MP 2.0 RC4 + .NET 2.0 very slow - too much for 256MB RAM? (1 Viewer)

[brucec]

My first test of MP 2.0 RC4 gave me some hope but some serious concerns as well ... the biggest concern being how sluggish MP 2.0 is compared to MCE 2004. Is it MP or Windows .NET 2.0 that are the issue here? During the sluggish start CPU utilization is anywhere from 20-65%, but not pegged. I'm just wondering if the newer version of MP and newer version of .NET should force an update to the MP requirements page such that 384MB RAM (or more) is minimum. Anyone else have this issue and resolve it (adding memory?)?

Has anyone tested with or without HT enabled? Just wondering if app<->.NET is a client server process setup such that having multiple virtual CPUs might help.

Things that impressed me about MediaPortal 2.0 RC4 :
(1) very slick interface ... better for 16x9 HDTV than Microsoft MCE.
(2) Great that it finds DVDs I've archived where MCE doesn't and plays most of them ... though unfortunate even though I told it to use WinDVD it uses it's own DVD player which doesn't work with FF/REW/ ... on MCE remote and provides very few options even with mouse/kbd.
(3) terribly slow ... thrashes the hard disk (90GB free) a lot, takes 20 times longer than MCE to bring up the root menu screen, also takes a long time just to switch between window and full screen mode.
(3) Though it seemed to show stations on Hauppage card in configuration mode, I couldn't actually tune to any of those stations after it started, even if I deleted the ATSC card from the list.
(4) Works only with the cursor keys on MCE remote ... no luck with pause, menu, FF, ... playing DVDs.
(5) Got the "cannot build a graph for this device" error for my Fusion HDTV 5 lite card ... I've seen elsewhere how to address this and will try that later.

Gateway Media Center PC FM-901
Windows XP MCE 2004
2.8 Ghz Pentium 4 (HT disabled currently)
256 MB (DDR) RAM
300GB IDE drive (16MB cache)
Radeon 9600 (128MB) AGP graphics
Hauppage PVR250-like Gateway OEM tuner
Fusion 5 Lite ATSC/QAM tuner
MCE Remote

Cheers,
Bruce

 

[Paranoid Delusion]

brucec

I think a memory upgrade required, just adding another 256mb will make things Whizz along.
Just make sure the memory is the same make, it does make a difference.

8)

 

[STSC]

My MP works fine with 256MB on a P3-S 1133. I also know MCE, but I don't think that it's much faster than MP.
Maybe you should put only Windows XP, .NET Framework 2, nVidea Codecs and MP on your system. That's all you need.

 

[brucec]

I'm not running anything other than Windows XP Pro component of Windows XP MCE 2004 (not running the MCE GUI, exited even my ATI tray utility and other tools). And certainly I've exited all programs as well. Perhaps XP Pro is just more of a memory hog than XP home? I've got a Windows 2000 machine with 2GB RAM I'll try this on (though I know there are issues with W2K) just to see if it loads much more quickly.

At least it's nice to hear others don't suffer this bad performance, but I don't want to go buy memory if that isn't going to speed things up ( I like 256 MB since it hibernates and recovers from hibernate twice as fast as 512MB!).

One question to STSC ... are you using .NET 2.0 and MP 0.2 RC 4, or are you using the earlier, smaller versions of each/either?

...Bruce

 

[STSC]

.NET 2.0 and MP 0.2 RC 4,

Yes, nothing more on my system.

 

[NLS]

256 is the minimum requirement for XP.

XP Pro definately is "heavier" than Home since it has more services enabled.

For the price of RAM these days, I would say 1GB is the absolute minimum.

On a media center computer you don't just want to load 1-2 apps; you also want these 1-2 apps to DO something with media, and media means MEMORY (both runtime and storage)...

My media center computer has 512MB and I think it is outdated...