My computer video files are screwy

Factual Questions
1

My computer recently when belly up, the stupid thing wouldn’t start up anymore. It turned out that my AGP port was broken, so I needed it replaced. Therefore, a whole new Motherboard, with a new CPU. My old CPU was a PIII 550, but this one is a P4 1.8Ghz. Everything else (apart from the PSU) is exactly the same, including the video card (a Matrox Millennium G400) and the SD-RAM (192Mb).

Everything works just fine now - except for one thing. My avi movies stutter slightly (video only, audio is fine), and my quicktime movies play the video stream slightly slower than the audio, so they’re out of sync almost all the way through.

Do you think it’s
a) the RAM? Need more? New chips to match the MB?
b) the video card? New drivers for the MB maybe?
c) something else?

Any help would be a godsend!

2

I would almost say Video drivers first. Try installing the new versions and see if that helps.

3

The Matrox Millennium G400 is a somewhat older card and is pretty sluggish performance wise relative to even the less expensive $50-$60 and 64 meg Nvidias you can get. You can update drivers but using that card in a 1.8 gigahertz system is is going to be a major drag on overall system video perfromance. A new driver set would probably help but it would be a better investment overall to get a newer card.

BTW there are separate and specific TurboGL G400 drivers for the Athlons and P3/P4 CPUs.

http://www.tech-report.com/reviews/2000q1/g400/

4

Aha. Astro, what you say makes sense. I reckon you’re probably right.

Boy, it’s an expensive business this computer thing.

5

I would think that the G400 would be able to play avi and quicktime movies without a hitch though.

6

There is a Directshow filter patch you can apply that will probably help solve your problem. You can download it here.

7

hm, I wonder if Cecil’s a computer whiz…

8

Hmm. Hodge, that didn’t seem to work. Doesn’t look like that was the problem.

So my next question is, if I upgrade to a newer Matrox card, what do I change it to? Am I looking for larger than a 32Mb card? or will teh Matrox 550 be enough?

Don’t want to waste money on a card that won’t solve the issue, and especially don’t want to pay twice as much for a card than I need to.