Netbooks and Fansubs

[chikorita157]

I'm pretty sure that the Celeron 353m is a single core processor, so you may be out of luck with hyperthreading. You can tell from this by opening the task manager. If you go to performance, a hyperthreading CPU should show two graphs (this is also the case with dual core processors). If not, you got a single core processor. Celeron 353m isn't meant for high-bit rate H264 or HD videos since it doesn't really have that much performance. Netbooks are really meant for basic tasks (internet, word processing and music playing.)

You might want to try hardsub releases if you are having difficulty playing subtitled videos, but don't try reencoding your video file on a netbook, or it will take ages.

[Dark Shikari]

If there's really a big issue, someone could write a CABAC -> CAVLC converter for H.264 files; this could significantly reduce decoding CPU load without a full re-encode.

It wouldn't be too difficult; most of the code can be taken from x264 or libavcodec. And if it doesn't support interlacing, it becomes much simpler to write.

[synaesthetic]

It's single core... the processor is basically a stripped down version of the Core Solo, so yeah. No hyperthreading for me.

I am trying to avoid re-encoding entirely. The netbook looked like such an attractive option for portable video--most portable media players like the Cowon Q5W, D2, the iPod Touch and so forth typically is very limited in format, doesn't support softsubs at all and couldn't even remotely handle h.264 in any way, shape or form.

I really wouldn't mind watching hardsubbed XviD releases--in fact, I do whenever I can. But it seems that these days, only the really super popular series get an XviD release. A lot of fansubbers release only in 720p h.264. That much resolution is overkill on a monitor that only displays 1024x600 pixels in any case.

If some more ION platforms with actual netbook form factors instead of subnotebook form factors (i.e. anything bigger than 10.2" screens) come out, I'll have a winner there. Even so I'm still considering the Mobii ION miniPC. It's a little expensive though... at $450, it's in the same price range as the Lenovo and Samsung 12" models. And the battery life isn't the best thanks to the use of the Atom 230 processor instead of the N280.

Importing it will also be a pain. -.-' I hope Point of View decides to distribute in the US soon.

I'm wishing I had access to a netbook equipped with the Atom N280 and a copy of CoreAVC installed to see if it can handle 720p h.264 decoding with softsubs. Since I was already looking at flipping my 900HD for a 1000HE primarily for the much greater battery life (7 hours vs. 2.5 hours) and the bigger, more comfortable keyboard...

Edit: Is there any way to, for lack of the proper terminology, flatten softsubs into the video itself and turn them into hardsubs?

[Dark Shikari]

Originally Posted by synaesthetic

Edit: Is there any way to, for lack of the proper terminology, flatten softsubs into the video itself and turn them into hardsubs?

Yes, it requires a re-encode and a lot more bitrate.

A better strategy might be to add an option to the subtitle renderer to use lower quality rendering to minimize CPU usage.

[synaesthetic]

It would help if the ION equipped netbooks would actually SHOW UP.

But they seem to be nowhere to be found.

[Rasqual Twilight]

I wonder how future ARM processor-based netbooks will fare.
On the paper, early prototypes boast 720p playback (using a hw accelerator chipset)
* http://www.crunchgear.com/2009/03/02...chable-screen/
* http://www.tomshardware.com/news/net...-ARM,6757.html

Not being x86/x64 won't help: as they're not running windows, I suppose distributors may be less interested (as seen with the eeepc).

[synaesthetic]

I'm still on the fence here. I love my netbook's size but... urgh.

I wonder if there's some kind of compromise between bigass widescreen laptop and netbook.

Originally Posted by Dark Shikari

If there's really a big issue, someone could write a CABAC -> CAVLC converter for H.264 files; this could significantly reduce decoding CPU load without a full re-encode.

It wouldn't be too difficult; most of the code can be taken from x264 or libavcodec. And if it doesn't support interlacing, it becomes much simpler to write.

It wouldn't need to support interlacing... I've never even seen an interlaced fansub encode before.

