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Topic: Trying to play MP3... (Read 11179 times) previous topic - next topic
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Trying to play MP3...

486SX 25 MHz (without FPU, co-processor... nothing), 16 MB, Win 95.
I'd need a program with an integer decoder. Is there any chance?

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #1 –
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486SX 25 MHz (without FPU, co-processor... nothing), 16 MB, Win 95.
I'd need a program with an integer decoder. Is there any chance?

Very hardly. I always heard that the minimum requirements for real-time MP3 decoding were 486DX4-100 or Pentium 90

I think even a 486DX2-66 wouldn't process enough MIPS to decode MP3 in real time no matter how much you hack the decoder to speed it up.

Anyway, MAD is an integer MP3 decoder. Give it a try. :B

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #2 –
MAD! What was I thinking? 
OK, thanks Roberto. 

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #3 –
All FhG decoders (including the one in Winamp) are integer-based as far as I know. Very likely faster than MAD.
Microsoft Windows: We can't script here, this is bat country.

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #4 –
I remember I could play mp3s on my old 486 (DX2 50MHz; 16MB Ram; Win95) in real-time. No problem. But I don´t know which player I used.

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #5 –
Maybe you can play with players like Xing and Digideck, that cut lots of "edges" to make the decoding faster. Of course, quality suffers (they reduce accuracy, etc.)

IIRC, there was a 486 version of DigiDeck. Google around.

@S_O: Maybe you used Winamp with the Nitrane decoder. That decoder is hell fast, but we all know by now how buggy and low quality it was.

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #6 –
I recall a small and free mp3 player avaliable for download at the Fhg Institute(Frahunhofer) website's until 2 years ago.
If I'm not mistaken, it was able to play mp3s in i486s machines without a problem.
They even had a 16bit version as well. 
(WinPlay???)

//edit by LIF//:
Get it here.
"Jazz washes away the dust of everyday life" (Art Blakey)

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #7 –
Quote
486SX 25 MHz (without FPU, co-processor... nothing), 16 MB, Win 95.
I'd need a program with an integer decoder. Is there any chance?

The other thing, if you can find a compatible player, is to ditch the overhead of W95 and
run dos... or linux without Xwindows.

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #8 –
I don't think DOS would be of much help. Even mpxplay requires a 486DX4-100 to decode MP3 (or at least a Pentium 120 for Vorbis).

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #9 –
Pentium 90 needed to decode MP3? Not true. 

I used to listen to MP3s on a Pentium 60. (The one which is compatible with the 486 "overdrive" thingybobby. The socket was incompatible with Pentium 66+.) 44kHz 16bit stereo used to work fine in both Winamp and winplay3, with Windows 95.

But there was a catch: I couldn't run anything else while listening to MP3s or the sound would skip! I had to either downmix or downsample if I wanted to do something else.

Nullsoft DOSAMP worked in DOS, but IIRC my DOS sound drivers were flaky and I could only get 22kHz playback. Later, DAMP worked fine IIRC.

I've still got DOSAMP on my HDD.

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #10 –
i used to play mp3z on an old 486dx 66 machine, overclocked to 80mhz. i had to check the "half" quality in the decoder box options in winamp, however. but it sounds to me like what you have is a 386...i don't think they made 486 chips at that speed...but i could be wrong. i highly doubt you will be able to get an mp3 to play with 25mhz without decreasing the quality somehow.
i hate cats

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #11 –
There were definitely 486SX-25's.

http://www.hardwareanalysis.com/content/image/10111/

Take a look at the date on the chip (1989)... it must have been one of the first (if not the first) 486, since 386's were still rather high end and pricey just a year before that in 1988 (I remember clearly, as I was taking some computer science courses that year at a technical college). 

Ahh, the good ol' days when 640k really was just about enough for anyone... 

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #12 –
i stand corrected.

btw - i read somewhere that the quote you are alluding to was never said by bill gates...its just urban legend.
i hate cats

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #13 –
Quote
i stand corrected.

btw - i read somewhere that the quote you are alluding to was never said by bill gates...its just urban legend.

Could be... if it's an urban legend, it's been around a long time.  I think he did say it (or something like it), but of course it's possible he didn't.

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #14 –
Quote
Pentium 90 needed to decode MP3? Not true. 

