need help tuning system for dvd playback

fil.krohnengold · 01-17-2007, 03:18 PM

Looking for general pointers/opinions here.

I'm running slack11 with the stock 2.4.33 kernel. The hardware is a thinkpad x30 - 1.2GHz PIIIM with 256M ram. (although, incidentally, /proc/cpuinfo reports the processor is running at 800MHz (?)). The dvd player is in a powered firewire enclosure. And playback through xine results in many frame drops.

So here are some questions.

1) would increasing RAM make any difference?

2) are there available kernel params relevant to this that are worth recompiling for? (i'd like to stick with 2.4)

3) i have no usb 2 ports - would a usb1-connected device perform any better (he doubts)?

I never saw this machine working under windows xp - but i imagine there's enough horsepower here to play movies. I have a 600MHz/512MB mac which plays without a hickup.

Thanks all -

H_TeXMeX_H · 01-17-2007, 10:12 PM

You forgot the most important component ... the video card. What's your's ?

duryodhan · 01-17-2007, 10:49 PM

Try using mplayer too ..... many times that makes a difference.

dugan · 01-18-2007, 01:30 AM

What video driver is xine using to render video? Depending on your video card, you'll want to use either xv or opengl but never anything else. It's possible that xine is trying to render video using something much slower, such as Xshm.

You should be able to find the answer in xine's menus.

fil.krohnengold · 01-18-2007, 01:44 PM

Thanks for chiming in folks.

It looks like the video card is an Intel i830. lspci reports

Code:

 Display controller: Intel Corporation 82830 CGC [Chipset Graphics Controll
er]
        Subsystem: IBM ThinkPad A/T/X Series
        Flags: fast devsel
        Memory at e8000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [disabled] [size=128M]
        Memory at d0080000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [disabled] [size=512K]
        Capabilities: [d0] Power Management version 1

which seems not too shabby. Thanks dugan for that tip about xine's choice in video drivers. it was set to "auto". i've tried it with xv and opengl now. each stuttered differently. maybe i'll give mplayer a try...

H_TeXMeX_H · 01-18-2007, 02:45 PM

Ok then, it seems to be a decent card. Now is direct rendering enabled ?

run this to find out:

Code:

glxinfo | grep direct

It should say

Code:

direct rendering: Yes

Your card is supported by open-source dri drivers, and it looks like many GL extensions are supported.

I recommend mplayer as well. Also, in mplayer goto (Right-click ->) Preferences -> Video

and make sure 'gl X11 (OpenGL)' is selected, and that 'Enable direct rendering' is checked. That might help.

And one more question: You say your dvd player is a firewire powered enclosure but then inquire about USB. Firewire is quite fast so I don't think that is the problem. USB 1.0 is quite slow, so it will be a problem. USB 2.0 is faster than 1.0, but about the same as firewire (depending on the situation ... firewire is usually faster than USB 2.0). So your connection is firewire right ?

fil.krohnengold · 01-18-2007, 05:00 PM

knowing stuff is cool. thanks for knowing.

glxinfo shows that direct rendering is *not* enabled.

if i build a new dri driver module, would i leave the x server as is?

i'll bring down mplayer and see how that performs - however i see these warnings from the xine-check script:

Code:

[ hint ] Your DVD drive seems not to be attached via ATAPI.
         This might be due to the use of an ide-scsi emulation.
         If you really have a SCSI DVD drive, your SCSI controller is likely
         to do perfect DMA, so there's no reason to worry about this.
         However, if you're using ide-scsi, there is a chance that DMA is
         disabled for the DVD drive. Moreover, I don't know how to enable
         DMA in that case, so you probably have to live with some performance
         loss. (FIXME: check for /proc/ide, provide solution)
         press <enter> to continue...

[ good ] found xvinfo: X-Video Extension version 2.2
[ hint ] Your X server doesn't support YV12 overlays.
         That means xine will have to do color space transformation and scaling
         in software, which is quite CPU intensive. Maybe upgrading your
         X server will help here.
         If you have an ATI card, you'll find accelerated X servers on
         http://www.linuxvideo.org/gatos/
         press <enter> to continue...

[ hint ] Your X server doesn't have any XVideo support...
         XVideo is an X server extension introduced by XFree86 4.x. This
         extension provides access to hardware accelerated color space
         conversion and scaling, which gives a great performance boost.
         If you have a fast (>1GHz) machine, you may be able to watch all
         kinds of video, anyway. You will waste lots of CPU cycles, though...
         press <enter> to continue...

mmm - does xine want me to recompile X? or are these things more command-line switch types of things. supposedly, xvideo and YV12 overlays are both supported "by default" (version 6.9).

BTW, yes, i'm using firewire. i was asking about other protocols just out of curiosity. i'd rather not buy anything new (except ram if i have to) - but was wondering if maybe i was making life more difficult for myself by using firewire.

H_TeXMeX_H · 01-18-2007, 06:08 PM

I believe that DRI is included as a module in most slackware kernels, all you need to do is load it (someone correct me if I'm wrong).

