How fast is your Divx/Xvid to DVD conversion rate?

[digicube]

I have a 2.4 GHz Intel P4 with HT and 1.5GB PC2700 DDR, it's pretty long. A 30s clip took 2 mins 30s, which is 5 times it's running time. How can I speed it up without purchasing a faster CPU?

[DJRumpy]

I'm guessing from your poor performance, your using TMPGenc as an encoder. Switch to CCE, or MainConcept, and you'll see close to, or faster than realtime encodes.

[digicube]

Yes I'm using TMPGEnc, I'll try the others you mentioned.

[digicube]

Which one would you recommend? CCE or MainConcept? Is there a website that compares CCE vs MainConcept vs TMPGEnc?

[digicube]

Do you know how to add black borders around the video using Mainconcept to counter TV overscan? Will a TV overscan a home-made DVD? I know it does it badly with home-made VCDs.

[soundforbjt]

IMHO, CCE will give the best quality. Don't know about best speed though.

My system is similar to your's and with CCE I get 1.5 realtime speed (ie...30min encode takes 18 to 20 min).

[digicube]

When you encode, do you place black borders around the video? Most of my videos have subtitles I'm afraid the TV will cut parts of it.

[digicube]

I think I'll use Mainconcept even though CCE is significantly faster in encoding times because CCE couldn't proceed after a certain time when encoding one of my Divx files while Mainconcept handled it with no problem.

[digicube]

I think I'll stick with TMPGEnc because it's the ONLY encoder that allows you to place borders around the video to deal with TV overscan problem.

[Gregg]

The encoding time depends on the settings you use. I set up TMPGenc for fastest encode time. It takes 2 1/2 hrs for an average movie. Those DixX/Xvid movies don't deserve more anyway.

Enjoy!

[DJRumpy]

digicube, all of the encoders will let you modify the encoded image in any way you like, including letterboxing, resizing, overscan adjustments, ect. CCE is not as newbie friendly as TMPGenc, but it will produce excellent quality, and the best speed of the three encoders. Main Concept is also an excellent encoder, with excellent speed.

If you want comparisons, just search the forums. There have been endless numbers of debates regarding the relative strengths and weaknesses of each. In the end, you'll simply have to decide for yourself. I'd suggest you try all three. Make sure you read a guide for each, so you understand the application.

[digicube]

DJRumpy, CCE is definitely more for the professionals since it's almost $2000 but Mainconcept looks easy enough. I can resize the video but I still can't figure how to add black borders around a DVD/VCD compain video using Mainconcept, I couldn't find anything in the manual too. Maybe you direct me with instructions?

[DJRumpy]

The basic version of CCE only costs around $50 dollars U.S. About the same as TMPGenc. It only does 2-Pass though. The speed is the same aas the professional version.

By resizing, I'm referring to pre-filtering your input. It's not necessary to do this in the encoder itself, although TMPGenc does this natively. CCE will allow you to resize to any resolution, although it doesn't do letterboxing. I use AVISynth for my editing. If you use CCE, or MainConcept, just use VirtualDub, or AVISynth to resize and letterbox your input. You then simply frameserve it to your encoder.

[digicube]

I see, so I have to use multiple programs. Do you know a website that gives step-by-step instructions on this? It's great TMPGEnc does this natively maybe this is why it is slow because it does many things in one.

[digicube]

I think I found it at www.videotools.net and Avisyth website. I'll see if I can do it.

[DJRumpy]

You can also use the GUIDES section here for help on any of these tools. If you get lost, just post

[digicube]

Success, I manage to do it with videotools' AVI wrapper Link2 and mainconcept encoder but there's still a problem. For Divx/Xvid videos, I have to turn on the RAW Audio option in Link2 which extracts the audio making the link file a lot bigger. Any way of getting around this? As for CCE, I have CCE SP 2.67 Trial version and it says "Video CD is not selectable" so I can't use this program. I can resize my 640x480 Divx video to 352x240 for VCD in Virtualdub and frameserve it but the end result will be too pixelated.

[DJRumpy]

You can always just re-encode your big PCM WAV file to an MP2. Use BeSweet.

Success, I manage to do it with videotools' AVI wrapper Link2 and mainconcept encoder but there's still a problem. For Divx/Xvid videos, I have to turn on the RAW Audio option in Link2 which extracts the audio making the link file a lot bigger. Any way of getting around this? As for CCE, I have CCE SP 2.67 Trial version and it says "Video CD is not selectable" so I can't use this program. I can resize my 640x480 Divx video to 352x240 for VCD in Virtualdub and frameserve it but the end result will be too pixelated.

You don't use the Video CD setting in CCE. You simply resize your video with VirtualDub, or AVISynth to whatever resolution you want (sounds like you want VCD - 352x240), and select (MPEG-1 SS) for the type, rather than Video CD. I don't know why they leave that setting there.

[digicube]

yes but if I resize it in virtual dub and frameserve it to CCE, the result is very pixelated, don't know why. I probably be best finding a CCE version with Video CD settings selectable. I think I'use this procedure for DVD encoding since VCD is still tolerable in TMPGEnc and much easier to use.

[ronnylov]

Regarding the resizing and adding black borders I recommend trying FitCD, which can generate the avissynth script you need.

Edit: With CCE and only rezising in avisynth I get 2.0 encoding speed when encoding to DVD. I usually do 2 passes VBR (plus the vaf creation) so that 3 encodings in CCE. This mean 40 minutes of video requires one hour encoding time. But this is video only and from a xvid/divx source, then I encode audio in tmpgenc separately

EDIT 2: I have an AthlonXP 2500+ Barton on an Abit NF7-S rev 2 motherboard running at 2000 MHz (10x200) and 1 GB of dual channel memory.

[digicube]

The FitCD works great, my resized windows is not as pixelated as before. Since you do audio and video seperately, can you author the files to DVD without joining(multiplexing) them together? I have TMPGEnc DVD Author. I'm asking this because I think it would be tedious if for a 4GB DVD movie needs 12GB(4GB for seperate audio and video files, 4 GB for the muxed file, 4GB for the VOB files) of disk space to author.

[DJRumpy]

yes but if I resize it in virtual dub and frameserve it to CCE, the result is very pixelated

Frameserving will not affect the quality, although the settings you select in VirtualDub could. The primary cause for pixelation would be your settings in CCE. If your creating a VCD, make sure you change the matrix to "Ultra Low Bitrate" if you have that setting available (look under the VIDEO options for a 'Quantization Matrices' button). You should also ensure your using the maximum bitrate allowed for VCD (1150 kbps).

Since you do audio and video seperately, can you author the files to DVD without joining(multiplexing) them together?

That depends on your authoring software. Most will accept seperate audio and video streams.

I'm asking this because I think it would be tedious if for a 4GB DVD movie needs 12GB(4GB for seperate audio and video files, 4 GB for the muxed file, 4GB for the VOB files) of disk space to author.

AC3 or MP2/MPA audio will take up at most, maybe 300MB. Combined with the Video, they equal the size of your DVD, so at most, you would have around 8GB, not 12.

[digicube]

Do you use CCE to convert Divx/Xvid to MPGs? If so, do you know what this error means? "mux video buffer overflow" Also which version of Avisynth should I install? 2.08 or 2.5?