Mainconcept vs TMPGenc

[Chrome58]

Well, after reading a post about the Mainconcept MPEG encoder, I was willing to give it a try, being a die-hard TMPGEnc fan from the beginning. I was in for quite a surprise ...

All I have is an old 500-MHz PIII running W2K, and with TMPGEnc, I had conversion time ratio (from DVD to VCD) always above 6.2:1. Imagine my surprise when Mainconcept did the job with a 1.4:1 ratio !! And I did a comparison test between two sequences from Star Wars Episode 2, there is absolutely no difference in quality (with standard parameters in Mainconcept and HQ method in TMPGEnc), and I did not even started tweaking all the controls in Mainconcept ...

Of course, TMPGEnc is free while Mainconcept costs about 150 euros, but you can download a fully fonctionnal version from their website. It only adds a watermark in the left-hand corner of the screen ...

[previn]

Absolutely, svcd is about 4 times quicker with mainconcept, quality is at least as good. You don't need to extract vbr or ac3 audio either.

[jolo]

Absolutely, svcd is about 4 times quicker with mainconcept, quality is at least as good. You don't need to extract vbr or ac3 audio either.

I have been trying Mainconcept and I love the speed, love the batch processor, love the ease of use.
But ......Thr Mainconcept encoder does notsupport Directx 9.0 which I have installed. Just found that out.


Thinks like File Splitting freezes after filling up one file, I have several other SVCD problems. I am waiting to hear some specifics on the my problems which may be attributed to Direct X 9. I'm very frustrated and the support isn't the greatest, but I have a lot of hope this will get resolved and I will purchase the product. The speed, batch processor and general ease of use is so attractive to me.

Jon

[Chrome58]

The only problem I've got with Mainconcept is that I did my comparison test opening directly a vob file, and the number of frames processed (as well as the total time) was wrong. For example, a vob file containing three chapters, totalling 9546 frames and a running time of 6'21", is opened and processed as a file containing 7090 frames and 4'44" for running time, which is the correct length for the first two chapters of the original vob file. Somehow, it does not recognize the last chapter. Anyone experienced this ?

[jolo]

Mainconcept probably will be updating and perfecting that type of stuff in the future.

I spoke to someone at the company and after that, I'm totally with them. The issue for users is that they are very young with the sand alone encoder and there are things that aren't fixed yet. There not marketing their stanalone encoder except for people who find it on the website.
Adobe has made the encoder their official encoder in their technologies, which is what they are into.

[Baldrick]

Mainconcept sucks!!!!!!!!!!!! Cause the demo installation don't work for me... I had planned to add some more mpeg2 basic converting guides...

[robomonkey]

Why didn't it work?, what errors did you get?

[Baldrick]

1607 unable to install installshield scripting runtime

will try to reboot and test.

[Baldrick]

Worked fine after reboooooting so ignore my last posts.

[suerpflysocal]

also has built in DV codec support which takes DV-1 and DV-2 without any modifications!
i wish more people would use this so that there is a guide on it with tweakage settings.

the watermark can be seen obviously on your computer but is hardly noticeable when played on your TV (i think half is chopped off)

[Baldrick]

Too bad that it can't crop or add borders. I hate to frameserve .

[fingernailX]

SuperFlySoCal - There aren't many tweaks but those available are listed at http://www.mainconcept.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=54

I've included the tweaks of interest below:

************************************************** **********

How can I improve the quality of my DVD?
In order to improve the quality of an DVD
1. change (increase) the settings under Motion Search Region
2. reduce value of Noice sensitivity (3..12) if you have clean source or use LineFilter
3. change Search Method to bigger value (not bigger then 11)
4. Use User quantization matrices
6. Reduce Intra DC precision to 8 bits
6. Use LineFilter
7. Increase bitrate


************************************************** **********

How can I improve the quality of my SVCD?
In order to improve the quality of an SVCD
1. change (increase) the settings under Motion Search Region
2. reduce value of Noice sensitivity (3..12) if you have clean source or use LineFilter
3. change Search Method to bigger value (not bigger then 11)
4. Use User quantization matrices
5. Reduce Intra DC precision to 8 bits
6. Use LineFilter
7. Deinterlace the source

_________________
Frank Schoenberger
MainConcept AG


I can tell you that increasing the motion search, turn on line filter and dropping noise sensitivity to 8 and deinterlacing made a big difference for me with captured dv footage.

