[Saxo]

Hello to all,

I'm glad this forum exists and have already read many helpfull remarks. I just got my new DELL mini 10 (specs below) and everything seems to work just fine, even with a quite 'hungry' antivirus. I have installed (and disabled !) a variety of software including Open Office, Firefox, VLC, etc. I install directly from my external USB drive.

A main problem seems to be streaming video, it just doesnt work well from some sites (choppy). Also, HD video doesn't work at all - although the advertisement for the mini 10 mentions HD video and there is an HDMI port. I have tested HD files downloaded from the MS site (wmv format) and with VLC versions 8.6 and 9.4 as well as WMPlayer. Selecting HD on youtube (flashplayer 10) is no good either but HQ seems to work just fine.

I have done identical tests on my old laptop with success (latitude D620 with dual core and 1 GB ram but NVIDIA quadro graphics).

Does anyone have any suggestions ??

Otherwise it's a little beauty and I hope to solve a few minor problems. Note that I have the French version with the azert keyboard and ... French windows (sorry !).

Thanks for any help,

Saxo
Mini 1010/Intel Atom z530/1GB Ram/1366x768 scr./160GB drive/WXP

[zrtom]

That's pretty much the same disappointing results I have had for about two months now. I could get the Microsoft HD clips to run in XP but it was spotty in Windows 7 and not at all in Windows 7 with Aero enabled.

Everyone is hoping newer graphics drivers are in the works to get these things working as advertised.

[Saxo]

Thanks zrtom,

I'm no expert but it must be that HD is demanding for the mini10 hardware. However, there could be a software issue too ie the particular video coding and interpreting. I have done further tests on the streaming videos. On the mini10 I got very nice results from the PBS site (US), but poor result from the MSNBC site (often choppy and with annoying audio delay). I still can't read an HD file.

Anyone have more ideas ?

Cheers,
Saxo.

[robandjeanne]

It drives my 42 inch Phillips 720p OK, but any diagonal lines in a movie are choppy no matter what resolution I've tried. This drives me crazy. For comparison I hooked up my old Compaq with svideo analog out. The viewing experience is far better with svideo. So far I'm totally underwhelmed with the HDMI output. Also there is a dichotomy because the PC desktop looks great from HDMI (better than analog svideo) but movies from HDMI look terrible.

Also, the 10 inch screen is fine for a hour or so, but I'd really like to have had a VGA output for driving the my many CRTs or older flat screens on longer sessions. Unfortunately svideo is abscent from most modern PCs, and probably VGA will be next. Why does it seem those old analog outputs (svideo & VGA) outperform the HDMI on movies?

[robandjeanne]

The HDMI output was so poor on movies that I didn't bother to solve the audio issue. I'm assuming there is a way to tell the 1010 that audio should come out the HDMI with the video?

[Pauli Karvinen]

Have anyone tryed dell mini 12 chipset drivers from Dells web pages, i think it have a better drivers for gma500 and chipset:

"DXVA Filters from Dell for GMA500 to enable hardware video acceleration for H264 in WMP"
file= R203604.EXE

[Saxo]

Thanks for the information. I am still hoping that a new driver for the GMA 500 may help for some streaming video and HD (although given the processor, that seems unlikely). Following the post of Clavik
http://www.mydellmini.com/forum/dell...a-win-7-a.html
I tried to install this driver that I downloaded from the DELL support page.
However I did not get any change in results and also my wireless didn't work (which I don't understand). So, I reverted to my previous set-up. Maybe XP users have to do a full reinstallation of bios, chipset etc. to get an improvement ? This is getting beyond my knowledge and ... patience.
Cheers !

[2die4]

Originally Posted by Saxo

Thanks for the information. I am still hoping that a new driver for the GMA 500 may help for some streaming video and HD (although given the processor, that seems unlikely). Following the post of Clavik
http://www.mydellmini.com/forum/dell...a-win-7-a.html
I tried to install this driver that I downloaded from the DELL support page.
However I did not get any change in results and also my wireless didn't work (which I don't understand). So, I reverted to my previous set-up. Maybe XP users have to do a full reinstallation of bios, chipset etc. to get an improvement ? This is getting beyond my knowledge and ... patience.
Cheers !

i have updated my mini10s hd driver to the new xp one that has come out and havent had any of these problems.

[Saxo]

Thanks for the reply. Do you get satisfactory results with the new driver (such as HD option in YouTube, or various video formats) ?
If yes, I'll have to redo the installation of the new driver.

Cheers.

[Dylbot]

Well, I installed the latest drivers along with the CCCP codec pack on my mini 10, and installed the same codec pack on my Inspiron 1520 (2ghz core 2 duo, 8600m gt, 2gb ram, both on XP) for comparison, and not only am I getting equivalent performance from 720p videos, but lower resolution videos actually look better on the Mini 10 (richer colours, less artifacting) than they do on the 1520. Believe me, when you get it set up right, video is the one thing that the GMA 500 does brilliantly. I haven't tested it with online streaming services (Youtube etc.) yet, though. I do advise using Media Player Classic over VLC on the Mini 10, as VLC just gives me stuttery playback and massive amounts of screen tearing, whereas MPC is smooth as silk.