Ein said:Check out Apple's recommendations here.
Download sample H264 clips and try them out.
I found this to be the shortest clip, at 14.3 MB, 960x540.
Bear in mind that u'll need "QuickTime 7 for Windows Public Preview " to play back the clips... that's another 24.5 MB
ATi RULES Again ??? Sid's comments pleaseYou will need a graphic card with some dedicated transistor gates to be able to play back H264 content. Right now, the still unavailable but soon to arrive R520 is the only piece of graphic hardware demonstrated and capable of handling H264 content.
R520 can play H264 video content while Nvidia so far failed to prove that its G70, Geforce 7800GTX is capable of doing so. Nvidia claims it can but Nvidia has failed to prove that to the INQ and to the rest of the world. We will ask Nvidia again how it can be done on a Geforce 7800GTX.
How does H.264 compare with MPEG-4 in QuickTime 6?
The MPEG-4 video in QuickTime 6, referred to as MPEG-4 Part 2, plays an important role in the evolution of standards for the Internet and wireless multimedia industries, where it has been widely adopted. H.264, also known as MPEG-4 Part 10, is a newer technology than MPEG-4 Part 2, providing up to four times the frame size of video encoded with the MPEG-4 Part 2 video codec at a given data rate. H.264 will undoubtedly build upon the success of MPEG-4 Part 2.
WE WERE intrigued with H.264 content and the ability to play it back, and we spend two days of testing and finally came to some conclusions. At this time there is no graphic card hardware acceleration for this fancy codec.
It's very CPU dependent and we have some advice for both Intel,AMD and Apple computer users.