Vista Aero and performance

[gloomyandy]

Folks,
Not sure if this has been posted before (did a search and couldn't find anything) but I thought it may be of use....

I've just built a new PC using Vista and an ATI HD3450 graphics card. I had an svn build installed and was very happy with the performance getting only around 8% cpu usage when viewing BBC HD content on a 1080p display. I've been changed a few things including upgrading to RC2. Then I noticed that my cpu usage was up at the 40% level with one cpu doing most of the work... I tried a few things and was unable to get the low cpu usage I had before. I was all set to post a bug report against RC2 when I remembered that (on the advice of another forum), I had disabled Vista aero by selecting the basic colour scheme. A quick change to the settings later and I'm back to 8% cpu usage! So don't believe everything you read, and only change one thing at a time and then check everything!

I'm rather surprised by how big an impact this has (if anything I would have thought not using aero would make things faster). Perhaps my graphics card really is only designed to work on Vista...

Anyone any idea what is going on?

Hope this helps someone else!

All the best

Andy

[Paranoid Delusion]

I have everything "turned on" in Vista, and never seen a issue, occasionally get dreamscene, does not like something, but i can be browsing internet and it turns itself off, and that seems to be a complaint a lot of people have with Ultimate features, so nothing to do with MP.

Glad you found it out, these kind of things make MP look the villian

[tourettes]

Please remember that EVR and AERO go together. To get best possible video playback quality from EVR you need to have AERO enabled.

[Beechus]

Hey, i also have a 3450; they're possibly the best graphic cards ever built! For 25quid I get a graphics card which has hdmi (via the free dvi to hdmi adapter) which nails 1080p and BBC / ITV / Channel 4 HD!

I tried turning off aero and experienced the same performance issues you did.

[gloomyandy]

Hi,
Which 3450 card did you get? I didn't get an hdmi adapter with mine and I've been having a hard time tracking one down in the UK (So far I've managed to buy the old black one rather than the gray one!). I'm going to be building another PC for a friend and if possible I'd like to get a card that has the adapter (or that has hdmi outputs by default)...

Thanks

Andy

[Beechus]

Mine didnt have it on the box- but the company I ordered from state that it comes with HDMI, so i went in store and they gave me one for free

[robyf]

Originally Posted by tourettes

Please remember that EVR and AERO go together. To get best possible video playback quality from EVR you need to have AERO enabled.

Problem is: with aero I get stuttering (not so fluid picture as without it). I have a 3450 and AMD BE-2400 processor, it could not be a system spec problem or?

[Paranoid Delusion]

Are you using Driver 8.7beta, that seems to solve some issues.

[robyf]

Originally Posted by Paranoid Delusion

Are you using Driver 8.7beta, that seems to solve some issues.

I will try 8.7 drivers as soon as I get back home from my vacation... They're out now.

Thanks

[robyf]

Originally Posted by Paranoid Delusion

Are you using Driver 8.7beta, that seems to solve some issues.

New 8.7 drivers seem to have solved the stuttering issue with aero and EVR so I could recommend them at least for a 3450 video card. I also disabled cool&quiet in the bios configuration of my motherboard (as suggested in various posts), this improved a lot the smoothness of the video that is now almost as smooth as the one of my set top box.