yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] leoni1980:
Fair point. If you can tell me how to remove the 'but disappointing' bit from the poll I will, otherwise we'll imagine the 'but disappointing' bit doesn't exist for the purposes of the poll...

Here's my video. If it's out of sync please report as I've had this problem before and didn't have chance to check the upload before I left the house. Cheers.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] yetdy:
I can't say that I'm impressed by the video performance of the athena because it's my largest problem eversince I got it last week especially in 128 dpi settings. I'm neither in the position to say that I'm disappointed also because I really haven't had the chance to play with it that long. I would have to vote later. I appreciate though these types of threads because it forces people to look for ways to either extend their capabilities in trying to know and teach what they can do with their athena to prove that it's a really good machine or to simply shoot down the opinion of others. Suffice it to say that it may bring out the best of the athena or bring it down to te gutter. The best part is that people get to choose base on their best judgement who to believe and which opinion to discard.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] leoni1980:
Any performance videos yet?

I genuinely would like to know if the claims about video performance being good are true, I'm not trying to catch anyone out :)
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
Sorry, I did'nt see the word UNCONVERTED and picked A. I guess it should have been a B. But why would anybody play it unconverted? The files are just far too big unconverted, isn't it? Also, it would carry so much useless information designed for home theatre systems at least, that it would literally chock any small device movie player to dealth. What I do play include a 900MB movie which is crystal clear, does not skip at all, and never have any out of sync problem. But I'm not sure if it has gone through conversion, as I downloaded it from the net.

If I want a home theatre movie quality experience, I'd not use Athena to do it. I'll use my home theatre system.

Would you play movies unconverted on say a viewty or N95?

Midget, could you transfer my vote from A to B?
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] Martincyborg@gmail.com:
quite to the point ha?
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] leoni1980:
My wording is a little off-kilter. When I say 'unconverted' I mean 'not specifically optimised for the device' I.E. the sort of file you'd download/play on your desktop. Sorry for the equivocal wordage peeps!
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
I never convert any movies that I download, so that qualifies as unconverted then?
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] Just about right:
I hav to jump in here. The resolution or aspect ratio of your movie file along with the audio coding was low. If I had those settings on a movie and played on the Athena, it would be no problem. I convert almost all my movies using DVD Catalyst and I ensure it is at 30 fps, audio is at 192, the max I can get it and the picture adjustment is at 1100. I have very few problems when I play those on my athena. If I could get the file you have I would love to cross compare, because that video shouldn't choke the Athena at all. At least in my experience using core player.

Then again, this is just my two cents.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] leoni1980:
yes it does! when you get chance to upload a video showing the quality please do. I'm suprised if your Athena can handle them without either displaying linear patterns during fast scenes, losing sync or stopping and starting. If it can then I will capitulate and say you are a lucky so-and-so!
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] leoni1980:
i chose that video because it is one i had problems with on my athena.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] leoni1980:
EVERYONE TRY THIS SHORT VIDEO AND REPORT BACK ON THE PLAYBACK QUALITY. I THOUGHT IT WOULD BE BEST TO HAVE A STANDARD FILE TO TEST OUT THAT'S SMALL ENOUGH TO UPLOAD. It's just a video of my dog recorded on my N95 at tv quality. It is a 640 by 480 resolution video which should be a good ratio for the Athena. I haven't modified it in any way. Let me know what results you all get.

Cheers
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
In that case, I'd keep my A rating for the time being because until now I still don't understnad the issue.

I'd test your sample file and provide feedback. There must be something that I've missed I guess. Yes, perhaps I have been real lucky.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
I've downloaded it to my desktop runing Vista and want to try it here first. But could'nt play it media player. Do you need to convert it before it can play there too? What program do you use to play it on desktop?

On my device, it says "MPEC4 AAC Audio Decoder not included! It was removed from the official install package because of intellectual property considerations." (strange. I never had this error before)

Is this the kind of problem you're referring to Leoni?

Oh wait, although it has the above error message, the video plays perfectly! I get very sharp image. The camera itself jerks a bit I think during shooting but the playback is smooth.

No sound though. Is there supposed to be sound?

Cute little doggy! Is that your dog?

So, to sum up, for me. It works without conversion on my Athena but not on my Vista desktop.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] leoni1980:
The issue is that Video playback is an issue with the Athena (and other devices) yet some people insist theirs work fine. If there is no problem then I wonder why threads like this this this this and this among many others exist? (oh, and this!)

Many moons ago I thought I'd solved the problem bu it must've been a lucky video file as a couple of days later I tried a different downloaded movie and back I was to the 'flickery' pictures and loss of sync.

