[mythtv-users] [old] Re: XvMC and libmpeg2 to be dropped in 0.25

[D. Hugh Redelmeier]

| From: Brian Wood <beww at beww.org>
| Date: Fri, 3 Dec 2010 11:22:59 -0700

| XvMC is an older hardware support method for mpeg2, it's pretty well 
| been replaced by VDPAU, and decoding mpeg2 in software is not all that 
| CPU intensive (pretty much anything over 500 Mhz. can handle it at SD 
| resolutions).

[Sorry for reviving this old thread.  I'm way behind.]

As I understand it VDPAU is only supported by the nVidia proprietary
drivers on nVidia hardware.  I'd like something supported by open
source on a wide variety of hardware.  I don't exactly have a
candidate API: XvMC is too limited, VA API is apparently not there
yet, XvBA is AMD-proprietary (I think), perhaps OpenGL isn't overkill.

Some of my Myth boxes don't use nVidia hardware (a couple of those are
old too -- no PCIe slot).  Of course I could stay at .24 (hey, I'm not
all there yet) but I want to get all my Myth boxes running at the same
level.  After all, Myth boxes are only supposed to talk to others that
have the same version.

One argument thrown out in the discussion is that replacing boxes is
good for the environment.

(a) it depends.  For example, on the amount of time the box is on.

(b) making modern boxes use CPU decoding when they could have used
    their hardware assistance (eg. ATI cards), is certainly not a win
    on energy consumption.