Originally Posted by Rasqual Twilight

I wonder how future ARM processor-based netbooks will fare.
On the paper, early prototypes boast 720p playback (using a hw accelerator chipset)
* http://www.crunchgear.com/2009/03/02...chable-screen/
* http://www.tomshardware.com/news/net...-ARM,6757.html

Not being x86/x64 won't help: as they're not running windows, I suppose distributors may be less interested (as seen with the eeepc).

Boasting 720p playback is not very useful information. The Celeron netbook I own plays 720p h.264 just fine, easily even. But only without softsubs. Once subs are introduced into the equation, many bad things happen.

The fact that the ION netbooks boast 1080p playback makes me believe they should be able to handle softsubbed 720p.

[synaesthetic]

Interesting update.

Thanks to the fine folks over at eeeuser.com forums, I've managed to get playback of 720p h.264 with softsubs working on a Celeron-M 353 running at 1.1GHz!

Not just working either, working without issue. CPU load while playing is between 60-85% and OP/ED segments play flawlessly!

Without CoreAVC and overclocking, it can't keep up, but I haven't noticed much of anything by overclocking my eee PC to 1.1GHz other than the fan cutting on more often.

So yes, it is possible to get 720p fansubs playing on less powerful machines.

[mit7059]

So decided that I was a little tired with my eeepc 900HA I turned it into a hackintosh. As such I had to start using VLC (which I hate) instead of MPC (which I love), and I ran into one issue on a receint trip that really annoyed me. I was watching Natsume Yuujinchou and during the OP and ED (and once in a while during the show itself) the subtitles would stack on top of each other instead of going away. Very annoying. Any thoughts on this?

Also in an unrealated problem I've noticed that I can't get subtitles from mkv files to work in MPC with Windows 7 on my desktop, it's not a big issue because Microsoft finally made Windows Media Player usable but it just struck me as odd, even when I run MPC as Windows XP they don't work, maybe I'll try running the filters as windows xp. It's just curious because the filters work with WMP but not MPC.

[chikorita157]

Originally Posted by mit7059

So decided that I was a little tired with my eeepc 900HA I turned it into a hackintosh. As such I had to start using VLC (which I hate) instead of MPC (which I love), and I ran into one issue on a receint trip that really annoyed me. I was watching Natsume Yuujinchou and during the OP and ED (and once in a while during the show itself) the subtitles would stack on top of each other instead of going away. Very annoying. Any thoughts on this?

Also in an unrealated problem I've noticed that I can't get subtitles from mkv files to work in MPC with Windows 7 on my desktop, it's not a big issue because Microsoft finally made Windows Media Player usable but it just struck me as odd, even when I run MPC as Windows XP they don't work, maybe I'll try running the filters as windows xp. It's just curious because the filters work with WMP but not MPC.

MPlayer OS X Extended is a better player on OS X since it better supports subtitles like it supposed to and they seem to fixed the memory leak awhile ago, so it shouldn't be a problem now.

You can also try Perian in Quicktime, but you have to wait for MKV files to load.

[0utf0xZer0]

I think we've established netbooks can handle most 720P subs with proper software, but if you really want to give your netbook a torture test, I recommend trying the 100MB version of the Kurenai OP that BSS used for episodes 6-12. It's hardsubbed, but at over 1MB/second, it can send the CPU usage on my 2.2GHZ Athlon X2 desktop over 50%.

Another nifty torture test is Nipaa's non-HD version of Higurashi Rei episode 1. It's only 480P and with subs off consumes under 20% of my CPU... but that can jump over 50 with subs on during the OP.

It would be interesting to know if there's any netbooks out there that can handle that - I don't have one to test on myself.

[chikorita157]

My Mac mini G4 with similar performance to the single Intel Atom at 1.6 GHz can play 480p video (852x480) with 60% CPU usage under mplayer and 70-80% CPU usage under Quicktime 7 without any choppy playback. It cannot handle any type of HD video, since the CPU isn't as powerful as the Core processors and it doesn't have a powerful GPU (Radeon 9200 with 32MB of vRAM, which is slightly better than the crappy Intel GMA 950, but no support for Core Image).

I have access to a computer with a Intel D945GCLF motherboard with Hackintosh loaded (yes, you can load Mac OS X on several Netbook models using the Intel Atom), which should be the same exact hardware used in netbooks since it contains the same exact Intel Atom CPU used in Netbooks. Playing back a 720p video, the playback isn't that great, it's very choppy under Quicktime with CPU usage varying to 70-110%, which is a lot.