I just wish there was an answer that worked for everyone.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
Is there supposed to be sound? I did'nt hear any, or perhaps it's very faint? The video itself is plays smoothly though. I'm not sure if I "pass" your test. Please let me know if my A rating was justified, or perhaps it should be a B? Anyway, other than the error message that pops up, the video plays without any indication of any problem.

Yes, I've also seen those links that you gave, but was never able to understand what they were saying. I did'nt tweak my device in anyway.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] leoni1980:
Just after some feedback on how well it works. My Athena used to struggle with N95 videos so I thought it would be a good test. I'm not sure why yours works but other people's don't. Strange. I used to tweak mine to death too trying to get things running smoothly.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
I take it then that I had justified the "A" rating for my case.:)
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] leoni1980:
it would seem so ;)
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
hooray! : )
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
No war so far. :) Leoni is a reasonable person. He certainly won't **** at his own thread.

Ooops. hope this won't get YOU started.:D
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] klenovsky:
just tried the dog clip on not tweaked Athena with just the DUAL 3.0 and the Core player. runs nice windowed, but very poorly on 640x480 just like slideshow... :(:(:(
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
Mine is as smooth as silk, using TCPMP. Give it a try. In my case, I had an error message poping up. But I just close that error window and the video played without any problem.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] c0mput0r:
Just tried the dog file. Using tcpmp for playback with micro drive mode enabled, "ATI_IMAGEON", smooth zoom 50% it benchmarked at 67%. I tried it from sdhc memory card, micro drive, and internal memory. Internal memory benchmarked slower at 65%. It does not play perfectly with a small pause for the video in the beginning. Then it plays good until the dog runs. When the dog runs it gets a little choppy. Playback seems worse when the camera moves. It is not as fluid as I would like.

For me I personally re-encode everything I put on my phone into xvid with video at 512x384 and bit rate 600. All audio 128 mp3. Fps is always changed to 23. If I use these settings I get acceptable video and audio playback and tcpmp benchmark of 100% or more. The video is only encoded single pass. At these settings a full 2 hours for a single file is around 670MB. Episodes of sea-lab i have are at 50-60 MB and sponge bob episodes for the nephews are about the same.

I do notice some audio sync issues in longer files every so often but a quick pause and restart usually fixes it.

I have uploaded a re-encoded video with the settings I use. In tcpmp it benchmarks as 103.84% playback speed. Here is a link for you to try it out and see.

http://www.mediafire.com/?f1jycf2nl3w
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] c0mput0r:
eaglesteve could you run the orig dog file in tcpmp and select benchmark and tell us what average speed it reports?

Also what version of tcpmp are you using.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
I use different settings from yours. I tick smooth zoom 50%, quality medium, raw framebuffer.

Each benchmark is different. Most of the time, I get at least 150% to 180% speed. This is playing Leoni's file as is.

Attached is a screen shot of one of the runs showing average speed of 175.22%, benchmark frame rate of 49.54 (original is 28.27) and bench mark data rate of 4.9 Mbit/s (original is 2.8 Mbit/s)
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] c0mput0r:
Well that explains everything. If you do not have quality set to "normal" then you are not going to see the problems everyone else sees. For me the options > video > quality setting i use is normal. The other two selections are low and lowest but i use normal. I would expect that if you changed that to normal quality and benchmarked it you would see exactly what we see. For me any other setting besides normal makes everything too blurry. Switching from normal to low will speed things up quite a bit and thats why you are not seeing what we see.

edit: another weird thing is that in your screen shot it shows original time as 9 seconds when in fact the clip is 12 seconds.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] taxist:
SKTools results of Athena:

Integer;314.1551;Moves/25 usec (275.47 -Dell Axim x51v, 283.55 -HP iPAQ hx4700) = GOOD!!!

Floating point;8.411;MWIPS (8.14 - Dell Axim x51v, 8.04 - HP iPAQ hx4700) = GOOD!!!

RAM access;2205;Speed index (2095.00 - Dell Axim x51v, 2102.00 - HP iPAQ hx4700) = GOOD!!!

Draw bitmaps;985;Speed index (1654.00 - Dell Axim x51v, 1276.00 - HP iPAQ hx4700, 1328.00 - FS Pocket LOOX n560, 1240.00 - HP iPAQ hx2410, 928.00 - O2 XDA Atom) = it's really NOT GOOD !!! :(

Main storage (write);8325.20;KB/sec

Main storage (read);6314.49;KB/sec

SDMMC (write); 606.32;KB/sec

SDMMC (read);14840.58;KB/sec

MicroDrive (write);15917.10;KB/sec

MicroDrive (read);12989.43;KB/sec

Video System of Athena (drivers? hard components?) - **** ..... :(
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] mlambert890:
Not sure I understand the overall point of this thread? It's just a fact that the Imageon is really not well supported by *any* player and Picard (TCPMP/Core) makes this very clear.

