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Speeding MPlayer on VIA EPIA motherboards, non-M versions
http://forums.linhes.org/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=526		 Page 1 of 1
Author:  pete-edworthy [ Fri Jan 16, 2004 3:29 pm ]
Post subject:  Speeding MPlayer on VIA EPIA motherboards, non-M versions
Thanks to a wonderful guy called Alastair Robinson an accelerated video driver exists for the CyberBlade C1i graphics adapter that is used on the non-M versions of the VIA EPIA motherboards.

His website is at http://www.blackfiveservices.co.uk/EPIAVidix.shtml

Even better the version of MPlayer included has this driver, sadly MPlayer needs re-compiling to deal with the limitations of the C3's missing instructions so...

From a terminal window:

Code:
cd /home/mythtv/r4_src
tar -xvjf MPlayer-0.92-patched.tar.bz2
cd Mplayer-0.92
./configure
make
su
[root password]
make install


because of the low level access of the driver to the video card it needs root access. This is a security risk so if you are worried about this stuff read the MPlayer docs on how to setup a driver, but this is much easier :?

Code:
cd /usr/local/bin
chown root:mythtv mplayer
chmod u=rwxs mplayer
chmod g=rxs mplayer


To use the driver go into 'Setup' -> 'Video Settings' -> 'Player Settings'
and set it to:

Code:
/usr/local/bin/mplayer -fs -vo xvidix -framedrop -quiet %s


This has improved the playback on my 800MHz greatly, although I'm still playing with settings to get high quality DVD's to play well. 8000Mbs plays perfectly, but 9200Mbs is choppy on with the research :twisted:
Author:  pete-edworthy [ Thu Jan 29, 2004 4:21 pm ]
Post subject:  yet more improvements
Installing as tv i.e. 800x600 also saves a few cpu cycles.

For SP/DIF output you need the viaudiocombo driver.

Code:
#get the driver
wget http://downloads.viaarena.com/drivers/audio/viaudiocombo-2.3-1.tar.gz
#get rpm utils
tar -xvzf viaudiocombo-2.3-1.tar.gz
cd viaudiocombo-2.3-1
rpm2cpio viaudiocombo-2.3-1.rpm | cpio -ivd
tar -xvzf viaudiocombo-2.3.tar.gz
su
[password]
cp viaudiocombo.o /lib/modules/2.4.21-xfs/kernel/drivers/sound/
depmod
#cp viasound /etc/init.d/
cd \etc\modutils\
mv alsa-0.9-knoppix ..\alsa-0.9-knoppix.old
echo alias sound-slot-0 viaudiocombo > viaudiocombo
update-modules

cd \etc
#edit modules
#comment out snd-via82xx
#add viaudiocombo spdif_out=1
exit
reboot



also make sure to have the jumper in the right (pins 3&4) place.

to use it just use mplayer as shown above.

Sadly a few limitations, the non-M versions can only do two channels of audio even through the sp/dif port. It is possible to overclock it with the longhall driver 1GHz is reachable, this does disable LIRC though. I'm not going to explain how to do this as its quite dangerous.

Even with all this fast sections in DVDs will have dropped frames.

I'm looking forward to a 1GHz EPIA-M for my birthday, which should be easier.
Author:  Xsecrets [ Thu Jan 29, 2004 5:17 pm ]
Post subject: 
yes the nemiah is the way to go. I haven't used one myself, but the upgraded specs should make it plenty for this kind of thing. 1Gh with full speed FPU, and sse instructions, plus I think all the nemiah boards have the mpeg2 decoder on them. Pretty sweet. At some point if I have some extra money I will probably get one of these to play with. Only downside over the lower clocked M boards is you need some sort of cooling.
Author:  pete-edworthy [ Wed Feb 04, 2004 8:59 am ]
Post subject:  M1000 baby
Just got my board and the cooling fan on this is very quiet, much quieter than my hd or quiet (30db) psu. So I don't think it will be a problem :D
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