THERE IS A CHANGE TO OG MESSAGE. offer copy of product as souvenir...

[infinityone]

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[Forum Troll]

No matter what you do, re-encoding from DIVX to MPEG1/2 will cause a quality loss. It always does, and there is nothing you can do to avoid or prevent it. Filters could be used to minimize the quality loss, but this would extend encoding time into many HOURS. There are a few standalone apps that can sort of do what you want, but the results would be far below what you are expecting. Easiest way would be to get a DVD player that can play DIVX files.

[Nelson37]

I do not understand why you are overcomplicating such a simple basic concept.

You want the customer to have a video disk they can take home and play in their PC. This is the primary goal.

Ditch the MPG-4 crap. Way too much hassle caused by the need to install or "embed" a Divx player. EVERY SINGLE CISTOMER will have an MPG-1 player on the PC. You are not, repeat NOT, constrained by VCD bitrates and resolutions. You could use 800x600 with a bitrate of 6000, for instance. Customer puts disk in PC and it autoplays, there is a script for giving a simple icon for even this.

Also, if you are considering real-time Divx compression, forget it. No way they will wait that long.

You make a disk image of the video which is known to be playable in all PC's, make an icon for a burner prog that burns the image, the prog will prompt to insert a blank disk. Voila, problem solved.

SFAIK, there is no such thing as an "embeddable" Divx player, nor for MPG2, which I have researched. Playing these will require a software install, or one which will run off the disk, which is possible with MPG2, but probably not with Divx. There are also legal issues involved, particularly important in a business scenario. Also note Divx playback is highly dependent on the CPU power in the PC, that all-important quality you want could well dissolve into a herky-jerky mess of discolored blocks, lock-up the PC, and/or give your elderly clients heart failure. MPG1 avoids these problems.

[hrlslcbr]

This requires re-programming of non-complient component softwares....this will CHANGE CCXtreme performance, as I understand. Do you think such customization of commercial softare can be arranged...for how much? How long would it take to burn discs in this inferior hardware scenario? (from start to complete finished Disc)


2) Embedded will be a "Decoder program" to decode MPEG 4(DivX) to MPEG 1 or MPEG 2....the program will be CCXtreme decoding "program".

Although I don't have the experience or knowledge to do ALL you want, I really (I mean REALLY) doubt Cinema Craft would modify their program for one user, and even less allow you to distribute it with your videos. By the way, these are the requirements to be able to run CCX Presto:

Software
Dedicated PC
Capture board
Decoder board
Serial cable for VCR control

And seeing that the price of CCX Vivo is US$38,000, I doubt it'll be too cheap

An 'Icon' that makes a video play by itself, guiding the user could be created with something like Flash (just an idea...), but I don't know if it can launch a DVD writing program when it finishes.
As Forum Troll said; converting from MPEG-4 to MPEG2/1 WILL sacrifice quality, even if you use the best encoders you can buy.

By the way. This is the system that, I assume, ships with the purchase of CCX:

Dedicated PC:
CPU Intel® XeonTM processor 3.20GHz x2 (L3 cache : 2MB)
or
Intel® Pentium® D processor 840 (3.20GHz)
Memory 2GB
HDD for system 8GB (80GB)
HDD for data SerialATA 500GB (RAID 0)

And the only input CCX accepts is SDI (1/BNCx1).

Check this out -> http://www.cinemacraft.com/eng/xtream.html

[kschang]

Question: where is the rest of the content that will be burned coming from?

[redwudz]

I tend to agree with the other posters. It seems you are making this needlessly complicated. Sorry you want to use Divx. I would at least opt for Xivd to save the cost.

Best would be MPEG-1 for the storage and the final file. It's pretty much a universal format for PCs and most other computers, and as Nelson37 mentioned, you can use most any reasonable resolution. WMV is a second possibility with a little lower compatibility. With either you can get the file size down fairly small and still keep an adequate resolution for most any purpose. And no re-encoding necessary.

If you have to encode Divx to VCD or MPEG-1, this will take a fair amount of time, no matter what speed computer you use. Not really a good format to convert on the fly to MPEG-1.

If your company is indeed a commercial enterprise, you should be asking these questions to a paid consultant that is an expert in the type of production you want to do. This will ensure you get a adequate setup that will serve your needs.

But I think they will give you the same type of info.

Also, you haven't mentioned what sort of business your company is engaged in. This would help greatly to evaluate what options our posters might recommend.

I'm probably wrong, but I suspect this has to do either with marriage proposals or investments.

But, no matter. Keep your files in one format and configure your software to choose the files you want to burn to disc. Stay away from encoding if you want to do this operation in a reasonable amount of time. If you are short on hard drive space, purchase more hard drives. It will be considerably cheaper and faster than converting Divx.

[kschang]

I'm probably wrong, but I suspect this has to do either with marriage proposals or investments.

For a bunch of seniors with limited computer skills? I dunno...

[kschang]

Start from the beginning: if you are creating some sort of a kiosk where people do some sort of a self-service video record, and you want them to take home a copy of whatever it is they recorded, playable on common settop players, then you should just come out and say so. If you want a program written to do so, then say so. What you're doing is micromanaging the solution and thus needlessly complicating things.

