What spec PC do you need for 1080p or 720p video?

[DTS]

What spec PC do you need for 1080p or 720p video?

What spec PC do you need to run 1080p video or even 720p video smoothly?

I've tried 720p and 1080p videos on a PC with a 1.4 Ghz CPU, 512 Mb RAM and a 16 Mb AGP graphics card (my PC), which wouldn't do it, and a 1080p video on a PC with a 3 Ghz CPU, 1 Gb RAM and a 128 Mb PCI-Expressx16 graphics card (someone else's PC), which also wouldn't do it.
This is with both Media Player Classic and VLC.

On the lower spec PC it's understandable, but on the higher-specced PC I thought it could be that the desktop resolution was lower than 1080p so the computer had to downscale the video, I tried in VLC halving the zoom (cause halving or doubling computers do better) and that didn't help.

I am interested in upgrading my PC to be able to play 720p and 1080p videos but seeing the spec of the other PC I tried it on, it really looks like a really high spec PC is needed. So what is the spec needed, exactly?

I know there are graphics cards that have lots of RAM on them, is that the issue? What about CPU speed does that matter much? Would I need a completely new PC to be able to handle 720p or 1080p videos?

[SoM]

send me a link for 720p and 1080p and i'll try it on my pc

[Scourge]

send me a link for 720p and 1080p and i'll try it on my pc

Here are some.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/window ... wcase.aspx

[SoM]

thx, i'm getting these two vids

super speedway - 720p
The Discoverers - 1080p

[Foo]

This is all the impact on my rig:

Now this is 4 cores at 2.4Ghz, but there's barely any impact on any of the cores and only 12-20% usage across the whole processor.

A single 2Ghz processor should be about right, then.

[Scourge]

I can play the 1080p just fine, but I'm limited to 1440x900 so it's not full 1080p. 720p no problems at all. specs:

Phenom quad-core 9500
8800gt 512mb
2 gigs ddr2 dual channel
19" widescreen lcd.
[lvlshot]http://www.jwivie.com/1080.jpg[/lvlshot]

Getting pretty similar results.

[SoM]

both of the ones i got played without stutter with a game in the BG and 8 tabs opened in FF

AMD64 X2 5400+
2 gig dual chan
XFX 8800 320 GTS

[SoM]

foo, how do i open the playlist in wmp 11, the tab on the right?

[Foo]

Not sure, s'always been there on this.

Try right-click a file then add to playlist

[DTS]

I didn't think of checking the CPU usage, it's at 50-something percent:
This is on the 3 GHz PC:

[lvlshot]http://img385.imageshack.us/img385/2284 ... agegl0.jpg[/lvlshot]

The video is from here:
http://www.vuze.com/details/D2EF7A37VR3 ... QSEKC.html
The download link is dodgy (it wants to install something) so just use the torrent which is linked there (I can't post a direct link to the torrent cause the button for the link uses session ID (in other words, cause of the way it's linked on that page).

It's an mkv so it's a bit different to the wmv's you've been using.
Here's the spec of the file:
Video: MPEG4 Video (H264) 1920x816 24.19fps [Undetermined (Video 1)]
Audio: Vorbis 48000Hz stereo [Undetermined (Audio 1)]

Edit: I just tried a 720p video and a 1080p video from the link Scourge posted and they play fine (on the 3 Ghz PC), so I guess wmv files don't need such a high spec PC. The picture quality seemed alright but isn't the picture quality on mpeg4s better? (It's hard to tell on the LCD monitor this PC has, the only thing was the wmv files seemed blurry whereas the mpeg4 (mkv) file seemed better defined.)

[XLer8er]

Edit: I just tried a 720p video and a 1080p video from the link Scourge posted and they play fine (on the 3 Ghz PC), so I guess wmv files don't need such a high spec PC. The picture quality seemed alright but isn't the picture quality on mpeg4s better? (It's hard to tell on the LCD monitor this PC has, the only thing was the wmv files seemed blurry whereas the mpeg4 (mkv) file seemed better defined.)

Youd probably want to play them MKV files. Its x264 which is stripped of the copy protection thats in h264. Its higher compression and higher bit rate than wmv though, so Id say a 1.8GHz Core 2 Duo or AMD equevelent. P4 would be like a 3.3GHz or better(does less per cycle). Vid card should have 64MB+ also.

There are some legally free content for x264.

Edit: it also requires proper codecs. X264 is almost like the kind youd find on Blu-Ray/HD-DVD (h264).