WME9 - SLOW configuration!

[fmillion]

I am trying to use Windows Media Encoder 9 to encode videos for playback on a pocket pc. The actual encode process performance is very good and the resulting videos are excellent.

HOWEVER..

Working with the WME9 application is a true exercise in frustration at the least! When I start up the app and choose to convert a file, I then must stare at an hourglass for a solid minute before being given the place to select a file. I hit Browse and choose my file and again hourglass for a minute or more and CPU usage to 100%. Then I can finally hit Next, and again lockup for at least a minute. Choose my destination format and enter properties, then the final summary. I uncheck "Begin encoding" because I want to tweak the encoder settings. I click Finish, and lockup again. When it unlocks I hit Properties to change video properties, and AGAIN it locks. I can edit video properties then, and then hit Apply, and ONCE AGAIN it locks. Then, I finally hit Encode and it locks again before finally starting to encode!

These individual delays can be from as short as 15 seconds to as long as **5 minutes or more!!** I haven't found any discernable correlation between the actual time of the delay and the file format, but I am noticing that standard MPEG1 streams (VideoCD type) seem to take much longer in these delays than DivX video files, and DivX video files typically take about 60 seconds to 3 minutes per delay. Again, during this delay CPU usage on wmenc.exe shoots to 100% and pegs there until the "seizure" is over.

This is frustrating - it is taking me longer to configure the encoder than it is to actually encode the videos! I've searched around but haven't been able to find any documentation of this issue. What is a video guru to do?

Athlon XP 2800, 1GB RAM, at least 40GB free disk space.

flint

[Soopafresh]

If you want to stay with a GUI, it sounds like your WMV codec might need reinstalling, as well as a refresh of DirectX 9.0c

before you make any changes, however, back up your registry with the incredibly simple rdilly app. Copy Rdilly to your Windows folder and click. It will look like nothing happened, but you'll see a new folder created in your Windows directory with your backed up registry files.
http://www.joejoesoft.com/vcms/124/


http://www.softwarepatch.com/windows/directx.html
http://nic.dnsalias.com/wmfdist.exe
http://www.codec-archiv.de/win/vcm/wmv9VCMsetup%5BCodec-Download.de%5D.exe
http://www.citizeninsomniac.com/WMV/wmfdist11.exe


If none of that works, you'll have to look for the offending dll that creates the 100% CPU utilization. NTFilemon from sysinternals will allow you to see the goings on behind the scenes.

[fmillion]

Well before I run to reinstall stuff, I decided to hit it with Filemon. Turns out there's LOTS of read access occurring on C:\windows\system32\KGyGaAvl.sys. After a stream of accesses to it, it still just pegs at 100% for a while without any activity in filemon. Ideas as to what's going on?

Also, I just tried WME9 on my laptop - same result. My laptop is a relatively fresh install (less than a month) so I doubt it's a directX mis-install over there.

[Soopafresh]

Dr Divx = KGyGaAvl.sys


I doubt "The Doctor" is even a chiropractor....

[fmillion]

"If you want to stay with a GUI"

Are there commandline tools to encode to Windows Media? Does WME9 include them? I'm a linux guy so I'm fine with writing batch files etc to encode to my parameters. I need to be able to specify:

Video output size
Video output codec
Video output bitrate and profile (simple, complex)
Audio output codec
Audio output bitrate, sample rate, channels

Thanks
Flint

[Soopafresh]

Cool. I believe the app in the middle of this page:

http://www.citizeninsomniac.com/WMV/

Usage for profiles.
-------------------
You can override parameters in a profile by appending arguments to a
command.

[-profile] <profile code>
Specifies a predefined profile to use in the session.

Codes and basic descriptions for the predefined profiles:
Audio/Video:
av20: Profile_AudioVideo_Modem_28K (actual rate: 20Kbps)
av32: Profile_AudioVideo_Modem_56K (32 Kbps)
av100: Profile_AudioVideo_LAN_100K (100 Kbps)
av225: Profile_AudioVideo_LAN_256K (225 Kbps)
av350: Profile_AudioVideo_LANDSL_384K (350 Kbps)
av450: Profile_AudioVideo_LANDSL_768K (450 Kbps)
av700: Profile_AudioVideo_NearBroadcast_700K (700 Kbps)
av1400: Profile_AudioVideo_NearBroadcast_1400K (1400 Kbps)
av350pal: Profile_AudioVideo_Broadband_PAL_384K (350 Kbps)
av700pal: Profile_AudioVideo_NearBroadcast_PAL_700K (700 Kbps)
av100_2p: Profile_AudioVideo_LAN_100K_2Pass (100 Kbps)
av350_2p: Profile_AudioVideo_LANDSL_384K_2Pass (350 Kbps)
av600vbr: Profile_AudioVideo_FilmVBR_600K (600 Kbps)
avq97vbr: Profile_AudioVideo_FilmVBR_Quality97 (Quality 97)



If that Dr Divx file kicks back in, however, it'll still be slowwwww. Another option is to wrap your files in Avisynth (you'll thank yourself) and run them with the VBS script above or with http://nic.dnsalias.com/wm9enc.html . I don't know the required settings for your hand held, but FFmpeg.exe will create WM8 files, IIRC.

You can process a folder for Avisynth script creation with this little app.

http://www.merage.uci.edu/~dvdotnet/downloads/scriptwriter15.zip
http://www.merage.uci.edu/~dvdotnet/scriptwriter.txt

If you give me the scoop on the output dimensions and frame rate, I'll help you make the Avisynth templates. Looks like 320x240 at 29.97fps ?

Out of curiosity, why not just temporarily rename that .SYS file that is giving you problems and see if Wmenc starts to behave ?

[dlflannery]

@fmillion:
I had about the same frustrating experience as you with the WME9 encoder gui. I was encoding for Zune (320x240 WMV). Another forum member put me on to the script file mentioned above by SoopAFresh. I got a batch file going but I could not get it to source mpeg2 (.mpg) directly and I'm not convinced anyone actually has. I handled .mpg with AviSynth and DgIndex, i.e., running dgIndex and feeding the d2v file and audio into the wme9 script via a .avs file. Worked great!

About that time I ran across AutoMKV and after a few mods by the very responsive author it became a better way to do it than my batch file. (AudoMKV basically does the same dgIndex/Avisynth/WME9 script thing I was doing but it has a nice user interface, and a lot of additional bells and whistles, including interlace handling, cropping, automatic audio sync adjustment, etc. Plus it can output other Mpeg4 level formats/containers than just WMV. I ended up writing a guide on producing Zune videos from mpeg2 inputs, which is linked from the AutoMKV page in videoHelp's tool section. This guide gives very detailed instructions on installing everything needed. There are 10 profiles for 1-pass WMV encoding and 6 for 2-pass.

The Zune 1-pass Quick profile uses the WMV7 codec and is extremely fast, about 35% of video length on my 3Ghz Pentium. At 500 kbps video and 128 kbps audio, the quality is all you would ever need on a 3" screen.

[Soopafresh]

Hey, good info, dlflannery.