H264??? Never heard of it. Conversion problem...

[sgt-pepper]

Hey guys,
Simple question really. I've got an avi file encoded with H264, according to AVICodec. I want to convert it to mpeg with tmpgenc. But tmpgenc doesn't recognise it. I've searched the site, but been unable to find a plugin or a codec that will help me.

Can someone please advise?

With thanks,
Pepper.

[Baldrick]

can you play the avi with wmp? try then increase the directshow priority in tmpgenc and reeopen the avi ( www.videohelp.com/tmpgenc#problems ).

[mikepenn]

H264 is mpeg4, if you convert it to mpeg2 in will look horrible

[jtoolman2000]

IS it 1280x720? I have some of these and I can't load it on anything but AVID Xpress

[celtic_druid]

DivX and XviD are also MPEG4 (different part) and many people convert such files to MPEG2 every day.

ffdshow includes a h.264/AVC decoder for both VfW and dshow. Since your file is in an avi container though it would need to have a compatible fourCC, which assuming it (FourCC) is "H264" it already has.

From recollection you will need to manually enable VfW decoding. dshow decoding can be enabled during the installation process.

[sgt-pepper]

It plays fine on WMP. I installed K-Lite Mega Codecs and it has ffdshow. Yes, I already had increased Directshow to 2 priority in tmpgenc and it does encode divx, xvid and anything else I've tried. This codec is a new one on me though. And as I say, tmpgenc won't load it. Is there a plugin I can try?

With thanks,
Pepper.

[sgt-pepper]

Sidenote: I just went into the ffdshow configuration, and it seemed to be enabled. I right clicked and chose "set all stable formats to libavcodec". I could have also chosen "set all supported formats to XviD". Don't know if that makes a difference. As well as checking in tmpgenc that DirectShow Multimedia File Reader was at high (2) priority, i increased AVI VFW Compatibility Reader to 2 as well.

Still nothing. Any other suggestions, please?

Thanks,
Pepper.

[Baldrick]

try other encoders or frameserve with virtualdub or avisynth.

[celtic_druid]

TMPGEnc doesn't work properly with ffdshow at least not newer versions. No idea what build klite is using though.

[sgt-pepper]

Ok guys, I've just tried loading the avi into virtualdub and got the following error message:

Couldn't locate decompressor for format 'H264' (unknown)
VirtualDub requires a Video For Windows (VFW) compatible codec to decompress video. DirectShow codecs, such as those used by Windows Media Player, are not suitable.

So I guess I need to install a new codec. Hopefully when I do this, tmpgenc will finally acknowledge the file.

Please advise,
With thanks always,
Pepper.

[GreyDeath]

FFDShow actually screwed up some of my other codecs on playback when I installed it to view a H264 file. So I just watched whatever I needed to, then did a System Restore. :P

Celtic, thanks for letting me know that I wasn't the only one having problems with TMPGEnc with FFDShow installed. Really Annoying...

[celtic_druid]

If you only want ffdshow to decode AVC, then make sure that is the only thing it is enabled for, then it won't be used for anything else.

What exactly did it screw up? If the problem can be reproduced then it can be fixed.

As for the VDub message, as I said you need to manually enable AVC/h.264 decoding in the VfW decoder config.

[lordsmurf]

as I said you need to manually enable AVC/h.264 decoding in the VfW decoder config.

Precisely how does one accomplish this task?

[sgt-pepper]

Celtic,

I still don't know. I attempted something a couple of months back, and it also screwed with my codecs. I don't know what I did, but I had a remove everything, and get everything back to normal. I still don't think I've got ffdshow configured the way it used to be.

If someone out there has a simple way to convert H264 to MPG using tmpgenc, I would love to know!

Joel (Pepper).

[Sakuya]

as I said you need to manually enable AVC/h.264 decoding in the VfW decoder config.

Precisely how does one accomplish this task?

I checked my Vfw Codec settings in ffdshow and H264 is enabled. Same in Video Decoder Config. Should I disable H264 in Video Decoder Config?

[lordsmurf]

H264 is mpeg4, if you convert it to mpeg2 in will look horrible

Not correct.

[Sakuya]

I'm using this script in TMPGEnc Plus and works:

AVISource("file.avi",false) 
LanczosResize(720,480)

But in the past, the resulting MPEG2 file will have several frames replaced by an opaque gray frame for some reason, almost always at the very end of the file and sometimes occasionally and randomly in the middle of the file. It wasn't there originally, and it wasn't there when I played the AVS file in MPC.

If anybody would want to test theirs and see if they get this problem, please post the results here. I'd really appreciate it! By the way, if you want to include audio in your MPEG2 file, you should replace "false" in the code above with "true", I think? Or do you just get rid of that parameter alltogether?