Which x264 preset are you guys using?

[hogger129]

just curious which x264 preset you guys are using in Handbrake? i am running an i7-4790, so the slow or slower setting is doable but i would like to use fast, faster or very fast if the quality isn't a huge leap backward. from what i've read here, very fast is comparable to the quick sync encoder. x264 on slow, in the past, has also produced much larger files than quick sync has.

so just wondering which x264 preset is recommended. i saw medium is the default.

[hogger129]

i'm assuming the slower the speed, the better the resulting visual quality, less posterization and artifacts. but x264 on the slower speeds appeared to produce larger files than quick sync did.

[fritzi93]

So you're encoding to target file size rather than crf? Best quality would be the slowest preset you can tolerate. But I'm sure you know that.

I use Ripbot, not Handbrake, but can't you queue up several encodes to run overnight? It seems a pity you wouldn't use your very powerful CPU for best quality. Personally, I switched from BDRB to Ripbot so I could use slower presets (smaller output file size for crf encodes). I built my current computer with that in mind.

Anyway, since you asked: slow preset, film tune. The Ripbot presets are no doubt different from Handbrake's, but in the ballpark I should think.

[hogger129]

So you're encoding to target file size rather than crf? Best quality would be the slowest preset you can tolerate. But I'm sure you know that.

I use Ripbot, not Handbrake, but can't you queue up several encodes to run overnight? It seems a pity you wouldn't use your very powerful CPU for best quality. Personally, I switched from BDRB to Ripbot so I could use slower presets (smaller output file size for crf encodes). I built my current computer with that in mind.

Anyway, since you asked: slow preset, film tune. The Ripbot presets are no doubt different from Handbrake's, but in the ballpark I should think.

are you using a target size, target bitrate or crf? i typically do crf 18 and i've been using the slow preset in the past, but the files are coming out to ~10gb as opposed to 6 or 7gb if i use quick sync. the only problem is i notice some posterization artifacts in the quick sync encodes.

i guess i'll stick with slow or very slow. the longest encode i've had so far is 5 hours and that was for a 3 1/2 hour movie.

is there any reason i should hold off and wait until H265 becomes more mature/adopted? i've got about 50 encodes to run and this is extremely time-consuming.

i'll try a few encodes using your suggestions and get a feel.

thank your for your time and input.

[fritzi93]

I use CRF, and slower presets give significantly smaller file size. IIRC, 10-20% smaller than with BDRB, which must use a pretty fast preset. Though I haven't used BDRB in awhile, so maybe there are more preset options in later versions? CRF encoded movies vary greatly in size, which tells me that you're always over or under-compressing when encoding to target file size.

Can't say about h.265. I'll be using x.264 for some time to come, for compatibility.

[Detmek]

I use Slow preset. Did some test more then a year ago and results showed me that Slow preset can give significant quality improvement in some cases compared to medium preset. But, I got only 1-2% quality improvement with Slower and Very Slow compared to Slow preset. So, I decided to stick with Slow.

P.S. If you want to compare quality among different presets you need to do that at the same file size, not the same CRF. Same CRF with different settings gives different quality.

[hogger129]

I use Slow preset. Did some test more then a year ago and results showed me that Slow preset can give significant quality improvement in some cases compared to medium preset. But, I got only 1-2% quality improvement with Slower and Very Slow compared to Slow preset. So, I decided to stick with Slow.

P.S. If you want to compare quality among different presets you need to do that at the same file size, not the same CRF. Same CRF with different settings gives different quality.

Did going at slower and very slow create smaller files? Or was it merely a quality increase?

[Detmek]

Slower presets will give you better compression, meaning better quality per filesize (bitrate).

With 2-pass encoding where file size is constang it will always give you better or at least same quality. But 2-pass encoding is tricky because you can not know what bitrate is needed for particular video to be transparent or visualy pleasent. So, you can overshot or undershot if you manually set filesize (bitrate).

With CRF it is a different story. Changing presets but using same CRF can lead to 3 situations:

1. Increase quality and filesize
2. Increase quality at the same filesize (almost imposible to get same filesize with same CRF but different presets)
3. Decrease quality and filesize

When you try to choose CRF and preset first choose the slowest preset you can tolerate and then run a few encodes with different CRF values to see what CRF value gives you transparent video or at least subjectively good quality.

[hogger129]

thanks for your time and input. i guess i will stick with x264 on slow or slower. that sounds like it will be the best balance of speed and quality. just curious, any of you guys using x265 yet? i tried a couple of encodes on the very fast setting because x265 is so slow compared to x264. the small size is great but i didn't like the quality very much.

[Selur]

but i didn't like the quality very much.

Then use slower settings,.... in example something like:

x265 --preset slower --no-high-tier --no-open-gop  --psy-rdoq 15