Discrete HTPC GPU Shootout
by Ganesh T S on June 12, 2011 10:30 PM EST
The lack of a standardized HTPC GPU evaluation methodology always puts us in a quandary when covering the low end / integrated GPUs. Towards this, I had a long discussion with Andrew Van Til, Mathias Rauen and Hendrik Leppkes, all popular open source multimedia software developers. The methodology we developed is presented below.
The first step is to ensure that all the post processing steps work as expected. HQV benchmarking gives us an idea. Once the cards' post processed videos pass visual inspection, we need to gather an idea of how much time is left for the GPU to do further post processing activities. These may include specialized scaling algorithms, bit-depth etc. as implemented by custom MPC-HC shaders / renderers like madVR.
Deinterlacing and cadence detection are aspects which affect almost all HTPC users. Other aspects such as denoising, edge sharpening, dynamic contrast enhancement etc. are not needed in the mainstream HTPC user's usage scenario. Most mainstream videos being watched are either from a Blu-ray source or re-encoded offline or TV shows which need deinterlacing (if they are in 480i / 1080i format).
| Denoising OFF | Denoising ON |
|
|
|
|---|---|
The intent of the benchmark is to first disable all post processing and check how fast the decoder can pump out decoded frames. In the typical scenario, we expect post processing to take more time than the decoding. Identifying the stage which decides the throughput of the decoded frames can give us an idea of whether we can put in more post processing steps. This is similar to a pipeline whose operating frequency is decided by the slowest stage. We then enable post processing steps one by one and see how the throughput is affected.
DXVAChecker enables us to measure the performance of the DXVA decoders. We use a standard set of 1080p / 1080i H264 / MPEG-2 and VC-1 clips. We also have 1080p DIVX / XVID and MS-MPEG4 clips. Cyberlink PowerDVD 11, Arcsoft Total Media Theater 5 and MPC-HC video decoders were registered under DirectShow. DXVA Checker was used to identify which codecs could take advantage of DXVA2 and capable of rendering under EVR for the sample clips. An interesting aspect to note was that none of the codecs could process 1080i VC-1 or the MPEG-4 clips with DXVA2.
Note that the results in the next section list all the cards being tested. However, the 6450s and GT 520 shouldn't really be considered with seriousness because of the issues pointed out in the previous sections.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
70 Comments
View All Comments
ganeshts - Thursday, June 16, 2011 - link
PotPlayer apparently doesn't have support for hardware deinterlacing, and has a host of other issues [ Search for PotPlayer in this page and then read the next set of posts about it : http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=20... ].Of course, if it works for you, it is great :) (probably it is a good solution for people watching progressive material only).
The author of LAV CUVID talks in that thread about how renderless DXVA mode works with madVR at the cost of deinterlacing.
Btw, there is no decode of DTS-HD in any open source software now. Both ffdshow and PotPlayer can decode only the core DTS soundtrack. DTS decode has been around for a long time, though.
NikosD - Saturday, June 18, 2011 - link
Indeed, I was referring to progressive material only - interlaced material is rare - but the page you mentioned says PotPlayer has CPU deinterlacing.I don't see where is the problem.
Hardware Deinterlacing is less important - for most users - than Hardware Decoding (DXVA) and less important than the UNIQUE capability of using DXVA + madVR at the same time.
The cost of hardware deinterlacing is nothing compared to the cost of DXVA and madVR.
For the audio part of your answer, I have to say that because of my AVR (Pioneer VSX-920) decoding inside a PC, BluRay, Media Player or any other decoding capable device of multi-channel audio is never an option for me.
I always prefer the bitstreaming solutions for multi-channel audio - as most of the owners of AVR do - like those provided by FFDshow and PotPlayer which both are more than capable of providing them.
That's why I wrote "decoding and pass-through", I had to write "splitting and pass-through".
One last word.
For every piece of software out there, there is always a list of changes, bugs, things to do.
That doesn't mean we don't use it or like it.
PR3ACH3R - Friday, June 17, 2011 - link
@Ganesh T S,This is some NICE work.
In fact, I cannot recall when was the last time I have seen such an in depth article on the HTPC GPU subject in Anandtech.
The balance between the technical issues, the background, & the effort to honestly report all issues known to you in this article, is spot on.
If it is missing something on the issues report, it misses on the ATI/AMD DPC Latency spiking issues.
As this is still remains unnoticed in Anandtech even in this excellent article, here is a link to the AVS post describing it.
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=12...
(Ignore some of the discredit attempt posts in this thread, this problem exists to this very day.)
NikosD - Thursday, June 23, 2011 - link
Well, I did some further tests and found out that PotPlayer does have hardware deinterlacing.Have you done any tests by yourself to see if the player supports Hardware Deinterlacing ?
ganeshts - Saturday, June 25, 2011 - link
NikosD, I will definitely try PotPlayer out in the next GPU review. Till now, my knowledge is limited to what is there in the AVSForum thread.flashbacck - Friday, June 24, 2011 - link
I know HTPCs are even more of niche these days than ever, so I appreciate you still doing these tests very much.wpoulson - Thursday, July 28, 2011 - link
I really appreciate this guide and have been stepping through itI just registered the ASVid.ax file from TMT5 but the filter is not showing up in the External Filter section of MPC-HC. At first I thought it might be because I registered it on the 32 bit side and I'm using 64 bit MPC-HC, so I unregistered the file from System 32 and registered it on the 64 bit side.
I registered it by going to Start>CMD>Cntrl-Shift-Enter and using the "Regsvr32" command to register the file. I put the file along with the checkactivate dll in a folder in the root directory of my C drive and pointed the Regsvr command to the ASVid.ax file. After hitting enter, I received a "dll successfully registered" message.
Can someone help me to get the filter visible for MPC-HC?
A question...While it's considered beta, will the new LAV video decoder do the same thing the arcsoft video decoder does?
Thanks
Warren
stuartm - Friday, January 20, 2012 - link
I am aware the gt 430 is a good choice to work around the infamous WMC 29/59 framerate bug. Can you comment on whether or not the 6570 will stutter or not when playing content with 29/59 framerate problems? A very important consideration for those of us using ceton or HDHR Primes (or the new Hauppauge box) for cable TV Live viewing and record/replay.Thank You
MichaelSan1980 - Saturday, January 21, 2012 - link
I'd use my HTPC for DVD's and BD's only with an Full-HD TV. Since i have a rather strong CPU and wouldn't use Hardware Deinterlacing for DVDs, i wonder, if the GT520 is ~that~ bad, in terms of image quality?drizzo4shizzo - Wednesday, June 20, 2012 - link
Old guy here.In the market but I need confirmation that these cards can do component output to "old guy" HDTV.
NONE of the marketing materials suggest that any recent card can.
Meaning they either come with a component video breakout or at least are compatible with a known 3rd party product, and that they can do the RGB -> YUV thing.
This ancient EVGA 7600 GT I have does it... with an "svideo lookalike" 7 pin -> component breakout.
Anyone? Beuller?