GPU accelerated Flash video

[thilanliyan]

http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3678
http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/16463/1/

 

[SlowSpyder]

The article on AT's homepage says it'll be available with the 9.11 Catalyst drivers.

 

[Lonyo]

It's not ATI Stream...?

 

[Mgz]

I am surprised that ATi HD 3850/3870 is not in the supported list while I have been running MPC-HC DXVA 1080p on my 3850 for a while now

 

[tommo123]

me too. my ancient 2400XT can handle some decoding of AVC content and these flash movies etc are just AVC in a flash container aren't they? should only need a splitter and then the video can be decoded as normal. think there already is one for mpc-hc

 

[dualsmp]

Seems like a major oversight not supporting the discreet Radeon HD 3xxx cards. The AGP HD 3xxx variants would benefit the most from accelerated flash since their CPU's are not that powerful to begin with. Yet integrated HD 3xxx series are supported? What was ATI thinking?

 

[v8envy]

From the Linux ATI driver discussion I'm guessing the 3 series will never be supported for this functionality w/ Windows. The 2 and 3 series only had 'UVD' fixed function hardware. ATI have finally exposed some video acceleration for modern codecs like H.264 -- but only on hardware with UVD2. This includes the 4 series, presumably 5 series, and one of the onboard chipsets (HD3200?)

Now the good news for those of us with Linux and a few years to wait for drivers is the open source guys are implementing video decoding in shaders, to be abstracted by the new Gallium-friendly software stack. The bad news it probably won't be ready by the time multi-threaded video decode stuff runs great on hardware of the day in the first place.

Oh, and the API Intel and AMD have chosen for video decoding has a bridge to nvidia's proprietary API. There's no excuse for the Adobe guys to not use it.

 

[dualsmp]

From the Linux ATI driver discussion I'm guessing the 3 series will never be supported for this functionality w/ Windows. The 2 and 3 series only had 'UVD' fixed function hardware. ATI have finally exposed some video acceleration for modern codecs like H.264 -- but only on hardware with UVD2. This includes the 4 series, presumably 5 series, and one of the onboard chipsets (HD3200?)

Now the good news for those of us with Linux and a few years to wait for drivers is the open source guys are implementing video decoding in shaders, to be abstracted by the new Gallium-friendly software stack. The bad news it probably won't be ready by the time multi-threaded video decode stuff runs great on hardware of the day in the first place.

Oh, and the API Intel and AMD have chosen for video decoding has a bridge to nvidia's proprietary API. There's no excuse for the Adobe guys to not use it.

According to this chart (not sure of the accuracy) the 2xxx/3xxx mobility chips only support UVD, or UVD+. The mobility HD 3xxx seem to support UVD+ (with the exception of mobility 3200 and 3300 which support only UVD), the mobility 2xxx support UVD as well.

The question is why can't the discreet HD 3xxx cards support flash acceleration just like their mobility HD 3xxx counterparts? Both the discreet and mobility are either UVD or UVD+. And why can't the discreet and mobility HD 2xxx series support flash acceleration as well if the mobility HD 3200 and HD 3300 are capable of flash acceleration since they only support UVD?

Essentially if the mobility HD 3300 and HD 3200 support flash acceleration with only UVD, then every card on this list should be just as capable as of flash acceleration since they all at least support UVD or higher. Something is not adding up.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unified_Video_Decoder#

Cypress Radeоn HD 5800 Series------------UVD 2.2
Juniper Radeоn HD 5700 Series------------UVD 2.2
RV790 Radeon HD 4890 Series------------UVD 2[7]
RV770 Radeon HD 4800 Series------------UVD 2
RV740 Radeon HD 4700 Series------------UVD 2.2
RV730 Radeon HD 4600 Series------------UVD 2.2
RV710 Radeon HD 4300/4500 Series-------UVD 2.2
RV670 Radeon HD 3800 Series------------UVD+
RV635 Radeon HD 3600 Series------------ UVD+
RV620 Radeon HD 3400 Series------------ UVD+
RV630 Radeon HD 2600 Series------------ UVD
RV610 Radeon HD 2400 Series------------ UVD
RS880 Radeon HD 4200/AMD 785G Chipset-UVD 2

RS780
RS780D Radeon HD 3200/AMD 780G Chipset
Radeon HD 3300 IGP/AMD 790GX Chipset -------UVD

