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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: CU_AMiGA on November 01, 2003, 03:16:38 PM
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Hello!
I was innocently looking inside my local entertainment store and decided to look for some videos. Little knowing what i was about to let myself in for, i started searching. Then, suddenly, tragedy struck. I was ambushed by a legion of DVD stacks, full of DVDs, no videos whatsoever. In desperation i tried harder to look for these videos, but no luck. I then ended up lost in the DVD section, and feared i'd never leave the place alive! But, thankfully, help was at hand, the assistant showed me where the exit was and, with no hesitation, i quickly stormed out of the store (gasping for breath in the process).
In order to stop this fiasco from happening again i think the time has come for me to get a DVD player. I would just like to know would to be possible for DVD playback on Amiga (and the things i would need) and if it would be possible on my one, if not then what else would i need.
Regards,
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In four words: no ;-)
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I'd recommend you get one of them cheapo stand-alone dvd players. They can be found VERY cheap nowadays. I got my new one for 47EUR. The IDE DVD-ROM unit in my old standalone died and I thought about replacing that, but getting a new standalone DVD-player was actually more cost-effective (well 10EUR more).
And indeed you probably lack the CPU power to decode DVD's nicely :).
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I was actually thinking about either trying to get a standalone DVD player, or one of those DVD/CD RW Drives combos that you can get! I don't care about money, money is no object to me. I just wan't to know if to would be possible and the performance on my current Amiga, and if not, then whjat would i need to do. Remember, it is only for DVD playback, nothing else! :-)
I did have a PS2, and as many people know, that had DVD playback, but because the PS2 was ####e and all that, i ditched it!
Regards
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Well he has s a ppc and amp2 is ppc so you can buy that but not sure how well it will perform for you?its at kicksoft.co.uk....
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The data transfer rate you need for DVD is huge. It's like 30MB/s or something. There's absolutely no way you can get this on an Amiga, even if you had the CPU power to decode what you got back - which you don't.
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Aaaaaw, my 1meg/sec A1200 IDE can't handle DVD's? Darn ;-).
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Crap as the PS2's DVD playback was (stretching frames) it worked, but if you don't have it any more get a standalone DVD player. Trying to get an A1200 to playback DVD would be like trying to turn my Kia Pride into a hot rod, and theoretically that would be easier. :-D
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In a word: no
That's four.
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Now don't go veering offtopic mikeymike ;-).
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by KennyR on 2003/11/1 17:51:12 The data transfer rate you need for DVD is huge. It's like 30MB/s or something. There's absolutely no way you can get this on an Amiga, even if you had the CPU power to decode what you got back - which you don't.
Normal DVDs dont exceed 1.5 MB/s
Dont start with this one, I create DVD's my self (Its my job) believe me i know!,
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Richer sounds do a warfdale dvd player for 30 pound.
http://www.richersounds.com/ (http://www.richersounds.com/)
direct link is here acoustic solutions dvd player (http://www.richersounds.com/index.php?f=itemdetl.php&p=dvd421r2)
multi region version £59
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it is possible.... wheather the playback is worth it or not I dont know, I've never done it myself. Ideally you would need SCSI with DMA, like on some BPPC cards.... that would take the load off when fetching the data from the DVD drive... AMP2 can play some DVD's... so it would work, and you can half the size to increase speed with AMP2. But again i dont know how well it will work... I've only ever read about other people doing it.
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If you wan't to get a feel that your Amiga has a DVD drive connected to it do one of the following things:
1)
Buy a Kiss DVD Player/Video with an Ethernetcard in it and connect it via an RJ45 to your Amiga's Networkcard... You won't achive anything else than the Video is in your network with an IP :)
or
2)
Buy 2 rolls of ducktape. Wrap it around your amiga and a stand-alone DVD-rom drive, in any possible order you can think of...
:-D
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Normal DVDs dont exceed 1.5 MB/s
Dont start with this one, I create DVD's my self (Its my job) believe me i know!,
He's right you know. 10MBit/sec.
