After a recent thread about video playback on a G3 I've bundled my mplayer scripts with an ffmpeg conversion script to produce what I've found to be an optimal video format on low powered G3s.
Download the package here and follow the included instructions or read below.
After trying various formats I believe on a G3 mp4 using the Apple MPEG4 compressor is the best balance between playback efficiency, quality and file size - in the package the script is written with converting 360P h264 in mind and converts to a 720kbps, stereo playback video at 20FPS. You can easily edit the script to change bitrate and framerate according to your needs - the script doesn't change the video resolution.
I've tested this on my 12" G3 iBook, 12" G4 Powerbook and Mac Pro 1,1 and haven't encountered any problems but as videos are output in myriad formats I can't rule out you might hit a video that refuses to convert.
On my 600Mhz G3 iBook a 360P video plays back at an average of 55-60% CPU using the bundled MPlayer.
Instructions as included in the package.
To install:
1.Unzip the archive and move the folder Video to Applications.
2.Inside the folder, move mplayer, mView and mViewX to Applications.
3.Inside the folder, drag G3V to the dock to create a shortcut.
4.Do the same with mView and mViewX
To use:
1.Drag video to be converted to the G3V shortcut in the dock (A 20 second test clip, Fluffy has been included.)
2.Click ok to confirm start of process.
3.Click ok when process finishes.
4.Move converted video (and rename) from root folder.
5.Drag video onto mView shortcut in the dock to play (or mViewX for greater efficiency.)
To change conversion parameters:
1.In Video folder double click Edit
2.Script will open - alter any parameters after the set arguments statement. These are the default parameters:
-f mov -vcodec mpeg4 -b 720 -r 20 -acodec mp3 -ac 2 -ab 128 -ar 44100
-b is bitrate (set to 720k/bits per second)
-r is framerate (set to 20)
-ac 2 is audio channels (set to 2 for stereo, 1 is for mono)
-ab is audio bitrate (set to 128k/bits per second)
-ar is audio sampling rate (set to 44100)
3.After any changes, click Compile then save and close.
Download the package here and follow the included instructions or read below.
After trying various formats I believe on a G3 mp4 using the Apple MPEG4 compressor is the best balance between playback efficiency, quality and file size - in the package the script is written with converting 360P h264 in mind and converts to a 720kbps, stereo playback video at 20FPS. You can easily edit the script to change bitrate and framerate according to your needs - the script doesn't change the video resolution.
I've tested this on my 12" G3 iBook, 12" G4 Powerbook and Mac Pro 1,1 and haven't encountered any problems but as videos are output in myriad formats I can't rule out you might hit a video that refuses to convert.
On my 600Mhz G3 iBook a 360P video plays back at an average of 55-60% CPU using the bundled MPlayer.
Instructions as included in the package.
To install:
1.Unzip the archive and move the folder Video to Applications.
2.Inside the folder, move mplayer, mView and mViewX to Applications.
3.Inside the folder, drag G3V to the dock to create a shortcut.
4.Do the same with mView and mViewX
To use:
1.Drag video to be converted to the G3V shortcut in the dock (A 20 second test clip, Fluffy has been included.)
2.Click ok to confirm start of process.
3.Click ok when process finishes.
4.Move converted video (and rename) from root folder.
5.Drag video onto mView shortcut in the dock to play (or mViewX for greater efficiency.)
To change conversion parameters:
1.In Video folder double click Edit
2.Script will open - alter any parameters after the set arguments statement. These are the default parameters:
-f mov -vcodec mpeg4 -b 720 -r 20 -acodec mp3 -ac 2 -ab 128 -ar 44100
-b is bitrate (set to 720k/bits per second)
-r is framerate (set to 20)
-ac 2 is audio channels (set to 2 for stereo, 1 is for mono)
-ab is audio bitrate (set to 128k/bits per second)
-ar is audio sampling rate (set to 44100)
3.After any changes, click Compile then save and close.
Last edited: