powerbook 17 lags dvd playback

[dslang]

Hi

I searched the forums but couldnt come up with anything so I've resorted to posting. My apologies if this has been answered before.

I recently bought a 17 powerbook in singapore and switched over from windows. Well i'll never be able to touch a microsoft computer again but there's one problem on this... There are some dvds that playback just fine on it, but there are some that lag alot during playback. the computer itself would run just fine, but it'd skip a frame or two every few seconds during the video. it's getting incredibly annoying as i wouldnt come to expect this from a computer that can run photoshop itunes adium and final cut at once but lag when only dashboard, finder and the dvd player are open.

I've already tried updating my dvd player off the mac website and the same lagging problem happens when i try other playback programs like translucy. i've tried playing with all the dvd seettings but nothing's changing.

i'm running the latest version of tiger.

thanks
david

 

[Makosuke]

Not sure if this will help any, but you might try going into the Energy saver pref pane and turning the performance option to "high" and see if that helps. I haven't specifically heard of that being a necessity for smooth playback, but it's at least worth a shot.

The other possibility is that there's something happening periodically on your PowerBook that's slowing the DVD player down; have a look at Activity Monitor (when you're not playing a DVD or doing anything else) and see if there are periodic spikes of processor use; if there are, whatever is causing them will be your culprit.

I can say I've never personally seen any issue with the DVD player playing smoothly either on my tower or on an old-ish iBook (which would be significantly slower than your PowerBook), so what you're seeing is almost certainly not normal.

 

[dslang]

alrigh

hey. thanks for the help

can you think of any other reasons tho? or do i have to resort to bringing it down to apple

 

[varmit]

What are some of these movies you are having problems with? They might have some DRM technology in them, or they are regional settings, maybe a scratch.

 

[dslang]

they're just normal bmx and biking movies, i dont have problems playing them back on pcs and dvd players and they are scratchless