H264 vs Divx/Xvid...

[lein]

what software are you guys using to encode to h264?

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: lein
what software are you guys using to encode to h264?

FairUse Wizard - i didn't want to learn a lot about it like i normally do with stuff, i just wanted click and go. this works excellent and i use the new vlc (0.8.4 i think is the one i have) to play it which works excellent and is less cpu intensive than wm10.

with fairuse it is free for file sizes up to 700MB in either x264, xvid or if you have the divx codec installed that one too. it is very easy and has a nice queue feature so i can have 3-4 iso movies and convert them while i sleep. it also has a auto turn off your computer option when the encoding is done.

 

[eelw]

Originally posted by: lein
what software are you guys using to encode to h264?

QT7 here.

 

[rbV5]

Originally posted by: IeraseU

I'm pretty sure it doesn't yet...

I do believe the X18xx series of cards did offer decoding support out of the box; encoding support however has not yet been added, but it's coming.

I can verify that X1800 does not have H264 decoding support out of the box. There is a link on the Catalyst install disc to obtain the decoder, and there is a "H.264 decoder Available for download soon" message on the page at ATI.com

 

[gsellis]

Sidebar... Just because I remembered it and off-topic (more of a tangent)... The folks at my favorite DV forum were discussing this simple editor that can edit HDV MPEG.

Womble MPEG Video Wizard

Have not tried it, but they have been cutting footage with it (non-TS).

BTW, one thing to look at in your trials is the reds and blues. Current DVD MPEG tends to crush reds (unless you have CCE). I know WMV vs MPEG clearly shows better color.

 

[xtknight]

Originally posted by: gsellis
BTW, one thing to look at in your trials is the reds and blues. Current DVD MPEG tends to crush reds (unless you have CCE). I know WMV vs MPEG clearly shows better color.

Hmmm...I wonder if this has anything to do with the color space?

RGB565 is quite common. That means red gets 5 bytes, green gets 6, and blue gets 5. They use more for green because our eyes are more sensitive to it. You may try RGB555 if you can find the option anywhere. There are options for that in Windows Media Encoder.

 

[eelw]

Originally posted by: gsellis
Womble MPEG Video Wizard

Yup. Womble is one if not the best MPEG2 editor. Very easy to use and generally doesn't need to reencode the file as you edit out commericials from the video. Also it retains proper audio sync on the edited file. Other programs that I have used always screws up the muxed audio for videos that I recorded on my set top DVD recorder.

 

[bob4432]

Originally posted by: bob4432

Originally posted by: eelw
You can get surprisingly good looking video with a bitrate as low as 200kbps for a 640x480 video with a 2 pass h.264 encode. What bitrate are you currently using?

i think it came out to ~ 500KB/s (total movie length is 1hr 40min and total size is 450MB)

tonight i will encode @ 200MB total file size using probaly close to the same resolution and might try vbr instead of cbr for audio. will le you know how it goes 🙂

the difference between the 450MB and 700MB videos is not very much, but the difference between the 200MB and 450MB videos was huge. the 200MB video looked bad since it was the same resolutions as the 450 and 700MB videos. so for me is looks like the sweet spot is ~450MB, which is nice since i have a 512MB flash drive so transfering movies to the laptop is too easy 🙂. looks like i will be re-encoding the ones i have over @ 450MB/s and using xvid as the codec due to the quality/cpu usage ratio (keeping the laptop in mind).

if anybody knows of an easy way to edit xvid and x264, i can cut a small 2min part out so you can see the differences of the 700, 450 and 200MB versions in both xvid and x264...

[EDIT]found and easy way to cut, let me know if anybody want a ~3min video of x264 and xvid from the 450MB full videos and the 200MB videos to see the differences[/EDIT]

anybody use vp7? have heard it is very good but there is not much support....