[Xtasy2002]

Faster or not the mainconcept is still overpriced. There is no way they can justify their super high prices for a piece of encoding software when other software like TMPGEnc, MovieFactory, Studio 8, etc. all have MPG encoding built in for $50 or less. If they want to be a serious competitor they need to bring the price down on the full single user version to at most $50.

[jfebus]

You can't compare the excellent quality and performance MainConcept give you with the trash quality and slow performance of Studio or MovieFactory...

It's a bargain for only $150!

[pepegot1]

Reply to Directx 9.0 from Main Concept:

Hello,

We do have problems with directX 9. We are working on a solution. The
next version of the encoder should work with DX9.

Regards,
Patrick Kuckertz

Only problem is they are too slow about it. CCE just came out with an encoder for $58.00 and it works very well. I got stuck with MC ver. 1.3 when I switched to DX 9.0 and emailed them about it. The reply is the above.

[sodium]

to baldrik:
i have the same problem with MC with aspect ratio. don´t crop or add borders to keep the same aspect ratio as video source.
i had tried to frameserving from vdub and avisynth, but no luck yet.
from virtualdub i get a green video.
from avisynth the program crash.
have you tried frameserving to MC succesfully?

[alenhard]

I have successfully frameserved to Mainconcept many times from both Virtualdub and MediaStudio Pro 6. What exactly isn't working for you?

[jolo]

alenhard,

I'm going to take you up on your offer, but frameserving isn't my thing, so if you wouldn't mind being patient here are my issues and if you could explain specifically how frameserving can help me, that wouold be great.


1. I am usually converting avi files (DIvx) to SVCD compliant MPEG-2s, for burning in Nero and playing on my stand alone DVD player.

2. I have tried a few things, but I am unclear how to have mainconcept encode a t 23.976 NTSC movie ? Do I make several changes, no changes, I have heard both from Mainconcept.

3. If the source is wide screen and I do not have a wide screen TV, after I encode using the SVCD profile in Mainconcept, the picture is "stretched" when I play it. There is not a "keep aspect ratio" selection there. Also the 2,1,11 setting (something like that), is greyed out when selecting the SVCD profile. I want to get it accurate with small bars on the top and bottom, like the source looks like.

4. For me and several others, but not all, when select the spanning feature and let is say 700MB for example, it fills up a file, then creates a new empty one, then the encoding stops.

If frameserving can help this, please tell me how and please be specific on how to do this because of my ignorance to frameserving.

Thanks
Jon[/list]

[sodium]

alenhard,
i´m nos a experience user with frameserving. to tell the truth, thid is mi first attempt, because in tpmgenc i didn´t need to do this.
with virtualdub i open avi file, select full processiong mode for video and no audio. then add resize filter to add up a bottom borders to keep aspect ratio in MC encoded videos.
last, start frame server , write a name for the .vdr file and open MC, selecting the vdr file. when i open the vdr file MC reads the info from the file, but in preview window only see a green video. i start encoding and the resulting video is a blank green video.
the same operation with virtualdub and frameserving to tmpgenc no problem. some hints?

[abularkin]

Well I have directx9, and it created 2 cvd mpeg files which played at the proper 16:9 aspect ratio on my computer, but... when adding chapters vcdeasy padded another 150 mb onto the file so that i was unable to burn. then I tried just burning the file in nero as an svcd, but 791 mb did not fit on the 800 mb disc. Are these also problems encountered by other users of directx9?

