--b-pyramid

[catracho2009]

Could somebody explain me what really does b-pyramid in x264 encoding?

how could affect a good reproduction in AVCHD disc with b-pyramid : 2 ?

is better in --b-pyramid strict?

[poisondeathray]

It allows b-frames to be used a reference frames (instead of only I or P frames)

This will increase coding efficiency on some sources more than others (e.g. like anime where there are lots of repetetive sequences). Other types of content might only make marginal gains or even none

Better efficiency implies higher quality at a given bitrate (filesize)

--b-pyramid 2 (normal) isn't compatible with many AVCHD/blu-ray hardware players , but it's slightly more efficient than using --b-pyramid 1 (strict) . "strict" is slightly more efficient than "none" but ensures compatiblity for hardware players

[catracho2009]

Thank you very much for your useful info.

I've been confused with Level with h264.

many movies and files online are High@L4.1 and now...Divx Plus HD and new update of RipBot264 are High@L4.0, which are better?, I start encoding many files at High@L4.1 since last year.

[poisondeathray]

I've been confused with Level with h264.

many movies and files online are High@L4.1 and now...Divx Plus HD and new update of RipBot264 are High@L4.0, which are better?, I start encoding many files at High@L4.1 since last year.

The Level only defines an upper limit according to the AVC spec , it doesn't necessarily indicate which is better, or say anything about the actual content.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.264/MPEG-4_AVC#Levels

For example, some content can have actual level 3.1 content, but be flagged as Level 5.1. It just means it won't surpass the limitation of the Level specified

A movie with L4.1 could allow higher bitrates than L4.0 (but it still doesnt say anything about the actual quality).

An analogy would be a zone with 50km/h speed limit and another zone 100km/h speed limit. If a car goes 40km/h in either, it's still going the same speed. But, you could go faster in the 100km/h zone if you wanted to , you might go 60 or 70. (i.e there is a higher limit). But in the 50km/h zone, you are limited to 50km/h maximum.

[catracho2009]

Hi,

Now, I got it!!!

I will encoded my files like source, of course with the AVC spec to work correctly in my ps3 and blu-ray player...

someone could post actually most useful AVC spec to encoding AVCHD...is confused Level, Ref Frames, Bframes, B-pyramid...

[poisondeathray]

blu-ray and avchd compatibility imposes farther restrictions . i.e. you get less coding efficiency (or lower quality at a given bitrate) than if you had used unrestricted settings . This is because the hardware chips are not as strong as a software decoder, so they can only decode lower settings that are defined by the blu-ray standard (to ensure compatibility).

if you want easy to use, and don't want to worry about fiddling with settings, use avchdcoder or multiavchd

if you want to fine tune and learn about the settings start with these:

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=154533
http://mewiki.project357.com/wiki/X264_Settings

[catracho2009]

Hi, poisondeathray.

Thanks for your help and the links with all the info that I need.

Have a nice day.

[Lawbringer]

Just keep in mind, most BluRay players will not play video that has b-pyraimds. I learned this the hard way.