More Codec performance test

60 different codecs and compression settings on 3 different single drive systems.
Playback is on 1 layer only. Results do not scale to multiple layers
NOTE: System disc is NOT the drive disc.

Tested
Single Raptor 74GB
Single 10k SCSI Atlas iV
Single 15k SCSI

Results:
Different drive Systems are pretty similiar.
10k drive is not slower than 15k drive.
Raptor is slower at uncompressed data - but pretty similiar with compressed codecs. ( Blackmagic codecs are uncompressed )
Single layer 25fps playback of 720p footage is possible with:
photojpeg 50% & 75% and mjpegA 50% & 75%

Single layer 25 fps playback of 1080p footage is possible with
photojpeg 50% and mjpeg 50% ( just )
and marginally at photojpeg 75% and mjpegA 75% ( just )

60 different codecs tested playing back 4 layers of the same type of content

tested on internal drive
internal raptor 74GB
scsi 15000rpm Maxtor Atlas 74GB
scsi 10000rpm Maxtor Atlas iV 140GB
dual raptor - firmtek card

Results

Internal drive is very very bad.( and these figures are just averages - not deviations, the internal drive has poor consistency ).
Raptor, and scsi 10k and scsi 15k have close performance.
scsi 10k is slightly faster with some codecs.

Only dv-ntsc will give close to 30fps performance on all 4 layers.
DV-NTSC is slightly faster than DV-PAL- the difference is important

Quote:

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Originally Posted by samsc

60 different codecs tested playing back 4 layers of the same type of content

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These results are a little geeky.
Ill try and find to way to present them which makes more sense.

Single and dual raptors same files.
4th layer complete time

dual raptors have slight edge with dv codecs.
Not much in it.

Softraid vs Apple raid.

Very little in it....

Quote:

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Originally Posted by samsc

Softraid vs Apple raid.

Very little in it....

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Did you play with any of the settings? Different , journalled or not, etc.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by mdc1138

Did you play with any of the settings? Different , journalled or not, etc.

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I always turn off journalling.
Always.

Just wondering why DV PAL only makes an appearance at 50%

Cheers

Quote:

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Originally Posted by tharding

Just wondering why DV PAL only makes an appearance at 50%

Cheers

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DV-PAL and DV-NTSC have no quality settings.
Their compression rate is fixed, and unchangeable.
50% is just a convention.
Its not really 50%

Richard,

Thank you for this very valuable and obviously painstaking information. It must have taken a very long time to compile all of this.

I'm just curious, what was the media you used for this? What clip was it?

Christian Choi

Quote:

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Originally Posted by litemover

Richard,

Thank you for this very valuable and obviously painstaking information. It must have taken a very long time to compile all of this.

I'm just curious, what was the media you used for this? What clip was it?

Christian Choi

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I automated everything, and had the software write out the results to a tab delimited file.
...Im lazy...
then i imported all the information into excel. Wrote some scripts to order everything correctly, then plotted graphs in Deltagraph.
Took about 5 days.
But the results were worth it.
I now have the ability to benchmark anything really quickly.
And I built-in the testing to the software - so you can do it if i tell you where its hidden...

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I used 5 different hi-def 1080p files from Digital juice,
http://www.digitaljuice.com/products...p?cid=1&pvid=5

i converted them using 'Compressor' to 68 different file formats.
Compressor is quite good at doing this- and will do 68 output files - into the correct folders - with different sizes and codecs - from a single click....
http://www.apple.com/dvdstudiopro/compressor.html

i got my copy from buying DVD studio pro.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by mdc1138

Did you play with any of the settings? Different , journalled or not, etc.

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Take a look at the EX1....

Dual Dual pentiums, 8 drives?

Ask them about performance?
Danny can give you their contact numbers.

http://www.vlps.com/NorthAmerica/news/vlps_30.phtml

Quote:

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Originally Posted by samsc

I now have the ability to benchmark anything really quickly.
And I built-in the testing to the software - so you can do it if i tell you where its hidden...

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Sounds good to me! Nevertheless, Great job at figuring all that out. Thank you again.

Christian Choi

Quote:

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Originally Posted by samsc

Take a look at the EX1....

Dual Dual pentiums, 8 drives?

Ask them about performance?
Danny can give you their contact numbers.

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Does Danny work for them now or something? Looks interesting but only3 movie layers and 2 adjustment layers? The media window on the DX2 does rock though. Having the ability to automatically index your files into thumbnails onto a touchscreen with all the playmodes on it sure does beat building palettes.

I'm very interested in quality of playback, particularly of Hidef. Not to be honest or anything, but I never use the 3d effects, even in Catalyst. I suppose I would if I needed to wrap them around a 3d opbject just to get them to read tangiably. So far, I haven't needed to use them. I barely have enough time to push video out let alone light layers and worry about rotating stuff around though, I suppose this could make for some very interesting effects that can't be done via video, if you explored the possibilities and had the time to really dive into it.

Christian Choi

Quote:

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Originally Posted by litemover

Does Danny work for them now or something?Christian Choi

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Danny is still at highend. Danny knows the team at VLPS.

I never use 3d either - i think it very cheesy unless it rendered with great skill.
And the 3d artists- have phonemenal tools available to them these days.

Dodgy 3d in real time just isnt going to cut it- when you are competing with stuff rendered in Maya or whatever.

Peoples expectations of 3d these days- are way too high. They dont understand the countless hours and days of rendering required in the production process to make their stuff look good.
Its the same for video too.
Making video look professional is a shit load of work.

Christian,

The thumbnail thing on the EX-1/ DX2 was actually developed for Catalyst Media Servers ;-). You have to have the same content on the DX2 Mac as you do on the EX-1.

I saw the EX-1 running with 3 3d objects and a artbeats movie behind. The performance was not good. The movie was playing at around 15 fps... I noticed this at their demo.

I was under the impression that the EX-1 spare media server was just that. Or for doing dual output stuff.

The problem with the EX-1 is you could spend all your programming time just lighting your 3D objects - which you could do in Maya or any other 3d package.

Zillions of DMX channels.

Hugh

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Spam Butterfly

The problem with the EX-1 is you could spend all your programming time just lighting your 3D objects - which you could do in Maya or any other 3d package.

Hugh

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and nowhere near as good.
opengl or directx shading and lighting is nowhere near good enough to compete with maya renders or even any low end 3d program.
unless its raytraced its never going to be good enough.

soft-shadows?
transparency?
artistic lighting?
I dont think so.

the moment you hit this sort of complexity its back to the 3d program for decent looking fx, at which point its pointless having 3d controllable from dmx.

except for textures and movement and visual complexity - which is how it works in pixelmad.