Can someone explain the difference between main, high, baseline & Levels?

[smackyourfupa]

Just wondering what the differences are between the options for Profile (Baseline, Main, High) & the Levels. I have no idea what the differences are but notice most video files are Main or High with a Level of 3 to 4.1 so that's normally what I choose when rencoding with XMedia Recode.

[yoda313]

I can't tell you the exact differences but it mainly has to do with the amount of control you have over the exacting specs of the video itself. Things like cabac and reference frames are involved. I know about them but I don't know the ins and outs of them.

The higher the profile the more "stuff" you can do with the video. Thats the best I can offer you.

Suffice it to say the lower the profile the more compatible the video will be. Same with resolution. Keep it sd and profile 3 and just about anything that can handle h264 and the appropriate file extension and it will play just fine.

To get more specific you'll have to read up on cabac and reference frames and more on the profile itself.

Hope that gets you started.

Oh and by the way it seems like most bluray players are 4.1 and older units like old tablets and stuff will be 3, as would other portable devices that handle h264 that aren't really recent. So stick with sd and profile 3 and pretty much anything should play it. (beyond those generalities you'll have to test your target device to see what profile it likes and what settings you can maximize on it to achieve your desired results, however my exprience has been usually the presets do just fine)

[jagabo]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.264/MPEG-4_AVC#Profiles
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.264/MPEG-4_AVC#Levels

[smackyourfupa]

wow