So according to the dri site:
http://dri.sourceforge.net/doc/DRIuserguide.html

You should:

Quote:

First, the XF86Config file must load the GLX and DRI modules: (this is /etc/X11/xorg.conf)

Section "Module"
...
# This loads the GLX module
Load "glx"
# This loads the DRI module
Load "dri"
EndSection

...
If you want all of the users on your system to be able to use direct-rendering, then use a simple DRI section like this:

Section "DRI"
Mode 0666
EndSection

...
Finally, the XF86Config file needs Device and Screen sections specific to your hardware. Look in section 10: Hardware-Specific Information and Troubleshooting for details.
...
10.2 Intel i810

Requirements

A kernel with AGP GART support (such as Linux 2.4.x) is needed.

Configuration

Your XF86Config file's device section must specify the i810 device, and specify a usable amount of video ram to reserve.

Section "Device"
Identifier "i810"
VendorName "Intel"
Driver "i810"
Option "AGPMode" "1"
VideoRam 10000
EndSection

The Screen section should then reference the i810 device:

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen 1"
Device "i810"
Monitor "High Res Monitor"
DefaultDepth 16
Subsection "Display"
Depth 16
Modes "1280x1024" "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
ViewPort 0 0
EndSubsection
EndSection

The kernel module for the i810 is named i810.o and should be installed in /lib/modules/2.4.x/kernel/drivers/char/drm/. It will be automatically loaded by the Xserver if needed.

Note that the last part is for the i810, but it may also apply for the entire series (AFAIK) ... "Intel i810/i815/i830 (motherboard chipsets)", so just change i810 to i830.

Then restart and it should work ... check glxinfo again.

fil.krohnengold · 01-19-2007, 03:04 AM

thanks so much!

couple of strange things. when i specify the i830 module in xorg.conf, startx dies complaining it can't find that module - however the i810 loads just fine. the two modules are actually in the same directory with idential ownership/perms.

also, it looks like glx is loading, along with dri now. glxinfo, though still shows direct rendering is not available. i did add that "DRI Mode 0666" bit from the example above.

i haven't built mplayer yet (tomorrow) but xine did perform better with the i810 driver - not great yet, but better.

duryodhan · 01-19-2007, 04:07 AM

You should have seen the Sticky post here : http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...d.php?t=402003

this (cwwilson's guide ) is one of the finest for Slackware. And take any questions you have there, much better informed people are subscribed to that thread, no offense to Texmex though.

and Texmex, how do I enable that OpenGL option in mPlayer? I haven't enabled GUI.

Crobat · 01-19-2007, 07:15 AM

Try running glxgears and see what kind of output you get.

fil.krohnengold · 01-19-2007, 12:59 PM

glxgears seems to run better without dri loaded. 230fps vs 205-210. hrm.

any clue as to why the i830 modules can't be found?

thanks for that tip about cwwilson's guide. i'll check that out too.

Crobat · 01-19-2007, 01:30 PM

230 is pretty low. Did you get any errors that appeared in the terminal window when you ran glxgears?

Make sure this is near the end of your xorg.conf file

Code:

Section "DRI"
Mode 0666
EndSection

Adding this piece caused my FPS to jump from 500 to 1700.

H_TeXMeX_H · 01-19-2007, 02:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by duryodhan

You should have seen the Sticky post here : http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...d.php?t=402003

this (cwwilson's guide ) is one of the finest for Slackware. And take any questions you have there, much better informed people are subscribed to that thread, no offense to Texmex though.

and Texmex, how do I enable that OpenGL option in mPlayer? I haven't enabled GUI.

Good advice, I don't know that much anyway

As for mplayer

Quote:

-dr
Turns on direct rendering (not supported by all codecs and video outputs) (default is off). Warning: may cause OSD/:SUB corruption!

so it's

Code:

mplayer -dr

All the drm modules are at

Code:

/lib/modules/`uname -r`/kernel/drivers/char/drm

Something like this should be in there:

Code:

drm.ko
i810.ko
i830.ko
i915.ko
mga.ko
r128.ko
radeon.ko
savage.ko
sis.ko
tdfx.ko
via.ko

fil.krohnengold · 01-19-2007, 06:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Crobat

230 is pretty low. Did you get any errors that appeared in the terminal window when you ran glxgears?

Make sure this is near the end of your xorg.conf file
[...]

Yup it's there. And no errors from glxgears. However - this is in the Xorg log files:

Code:

drmOpenDevice: node name is /dev/dri/card0
drmOpenDevice: open result is -1, (No such device)
drmOpenDevice: open result is -1, (No such device)
drmOpenDevice: Open failed
drmOpenDevice: node name is /dev/dri/card0
drmOpenDevice: open result is -1, (No such device)
drmOpenDevice: open result is -1, (No such device)
drmOpenDevice: Open failed
[drm] failed to load kernel module "i915"
(II) I810(0): [drm] drmOpen failed
(EE) I810(0): [dri] DRIScreenInit failed. Disabling DRI.