CPU usage for those with working HDTV tuners

[Fuzzy]

I am outputting in 1240x700 (it is the native resolution of my TV without the overscan). Though, with overlay mode (and VMR9 with most video drivers) the resolution shouldn't affect resolution. The video is sent to the video-memory in it's original decoded resolution, and the video card does the stretching when displaying it. You can see this when you go into a menu and the video is shrunk to the little preview size, the CPU usage doesn't change.

[Mike Young]

I think resolution will have a huge impact on cpu, I tried setting my res to 1920X1024
and cpu was a solid 100%
I've been using 1024 x 768 which I belive is the native resolution of my display.
I downloaded the Nvidia Decoders last night, interestingly, they are the only ones that will play HD content in VMR mode - all others stutter in VMR mode, but ONLY when playing HD - And CPU usage is not high.

has anyone noticed different cpu usage levels by HD channel ? I have some that SEEM to be higher than others.

[mkanet]

With Hyperthreading, my CPU shows 10%-20% when recording 2 HD channels at the same time. If I turn off HT, it changes to exactly twice that. It appears, at least for my case, that when I have HT turned on, I get a false reading.

[flashbacck]

what about watching live TV, mkanet?

[mkanet]

If I remember correctly, sagetvservice doubled in CPU utilization (around 30-40%). I don't know about sageTV.exe. I'll check tonight when there's stuff I can watch.

I also noticed that when I turned HT off, my system has roughly twice the available physical RAM.

I think I may already be pushing it to record 2 HD shows and 1 analog show all at the same time on the same PC that I also playback recordings on. If I added another HD tuner, I'm sure I wouldn't have enough CPU power on my PIV 2.6GHz.

[Opus4]

Originally Posted by mkanet

With Hyperthreading, my CPU shows 10%-20% when recording 2 HD channels at the same time. If I turn off HT, it changes to exactly twice that. It appears, at least for my case, that when I have HT turned on, I get a false reading.

BTW: It isn't a false reading; it is because HT makes it appear to Windows that there are 2 cpus.... 50% cpu usage is 100% of a single cpu, so 100% usage is 100% of both cpus. I have a system with 2 physical cpus & it does the same thing. (And, yes, I know HT isn't truly the same as 2 separate cpus.) It is a percent of all available cpu usage.

When I get something like 67% cpu usage, I know both cpus are chugging away.

- Andy

[flashbacck]

Do any of you guys have problems with your systems completely crashing (i.e. screen just turns black) when playing HD content?

[mikejaner]

Yes, it seems to be only in VMR9 with FSE enabled. I have switched back to Overlay and haven't had a crash since. I hope somebody has submitted this as a bug. Otherwise I will. It seems to crash when there is a trip in the video stream, because at the same point in video, Overlay will just drop a frame, where FSE/VMR9 will go black, and never come back, hehe.

[Mike Young]

I just started another thread releated to general HD problems I have been having, my screen doesnt go black...I get the 'lost connection to server' even though my network connection is fine. I think this is way the probelm manifests itself on a client rather than a server. I do not have FSE mode on either and mine has done this with VMR or Overlay.

[Thomas Wischgol]

I did not have crashes (I have both VMR9 and FSE enabled). However, sometimes when watching HD content Sage behaves wierd when I go back or forward. Sometimes when pressing rewind it moves forward and sometimes it moves back the slider in the timeline but still keeps playing without rewinding. And sometimes it just does what you would expect it to do. I have not figured out yet what causes this or under what circumstances this behaviour occurs.

[paulbeers]

My CPU sage is at about 25-35 percent when outputting video 1280x720 to my monitor. I haven't had a chance to output to my HDTV since all I am doing is testing Sage 3. My test rig is as the following:

AMD Athlon 64 3000+
1 gig DDR400
Geforce Vanilla 6600 (silent gigabyte) 256mb
Nvidia Codecs

Should be able to handle 1080i at less than 50% usage. Unfortunately my 17" LCD only can handle 1280x1024. The BIGGEST thing is that I had to use Overlay mode. It would ping right up to 80 percent or better if I tried the other mode.

My final rig will probably be something like the following:

Sempron 2800+
512mb of DDR400
Geforce Vanilla 6600

I think this should be able to hand 1080i at no worse than 70 percent usage at the worst and probably more like 50.

[flashbacck]

Originally Posted by Thomas Wischgol

I did not have crashes (I have both VMR9 and FSE enabled). However, sometimes when watching HD content Sage behaves wierd when I go back or forward. Sometimes when pressing rewind it moves forward and sometimes it moves back the slider in the timeline but still keeps playing without rewinding. And sometimes it just does what you would expect it to do. I have not figured out yet what causes this or under what circumstances this behaviour occurs.

YES. I see this too!!! You should submit a bug report if you haven't already.

[Thomas Wischgol]

Originally Posted by flashbacck

YES. I see this too!!! You should submit a bug report if you haven't already.

I just filed a bug report. I do not know how helpful this is, though, because I still have not figured out how to exactly reproduce this problem. But since I am not the only one with this problem it might help.