 accelerator cards which would handle DVD video, but they don't make those anymore, I don't think.

 

[840quadra]

The previous poster is correct, it is the processor.

My 350 didn't have a problem with most DVD Video playback, but any and all issues that I had went away after I upgraded to a G4 Processor.