Can I watch 4K on a 2006 1.1

[AppleRussMac]

I would really like to know if it's possible to view 4K content on my Mac without it stuttering. The 4K footage is from my Panasonic lumix GX80/85. Footage plays fine on the camera so I know the source footage is ok. I have searched the forums and plenty of other places on the net but I can't find any answer.

My current setup is as follows:

Mac Pro 1.1
2x 3GHz dual core (4 cores in total)
8GB ram
NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT with 512 MB

I have installed a USB 3.0 pci card and connect a USB 3.0 SD card reader and played the files straight from the SD card and they still stutter which makes me think the problem is either cpu, gpu or ram.

I don't have a 4K monitor, so I am not looking to view the output at 4K, I just want to be able to play the files without them stuttering.

I will be doing basic editing (trimming and putting background music in) via iMovie or FCPX which I know for the latter I can do via proxy so I'm not bothered about that running smooth as such.

Ultimately when I can justify the cost I will upgrade to a 2010 Mac Pro, but for now an upgrade would be fine.

Thanks to anyone who can offer any advice.
[doublepost=1539453726][/doublepost]Sorry meant to also say is flashed to 2.1 and is running 10.11

 

[Synchro3]

As the CPU of the Mac Pro 1,1 is far to weak you would need a GPU with HEVC decoding.

In macOS only the Sapphire RX 580 with Orinoco framebuffer has HEVC decoding capability. This card will not run in the Mac Pro 1,1.

 

[AppleRussMac]

Thanks for the reply Synchro3. I'm guessing upgrading the cup to the 8 core version still won't help?

Is HEVC for .h265? My Panasonic does 4K h264. Does that mean I can solve this issue with a lesser card?

 

[tsialex]

This card will not run in the Mac Pro 1,1.

To clarify it more:
RX-4xx and 5xx only works with flashed MP4.1>5,1 and MP5,1. AMD drivers need SSE4.2, that only Xeons from MP4,1 on wards have. You can’t even use a MP4,1 with the most recent supported MacOS version, El Capitan, no drivers.

 

[AppleRussMac]

Thanks for the clarification tsialex. Are there any cards that are worthwhile me upgrading to on a Mac Pro 1.1 (2.1)?

 

[tsialex]

Thanks for the clarification tsialex. Are there any cards that are worthwhile me upgrading to on a Mac Pro 1.1 (2.1)?

If you need bootscreens you can use the original EFI32 Apple GPUs or any EBC Mac EFI64 card, like HD5770 or HD5780, if you don’t need bootscreens you can use any Kepler NVIDIA GPU like GTX 680.

 

[AppleRussMac]

Thanks again tsialex for your prompt and informative reply.

I will make a note of those two types of cards and search eBay. Do you know if either of them would playback 4K?

 

[Synchro3]

Thanks again tsialex for your prompt and informative reply.

I will make a note of those two types of cards and search eBay. Do you know if either of them would playback 4K?

GTX 680 has H.264 hardware acceleration, but no H.265 (HEVC) acceleration.

 

[AppleRussMac]

Thanks Synchro3.

So with a GTX 680 I should be able to play the 4K H.264 files from my Panasonic?

 

[droog]

Thanks Synchro3.

So with a GTX 680 I should be able to play the 4K H.264 files from my Panasonic?

Multiple people have said no in various informative ways.

 

[AppleRussMac]

Thanks droog - I get the picture.

 

[fhturner]

To further elaborate, I have a similar LUMIX G85 shooting up to 4k30 @ 100Mbps, as well as a DJI Phantom 4 shooting up to 4k30 at 60Mbps. It’s easier to play these back on my MacBook Pro 2015 using Quick Sync than on my Mac Pro 2010 with 12-core 3.46GHz.

HOWEVER, the Mac Pro does pretty well most of the time, only occasionally dropping frames, and even then not all that badly. The 100Mbps LUMIX stuff is the most challenging. When it’s playing that 4K footage back, I’ll get probably 300-400% CPU usage. So obviously, this is not easy for it to do, but it generally works. I believe its ability to decode and play this 4K H.264 stuff back is helped a pretty good bit by the max clock speed and add’l processing power of the Nehalem/Westmere architecture, which of course your MP1,1 does not have.

I also have an MP2,1 which is 8-core 3GHz, and like your MP1,1, it cannot handle the 4K H.264 stuff very well either. As you say, transcoding to ProRes in FCPX will allow you to edit way more smoothly, so if you don’t make any tower change, you’ll want to do that for sure. But obviously that requires some add’l overhead (both CPU and disk) up front. Playback of the native H.264 files will still be choppy no matter what, I’m afraid.

There has been mention of HEVC/H.265 hardware decoding on RX 580, but I’ve not had any success with acceleration on mine for H.264, only H.265 (which the latest Mojave 10.14.1 beta breaks). Synchro says there’s H.264 acceleration on the GTX 680, but is that usable anywhere other than a 3rd party player? IOW, does QuickTime or FCPX/iMovie use it? I’d be very surprised if so. AFAIK, we’re only getting HEVC decoding on RX 580 as a sort of trickle-down from the iMac Pro (which was essential to have Vega acceleration due to no Quick Sync). I’ve submitted a feature request for the inclusion of H.264 accel in Mojave, but I won’t hold my breath...

 

[thomasthegps]

your only option would be to install linux. The RX 580 should provide hevc hw decoding under linux with the mesa drivers. Good Luck

 

[Zlobnick]

Try playing your files with this player:

https://lhc70000.github.io/iina/

 

[Project Alice]

Flash to a 2,1 then upgrade to dual quads. With a GTX 680 or better, anything newer that will work on el capitan. You should be able to watch at least h.264 4k.

