Highest Compression Codec?

[Solonor]

Hi all, new to the forums, and have a question that hopefully makes sense and hasn't been answered somewhere else before. I have tons of video clips in various formats WMV, AVI, MPG, MOV, VOB ect. I'm not too concerned with video quality but more hard drive space, I've converted several of the files to a avi format which i believe is divx. However some files like WMV will convert to larger files and then other WMV's will be smaller in avi. What I'm wondering is whats the best format to use to make the smallest files possible? Thanks in advance.

[guns1inger]

Size = running time x bitrate. You can lower the size by using a lower bitrate. This holds for an compression codec. If you don't care too much about quality, resize all the files to around the same resolution and compress them heavily with Divx or Xvid.

That said, the best compression/quality codec at the moment is H.264, however it is also one of the slowest when it comes to encoding.

The simplest option is to buy a large external HDD and move your videos across to that for storage.

[JohnnyMalaria]

WMV can be heavily compressed to almost any size.

AVI and MOV are simply containers in which audio/video of a specific format reside. i.e., AVI and MOV can also be very small if the video format allows heavy compression.

MPG and VOB are essentially the same and can also be heavily compressed.

How small a file any of these can generate depends upon what you are willing to sacrifice. For example you can change the size of video frame. If you source is 720 x 480 you could reduce it to 360 x 240 - that reduces everything by a factor of four. You can also reduce the frame rate. If your source is 30 frames per second, you could change it to 15 frames per second. Doing both could reduce everything by a factor of 8 and that's before you compress it.

[Solonor]

Heres some more detail, time isn't a factor, i let me PC run doing various encoding jobs while at work and sleeping. I'm using WinAVI converter now. All I'm doing is having it run the conversion to avi using the default codec. Not messing with resolution or fps, and some files will end up half the size of the source and others will almost double the size of the source. What would you guys recommended as a good app to batch convert the files? So it seams like H.264 is the way to go? any pros or cons on that vs divx or xvid? Thanks so far guys, already have some new directions to go.

[guns1inger]

I'm using WinAVI converter now

Wow. You really don't care about the quality.

Again, I wouldn't bother. Get an external HDD for storage.


Edit : Fixed Quote tag

[Solonor]

pquote]I'm using WinAVI converter now

Wow. You really don't care about the quality.

Again, I wouldn't bother. Get an external HDD for storage.[/quote]

lol, its not that i'm just very new to working with videos. whats a good app to use? WinAVI was the first thing i came across.

[JohnnyMalaria]

For WMV, try Microsoft's free Windows Media Encoder - very configurable.

EDIT - it is also fully scriptable and you can run batch processes.

[guns1inger]

Edit : Stupid mouse