Best video codec for the Pandora?

[rohezal]

I want to watch videos on the Pandora, what codec (to encode the videos) do I use for best speed and lowest power consumtion on the Pandora (is gpu accelerated video decoding support)?

 

[klapse]

You will need to measure CPU consumption yourself. I would suggest trying HuffyUV and mpeg2 codecs for low CPU usage.

 

[rohezal]

Wait the 3D chip can't do video decoding? What is about the dsp with baseband h264 decoding? Does it work with video players avaible for the Pandora?

 

[ekianjo]

Nope.Cpu only.

 

[rohezal]

Wait the Pandora can run 8-10 hours video playback without hardware acceleration? Wow. I am impressed (and a bit shocked ).

 

[klapse]

I wouldn't bother transcoding videos to an inefficient (low cpu use) format to get 1-15 percent (guesstimated) longer playback time.


On N900 gstreamer uses DSP for some codecs and I think ffmpeg has neon support.

 

[WizardStan]

The Pandora can decode standard def (480p) h264 (through mplayer with the right options, which panplayer automatically adds) and high def (720p at least) divx or xvid encoded. There's some work playing high def h264 baseline with the DSP but I don't know if that's worked into anything yet, and even if it is odds are poor that whatever you have just uses baseline.

Simple answer: if it's divx you're fine. If it's 480p h264 you should be fine. If it is high def h264, downsample it to 480p or re-encode it with divx.

 

[Galaxis]

Simple answer: if it's divx you're fine. If it's 480p h264 you should be fine. If it is high def h264, downsample it to 480p or re-encode it with divx.

This puzzles me somewhat - just yesterday I threw one of the XBMC distibutions onto a Raspberry Pi, and it played 720p h264 just fine on my TV. It was struggling with an 720p hi10 encode, but even that almost worked.

 

[rohezal]

This puzzles me somewhat

The key for lower power consumption and smoother video playback is hardware acceleration. And I try to figure out if there is some in this thread.

So far I understood:

baseline h264 can be accelerated with the dsp

h264, xvid and divx works fine on the cpu (which uses more power).

An other interessting question: how big is the difference in battery lifetime? Is the cpu power consumption big enough vs. the power needed for the display, so a significant longer battery lifetime can be archived with hardware accelerate video decoding?

 

[WizardStan]

This puzzles me somewhat - just yesterday I threw one of the XBMC distibutions onto a Raspberry Pi, and it played 720p h264 just fine on my TV. It was struggling with an 720p hi10 encode, but even that almost worked.

The Pi's decoder chip is well supported, Broadcom basically said "here's everything you need, go nuts". When asked for the same information, TI basically said "yes, the DSP can do all these things, here's some very basic examples of how you might be able to do it yourself, but that's as much as we're willing to offer".Which isn't entirely unfair, it isn't their responsibility to write software for us, it just would have been nice if they'd provided the basic tools to do what they'd said it could do in the first place.

Hi10 decoding has to be software decoded, as I understand it, because no hardware decoder exists that can work with 10bit data or something. It was probably similar in performance as on the Pandora: struggles, almost seems to work, skips a lot of frames.

 

[Galaxis]

This puzzles me somewhat

The key for lower power consumption and smoother video playback is hardware acceleration. And I try to figure out if there is some in this thread.

Well, it's not hardware accelerated on the Pi either (at least I don't have a codec license).

 

[WizardStan]

Well, it's not hardware accelerated on the Pi either (at least I don't have a codec license).

Yes it is, or at least it should be. As far as I know, the XBMC build for Raspberry Pi fully supports the Broadcom videocore.
edit: http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=Raspberry_Pi/FAQ#Video_and_audio_formats_the_Raspberry_Pi_can_playback

H.264 up to 1080p is supported, excepting Hi10p. Additional codecs, such as MPEG2 and VC1, require purchase for HD playback. It then suggests that standard definition videos (ie, 480p MPEG2 videos) can be decoded in software without the purchase of a codec.

But your h264 videos will all have no trouble on the Pi with its hardware decoder, whereas the Pandora only has hardware support for baseline (at best), and everything else needs to be done on the CPU.

Do a hi10p comparison between the Pi and the Pandora, that's the only way to get anything resembling an accurate comparison.

 

[TrashyMG]

Don't you have to pay for a commercial codec to have this support on the Raspberry Pi?

 

[WizardStan]

As far as I know, only the MPEG2 and VC1 codecs are commercial, XBMC has support for the full h264 built right into it.

edit: yeah, if you look at their store, only keys for MPEG2 and VC-1 are available: http://www.raspberrypi.com/license-keys/

h264 is a freebie.