My 8 Core 3,1 with a GTX 1060 can do 4k. Don't listen to the nay-sayers, these old things are more powerful than people seem to think.

I don't edit video, so I don't know how that will work. If that's what you're asking. But as far as watching 4k goes it is definitely doable.

 

[Synchro3]

Synchro says there’s H.264 acceleration on the GTX 680, but is that usable anywhere other than a 3rd party player? IOW, does QuickTime or FCPX/iMovie use it? I’d be very surprised if so. AFAIK, we’re only getting HEVC decoding on RX 580 as a sort of trickle-down from the iMac Pro (which was essential to have Vega acceleration due to no Quick Sync). I’ve submitted a feature request for the inclusion of H.264 accel in Mojave, but I won’t hold my breath...

Yes, h.264 is no problem with a Nvidia card. iTunes, Quicktime, Iina, VLC make use of GPU h.264 hardware acceleration.

It's h.265 the CPU has to do a lot of the work (without RX 580).

In the pic below you can see the difference between h.265 (Iina) and h.264 (VLC).

Hardware details in the signature.

 

[fhturner]

Yes, h.264 is no problem with a Nvidia card. iTunes, Quicktime, Iina, VLC make use of GPU h.264 hardware acceleration.

I understand that IINA, VLC, and other apps might make use of Nvidia GPU hardware acceleration for decoding, but I cannot imagine that for QT/FCPX Apple would be tapping into that for cards using unsupported beta drivers and not doing so for AMD cards that are supported/recommended for Mac Pro now.

I see 4K H.265 and 1080p H.264 (which does not require much CPU usage on Mac Pro anyway) in your screen grabs, but do not see 4K H.264. Can you do me a favor and show the percentage of CPU used when playing back 4K H.264 in QuickTime Player? My guess is you’ll see 200-300-400% CPU, depending on the source.

 

[tsialex]

Hey, you all are mixing MP5,1 support with MP1,1. With a MP1,1 you can't run most of the GPUs on the market today.

The most recent macOS version you can install into a MP1,1 is ElCapitan and even if you get a GTX 780 and upgrade the processors to the fastest supported, probably you still can't view 4K files smoothly with a MP1,1.

With a MP3,1 and the GTX 780 you will get it going, but not with the MP1,1 or MP2,1

 

[fhturner]

Hey, you all are mixing MP5,1 support with MP1,1. With a MP1,1 you can't run most of the GPUs on the market today.

The most recent macOS version you can install into a MP1,1 is ElCapitan and even if you get a GTX 780 and upgrade the processors to the fastest supported, probably you still can't view 4K files smoothly with a MP1,1.

With a MP3,1 and the GTX 780 you will get it going, but not with the MP1,1 or MP2,1

Hey Alex—

True... we've kinda been discussing 2 things tho: addressing the initial question about using a MP1,1 for viewing 4K, as well as what sort of options in general you might use for accelerating playback (if any). I realize the RX 580 is out, due to needing SSE4.1 (or whatever version it is) for the AMD drivers, but there was talk about using a GTX 680 and having hardware acceleration too. So that's why some of the discussion was including experiences (like mine) from 5,1 to compare to 1,1/2,1 (also like mine).
[doublepost=1539614378][/doublepost]

With a MP3,1 and the GTX 780 you will get it going, but not with the MP1,1 or MP2,1

My curiosity from Synchro's comments was whether the acceleration he'd observed was present for 4K H.264 in QuickTime's framework (different name now, I know) to where it would be usable in FCPX/iMovie/QT Player. Would your 3,1 + GTX 780 support that, and not just a 3rd party player?

 

[tsialex]

My curiosity from Synchro's comments was whether the acceleration he'd observed was present for 4K H.264 in QuickTime's framework (different name now, I know) to where it would be usable in FCPX/iMovie/QT Player. Would your 3,1 + GTX 780 support that, and not just a 3rd party player?

I can play 4K h264 video with MP3,1 and my GTX-680 using IINA easily, but never checked with QTplayer.

 

[hal9000mx]

I would really like to know if it's possible to view 4K content on my Mac without it stuttering. The 4K footage is from my Panasonic lumix GX80/85. Footage plays fine on the camera so I know the source footage is ok. I have searched the forums and plenty of other places on the net but I can't find any answer.

My current setup is as follows:

Mac Pro 1.1
2x 3GHz dual core (4 cores in total)
8GB ram
NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT with 512 MB

I have installed a USB 3.0 pci card and connect a USB 3.0 SD card reader and played the files straight from the SD card and they still stutter which makes me think the problem is either cpu, gpu or ram.

I don't have a 4K monitor, so I am not looking to view the output at 4K, I just want to be able to play the files without them stuttering.

I will be doing basic editing (trimming and putting background music in) via iMovie or FCPX which I know for the latter I can do via proxy so I'm not bothered about that running smooth as such.

Ultimately when I can justify the cost I will upgrade to a 2010 Mac Pro, but for now an upgrade would be fine.

Thanks to anyone who can offer any advice.
[doublepost=1539453726][/doublepost]Sorry meant to also say is flashed to 2.1 and is running 10.11

I have the same problem with my MP1,1 and i opted to buy one of these. This can play 4k content without any problem. It cost only 200 bucks and you can find other in a 160 bucks range.

Mini PC, 6GB DDR3 120GB SSD Windows 10 Pro Mini ordenador, 4K Dual Output, Intel HD Graphics, Gigabit Ethernet Dual Band Wi-Fi Bluetooth 4.2

Mini PC, 6GB DDR3 120GB SSD Windows 10 Pro Mini ordenador, 4K Dual Output, Intel HD Graphics, Gigabit Ethernet Dual Band Wi-Fi Bluetooth 4.2

www.amazon.com

Cheers.