DVD, MPEG4, HDTV Playback

The next round of tests is intended to check the ability of the new integrated graphics from Intel to play videos of various formats.

MPEG-4 comes first. I took a copy of the “Shrek” movie (512x384, 130/96kbps video/audio, DIVXMPG4 V3/MPEG Layer-3).

There are no surprises: the i915G with a Pentium 4 EE have no problems playing MPEG-4 video.

Then I took a copy of the “What Dreams May Come” movie as an example of a DVD movie (720x576, 8712/448kbps video/audio, Interlaced MPEG-2/Dolby Digital [AC3]).

DVD playback is no problem for any of the integrated chipsets.

Last goes the hardest version of video, a HDTV “Step into Liquid” clip (1440x1080, 8000/384 kbps video/audio, Windows Media Video/Audio 9 Professional):

The i915G loads the CPU the least of all. This is no wonder considering that the software decoder is best optimized for Intel CPUs, and the i915G works in pair with the most powerful of them.

The average speed of playing HDTV:

The clip is recorded at 24 frames per second, but the statistics provided by Windows Media Player says 23.8 fps rather than 24, although there are absolutely no skipped frames.