Under MPlayer OS X Extended with the Atom Hack, It uses 294% CPU usage with the default settings (Corevideo) and 208% under Quartz. Intel Atom is not really that suitable for 720p video unless you install a H264 accelerator like CoreVideo. Otherwise, you will get very choppy playback for 720p video under the Atom.

The Atom is really only designed for basic tasks like the Internet, Office Suites, basic server, MP3 and lower resolution video. The Intel Atom with the crappy GMA graphics is not designed to play any type of HD video, unless you use H264 accelerators which most aren't free. The nVidia Ion supposed to solve the bottleneck with H264 and HD video since it have a better GPU which can be used for H264 acceleration, but the only problem, is that there isn't that many netbooks that are available to take advantage of the nVidia Ion platform.

If you feel like building your own Nettop with Nvidia Ion, there are quite a few out there. The only problem is that they cost more than the ones that only come with a crappy GMA 950.

[Jedai]

I have a Samsung NC10 with an Atom N270 and a crappy GMA 950 (it IS crappy, I wish I had found a Ion equiped one as cheap but I really don't have the means).

Most 720p plays flawlessly with the mplayer-p4 with ffmpeg-mt from Gianluigi Tiesi (skiploopfilter=all:threads=2), even the OP and ED (except some encodings from gg_fansub, specifically Antique Bakery). So it is possible to read 720p videos with an Atom Netbook (I don't know about your torture test chikorita though...).

--
Jedaï

[chikorita157]

The difference is between your N270 and the 230 on the desktop motherboard is 64-bit compatibility. Note that I'm using Mac OS X opposed to Windows, so results and playback results are going to be a lot different since the GMA 950 is the real bottleneck since the driver is hacked so it would work in Hackintosh.

Turning on mplayer-mt on didn't make much a difference. Mplayer OS X Extended is still using 150% CPU shown by mplayer statistics window although alot lower than before.

Playing the same 720p video on a G4 Mac mini uses 180% CPU usage with Quartz on opposed to 208% with the Atom (video is still unplayable on the G4, mainly since it's choppiness.) Mainly because the G4 Mac mini have a better video card than the Atom does, but isn't far off.

[synaesthetic]

The Atom is also slower per-clock than the Celeron-M, so there's going to be a difference between an Atom 230 running at 1.6GHz as opposed to a Celery overclocked to 1.1GHz.

Now I know an N280 can do 720p without any tweaking with the new version of ffdshow. A friend of mine has the N280 version of the eeePC 1005HA and demonstrated for me. Asus Super Hybrid Engine will overclock the Atom processors by default to 1.8GHz in "Super Performance Mode." The Celerons don't do that, so I use eeectl to ramp up the FSB.

Some guys over at eeeuser.com forums have pushed their Atom-equipped eeePCs to 2GHz+. The Atom is surprisingly tolerant of being OCed.

Edit: If you really want to squeeze out the last bit of performance from your eeePC (or any other netbook that uses the Intel GMA950), it's interesting to know that most netbooks run the GMA950 underclocked to either 166MHz or 200MHz. With the little utility GMABooster you can put the chip back up to its native clock speed of 400MHz.

I don't actually do this myself because it only seems to help when playing more demanding games, which I don't do (only old games and 8/16-bit console emulators on my eeePC). It does make the eee run much hotter though, especially if it's OCed to 1.1GHz at the same time. Saw eeectl report temperatures of 72oC so I decided it's probably best to not do that. ^^;

[chikorita157]

The only problem is the Intel D945GCLF motherboard is not overclockable in any shape or form... so it's going to stay slow.