I used to listen to MP3s on a Pentium 60. (The one which is compatible with the 486 "overdrive" thingybobby. The socket was incompatible with Pentium 66+.) 44kHz 16bit stereo used to work fine in both Winamp and winplay3, with Windows 95.

As I said, earlier versions of Winamp used nitrane, that used to cut around the edges in order to play faster. So, yes, you could decode them in real time, but with reduced quality (reduced decoder precision).

Probably the decoder was running at "half" or "quarter quality" mode. You didn't even have to enable that, the decoder switched to a lower quality mode automatically if there wasn't enough processing power. Same thing with the current decoder, although it doesn't cut around the edges anymore.

And probably the same thing happened with WinPlay3.



Anyway: Yes, for full quality MP3 playback, you need more than a Pentium 60. Or a 486 other than DX4-100/120

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #16 –
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Quote
Could be... if it's an urban legend, it's been around a long time.  I think he did say it (or something like it), but of course it's possible he didn't.

http://www.urbanlegends.com/celebrities/bi...tes_memory.html

Could just be me, but Gates' denial smacks of avoidance and "thou dost protest too much."  It comes across as a marketing statement, not a factual statement.

Not that it matters -- who really cares whether he said it or not?  Talk about beating the skeleton of a dead horse...   

(OK, I was the one who sort of brought it up...).

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #17 –
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but it sounds to me like what you have is a 386...i don't think they made 486 chips at that speed...but i could be wrong.

SX=sucks.  486SX processors actually ran SLOWER, for the most part, than 386DX.
gentoo ~amd64 + layman | ncmpcpp/mpd | wavpack + vorbis + lame

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #18 –
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Quote
but it sounds to me like what you have is a 386...i don't think they made 486 chips at that speed...but i could be wrong.

SX=sucks.  486SX processors actually ran SLOWER, for the most part, than 386DX.

agreed. i remember i had an old 386 25mhz laptop that ran sooo much faster than a 386sx desktop that i had...man that thing was SLOW, even in windows 3.1
i hate cats

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #19 –
My old 486 DX2/66 could not play MP3 in real-time at full quality (only at half quality). I bought a Pentium Overdrive on eBay for like $20 a few years ago. Running at 83MHz, the Pentium overdrive played MP3s fine at full quality.

Haha, I remember all the hype about Pentium Overdrive sockets when people were buying 486s. It was sooo important to have one. When the Pentium overdrive finally came out, hardly anyone got one.

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #20 –
486SXes came out after DXes.  There was a series of 486DXes that were defective (the FPU and I believe something else were bugged).  They disabled the FPU and sold them as a "discount processor".  The Pentium FDIV bug wasn't the first time Intel had trouble with their FPUs.  I had a DX2/66 but it turns out the DX50s (different from the DX2/50s) were faster.  They were uncommon though because the 50MHz bus wreaked havoc with lots of VLB cards of the era.

Anyhow, there were still 486es in use when mp3s started circulating when I was in college (DX4/100's at least) and they played them OK IIRC.  A 486SX25 is probably a long shot, but are the low-power embedded processors in portable players that much faster?  In this thread it's mentioned that they use about 30MHz to decode mp3s...

Quote
Haha, I remember all the hype about Pentium Overdrive sockets when people were buying 486s. It was sooo important to have one. When the Pentium overdrive finally came out, hardly anyone got one.

HAHA, those things were surreal.
I am *expanding!*  It is so much *squishy* to *smell* you!  *Campers* are the best!  I have *anticipation* and then what?  Better parties in *the middle* for sure.
http://www.phong.org/

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #21 –
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In this thread it's mentioned that they use about 30MHz to decode mp3s...

30mHz DSPs. Keep in mind these are processors specialized in signal processing, not general purpose processors like CPUs.

Besides, these DSPs aren't running a fully featured operational system in the background.

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #22 –
I remember somewhere reading about an MP3 player for Playstation. It might have just been in development, but the PS certainly doesn't have a 60MHz processor.

Trying to play MP3...

Reply #23 –
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I remember somewhere reading about an MP3 player for Playstation. It might have just been in development, but the PS certainly doesn't have a 60MHz processor.

I never heard of anything like that. As far as I know, the PlayStation can decode ADPCM at most. (although MP2 would be a possibility)

And it's CPU runs at 33mHz. Certainly not enough for MP3, unless using some low quality mode.