DVD playback poses two types of system stress: Reading at a guaranteed, sustained 10MBit/sec and decoding the contents coming off it quickly enough. The system must be generally (as in, lack of bottlenecks) fast enough for one operation not to negatively affect the other.
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Animagic is right. The maximun bitrate for Video DVD can be 8000 kbits/sec, even less then 1,5MB/s.
The problem is the CPU power which can't handle 25fps decoding... :-(
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mikeymike:He's right you know. 10MBit/sec.
DVD playback poses two types of system stress: Reading at a guaranteed, sustained 10MBit/sec and decoding the contents coming off it quickly enough. The system must be generally (as in, lack of bottlenecks) fast enough for one operation not to negatively affect the other
Yes 10MBit/sec (MebaBits) will give you about 1,25 MB/sec (Megabyte/second). It is about 1.5MB/sec i pointed.
I really dont know if amiga is capable of playing back MPEG2 but as for the transfer rate I am definately sure that is 1.5 MB/sec :-)
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The problem is the CPU power which can't handle 25fps decoding...
There is a workaround for that, at least with PCs. Either have a graphics card with MPEG-2 decoding capabilities, such as the GeForce =>2 range (the decent models that is), or have an MPEG-2 decoding card.
Software would need to be written for AmigaOS in order to take advantage of the latter option though.
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Isnt elbox meant to be writing drivers for mpeg pci decoder board.?
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What about fully UDMA33 capable IDE controllers for the classic Amiga range?
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Animagic wrote:
Normal DVDs dont exceed 1.5 MB/s
Edit:
Actually, you could be right.
But it's not just the transfer rate, it's the CPU load. PIO controllers like Amiga IDE or most of its SCSI solutions eat almost all CPU time at full transfer.
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KennyR Edit: Actually, you could be right. But it's not just the transfer rate, it's the CPU load. PIO controllers like Amiga IDE or most of its SCSI solutions eat almost all CPU time at full transfer.
KennyR, I didn't mean to offend you.
DVDs use about 1.5MB/sec and thats final.
I just wanted to correct something that might have put the conversation way out. :-)
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A Superbit DVD9 coming in at 86 minutes.
DVD9 is dual layer, single sided with about an 8.5GB capacity. That's 8704 MB, divided by 86 is 101MB/minute, or 1.68MB/s.
Edit: Stating the obvious now ;-) didn't see those last posts
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The data transfer rate you need for DVD is huge. It's like 30MB/s or something.
Not more than upto 9-10mbit or so... depending on the bitrate of dvd.. usually they are 6-9 including audio
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KennyR, I didn't mean to offend you.
DVDs use about 1.5MB/sec and thats final.
I just wanted to correct something that might have put the conversation way out.
No problem, you were right and I was wrong. ;-)
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I just looked at Elbox' website, and it says that software for a M-PEG 2/DVD decoder is in development. I'm looking forward to it...
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Well the CD32 had an MPEG1 decoder card ;-)
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getting a cheap dvd player eh? well i would suggest getting one for the pc, cause then you can get a region cracker more easily, but enough said on that point... the fact is, if you want to get a cheapo stand-alone dvd player, go ahead, get one from the supermarket. Get it from a company like SQNY, or PANNASONICS, or for instance PIONEEER, and it's play dvd's oh yeah, just...
If you really want a stand alone, go to richer sounds, and get a pioneer, a sony, a JVC, or a pannasonic, though their spares cost a lot... i heard that other guy bought it from e-bay and renovated one... who was it, amgiamad?
***edit***
oh and i wouldn't be so sure about getting the multi region versions, cause sometimes dvd's have little pieces of code which go, test all regions, if player multi-region NOT PLAY :-D
it's also vice-versa with multi region dvd's, but players are less picky about those... i wonder what happens if you have a multi region dvd, with a multi region dvd player... anyway, you get muli-region dvd's from like hong-kong for example
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Well in total amiga mag they review amp2 on a A3000/ppc 604e 233mhz and it works on that in lores mode....