divx 5 and xvid

[umair]

can someone tell me whats the difference between divx 5 and xvid? which one is better quality for a movie that i want to rip from a dvd?

[crahak]

It's much like Ford vs GM, or AMD vs Intel... Both have their fans and supporters... I lean towards the DivX one myself, but that's only me.

[umair]

so they are both pretty equal in quality? like if i rip a dvd to divx 5 and xvid using the same resolution and size and everything. the quality should be pretty much the same?

[crahak]

Depends who you ask

[KingJohn]

so they are both pretty equal in quality? like if i rip a dvd to divx 5 and xvid using the same resolution and size and everything. the quality should be pretty much the same?

No !

Now use DivX 3.11 Alpha (Low motion) 8)

[umair]

i thought divx 5 was better than divx 3

[banjazzer]

DivX 5 can compress considerably better than DivX 4 or 3 - partly down to its support for bi-directional encoding. In other words, if you are working to one or 2 CDRs, then the quality will be better.

XviD in it's current incarnation will yield pretty much equivalent quality and filesize to DivX 5.

The main difference is that DivX 5 is a proprietary product you are expected to buy. XviD is not.

[umair]

thanks banjazzer that made it really clear!

[crahak]

I find people have a lot more compatibility issues with xvid and stuff. However, yes, it's free. I never had problems with DivX 5 Pro anyways. Stay away from DivX 3 and 4... I use B frames only, GMC sometimes gives encoding errors (grey blocks on screen...) and QPel isn't much recommended either. Looks great. Other people like other setups, but this works for me at least.

[KingJohn]

I wonder why divX 3.11 alpha is the most widely used codec for sharing movies, considering its not so good as the rest ?

[banjazzer]

I don't know. Maybe because it is cheap and cheerful? However, I also wonder why people are still developing XviD, and others are trying to sell us DivX 5 Pro, if there is little or no improvement on divX 3.11 alpha. 8)

By the way, nobody said there was anything wrong with divX 3.11 alpha. But if you want the highest quality encode for a given filesize, then there are now better options.

[crahak]

Yes, the old one isn't the best, and besides those "shared" movies on the web suck as far as quality goes...

[bbb]

Divx 3 (2-pass) looks great on a good clean source. It's definitely better than Divx 4. Divx 5 was trying to improve on Divx 4 since no one liked Divx 4.

So, video quality wise it goes: Divx 3>Divx 5 Pro>Divx 4

However, everyone, even the creators of Divx 3 are trying to keep Divx 3 in the closet because, it's not exactly legal ... and hence they can't license it to make money. It's a shame since Divx 3 did produce great video quality at low sizes. Some people will emphatically state that Divx 3 is inferior to Divx 4/5 (and even create skewed test results to show this) but this is false negative publicity by the creators to try to bury Divx 3 and it's possible legal repurcusions.

Xvid is very similar to Divx 5 in terms of quality (or so I hear). It's better than Divx in that it supports interlaced material but people who make Divx know how to deinterlace to make their videos look good as progressive material. Also, Xvid, from what I hear, is not as stable as Divx 5. Linux people will use Xvid since it's open source and there's an growing and vocal open source cult out there.

I feel that Divx is more established than Xvid but you are free to try them both out. I don't really bother with either since I don't upload movies. I'm plenty satisfied with MPEG2.

[KingJohn]

I also wonder why people are still developing XviD.

Are they ?

And what would happen when all the beta tests are finished... another DivX 5... money money money...

[crahak]

You're stating divx3 is better than 5 as if it is facts. It is not. It's your own opinion of it. Per me, divx3 is ways behing 2 pass divx5 with B frames, and xvid is almost as good. Again, there are no facts, just opinions. Also, to make such claims, you have to do some pretty intensive and strict testing. It's not as easy as most people think. As far as divx4 not being the best, well, ok, I grant you this much. There are loads of threads on many forums asking the same question, and it basically ends up most of the time as either divx5pro or xvid. I don't recall anyone saying divx3 being the better one quality wise, and I mean LONG threads with intensive testing... So anyways, try and see what you like, because people don't agree on the same things, we all have preferences...

[ryanreko]

Using the CIF standards (frame size 352 by 288 max, Single pass, 30 fps, 1500kb max bit rate(not sure about this one)) what would you guys reccomend

thanks guys

[ryanreko]

Some times the source is interlace and somethines its not, if that make a difference...

[ryanreko]

any ideas or sugestions??

[banjazzer]

I for one don't understand your question.