ASUS Eee Box with Intel GMA 950 integrated graphics as a XBMC hardware platform?
#16
Hmm.. I was wondering about these a few weeks back when they were released, but wanted to wait for someone to try it with XBMC. 720 hey ? interesting...
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#17
troutbum Wrote:my only question is the atom 1.6 GHz processor up to 720p?
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=35179
Gamester17 Wrote:I pretty sure that will not be able to play any 720p H.264 videos at all as XBMC will not be able to off-load any video decoding to the GPU so the CPU will that the full load of that, see:
http://www.madshrimps.be/vbulletin/f22/i...nds-44465/
Quote:The Atom 230 (1.6Ghz) is as fast/slow in SuperPi as:
- Pentium 4 Wilmetta @ 2125Mhz
- Pentium 3 @ 1517Mhz
- Athlon Tbird @ 1616Mhz
- Pentium M 745 @ 1804Mhz
- Pentium 4 Nortwood @ 2.4Ghz
- Duron 600@1069Mhz

The SuperPi 32M result is even worse, as it's not even able to match Pentium 3 1Ghz CPU ( http://hwbot.org/listResults.do?cpuModel...&limit=100 )
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#18
"Without hardware decode assist for any of the HD video codecs the Eee Box’s Atom processor is left to do all decoding on its own, and unfortunately it’s not fast enough to decode any high bitrate HD video. In our testing we found that the 1.6GHz Atom was fast enough to decode a 4.5Mbps 720p H.264 stream at around 90% CPU utilization; anything more complex and we started seeing dropped frames. 1080p HD movies are completely out of the question. The CPU is fast enough to play 720p XviD/DivX however."

anandtech.com
 
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#19
molesza Wrote:Are you getting 720p on the 901?

x264 720p seems to work ok on my 901.
  • ASRock ION 330 OpenELEC XBMC Frodo.
  • 47" LG HDTV1080p, AC3/DTS Receiver.
  • 96" Epson LCD 1080p projector
  • 2x Raspbery Pi with XBMC
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#20
Nickman Wrote:x264 720p seems to work ok on my 901.

What's the bitrate?
 
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#21
xbs08 Wrote:"Without hardware decode assist for any of the HD video codecs the Eee Box’s Atom processor is left to do all decoding on its own, and unfortunately it’s not fast enough to decode any high bitrate HD video. In our testing we found that the 1.6GHz Atom was fast enough to decode a 4.5Mbps 720p H.264 stream at around 90% CPU utilization; anything more complex and we started seeing dropped frames. 1080p HD movies are completely out of the question. The CPU is fast enough to play 720p XviD/DivX however."

anandtech.com

I lll have to play to see if this is true - it didnt seem laggy when I played the 720 content but that is why i put in a SSD and some memory, faster access between hard drive and RAM.

as for audio, i didnt know it has special line out jack, i was gonna get a USB 5.1 audio and see how that worked.

My main reason for using the eeebox is reduce the number of moving parts that is one of the reasons i put in the SSD. I only play network items and nothing is stored locally.
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#22
bond007taz Wrote:I lll have to play to see if this is true - it didnt seem laggy when I played the 720 content but that is why i put in a SSD and some memory, faster access between hard drive and RAM.

as for audio, i didnt know it has special line out jack, i was gonna get a USB 5.1 audio and see how that worked.

My main reason for using the eeebox is reduce the number of moving parts that is one of the reasons i put in the SSD. I only play network items and nothing is stored locally.

plays 720 h264 files just fine, it doesnt like 1080 though - it will play but not well
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#23
bond007taz Wrote:when I played the 720 content but that is why i put in a SSD and some memory, faster access between hard drive and RAM.
correct me if I am wrong, but the extra ram and SSD drive are not really the bottleneck it is going to be the CPU...upgrading them will not make a significant difference in CPU throughput

Saying it works on 720p is one thing but it in the end bitrate is going to be more telling than 720p...when mine arrives and I get some time I will post results @ various bitrates. might be a week or two so if someone else has one, it would be interesting to step up the bit rates until playback faltered....
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#24
troutbum Wrote:...when mine arrives and I get some time I will post results @ various bitrates. might be a week or two so if someone else has one, it would be interesting to step up the bit rates until playback faltered....

Hi troutbum, curious if you had a chance to do some testing yet? Despite a bunch of searching the forum I can't seem to find a conclusive answer as to whether the latest ATOM chips can decode the common 720p mkv videos out there...
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#25
I'm also looking for a definitive answer on this. Considering buying this and running it with aeon or aeon lite, playing 720p h.264 mkv's. Any idea on how that setup would work?

ADDED: Would upgrading to a 330 dual core atom change anything?.
McQ
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#26
In this Anandtech review, there is mention that the chipset on Eee box does not support hardware H.264/MPEG-2/VC1 decode acceleration, while Poulsbo (the mobile Atom chipset) does it.

http://www.anandtech.com/systems/showdoc...i=3321&p=4

Does that mean that an EEE PC 900 would perform better than the EEE Box?
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#27
lepreshawn Wrote:In this Anandtech review, there is mention that the chipset on Eee box does not support hardware H.264/MPEG-2/VC1 decode acceleration, while Poulsbo (the mobile Atom chipset) does it.

http://www.anandtech.com/systems/showdoc...i=3321&p=4

Does that mean that an EEE PC 900 would perform better than the EEE Box?

Unless the specific decoding chipset was supported by Linux, in particular FFMPEG, it won't matter.
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#28
Ive bought a EEE-box now, and sadly it struggles with the common 720p.mkv files.. I get arund 15-20 fps while playing back movies, and almost 100% cpu usage. Idle with the mediastream skin CPU usage is around 60%.

Does anyone have any bright ideas on what I can do to fix the lag? Ill fiddle with this a bit more, but unless its solved fast its back to mediaportal. CoreAVC is waaay better then ffmpeg, and since I can't choose what codec to use in XBMC, then I have no other choice..

I have a more then capable HTPC right now btw, but its way to loud.. So its been moved out of my bedroom, and it degraded to a fileserver for now Tongue This EEE-box is so silent I can bareley hear it when everything else is off.. If it would only work with 720p files Sad
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#29
I found only one sollution.. CoreAVC. I get an average of 60%(some peaks above 80% tho) CPU usage with a normal scene 720p .mkv tv rip. With XBMC I had CPU usage at almost 100% and dropped frames like no tomorrow.

So its back to MP.. I guess if XBMC gives me the ability to change codecs before MP2 is released, then I might come back.

XBMC is awesome, but with that new slow HTPC, mp is the way for me.

Hope this was informative for those of you wondering about using this PC for XBMC..
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#30
Since i always read in the XBMC for MAC forums that the Apple TV can handle 720p content very good, i am a little bit surprised that the EEEbox is slower than the Apple TV it seems...
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ASUS Eee Box with Intel GMA 950 integrated graphics as a XBMC hardware platform?0