canopus-vs-mainconcept

[catdaddio6]

does anyone know how canopus compares to mainconcept??also is tmpeg the only converter with color correction?thanks for any and all input

[disturbed1]

Canopus Procoder (not express) has color correction and then some.

Speed, Mainconcept wins hands down.

Features, Canopus.

Quality, this is tough, and depends on your source of course, but my vote goes 100% to Canopus. Though Mainconcept isn't far behind. But you should know that most of my enocdes are from slightly to very noisey 8mm, HI8, and DV material, all of which is interlaced. Canopus seems to do a filter on all encodes, which gives an almost shiney look. To me it does look better on the TV then anything by CCE, TMPG, and Mainconcept.

Procoder is $500, while Mainconcept is only $140(?), then Procoder Express is only $60. Has all the features of the non express, minus the various color, sharpen, blur filters, and no mastering level for encoding.

I've used Procoder 1.5, and 2.0. 2.0 is great, but has more features than I need, so I settled for the express version.

[catdaddio6]

thanks for reply,and insight

[lordsmurf]

MC always had a blurry look and requires a fast PC. It's settings are a bit complex, which is not necessarily a good thing.

Procoder has better looking encodes, especially at Mastering Level.

If my source is high grade or perfect, Procoder for me all the time.
If I need to filter heavily, I use TMPGENC Plus.
MC tends to puke up bad/imperfect source and I think it makes it worse.
Color bleeding and softness on VHS is amplified on MC.

I have the 1.5 full version Procoder and 1.4.2 MC.

[Roderz]

disturbed1

Speed, Mainconcept wins hands down.

Is this still true for Procoder 2?
I read in a review that it was about 30% faster than the 1.5 version
Anybody got any info?

[DVD_Ripper]

I've been very happy with the on the fly MPEG Encoding from MainConcepts product.

I've been trying, unsuccessfully, to download a trial version of procoder for some time. Seems like their demo download web goes round in circles... never seems to start the downloading process... I will try again since I have a new system at work.

[disturbed1]

disturbed1

Speed, Mainconcept wins hands down.

Is this still true for Procoder 2?
I read in a review that it was about 30% faster than the 1.5 version
Anybody got any info?

Mastering Level is 30% faster than 1.5's speed. Everything else is about the same.

On one of my systems, 2 Pass mastering level takes 8 hours for a given project with Procoder 2.0, while Mainconcept (1.4.2) takes 4-5 hours 2pass for the exact same project. BUT, Procoder was miles ahead in quality

[Roderz]

I've gotten very used to using Mainconcept, but I'm very intrested in procoder because of the 'watched folders' feature - drop a file into the folder and of it goes!
Time to build a spare machine for the network me thinks

[disturbed1]

Procoder express has the same watch folder option. It lacks some of the multi-output functions, filters, savable templates and mastering level when compared to the full version. But when choosing between $550 and $60, I'd choose $60.

You can create templates in xml format, and save in the "C:\Documents and Settings\USER NAME\Application Data\Canopus\ProCoder Express\History"

This is also necc. to change the GOP length, which by default is 15, and is too high for 23.976fps material that needs pulled down afterwards.

[Anonymous843]

I went for canopus as the quality is alot better than mainconcepts and it has the ntsc to pal function which is great for me. if i want to do a quick job and not worry too much on the quality then i'd go for the MC. Also Mc is a bit finnicky to set up.

[jrsdsl]

Procoder express has the same watch folder option. It lacks some of the multi-output functions, filters, savable templates and mastering level when compared to the full version. But when choosing between $550 and $60, I'd choose $60.

You can create templates in xml format, and save in the "C:\Documents and Settings\USER NAME\Application Data\Canopus\ProCoder Express\History"

This is also necc. to change the GOP length, which by default is 15, and is too high for 23.976fps material that needs pulled down afterwards.

Can I ask what GOP length should be used for 23.976 material.

Thanks

[Muppet Meat]

CCE SP 3 pass VBR puts all to shame especially as far as afficiency is concerned. What other encoder lets you tweak the required bitrates for a given section of a section of footage after the first of 3 passes?
And who cares about speed comparisons? I would gladly wait for a 4 hour cooked turkey then 5 min microwaved chicken fingers.
Do you people actually watch your pc encode? I do it before going to sleep usually.

[Bodysurf]

disturbed1

Speed, Mainconcept wins hands down.

Is this still true for Procoder 2?
I read in a review that it was about 30% faster than the 1.5 version
Anybody got any info?

I've seen both in action, and while MainConcept is still faster, Procoder got a significant speed boost from v1.5 to v2.0. I didn't have the opportunity to do any benchmarks, but I would say 30-50% faster feels about right.

However, where Procoder blows away Mainconcept is in the quality of the encodes. For converting DV25 to DVD-compliant MPEG-2 video, I think Procoder v2.0 is the gold standard.

[fmctm1sw]

CCE SP 3 pass VBR puts all to shame especially as far as afficiency is concerned. What other encoder lets you tweak the required bitrates for a given section of a section of footage after the first of 3 passes?
And who cares about speed comparisons? I would gladly wait for a 4 hour cooked turkey then 5 min microwaved chicken fingers.
Do you people actually watch your pc encode? I do it before going to sleep usually.

I'd love to find out but at about 2 G's, I won't have CCE SP any time soon. Oh, and count my vote for nuked chicken fingers

[Muppet Meat]

$2000 Oh my god! lol, and its only a 5.10mb application. Boy do I feel stupid.

[labrat99]

I just did a quickie MPEG2 DVD spec. comparison of the following:

Canopus Procoder Express
TmpGenc
MainConcept
Ligos LSX

I encoded about 30 sec. of video - a well lighted scene that cuts to a dark room. I set all the encoders to 2pass VBR and matched all settings on them as near to the same as I could get.

The results:

MainConcept was 1.5 to 2.5 times faster than any of the other encoders AND had the best picture quality on the output clip.

I've been using TempGenc for quite some time - mainly to encode MPEG1's to VCD. In that arena, I think it beats MainConcept hands down. Once I moved to making DVD's, I naturally thought TempGenc would be the way to go. But, based on what I've seen in working with these four encoders recently, I'm going to switch to MainConcept for my DVD's.