Best program for VBR MPEG-1

[homerpez]

You read right. I'm interested in knowing what's the best program, in anyone's opinion, for doing VBR MPEG-1. NOT MPEG-2.

I've tried TMPGEnc, and it works, but of course I'm searching for something just a BIT better.

I'm still trying CCE for VBR, because I've heard it is much better at properly destributing VBR and makes the picture look better. Plus, the ability to do multiple passes (vs. TMPGEnc which can only do 2 pass, which only really goes thru once and encodes once). However, I've only heard this rave about MPEG-2 video, and as yet I can't get it to work right (at all...). It only generated an unreadable .m2v file (substance there, but no program recognized it), and ignored the audio.

I'd love to see some opinions...

[aldus4]

Have you tried the Panasonic MPEG Encoder? As you want to try different bitrates with mpeg1, I'd suggest using this one.

[homerpez]

Still going with TMPGEnc for now...

I can't get ANY file to open in the Panasonic program, except for an already-encoded MPEG-1!

I betcha I'm doing something wrong, but something tells me it's not for me, plus not VBR...

[homerpez]

Just tried Panasonic, and it IS just CBR, and what's more it's got a really messy picture (since it's limited to a low bitrate)... this is why I wanted VBR, so I can set a high MAX bitrate, and then an AVG that's lower...

So far TMPGEnc wins out for me, unless a miracle happens to make CCE easier/better...

Any other opinions?