[K12OSN] Pixelation with MPlayer

["Terrell Prudé Jr."]

Yes, it sure could.  I saw that 90-client-per-server figure and went,
"WHOA!!!"  I did some server CPU tests on my own server, and here's what
I found:

640x480 MPEG4 clip:  21% CPU/session
320x240 MPEG4 clip:  7% CPU/session

The CPU's are 1.2GHz Athlon MP's.  This is per CPU core, BTW, so if
you've got four such cores, you get just under 4x the capacity.

--TP
_______________________________
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Petre Scheie wrote:
> Could this be an issue of quantity?  That is, Terrel, how many clients
> have you got simultaneously watching the videos?  If Jim's got an
> average of 90 clients per server, even though they're big boxes (I've
> seen 'em), might that number be more than the server can handle for
> video?
>
> Petre
>
> Terrell Prudé Jr. wrote:
>> I've watched 640x480 videos (MPEG4) without any problems on my thin
>> client with MPlayer.  The key was to swap the video board in the thin
>> client for something a bit more powerful.  In my case, it was the
>> Matrox Millenium G400; doing that solved all my MPlayer issues.  It
>> also, BTW, made TuxType play faster.  Heck, I'm able to watch Tom's
>> Hardware videos, in MPEG4, at 720x480, without any framedrops,
>> pixelations, whatever--just nice, smooth video.  No, I don't have to
>> throw the -framedrop switch, either.
>>
>> Folks, watching videos on thin clients WORKS FINE.  I do it all the
>> time.  If you can, please try swapping your video board and see what
>> happens.
>>
>> --TP
>> _______________________________
>> Do you GNU!?
>> Microsoft Free since 2003 <http://www.gnu.org/>--the ultimate
>> antivirus protection!
>>
>>
>> David Hopkins wrote:
>>> Didn't mean for this to cause problems, so to speak, but ... what I
>>> have observed is that the video clip is mostly watchable at the
>>> 320x240 resolution that seems to be the 'native' resolution of the
>>> clip.  However, it pixelates which is where the teachers start
>>> chiming in about the inferior quality.  It does get worse as the
>>> clips get larger:  A 5Mb clip and an 'extended' version of the clip
>>> that is 13Mb do not have the same playback characteristics, with the
>>> larger and longer clip looking worse.
>>>
>>> My clients consist of Epia 533-based systems and donated Compaq EN
>>> SFF systems.  Either can play back without issues as long as they
>>> are fat clients. I have Gb from the server to the switch and 100Mb
>>> to the clients.
>>>
>>>  If I specify using X11-only, then MPlayer says that the Compaq does
>>> not have the resources to play back the video.  Using Xv, it does
>>> but is pixelated on fast motion scenes. :(
>>>
>>> MPlayer has alot of options for framedropping, lower fps playback,
>>> etc, and I will try and play with these to see if there is some
>>> magic combination that provides overall better quality.
>>>
>>> I really hope that the Atlanta work goes well since it will help me
>>> when I periodically try to the the State of Delaware DOE interested
>>> in the thin client approach.  I have a few Reps and Senators that
>>> know about the option, but getting them to commit time to really
>>> looking at it has been tough and little glitches like lower quality
>>> movie playback seems to 'impress' them more than the phenomenal
>>> uptime of the systems, ease of use, ease of management, etc.
>>>
>>> Slightly off-topic, but the same instuctor that is really vocal
>>> about the playback also was vocal about not getting sound on a video
>>> clip a few weeks back.  After playing it back in a pure Windows
>>> environment, it was finally possible to convince him that the clip
>>> in question didn't, in fact, have any sound and was only video.
>>>
>>> Sincerely,
>>> Dave Hopkins
>>>
>>>
>>>
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>>>
>>>
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>>
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