[MPlayer-users] Optimization for a slow CPU

[Rich Felker]

On Sat, Sep 09, 2006 at 09:23:13AM -0700, Grant wrote:
> >> >I have a Celeron 700 with 192MB.  I just bought a brand new Lite-On
> >> >DVD burner from newegg.com and luckily it is watchable with -cache and
> >> >-framedrop.  It's pretty choppy though and if I don't use -framedrop
> >> >the sound cuts out after a couple seconds and it's really slow.  The
> >> >picture quality is also kind of mushy.  Is there anything I can do to
> >> >make it play smoothly and clean up the picture quality?  Here's the
> >> >command I'm using:
> >> >
> >> >mplayer -cache 8192 -framedrop -dvd-device /dev/dvd dvd://1
> >>
> >> In case you haven't checked, you should make sure that you have
> >> activated DMA on your drive (check with hdparm)
> >>
> >> A celeron 700 should be more than enough for watching DVD, and
> >> probably most MPEG4-ASP (DivX) too.
> >
> >For reference, my celeron 366 is plenty fast to play DVD and
> >mpeg4-asp. If a celeron 700 can't do it then the user has serious
> >configuration problems.
> 
> What command do you use to run mplayer?

I use vidix vo driver on my celeron 366 laptop which has ATI Rage
Mobility vid card. Command line is just the -vo xvidix or cvidix,
otherwise defaults. -vo xv is not that much slower but with just 366 I
need all the performance I can get on that machine.

> What kind of a
> misconfiguration could I have?

Missing MTRR's, slow DVD drive (DMA problems, irq masking, ...) ...?

Rich