M98 Mobility Radeon HD 4800 Series-----------UVD 2
M96 Mobility Radeon HD 4600 Series-----------UVD 2
M92 Mobility Radeon HD 4300/4500 Series-----UVD 2.2
M88 Mobility Radeon HD 3800 Series-----------UVD+
M86 Mobility Radeon HD 3600 Series-----------UVD+
M82 Mobility Radeon HD 3400 Series-----------UVD+
M76 Mobility Radeon HD 2600 Series-----------UVD
M72 Mobility Radeon HD 2400 Series-----------UVD
M71 Mobility Radeon HD 2300 Series-----------UVD

 

[v8envy]

As I recall UVD+ was not enough, UVD2 was required. I don't remember which particular onboard video had the UVD2 hardware though. I could be completely wrong re: the HD4200 being the one.

 

[dualsmp]

According to the chart above the integrated Radeon HD 3xxx doesn't support UVD2 though, unless the chart is wrong. I'm just as confused as anyone else.

ATI says the following cards are capable of flash acceleration.

http://forums.amd.com/game/messageview.cfm?catid=260&threadid=122175&enterthread=y

AMD/ATI Hardware video decoding of H.264 content in Flash Player 10.1 is supported on AMD/ATI products with UVD2 with the ATI Catalyst™ Software Suite, starting with version 9.11 for the ATI Radeon™ family of products, and driver release 8.68 for the ATI FirePro™ family of products.

Radeon Radeon HD 4xxx (and higher)
Mobility Radeon Mobility Radeon HD 4xxx series (and higher)
Integrated/Motherboard Radeon HD 3xxx (and higher)
FirePro FirePro V3750, FirePro V5700, FirePro V7750, FirePro V8700, and FirePro
V8750 (and later)

 

[postmortemIA]

so flash sucks so much that you need both CPU and GPU to barely run 720P movie. wonderful.

 

[dualsmp]

Well I did a little digging and according to this post the HD 3200 is the only 3xxx series that supports UDV2. He could be correct, though maybe more than one 3xxx series has support for UDV2.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=14162508&postcount=16

780G 3200HD is the only 3xxx that has UVD2

 

[jmmyz14]

I am also in the same boat as a few of you. I have an ATI 3870 512DDR4 and my Hulu and other Flash video website viewing is terrible. Constant stuttering and plenty of dropped frames. When I saw the news I was jumping for joy, but when I saw the supported hardware list my heart sank.

You would think that a moderately beefy video card like the 3870 could accelerate some basic Flash videos...

I may try to pick up a GT240 or GT250 on the cheap for my HTPC now.

 

[cmdrdredd]

so flash sucks so much that you need both CPU and GPU to barely run 720P movie. wonderful.

Only if your system is an utter piece of shit to begin with.

 

[Arkaign]

I am also in the same boat as a few of you. I have an ATI 3870 512DDR4 and my Hulu and other Flash video website viewing is terrible. Constant stuttering and plenty of dropped frames. When I saw the news I was jumping for joy, but when I saw the supported hardware list my heart sank.

You would think that a moderately beefy video card like the 3870 could accelerate some basic Flash videos...

I may try to pick up a GT240 or GT250 on the cheap for my HTPC now.

That's bizarre. Flash HD video seems to work fine even on some of the low-end boxes at my job sites. Stuff like Athlon X2 3800+ and onboard Nvidia 6150 video on DDR1 memory.

Have you tried a different browser?

 

[Qbah]

Just tried it on a lappy I'm fixing. Has a C2D @1.5GHz (T5250) and a 8400M GS. Ran Youtube HD (MW2 HD trailer) - CPU is running at 70%+ and as a result - sometimes dropping frames (and it sure as hell ain't smooth). Running the newest WHQL drivers from nVidia. Nothing said I had to run any special versions so I assume those should be fine.

I also added the &fmt=22 to the link and well... CPU usage dropped like 25% on average (sits at below 50% most of the time). It is a bit smoother I guess, but still kinda choppy - or maybe I'm just paranoid... It just ain't buttery smooth.

Well, at least it works... Though I wonder how an Atom + 9400M would fare (I just don't trust reviews fully ). This laptop is a LOT more powerful than an Atom+IGP and it is still far from perfect...

Btw, it's a fresh Win7 install. Just drivers and flash 10.1 and a few extra drivers.