Possible Bug--Can't 2-pass in PSP H.264

[BellBoy]

I started using Visual Hub to convert movies and TV shows for the PSP and after that wasn't as pain free as I would have liked, I came back to the latest version of ffmpegX (0.0.9w_r5).

I had some success after getting the dimensions down (something that is sorely needed in the FAQ, IMO) with some TV shows like Entourage and some Looney Tunes shorts, but I wanted a feature film on my PSP. I attempted 40 Year Old Virgin and all that did was lock up my PSP (using 2.70 FW, btw).

I tried again with The Incredibles and I thought I had it nailed. I used MTR to rip (used the chapter option), and tried the plain PSP H.264 preset as a starting point. What I got was a 360 meg file that loaded and was recognized by my PSP. When I started playing it however, it skipped about a 3-5 second scene about a minute or two into the film and the sound was out of sync from that point on.

I thought that selecting two-pass encoding would fix this, but after selecting it and starting the process, it finished immediately with the error:

Mac OSX universal build for ffmpegX
  libavutil version: 49.0.0
  libavcodec version: 51.9.0
  libavformat version: 50.4.0
Input #0, mpeg, from '/Users/bob/Desktop/Incredibles/VIDEO_TS/Incredibles.VOB':
  Duration: 00:00:36.2, start: 0.280633, bitrate: 1519597 kb/s
  Stream #0.0[0x1e0], 29.97 fps(r): Video: mpeg2video, yuv420p, 720x480, 9800 kb/s
  Stream #0.1[0x29]: Subtitle: dvdsub
  Stream #0.2[0x2a]: Subtitle: dvdsub
  Stream #0.3[0x2b]: Subtitle: dvdsub
  Stream #0.4[0x20]: Subtitle: dvdsub
  Stream #0.5[0x21]: Subtitle: dvdsub
  Stream #0.6[0x22]: Subtitle: dvdsub
  Stream #0.7[0x80]: Audio: ac3, 48000 Hz, 5:1, 448 kb/s
  Stream #0.8[0x81]: Audio: ac3, 48000 Hz, 5:1, 384 kb/s
  Stream #0.9[0x82]: Audio: ac3, 48000 Hz, 5:1, 384 kb/s
  Stream #0.10[0x83]: Audio: ac3, 48000 Hz, stereo, 160 kb/s
  Stream #0.11[0x84]: Audio: ac3, 48000 Hz, stereo, 160 kb/s
Output #0, psp, to '/Users/bob/Desktop/Incredibles/VIDEO_TS/MAQ03893.MP4':
  Stream #0.0, 29.97 fps(c): Video: h264, yuv420p, 368x208, q=10-51, pass 1, 384 kb/s
  Stream #0.1: Audio: aac, 48000 Hz, stereo, 64 kb/s
Stream mapping:
  Stream #0.0 -> #0.0
  Stream #0.7 -> #0.1
[h264 @ 0x45a630]using SAR=208/207
[h264 @ 0x45a630]ratecontrol_init: can't open stats file
Error while opening codec for output stream #0.0 - maybe incorrect parameters such as bit_rate, rate, width or height

I found that if I turned it off, it started with no problems. When I saw the last error message I started to play with the dimensions of the movie. I tried 368x208 and 320x240--using 16:9 and 4:3 and nothing seemed to fix the problem. I tried turning on other features like high quality and trellis, but nothing mattered while 2-pass was checked.

Anyone have any ideas about what I might be doing wrong?

[tbluewater]

1. Why are you setting the audio bitrate to 64 kbps?
2. Which video container are you specifying? If MP4, try exporting your video in MOV.

[BellBoy]

I set it to 64 because I thought that might fix the glitch...it didn't.

If setting it to MOV won't interfere with getting this to play on my PSP, fine, but I was just using the presets.

[tbluewater]

I set it to 64 because I thought that might fix the glitch...it didn't.

If setting it to MOV won't interfere with getting this to play on my PSP, fine, but I was just using the presets.

I see. Don't take my suggestions seriously since I don't know anything about PSP.

[BellBoy]

No worries...but I can't tell you how many times that I've wanted to chuck this thing (PSP) in the trash because of all of these encoding hassles.

I wish Sony would get a clue to what people really want to use this thing for.

BTW, I'm trying another pass with my laptop that may have different versions of the binaries. Does anyone know if I can run r5 without upgrading to the newest binaries? That may be the reason why I can't get 2-pass to work on my desktop. I got it to start on my laptop with no problems. Now I just hope it completes without any sync (or otherwise) problems.

Edit: I'm trying this on Pirates of the Caribbean this time...I think I have a theory about why The Incredibles didn't work. If anyone here knows the movie, the glitch/skip starts right after the opening credits/interviews. There are cops chasing robbers and that little 3-5 (make that 10--I just timed it) second snippet is missing after encoding which throws the sound off. It might be MTR's rip of the DVD that might be to blame--this is the only thing I can think of since it's (I think) right at a chapter change where the glitch happens. The VOB file views fine with no jumping so who knows? I was using the latest version (2.6.6) so I might have to revert to an earlier version if someone can verify that this is to blame.

[BellBoy]

I found the difference between my laptop and my desktop.

The mpeg2enc was the Universal version on my laptop and it was the PPC version on my desktop. I copied it over and now both are the same. I do have a mix of PPC and Universal programs though for some reason...should they all be one or the other? The three that ffmpegx wants are now Universal on both machines, but things like vcgen, etc. are the PPC version.

I also noticed that I had a realib folder on my laptop but not the desktop so I copied and moved it over...should that make a difference as well?