[sodium]

in output format what you select? mpeg or vcd?
i think you have multiplexed the files as mpeg video, not vcd program. the first time i encode with MC same problem. video file to large to fit in 80 min cdr. you must encode as vcd, svcd or mpeg, paying atention in multiplexer settings. details ... advance ... multiplexer settings ... multiplexing type .. select vcd or svcd. this way you create a file with 2324 bytes per sector. if you encode as simple mpeg, in nero the file size will be larger than expected. sorry for my poor english.

[sodium]

another cuestion. you say your files plays correctly at 16:9 in your computer. my encoded videos also plays fine in pc, but when play in standalone dvd in my 4:3 tv, video is always fullscreen.

[SaSi]

I have tried and bought Mainconcept. I am not sure whether I love or hate it. Some pros and cons:

Pros
1. It can open m2v and mpg files

2. It's fast (Ultra faster than Tmpgenc and (a bit ?) faster than CCE

3. They actually answered to a guy that wrote to them with a problem (I have e-mailed to Verbatim about a problem with DVD+R disks I bought from them and only received the automated confirmation message telling me to expect an answer in 2-3 days. That was a week ago).

Cons:
1. Opening mpeg streams and m2v files is ultra slow. (I enabled the option to re-open the last session and re-starting it after opening an mpeg file made me think the application locked-up)

2. Doesn't allow resize or aspect ratio management. (Actually it does allow you to specify the content aspect ratio but scenarist doesn't recognize the setting. Doing the same thing in Tmpgenc allows Scenarist to properly handle the movie. With MC Scenarist rejects the video with a stupid message that the stream is not identified as NTSC or PAL. Of course it is, however I think there may be a bug in the encoder).

3. Doing VBR encoding creates a movie that is more off from the average bitrate than Tmpgenc's calculation produce. (A 2 hour-length movie at 4,500 kbps average created a 6Gb file )

4. Modifying settings from the shipped ones caused encoding to produce a 9Gb file from a 1:30:00 movie. Obviously I checked the wrong settings somewhere, but it's not obvious.

5. The manual is a "quick-and-dirty" compilation from someone that didn't actually understand how the program works. As soon the topic becomes advanced, the manual says "leave this allone, it's for professionals BUT THEY CLAIM IT'S A PROFESSIONAL ENCODER

I think I will write them a long letter with comments and suggestions and see what they have to say. [/b]

[jolo]

Excellent analysis SaSi,

I've been using the demo, talking to support, sending them e-mail and posting on their forum.

It appears not to be a totally complete product, but that wonderful speed, interface and the batch encoder are wonderful. I think the real expertise with Mainconcept is in Germany, not in the U.S. I also am of the belief that they are sincere and that they are working on it. I have been advising all people here to make sure that they post problems, not only on this forum, but on Msinconcepts support e-mail/or forum so that they know what to fix.

They also do not "market" the stand alone encoder and is something new for them. I wonder if the Adobe MPEG Encoder, which is Mainconcept's encoder gets taken care of first.

[BCIcdrz]

Professional encoder

how can it be professional if it dont have add borders. If it had that and kept its encoding speed ill glading buy a copy of this software. its the only disavange to this encoder i see so far. If they added that feature i'd say its the best.

[SaSi]

I have been trying to import Mainconcept m2v files into Scenarist. It won't accept them. With badly configured Tmpgenc or CCE files, Scenarist would give hints and errors (for GOP structure, bitrate, etc). With Mainconcept files, it just rejects the files without scanning them. Anybody has been succesful in importing Mainconcept into Scenarist?

[EnNiS]

hey im a avid tmpgenc fan
i here bout MC so i am goin to trey it out
wish me luck
ps. i use a 803 mhz p3 procesor and only have 128 mb of ram how ong should it take??

[sodium]

i have an amd 1200 with 512 ram.
usually, a divx movie to svcd takes 4 hours ( 90min long movie )
with MC 2 hours.
but 3 days trying the right settings
i had the most problems with video aspect ratio. i need to frameserver first to achieve the correct aspect ratio.
try searching this forum and www.mainconcept.com forum to find the right settings and avoid the major problems.