OESF Portables Forum

General Forums => General Discussion => Topic started by: LilMikey on May 28, 2004, 10:29:35 am

Title: Video Samples
Post by: LilMikey on May 28, 2004, 10:29:35 am
Alright, I don\'t have my Zaurus yet but something that appeals to me is the ability to drag movies around in my pocket.  So, I\'ve been spending my well paid work hours encoding videos in a number of ways in order to understand what can be accomplished with very low bitrates.  At http://www.lilmikey.com/zaurus/video/ (http://www.lilmikey.com/zaurus/video/) there are currently a growing number of encodings of the same video clip at various resolutions, file sizes, and audio bitrates.

Now, I don\'t have a ton of bandwidth so I beg you, be nice.  If you have a strong desire to download a clip at a certain resolution then spare me the overhead so other\'s can test it out as well.
Title: Video Samples
Post by: g0dless on May 28, 2004, 10:59:34 am
tnx for the info, now I just need my zaurus to arive so I can test them
Title: Video Samples
Post by: Morpheus on May 28, 2004, 12:38:08 pm
Am I doing something wrong here or doesnt the 5600 support AVI files?

I downloaded a couple of files but non would play. I just get an error saying \"Unable to play this file\"
Title: Video Samples
Post by: LilMikey on May 28, 2004, 12:42:51 pm
Unfortunately I can\'t say   My Zaurus is waiting for me at the post office.  They were encoded regular old Xvid/mp3 and play correctly on my linux boxen, my windows box using DivX codecs, and my co-workers e750 using the freeware \"DivX player\".  The default included 5600 media player may not be able to handle divx/xvid.
Title: Video Samples
Post by: TonyOlsen on May 28, 2004, 01:18:31 pm
Most AVI files can\'t play on the Zaurus... only certain codecs at certain bitrates are supported in some of the various players.  See:  

http://www.zaurususergroup.com/index.php?n...iewtopic&t=4242 (https://www.oesf.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=4242)
Title: Video Samples
Post by: LilMikey on May 28, 2004, 02:36:38 pm
I would be very disappointed to hear that plain Xvid files that play everywhere else can\'t play on the Z. I can understand the default player not supporting them but there must be a media player that can handle regular codecs.
Title: Video Samples
Post by: TonyOlsen on May 28, 2004, 02:51:31 pm
I assume you\'re using an Intel x86 machine as your main machine?  Most of the video codecs aren\'t available in Open Source and the source code isn\'t posted anywhere.  Even if they were, the codec would need to be rewritten from the ground up, because Intel x86 codecs are heavily based on the use of \"Floating Point\" computation, which the x86 does well, but the ARM processor in your Zaurus can\'t do Floating Point computation (except emulated), so the codec would be MUCH slower than on the x86.  I would \"guess\" that an Intel x86 Codec recompiled for your 400 MHz (ARM) Zaurus would run about the equivalent of a 100 MHz Intel x86 machine... or 1/4th as fast.

So... as discussed in the thread I posted above, the only real solution is to recompress all of your favorite videos into a codec (and bitrate) that currently IS supported under Zaurus.  There are many Zaurus video players out there (most of them free), each each of them supports 1-4 video codecs.  \"MPlayer\" appears to be the best, although I haven\'t tried it.  I\'m using the built-in \"MoviePlayer\" which supports Windows Video when used at 300 kbps or lower and MP3 audio codec.  \"MPlayer\" is said to support DivX.  I tried TkcVideo Player ($20), but it doesn\'t support too much...  MPlayer \"might\" be your best bet.

Let me know how it goes...
Title: Video Samples
Post by: LilMikey on May 28, 2004, 03:34:43 pm
The e750 we have here plays them just fine... it\'s not a hardware issue.  Dr.Z, Mplayer, and Kino all claim to play MPEG4.  Xvid is 100% open source.
Title: Video Samples
Post by: TonyOlsen on May 28, 2004, 04:42:13 pm
Quote
The e750 we have here plays them just fine... it\'s not a hardware issue.


Define \"them\".  Are you refering to Xvid?

Quote
Dr.Z, Mplayer, and Kino all claim to play MPEG4


MPEG4 is a general concept.  It doesn\'t support all MPEG4 codecs and variations.  Windows Media appears to only work as constant bitrate (not variable bitrate).

Quote
Xvid is 100% open source.


That\'s great to hear!   Does it work well on non-floating-point machines?  How doe sit compare to Intel x86?
Title: Video Samples
Post by: LilMikey on May 28, 2004, 04:53:23 pm
Yes, Xvid does work well on non-floating-point machines... we\'ve been playing the videos on e705s and iPaqs for the past couple days.
Title: Video Samples
Post by: TonyOlsen on May 28, 2004, 05:03:31 pm
That\'s great!   What bitrate?  Which player are you using... \"MPlayer\"?  What ROM are you using?
Title: Video Samples
Post by: Lance on May 30, 2004, 02:52:01 am
LilMikey,

I downloaded the 255-320-64sample.avi file and it played well on my C760 using the kino2 videoplayer.  It didn\'t seem to drop many frames and the stereo audio stayed in sync.  Very watctchable!

Lance

C760, cacko 1.21rom,san disk 256sd card
Title: Video Samples
Post by: LilMikey on May 31, 2004, 12:38:37 pm
I\'ve been watching the samples on my SL-6000 using mplayer.  They all seem to playback very well.  I\'m sticking with my assesment on the page that the 128mb/64kbit video gives the best band per mb.

If only the 6000 had a working mplayer frontend
Title: Video Samples
Post by: cmisip on May 31, 2004, 01:06:22 pm
Have you tried http://www.rothfuss-web.de/zaurus/ (http://www.rothfuss-web.de/zaurus/)

The source for the 1.2 version is available.  If you have java on the 6000, you might be able to use it.   I think most versions of mplayer around do not have the -menu feature.  Remove this from the source, recompile and see what happens. This is for a screen size of the 5x00 series though so I dont know how it would look on the 6000 display.
Title: Video Samples
Post by: Teletubbie on May 31, 2004, 01:12:41 pm
Hi,
I downloaded the 9MB File and can watch it fine on a SL-5500 using xmms and mlpayer. Maybe there is a xmms and xmms-mplayerplugin port also for the 6000?
Cheers,
Sam
Title: Video Samples
Post by: Cwiiis on May 31, 2004, 02:54:51 pm
The videos play fine on my SL-5500 using Opie MediaPlayer 2 from OZ3.2 that I repackaged to be compatible with the Sharp rom. It plays completely smoothly, except for the odd jerk on occassion.

These packages need to be installed in ram (unless you\'re using an updated ipkg) and they\'ll come up with an error unless you use the console, but it\'s safe to ignore it.

Links:
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~cil103/feed/op...30328-1_arm.ipk (http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~cil103/feed/opie-mediaplayer2_0.9.3-20030328-1_arm.ipk)
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~cil103/feed/li...14.2b-3_arm.ipk (http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~cil103/feed/libmad0_0.14.2b-3_arm.ipk)
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~cil103/feed/li....0.0-2a_arm.ipk (http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~cil103/feed/libogg0_1.0.0-2a_arm.ipk)
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~cil103/feed/li...30325-1_arm.ipk (http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~cil103/feed/libvorbisidec1_20030325-1_arm.ipk)
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~cil103/feed/li...1.0.0-3_arm.ipk (http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~cil103/feed/libxine1_1.0.0-3_arm.ipk)

You\'ll also need zlib and libopie, which you can get on the Opie feed. Hope that helps some 5500/5600 users...