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MP4 Video playback issues Mac Pro 2009

Skalagrim

Skalagrim

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jul 19, 2018
14
7
I have a 2009 2.26GHZ 8 Core Mac Pro with the firmware flashed to 5,1 and High Sierra installed. The problem Im having is that when I play an MP4 file, using quicktime, the video playback is choppy. Was wondering if its a CPU issue or something else. Would upgrading to the 3.6 GHZ 5680 Xeon processors help? I don't have any problems on my 2012 Mac mini 2.5Ghz I5 or 2012 MacBook Pro 2.6Ghz I7, They both run smooth.

System Consist of:
Mac Pro (early 2009) High Sierra
2x Xeon 2.26Ghz Processors
500Gig SSD Drive
12 Gigs ECC ram
ATI Radeon 5770 GPU (Have Tried Newer Cards Same result)
 
First aid showed no problems (The drive is new). I've tried this on multiple drives too. Tried fresh installs of Sierra and High Sierra.
 
This is just one particular mp4 file you're having problems with?

What is the resolution of this file? Did you encode it yourself or did you download it from somewhere?

Do you have another computer you can try playback on to see if it's choppy there as well?

Download VLC (it's free) and try playing it with that--any difference?
 
is it an h.264 file or h.265? you can use https://mediaarea.net/en/MediaInfo to check.

if it's h.265, then choppy playback should pretty much be expected - there's no GPU acceleration for the codec yet and even the 3ghz+ Mac Pro CPUs will have problems with playback.

if it's h.264, then something else may be wrong since there's hardware acceleration available.
 
Its all MP4 files (Most of them are 4k files)Downloaded straight from my DJI Mavic Air Drone. I have zero issues with my 2012 Mac mini, 2011 and 2012 MacBook Pro.
It goes from smooth to laggy to smooth. I don't really want to use a third party app.
Weird thing is that I Notice it too when playing the game Fortnite. Seems like few seconds of smoothness then Choppy for a sec and back and forth.
I have tried multiple video cards with same results.
 
Skalagrim said:
Its all MP4 files (Most of them are 4k files)Downloaded straight from my DJI Mavic Air Drone. I have zero issues with my 2012 Mac mini, 2011 and 2012 MacBook Pro.
It goes from smooth to laggy to smooth. I don't really want to use a third party app.
Weird thing is that I Notice it too when playing the game Fortnite. Seems like few seconds of smoothness then Choppy for a sec and back and forth.
I have tried multiple video cards with same results.
Click to expand...

Even though you can’t tell us the video codec (MP4 is just the container, not the codec). 99% your issue is because CPU limiting.

It’s a known issue that the slower CPU (even has 8 cores) may not able to play high bitrate 4k H264 video smoothly.

High bitrate H265 is almost guarantee cannot play smoothly.

Upgrade the CPU to X5680 should able to solve the H264 issue, but still can’t 100% alleviate the H265 issue.

For H265, the best way to play it on the cMP at this moment is install a RX580, and upgrade to 10.14 beta. With this combination, the GPU can do all the decoding in QuickTime player, and give out super smooth playback.
 
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I figured it out.. Yes its H265.. If I use the VLC player or 5kplayer like mentioned earlier it works fine. Was just hoping to you the native Quicktime player. Going to upgrade the CPU's soon. Thanks for the help.
 
Skalagrim said:
I figured it out.. Yes its H265.. If I use the VLC player or 5kplayer like mentioned earlier it works fine. Was just hoping to you the native Quicktime player. Going to upgrade the CPU's soon. Thanks for the help.
Click to expand...

For your info, in my own experience, IINA is the best player in macOS. It's purely design for Mac, has very Mac style user interface, and very good performance, but completely free of charge / ad.
 
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Check out Perian .. it's discontinued now but fixed that same problem for me - download ALL the available releases and try them one by one - I'm not using it at the moment and forget which version worked for me in Sierra. I think there MAY be some new versions developed by other people.
 
Like many, Perian was a valuable component of my video toolkit in the QT7 era. But after it was no longer supported, I uninstalled it. A friend was having trouble with importing AVCHD files into FCPX. After a little research it seemed Perian (which he had installed years earlier at my suggestion) was the culprit. He uninstalled it and that resolved it.

https://www.imore.com/how-remedy-very-slow-import-avchd-media-final-cut-pro-104
 
i think on mac's using a i3/5/7 use the igpu video decoder to play video while the xeon cpu's have no igpu.
trans code the video or use a 3rd party video player is best option.

iv mostly given up on quick time, 7 was the last one i relay liked X is way to striped back in features.
 
The IINA player works great! Like h9826790 said, its much like QT. Video is very smooth. Thanks for the info. I have no other issues other than processor speed. But that should change since I just received my (2) 6 core 5680's in the mail today.
 
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Skalagrim said:
The IINA player works great! Like h9826790 said, its much like QT. Video is very smooth. Thanks for the info. I have no other issues other than processor speed. But that should change since I just received my (2) 6 core 5680's in the mail today.
Click to expand...

Be careful when you upgrade the CPU, take your time, do it nice and slowly, step by step.

Upgrade the dual processor 4,1 can be tricky especially if the "new" processors are lidded.
 
Just finished the upgrade. Watched many videos and seemed to get it right on my first try. I de-lidded the cpu's to make it easier for reinstall. I went with the (4) razor blade technique and it worked flawlessly. Made a lot of mental notes on how far to push the blades in without hitting the capacitors. Once in, I applied heat with a small torch and it popped right off. Computer is now firing on all 12 cylinders.
 
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h9826790 said:
Even though you can’t tell us the video codec (MP4 is just the container, not the codec). 99% your issue is because CPU limiting.

It’s a known issue that the slower CPU (even has 8 cores) may not able to play high bitrate 4k H264 video smoothly.

High bitrate H265 is almost guarantee cannot play smoothly.

Upgrade the CPU to X5680 should able to solve the H264 issue, but still can’t 100% alleviate the H265 issue.

For H265, the best way to play it on the cMP at this moment is install a RX580, and upgrade to 10.14 beta. With this combination, the GPU can do all the decoding in QuickTime player, and give out super smooth playback.
Click to expand...
I have the RX 580 installed with Beta 10.14 (with current beta updates) and I don't seem to be getting any hardware decoding in quicktime still. Still choppy playback. Don't know if I'm doing something wrong or some settings need to be changed.
 
Skalagrim said:
I have the RX 580 installed with Beta 10.14 (with current beta updates) and I don't seem to be getting any hardware decoding in quicktime still. Still choppy playback. Don't know if I'm doing something wrong or some settings need to be changed.
Click to expand...
Download iStat Menus and use to monitor GPU usage.
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/istat-menus/id1319778037
This will tell you if it’s hitting the GPU or CPU when decoding.
 
Skalagrim said:
I have the RX 580 installed with Beta 10.14 (with current beta updates) and I don't seem to be getting any hardware decoding in quicktime still. Still choppy playback. Don't know if I'm doing something wrong or some settings need to be changed.
Click to expand...

Can you check which codec is it?
 
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