The Atom is really meant for basic tasks, but if you still want ultraportablity and still want power, the Atom is not the best choice out there. A Macbook Air and other ultraportables which have a Core2 Duo around the same size of the Atom which have a 200 MHz higher processor and can run circles around two netbooks (and that processor can easily play and encode 720p videos easily). It will probably take 2-6 netbooks to get the same performance as a Intel Core 2 Duo. I can't see why higher end netbooks use the smaller Core2 Duo chip and make it start at $600-900 than the wimpy Atom. You got to keep in mind that the Atom is a cash-cow for Intel since they are very cheap to produce and have high profit margins although the processor itself isn't the fastest in the low end CPUs and other low end CPUs will be more efficient than the Atom. Also, a Celeron (not the one used in EEEPC, core based) can probably outperform the Atom, although it uses more power than the atom.

As long you keep your CPU temps below 90 C, it should be okay... but if you still worry about it, use a cooling pad.

[synaesthetic]

They do make "netbooks" with Core 2 processors. They're called CULV notebooks, and so far only single-core models are on the market.

More powerful is nice and all, but one of my primary concerns is battery life. If it doesn't last more than two hours, I might as well just build a desktop. Not to mention weight. Those things keep me with the netbooks for portability.

I do have my eye on Acer's entry into the CULV market, the Aspire Timeline 1410. I'm not sure I'll like the additional size, though. I'm very used to carrying a tiny computer the size of a hardbound book.

[RayLancer]

Nice to hear that animes can be played nicely on netbooks (I'm seriously looking at a netbook and though I don't plan on playing games on it, playing anime is a must for me even if its not 1080p).

Anyhow I'm probably going to buy the new HP Mini 311. It came out like a week ago at the HP site and more local retailers are starting to carry them. Its pretty much a standard Netbook spec (N270 Atom processor, 160GB HD) but its a 11.6" netbook with the nVidia Ion GPU for $399.

[synaesthetic]

I was actually going to mention the HP Mini 311.

If you buy it from HP, you can get it with the Atom N280 for $25 more, which in my opinion is worth it, because the frontside bus is faster and you can use better RAM.

I'm more interested in the Acer Aspire 1410 due to the much more powerful Core 2 Solo SU3500 processor it packs. The battery life looks pretty similar to the HP Mini 311, as well. Plus the Aspire 1410 can go up to 4GB of RAM and has an 800MHz frontside bus (oops, that's the dual-core 1410TZ, not the single core 1410), as opposed to the Atom's lower FSB.

Plus the Acer comes in red. ^^;

If you get the HP Mini 311, make sure you buy CoreAVC. You'll need it to have the GPU decode h.264 via CUDA. You could also use DXVA, but CUDA should be better since it's specifically designed for nVidia GPUs.

Edit: Supposedly the dual-core variant, the Acer Aspire 1410TZ, should be coming out... at some point. That would give a significant performance boost but probably at a cost of battery life, and the 1410 is already on the bottom edge as far as battery life goes.

Edit #2: The dual-core variant of the 1410 comes out when Windows 7 goes live, which is probably why the 1410's price keeps dipping really, really low (I've seen it on sale for $399 now). The dual-core, unfortunately, does not come in red (sadness) but it does come in fingerprint-retardant "brushed aluminum" (painted plastic) that isn't glossy.

Now I'm going to sit on the fence. If the dual-core variant has the same 4400mAh battery as its single-core sibling... the battery life is going to be an issue...

Urgh. It would be nice if I could actually TEST this stuff without having to BUY it, and no reviewers ever test video playback with softsubs. ><

But the HP should still be able to eat any fansubs we throw at it so long as it's using hardware acceleration. I'm just unsure about the 1410. The reviews showed 1080p playback, but processor usage spiked to 100% on several occasions even though there were no dropped frames.

Put softsubs on top of that and it probably won't be able to handle it. =/

[0utf0xZer0]

Might be worth linking a couple articles from the other thread here too:
Blogsuki review of the Acer Aspire Revo, 1.6ghz single core desktop atom with Nvidia Ion. Should approximate the HP Mini 311 pretty well.

Tech Report Review of the Asus UL-30A. This is one of those CULV designs just mentioned, however, they seem to have gone out of stock everywhere - probably due to Windows 7 just like the Acer Timelines. However, it doesn't provide any test results with softsubbed files. My guess is that the 1.3ghz Core 2 Duo is good for 720P but not 1080P, since it doesn't have GPU acceleration. (Anyone know if anyone plans to launch a CULV + Ion design?)