Where the fault lies is a different story, but nothing with an Imageon is going to do well on the Win Mobile front. Basically, your best bet with high bit rate files will probably be to use raw framebuffer and essentially let the 624Mhz proc do all the work.

This is why so many still hold onto the Dell Axim 51v. If their primary usage is as a media player, there isnt any good alternative.

I went from HP4705 to the Advantage and I LOVE the Advantage for its overall feature set (even though its huge). I knew video would be a problem and of course, it is. Even worse than the HP4705 which already wasnt great (and this is born out by the benchmark results above).

Much like with the Hermes (which now has a fix) the problem is the video driver. Here of all places on XDA I thought this was well known. Does this thread indicate that there is somehow still debate on the topic??
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
Actually, although the benchmark shows only about 71% speed when set to best quality, I as a viewer could not detect any difference as compared to the converted one. Both are extremely smooth. I did not have the slide show effect. The quality of the image are equally sharp whether it was set to best or medium.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] leoni1980:
The 'debate' is outlined in the first post of this forum. Some people reported that their video performance was superb, hence the title.

The debate comes from a disparity over the expected performance of the device (in line with what we know about Imageon support) and what other people experience - which in some cases here is that they can throw anything at their Athena and it will play smoothly.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] adamelphick:
Hey leoni - I just saw this thread and thought I'd post my finding on your 'dog' video!!

My Ameo (with Dual 3.0) plays it REALLY badly - video skips - sound is non-existent etc -

I have complained to HTC about video performance and lack of hardware acceleration (despite it being advertised as having this chip!) on the device but so far (4 days now) no reply! What a surprise!
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
What setting are you using? Mine plays very smoothly even at 71% speed at best quality. However the sound was not there. I use raw frame buffer. What about you?
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] mlambert890:
No one can have "superb" performance on any Imageon based device. Maybe Ive just been at this too long? This is equally an issue on the HX4700. Anyone who says the performance is great is going to be either running a low bit rate file, or running with quality on medium, etc.

There's no mystery or magic. Was that your point then, I guess? To call out those who feel their performance is fantastic and prove to them that its because they're using lower settings?

Of course you can encode a file in such a way that it will play well on nearly any device, but devices based on the Imageon with a 624Mhz XScale and TCPMP/CorePlayer are simply not going to do well on normal/high quality with high bit rate 640x480 DiVX files (other CODECS will just be even worse, actually).

Its not really a debateable thing.. Anyone whose mileage is varying is simply using lower settings or low bit rate files. I have found that the Athena performance is roughly in line with what you'd expect from other PXA270/Imageon devices - maybe slightly worse, but none of them can play the tough clips without dropping frames. Are there any threads in particular where someone said they can play, for example, the CorePlayer Matrix trailer sample clip (640x480x1500kbit) and have it bench over 100%?

If you really want to hammer this point home, then make the poll scientific. Don't say "can handle anything I can throw at it"... simply say "can handle the freely available torture test clip at coreplayer.com" I can guarantee that the answer will be 100% what you're looking for. I'm sure the N95 can play that clip just fine and I can tell you the Axim x51v will bench at at least 150% on it, but an Imageon device will be hard pressed to break 90.

The other thing is, video is subjective. For Eaglesteve, 71% is acceptable, which is awesome. For me (and I suspect you) its a disaster... THATS where peoples mileage will REALLY vary... Perceived performance - not absolute performance. Absolute performance is not debateable, but "is this good enough for me?" certainly is.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] X7501_PPC:
realy ,,, it is a laptob

not pocket pc
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] tazeemn:
I totaly agree with malmabert890's comments. I've owned a few iPaqs including the 2790b and an i-Mate JasJam before upgrading to X7501 and the video performance of both JasJam and X7501 are pathetic to say the least. The iPaq 2790b on the other hand seems to work fine. After having a look at the performance of an iPhone and an iPod Touch, I'm beginning to think that HTC have lost the plot as far as getting the right componet mix is concerned. Video is just one of the issues though. I have not seen any application run at an acceptable speed on the X7501. After using it for 2 months, I have lost faith in HTC's ability to make a rfined product..
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] mlambert890:
I do like the Advantage overall, but I agree that HTC seems to be losing their way. They have gone from an anonymous builder of others designs, to a primary OEM to now a HUGE player in one of the top computing spaces of the day - handsets.

