SpiceWare's Blog

Just a few seconds faster this morning:

 

 

I did notice that not all cores are active:

 

 

So wondered if I could make Handbrake convert multiple videos at once. Found this setting, which can be increased to 2, 3, or 4:

 

 

Have a test running with it set to 2.

 

Runtime increased to 17:51 but during that time 2 videos were converted, not 1.

 

 

 

Cores were noticeably busier.

 

 

Test going with it set to 3.

 

Runtime increased to 22:04, but 3 were converted.

 

 

 

 

Cores were busier.

 

 

Test going with 4.

 

 

Runtime increased to 28:00 for 4 at once.

 

 

 

 

 

 

All but 1 core was pegged:

 

 

So I can now convert 8+ episodes in the time I used to do 1.  

 

Of course I never tried that setting on the Pro, so I currently have a test with 2 running on it right now. About 17 minutes remain.

For the Pro it was initially 58:27 to convert 1 video.   Briefly converted 1 again to get the CPU activity:

 

 

So there is some unused capacity.  The Pro has a 6 core CPU with hyperthreading.  

 

Cancelled the 1, then fired off 2 concurrent conversions which took 1:27:51

 

 

 

CPU activity:

 

Test with 3 underway.

3 concurrent took 2:02:55 on the Pro

 

 

 

 

CPU activity is pegged

 

 

Test with 4 underway.

4 concurrent took 2:39:57 on the Pro

 

 

 

 

 

 

CPU was pegged

 

Looking at the statistics I realized that using the average speed in fps would be a good way to review the results:

 

 

Being able to run 4 concurrent conversions improved throughput by on the Mac Pro by 45% and 126% on the Mac Studio.

 

I was surprised to see that the size of the resulting file was not consistent as every test run was done using episode 1 of season 7.  There must be some randomization in the compression process.

I've been using a Mac Studio for about a year-and-a-half now. It's easily the fastest Mac I've ever used, and this is "just" the M1 Max. It's also rock-solid stable. Apple really threw their best resources into optimizing the performance of the Apple Silicon hardware and their software for it. (Which is another way of saying, they had shifted all of their resources over to it several years ago, and the last of the pre-Apple-Silicon Intel stuff was bug-ridden, unreliable, and in the case of the last Intel Mac Mini: unusably slow and the absolute worst Mac I've ever used.)

 

While I don't have exact comparative figures from earlier Mac Pro hardware, I recently had to render out a nearly 10 hour compilation of animated films to Apple ProRes HQ (24 fps, 1080p, 24bit 48kHz uncompressed audio). To render the entire show on a Mac Studio: 25 minutes. That's jaw-droppingingly fast. I'm certain the Mac Pro (2019 model) took at least 1 1/2 to 2 hours the last time I used one of those a couple of years ago, and that was for a show at least two hours shorter. And that was an $11,000 Mac Pro when it was new.

On 5/2/2024 at 12:56 PM, Nathan Strum said:

While I don't have exact comparative figures from earlier Mac Pro hardware, I recently had to render out a nearly 10 hour compilation of animated films to Apple ProRes HQ (24 fps, 1080p, 24bit 48kHz uncompressed audio). To render the entire show on a Mac Studio: 25 minutes. That's jaw-droppingingly fast. I'm certain the Mac Pro (2019 model) took at least 1 1/2 to 2 hours the last time I used one of those a couple of years ago, and that was for a show at least two hours shorter. And that was an $11,000 Mac Pro when it was new.

 

Wow, that's impressive!

 

Have you seen Whisky? I've been using it to run some Windows games on my Studio:

 

 

I don't even run Mac games on my Mac.   Just emulators. Although it might be fun to try and dig up Carmageddon II. Carmageddon I actually got ported to iOS (and still somehow works - despite not having seen an update in... a decade?)

 

Although I have been enjoying this site to run some old Ambrosia games: https://infinitemac.org Particularly Barrack.

 

Now... if I can just find a way to load the full versions of Pop! and Battle-Girl, I'm all set!  

 

(I wonder though - could Whisky allow this dinosaur to actually run *and* access an AtariVox?)

22 minutes ago, Nathan Strum said:

I wonder though - could Whisky allow this dinosaur to actually run *and* access an AtariVox?

 

I'll give it a try this weekend.

Installation worked, but nothing happens when I run it.  I do see this in the Console's log reports, which isn't that helpful.

 

Whisky Version: 2.3.2
Date: 2024-05-09T22:24:29Z
macOS Version: 14.4.1

Bottle Name: AtariVox
Bottle URL: /Users/darrellspice/Library/Containers/com.isaacmarovitz.Whisky/Bottles/FF9CFD91-BE7C-4573-829D-4D3489115C3F

Wine Version: 7.7.0
Windows Version: winXP
Enhanced Sync: msync

Metal HUD: false
Metal Trace: false

Arguments: start /unix /Users/darrellspice/Library/Containers/com.isaacmarovitz.Whisky/Bottles/FF9CFD91-BE7C-4573-829D-4D3489115C3F/drive_c/Program Files (x86)/PhraseALator/PhraseALator.exe

Environment:
{
    "DXVK_ASYNC" = 1;
    "GST_DEBUG" = 1;
    WINEDEBUG = "fixme-all";
    WINEESYNC = 1;
    WINEMSYNC = 1;
    WINEPREFIX = "/Users/darrellspice/Library/Containers/com.isaacmarovitz.Whisky/Bottles/FF9CFD91-BE7C-4573-829D-4D3489115C3F";
}

msync: bootstrapped mach port on wine-13b4ee8-msync.
msync: up and running.

 

Thanks for checking. Worth a look anyway.

 

Mike (RevEng) was trying to update his Speakalator port for the Mac, but GTK is badly broked:

(It also affects an open source graphics app called Inkscape, annoyingly.)

 

I blame Apple.

 

I ended up getting Speakalator to work briefly by referencing a screenshot of Phrase-a-lator, to see what each button actually did.   Clearly though, that's not going to work for more involved speech-a-fying.