MPEG2 encode speeds

[Green Lantern]

Hello all. I have a Dual 1 GHz G4. Using the Quicktime MPEG2 encoder, I can encode slightly faster than real time, but the results aren't too good (colors look washed out and motion is jumpy). I've also used mpeg2enc. Quality is much better, but it takes about 3 times longer than the Quicktime encoder.

First of all, is my speed typical? Is there anything I might do to speed up the process.

Also, I have heard that the tools for the PC can encode faster, assuming that one has a fast P4. Has anyone had experience using a PC (say a 2 GHz Pentium 4) to encode MPEG2 at full resolution using VBR 1 or 2 pass? Is it really much faster or was I told a bunch of BS?

Thanks for your help.

[robert_swain]

Hi,

I haven't had much experience of DVD authoring on the mac but I do quite a lot on the PC using Adobe Premier to edit, TMPGEnc to encode and DVDIt! PE 2.5 to Author on a P4 2GHz.

To encode about 2 hours of video with the highest quality 2-pass VBR settings will take approx 30 hours BUT the quality is VERY good with bitrates down to about 5000 for video only and using Dolby compressed audio.

I guess good things come to those who wait.

I hope this helps.

Regards,

Rob.

[havema-1]

The only flags that affect mpeg2enc speed are -4 -2 -r and -I.

Adding -4 1 -2 1 to mpeg2enc string make a modest improvement to the quality but the encoding is also much slower. These control how ruthlessly mpeg2enc discards bad looking matches between sections of adjacent frames during the early stages of the search when it is working with 4*4 and 2*2 clusters of pixels rather than individual pixels. -4 1 -2 1 maximizes quality and -4 4 -2 4 maximizes speed (the decline in quality may be below the visual threshold with -4 4 -2 4).

Reducing the radius of the search for matching sections of images by using -r 8 or -r 0 in mpeg2enc also increases speed. Due to the way the search algorithm works the search radius is in effect rounded to the nearest multiple of 8. Furthermore, on modern CPU's the speed gained by reducing the radius below 16 is not large enough to make the marked quality reduction worthwhile for most applications.

If you want speed, consider also progressive encoding which is faster than interlaced.

Scaling the original footage to some lower resolution also increases speed.

Additional filters and denoisers take their time, too.

[jo-jo ma]

recently upgraded to media cleaner pro 6.

one of the bragging points on the website was "new faster vector motion encoding engine for mpeg2"

MCP5 getting 135:1 encode times (2 hours 15 minutes to encode 1 minute of footage)
MCP6 getting 100:1

tieing up my G$733 for a day and a half on a 20 minute clip is laughable. (or 8 1/2 days for a full 2 hour stream)

yeah, apples encoder is near or better than real-time, but its the other end of the spectrum.... QT mpeg2 encoder's picture quality, color saturation, smoothness are all marginal at best.

right now, for under $10k, mpeg2 encoding on the PC is the way to go.

i've got a $400 dual P3 1Ghz system running tunsami for all my mpeg2 encoding needs.


btw: 2-pop.com has a great forum on DVD authoring for the mac

[Eug]

recently upgraded to media cleaner pro 6.

one of the bragging points on the website was "new faster vector motion encoding engine for mpeg2"

MCP5 getting 135:1 encode times (2 hours 15 minutes to encode 1 minute of footage)
MCP6 getting 100:1

tieing up my G$733 for a day and a half on a 20 minute clip is laughable. (or 8 1/2 days for a full 2 hour stream)

yeah, apples encoder is near or better than real-time, but its the other end of the spectrum.... QT mpeg2 encoder's picture quality, color saturation, smoothness are all marginal at best.

right now, for under $10k, mpeg2 encoding on the PC is the way to go.

i've got a $400 dual P3 1Ghz system running tunsami for all my mpeg2 encoding needs.


btw: 2-pop.com has a great forum on DVD authoring for the mac

What are your settings with cleaner? (Both 5 and 6)

[jo-jo ma]

recently upgraded to media cleaner pro 6.

one of the bragging points on the website was "new faster vector motion encoding engine for mpeg2"

MCP5 getting 135:1 encode times (2 hours 15 minutes to encode 1 minute of footage)
MCP6 getting 100:1

tieing up my G$733 for a day and a half on a 20 minute clip is laughable. (or 8 1/2 days for a full 2 hour stream)

yeah, apples encoder is near or better than real-time, but its the other end of the spectrum.... QT mpeg2 encoder's picture quality, color saturation, smoothness are all marginal at best.

right now, for under $10k, mpeg2 encoding on the PC is the way to go.

i've got a $400 dual P3 1Ghz system running tunsami for all my mpeg2 encoding needs.


btw: 2-pop.com has a great forum on DVD authoring for the mac

What are your settings with cleaner? (Both 5 and 6)

i'm using the preset templates for DVD with both progs
MCP5 won't let me make any changes to the mpeg2 profile