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skalka
Asked: 2010-10-29 02:38:57 +0800 CST

Simplest way to use graphic acceleration to watch videos

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I've heard about the possibility to play videos using graphic processor of video card instead of normal processor. I've read a few tutorial but I haven't see improvement in performances, processors continue to work a lot, so maybe I just haven't enabled this feature. I'm wondering if there's a simple and quick method to do it and which are practical advantages, no technical or theoretic. I have an nvidia 8400 and I use proprietary driver (260.19.06).

hardware-acceleration

3 Answers

  1. There are several player supporting gpu accelerated video playback. But first you (nvidia user) should install latest nvidia drivers and vdpau libries (i guess vdpau-va-driver or vdpau-video or even just libvdpau -> synaptic will tell you).

    • VLC Player >= v1.1.2 (supports a lot of formats) -> enable gpu acceleration
    • Gnome Media Player (autouse best engine vlc|xine|...)
    • smplayer with vdpau support

    Latest nvidia packages you can find in ppa:ubuntu-x-swat/x-updates SMPlayer with vdpau support you can find in ppa:nvidia-vdpau/ppa

    Use carefully, ppa's can harm your pc.

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  2. Personally I use XBMC and Boxee to play back HD and SD Movies on my Ubuntu box. I have no problem with the same driver and a 8600. You have the option to turn on or off the VDPAU in these applications. Both apps have nice GUI. I don't now there is any official repository for XBMC for 10.10 I have compiled it from source but it was not a nightmare :) Boxee has deb packeg to intall on Ubuntu 10.10 and it working fine. I hope it helped :)

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  3. Here is the best solution!

    You can select Output driver option from some Media Players to play best quality videos with minimum use of processors. To do so I suggest you two players: Smplayer and Umplayer.

    Once installed follow these simple steps to use graphic processor to play videos.

    • Open either player and go to preferences (shortcut to open preferences: Ctrl+P)
    • Go to Video tab.
    • in Output driver: you can select your video driver to which you want to use while playing high quality videos. For example you can use xv option for Best performance, or you can use X11(slow) if you want to play hight definition videos in low configuration system. You can find other options like gl, gl(fast), gl(fast- ATI cards) and so on.. Use which best suits for you configuration.
    • Get help from following picture, I used Umplayer but it would be same for Smplayer also:

    image

    Please reply if you need further assistance..

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