This may sound morbid, but my guess is you're providing some sort of a kiosk where seniors can record their own video will, one copy of which will be archived by you and another copy will be given to the senior in question.

If that is the case, I wonder why don't you just use a DVD-camcorder. But then, my guess is completely out of the left field it's probably wrong.

[kschang]

No, you're STILL not getting it.

When you "convert" data stream from one codec to another (and DIVX to MPEG2 is an conversion) it's called "transcoding" (translation + encoding), and THAT CAUSES DATA LOSS. If you can afford $40000 encoder, than money is not a concern. Why not leave the footage as MPEG2, and get a bigger HD? It'll let you keep better quality, AND you don't even need to transcode your own footage, thus the only thing you have to encode is whatever you film, and MPEG2 hardware encoder cards are available now on market pretty cheaply (heck, most of these "PVR" TV tuner cards have it).

While I understand you want to keep your business concept a secret, you can't have it both ways. We can't offer you good advice if we don't know the ins and outs. I'd suggest you pay a consultant local to your location and have him sign a NDA.

[hrlslcbr]

One thing I still don't understand from infinityone:
You want to make all those things (encoding from MPEG-4 to MPEG-2, etc) on your client's PC?

This is how I understand it:
You give a file to your client, he opens the file; and a small video plays. After that, he's instructed to put a DVD on his drive and the PC burns it (in the proper format of course), and finally, he puts the DVD on his standalone player...

Is that what you want or I'm completely confused ?

[Nelson37]

I do not understand the need for the real-time conversion. If you must have the file in MPG-4 and also want it in MPG-2 or MPG-1, then convert it before you put it on the PC. I doubt even a $40,000 prog is going to handle a series of real-time conversions unattended except by novices, and maintain good quality every time. If the videos already exist before the customer arrives then they could be already converted.

The customer would just select an icon representing an image for whatever burning prog you choose, progs fires up and says "insert disk". Two clicks. If these are complete novice Seniors as you say, Ten clicks is at least five too many. Touch screens recommended.

Unless the customer is bringing IN a video already saved as an MPG-4?

You harp on "highest quality" and also speak of VCD. If Playback Device is KNOWN to be a DVD player (you specify Recorder? Why?), then there is no need, use, or want for VCD if quality is even a minor concern. I am confused.

I did miss the bit about playback on DVD recorder. While solving the MPG-2 problem, this eliminates MPG-4 as a possibility, unless the playback machine is in-house or supplied by you? Very few DVD players support MPG-4 playback.

Suggest you call CinemaCraft and get a price quote on customizing their software, and providing a license for run-time copies. You may be re-thinking your business plan.

Online usage for Video has as a primary requirment small size. Small size is directly contradictory to high quality. Multiple conversions also seriously degrade quality. Recommend start from a good source and produce BOTH the online version and the hi-quality version. You really can not get both in one file, no matter how you convert it.

My guess - Customer supplies some sort of video or content. You create an online file which the customer views and selects to purchase. Then customer comes in to burn disk, preview in-house and make copies if desired, and leave.

The problem is that an online file is either going to be of too poor a quality for a final purchased product, or too large to make viewing feasible. Software installation will be a problem. Also the on-site conversion will be too long, and not feasible for a novice to monitor.

The MPG-2 could be processed when the customer makes the online selection so as to be ready when the customer arrives at the kiosk. But this conversion should be done from the original source.

If you really have to convert on-site, on of the one-click Divx converters would probably be a better choice for ease-of use.

[kschang]

One thing I still don't understand from infinityone:
You want to make all those things (encoding from MPEG-4 to MPEG-2, etc) on your client's PC?

No, he said seniors will visit his place of business. So he will have control of the PC, but no people to walk the users through, so the app that handles the "whatever" must be as idiotproof as possible, and it will need to digitize/transcode/burn SOMETHING, of which we have no details.

[hrlslcbr]

One thing I still don't understand from infinityone:
You want to make all those things (encoding from MPEG-4 to MPEG-2, etc) on your client's PC?

No, he said seniors will visit his place of business. So he will have control of the PC, but no people to walk the users through, so the app that handles the "whatever" must be as idiotproof as possible, and it will need to digitize/transcode/burn SOMETHING, of which we have no details.

Are you sure?

My acquaintance wants to use the finished "software" on his Pentium 4 2.9Ghz PC

[kschang]

I want to provide a service to my clients visiting my place of business.

It's not our problem if he can't keep his own story straight.

[hrlslcbr]

It's not our problem if he can't keep his own story straight.

I actually want to help him, but I'm kind of... confused

[Nelson37]

He has as a basic part of his plan getting CinemaCraft to customize software, and provide some kind of runtime license.

This is not a viable business plan, this is the second stage of a wild-ass idea. Has not been thought through.

[kschang]

It sounds like he wants to build a bunch of kiosks to be used by non-computer people, and actually produce video DVDs that the users can take home in a matter of minutes. He wasn't sure if CC encoder can be copied or have better/simpler UI, and I think he simply latched onto the CC name because it's a big name, but as I said before, it's micromanagement.

[hrlslcbr]

Yes, he could use CCE Basic ($58) and .ecl files to do some of the work... (no need for the ultra expensive CCX).