It seems to me that their search for higher and higher volumes at better and better profit margins is being executed at the expense of good integration testing and quality assurance (and hence at the expense of the customer).

Even worse, they seem willing to just brute force through the issue and 'market' their way forward.

That said, it seems that the rat race is leading to no real perfect product. The iPhone has issues of its own (the SDK being the most glaring), Nokia (Linux/Symbian), Palm, BREW - all seem to have dirty laundry when you dig into the depths of the user community. Nokia does seem to have the best track record lately though. Too bad I like Windows Mobile :)
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] Kenjari:
Can some one recommend a good video encoder to use. I have been using a decrypter and AutoGK to convert my movies. I had great success on my x51v. However, as this thread has stated, the video on the Athena is horrible. So I have been reading through this thread and saw some recommendations for settings.

I have tried some of the settings, converting the same movie atleast 4 times now (which takes three hours everytime). I can not find good enough settings. My video continues to come out choppy. Unwatchable.

So what encoders do some of you use, and what would you recommend? Is AutoGK good? Should I upgrade to the lates version?

Lastly, what settings should I adjust for? Bitrate? Frames? Audio? etc

Thanks in advance!!
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] jetherson:
this thread is becoming more interesting, albeit a bit frustrating though.

i'd also like to know the answers to Kenjari's questions.

ciao!
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
There is a "sister thread" here:

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?p=1882175#post1882175 :)
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] imamlab:
NO CONVERTING video !!!

i just rename video file *.dat to *.mpg

play with TCPMP

then play perfectly on my himalaya's screen :cool:

but so bad on my athena's screen :D

ficker, lag, sound run faster than video,
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
We are still talking about UNCONVERTED divx movies here, right? The other videos always play at more than 100% full screen at normal quality.

For the dog video specifically, I find that if I play it with low quality, the picture sharpness actually improves, but the size of the vidoe becomes smaller.

The smaller size is still as good as a full screen playing on the other small screen PDA in the market. And this is at more than 100% of the normal speed for unconverted divx movies.

:)

Note:

If you choose zoom size of 100%, the video size is 2.5 inches diagonally, my first run benchmark is 142.2%

If you choose zoom size of 150%, the video size is 3.75 inches diagonally, my first run benchmark is 136.13%

If I choose fit best, the video size is 4.75 inches diagonally, my first run benchmark is 121.20%. This is almost full screen anyway.

If I choose full screen, the video size covers the entire screen, and the fist run benchmark is 122.87%

All the above seems to give no worse picture quality than the normal setting. I do notice that on SOME vidoes, a normal setting gives sharper image than the low, while on others it does'nt. It also seems to be affected by the zoom size.

I think this shows that you can play the video with at least average video quality, with full screen, at more than 100% speed on unconverted divx movies.

TEST SETTINGS for the above

ZOOM: BEST FIT or FILL SCREEN (100% and 150% do not take advantage of Athena's big screen)

VIDEO QUALITY: LOW

VIDEO: AT IMAGEON

ORIENTATION: LANDSCAPE IN THIS CASE

VIEW: untick Titlebar, timeslider, and taskbar to give you almost full screen.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] Kenjari:
I have played the little doggy a few times. What format is it in? avi?

Edit: I really dont get it. I will try to read this thread and the other (thanks eaglesteve) more. Why is it that this short film of the dog play so well....in normal, ATI Decoder? As soon as I load a movie, I have to adjust it in order for it to play.
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
It shows up as "MP4" in my device, but I think if you read Leoni's post, it is supposed to be a divx file.

You said that with normal video quality and in ATI IMAGEON Decorder mode you are able to play it well? That should not be the case. With ATI IMAGEONE, it should not be able to play at all, I think. You need to set it to ATI IMAGEON (without the Decorder), or Raw FrameBuffer. As for the video quality setting, if you set it to normal and benchmark it, you should get about 70%; whereas if you set it to low quality and benchmark it, you should get at least 120%.

Happy experimenting.:)
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] eaglesteve:
What player are you using in Athena and what setting are you using?
[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo Upgrading] Kenjari:
Once again eaglesteve you are absolutely correct. When I switched it to ATI Imageon Decoder it was playable but choppy. I set it to ATI Imageon and it played decent. When switching it to low, there wasnt much difference but I can see some.

Funny, when i download the doggy file...it showed up as an avi.

Thats what it is playing as on my Athena!!!!

Thanks alot for he response.