Now I'm not certain about this, but I think I read the other day that although the GPUs used in Macs can handle video decoding acceleration, Apple hasn't written any drivers for it and relies solely on the CPU for that job, making it much slower and more inefficient. Again, I may or may not be making this up.
Now I'm not certain about this, but I think I read the other day that although the GPUs used in Macs can handle video decoding acceleration, Apple hasn't written any drivers for it and relies solely on the CPU for that job, making it much slower and more inefficient. Again, I may or may not be making this up.
It's probably a conscious choice. Apple have always preferred software solutions to hardware ones, ever since back in the days of the Apple ][.
If I recall correctly, there was one model of Powerbook G3 with a hardware DVD decoder in. They removed that as soon as CPUs became powerful enough to do it.
Well it is not so much of a problem now since CoreCodec has released a Intel Mac version of CoreAVC decoder for H.264.
Which should help a lot. But i still think given how closely apple and Hardware Manufacture work together with drivers. I Find it strange PowerVideo or UVD is not turned on by default.
And while you're at it, how about some hardware ENcoding to move HDTV content to mp4 format in much faster than realtime???
The problem is; not everyone do HD Content AVC ( H.264 ) encoding. And even though the trend is more and more user will be doing it. There are still large amount of people who dont use it.
But H.264 decoding. With the recent announcement from Adobe adding support of it in Flash. More and more web content will be using H.264 over the next few years. Youtube and other video site. And it will properly explode rapidly.
Therefore the chance of user watching H.264 video is much much greater. Switching on H.264 hardware decoding helps to minimise the CPU resource and it is also more power efficient. Surely with the recent afford of greener apple. Apple should consider this right?
I really hate to see my CPU usage shoot up just because of H.264 HD Video.
if this is supported then i will definately get an iMac for Xmas.
Confirmation of what? That Apple does not use hardware decoding? Just look at your CPU usage during playback... \
Personally I don't expect Apple would do it anytime soon. Apple has demonstrated in the last years that it prefers the CPU coding. Probably this is more portable and minimizes development effort, so it must be (much?) less expensive. Any developer specialized on the matter to confirm?
Comments
Now I'm not certain about this, but I think I read the other day that although the GPUs used in Macs can handle video decoding acceleration, Apple hasn't written any drivers for it and relies solely on the CPU for that job, making it much slower and more inefficient. Again, I may or may not be making this up.
It's probably a conscious choice. Apple have always preferred software solutions to hardware ones, ever since back in the days of the Apple ][.
If I recall correctly, there was one model of Powerbook G3 with a hardware DVD decoder in. They removed that as soon as CPUs became powerful enough to do it.
Which should help a lot. But i still think given how closely apple and Hardware Manufacture work together with drivers. I Find it strange PowerVideo or UVD is not turned on by default.
And while you're at it, how about some hardware ENcoding to move HDTV content to mp4 format in much faster than realtime???
The problem is; not everyone do HD Content AVC ( H.264 ) encoding. And even though the trend is more and more user will be doing it. There are still large amount of people who dont use it.
But H.264 decoding. With the recent announcement from Adobe adding support of it in Flash. More and more web content will be using H.264 over the next few years. Youtube and other video site. And it will properly explode rapidly.
Therefore the chance of user watching H.264 video is much much greater. Switching on H.264 hardware decoding helps to minimise the CPU resource and it is also more power efficient. Surely with the recent afford of greener apple. Apple should consider this right?
I really hate to see my CPU usage shoot up just because of H.264 HD Video.
if this is supported then i will definately get an iMac for Xmas.
Anymore confirmation.?
I really hate to see my CPU usage shoot up just because of H.264 HD Video.
if this is supported then i will definately get an iMac for Xmas.
Confirmation of what? That Apple does not use hardware decoding? Just look at your CPU usage during playback...
Personally I don't expect Apple would do it anytime soon. Apple has demonstrated in the last years that it prefers the CPU coding. Probably this is more portable and minimizes development effort, so it must be (much?) less expensive. Any developer specialized on the matter to confirm?