First, I just wanted to thank you, nTekka, for your help in the past!

I have a couple of Matroska, MPEG-4 AVC videos, I'd like to convert to mpeg-2.
I was under the impression that tx4 could do this, but when I try to open with tx4, I get the error: "Cannot open file."
The file opens with all of my players, so all the codecs are installed... the highest priority to CoreAVC.

Is it possible to do this conversion?
If so, how do I configure tx4 to read it?

Any help appreciated... thanks!!!!

TXP4 can convert it, you will need some decoder first. Try K-Lite codec pack then open up TXP4 Options > Preferences > File input > uncheck AVI file reader and enable DirectShow file reader.

This should work, I used to do this for MKV and FLV before TXP4 supported FLV import.

Hi there.
Played around a bit with TMPGEnc now for a while and had to use "Merge & Cut" for the first time.
My problem is:
I can type in start and end point under "edit" but I can't drag & hold the slider.

OS is Windows Vista 64bit Home Premium (German).

I don't think its a bug, you are using it outside of its system requirement. TMPG doesn't support 64-bit OS anyway, so problems are bound to happen.

I made a compilation of clips from dvds of a TVshow. I separated each clip with a second of black video from the show, so the audio/video format is all compatible. It came out fine, burned a dvd, etc. Now I want to add more clips to it, so I'm loading a snippet of black, a clip, then the first compilation I made, then another clip. The audio starts to lose sync near the end of the first compilation.

I tried loading the first compilation video file several times into the project, separating each clip, and this improved the sync, but at the end of soem of these clips the A/V is either slightly shortened, or hiccups. So it's not a perfect solution.

Any solution to this?

Sounds like you got a mess going on there, so i'm trying to get it straighten out before I can help. Why not use the original source DVD for your clips if you are redo-ing to add more? What do you mean "A/V format is all compatible"? Im a bit confused by this because adding a second of black video doesn't make two separate clips compatible. This also might be where your problem is for the re-authoring.

I might have to start fresh, but I wanted to avoid borrowing the 20 (retail) dvds, finding/copying the scenes to the computer, and editing them down in TDA. And since I already did it once, seems like I shouldn't have to.
For aesthetic reasons, I wanted to separate each clip with a second of black video. When you add a clip in TDA, the Audio and Video Input format info is displayed in the "Add Clip" window. Or if you click on "Clip Info". If you try to combine clips and the audio is not the same bitrate, it will sometimes throw off the sync. I should have just said ALL clips (the scenes and the moment of black) are from the same retail series of dvds, with the same audio/video specs (the same A/V formats) so format differences are not the problem.

That clears things up a bit, have you tried using the clip link option in Track setting? That might work. If not then check what audio format your source uses and try to extract it then convert to WAVE, this might work.

Last resort is to do all your editing outside of TDA3 and create your file then import it into TDA3. Use TMPGEnc Xpress or MPEG Editor to edit your file, they are more flexible to fixing video/audio issues. Could also try a 3rd party encoder to fix it.

FYI this page is for TDA 1.5/1.6 (I'm using 1.6), not TDA3.
I'm unclear about the "clip link option in Track setting." If I click on "Track Settings" for the track, I get a window with Audio and Video format info. The video is not changeable, but the audio is. Are you suggesting I re-encode the audio for the old compilation?
Actually, since the new clips and old compilation are in the same track, it would re-encode all the audio. But the only way it will re-encode is if I change the audio bitrate (which I don't need to do).
I have TMPgenc Plus 2.5, but am unsure how to use it accurately (I don't have a handle on when to use pulldown, framerate, etc., and it seems to change them if you don't set it correctly).

Opps, Guess I use TDA3 too often and immediately assumed the same software for you. That option isn't in any of the older versions, best way to have your video playback smoothly is to pre-edit them outside of TDA with some external editing programs then encode it as one big file then import it to TDA. From there you can always use the keyframe/chaptering tool to create your chapters.

Can the newest version of TMPEG make FLV files?

No the newest version can only import FLV files, it can't encode (create) FLV files. But TMPG might add it if they already took the steps of making it a supported input format, the output should be coming along anytime now.

Subtitles Editor lets you import subtitles in .srt format. Those in 00:01:10,800 --> 00:01:13,633 time format work great, but my subtitles are timed using brackets like {67346}{67401}. Can't find anywhere, what .srt formats would TMPGEnc DVD Author 3 accept. Is there a utility to convert those fomats?

From what I know, theres only one type of .srt format and that uses -> for timing...I have never ran across any curly brackets for timing and it seems to be in millisecond or smaller?. Could be a custom format but I know its not a standard .srt file. As for TDA3, it will only take in srt and subtitle so your only option is to figure out what kind of format your file is and find a software to convert it to a real .srt file. You could make a simple program or script to do that yourself too.

Also, would help us if you can give us more info on your subtitle to search, I'm guessing its been renamed to .srt so that doesn't help us much, is there any other differences between the two format?

Thank you for responding.
Those curly bracket shouldn't be that uncommon, since DirectVobSub plays them correctly with WMP. After some digging, I finally found that those numbers in brackets represent frames. So when my movie plays 25 fps at 00:30 I get {4500}. I found a converter, but it only reads first bracket, so I get those double subs on screen when conversations pick up. Hope that helps others, and I'm still looking for good tool for conversion.

Hmm, I see, that makes sense. As for the tool, I might be able to make one if you can email me a sample or two of your subtitle.

Send it to my "Fake" email account, where all spams and junk goes that I don't mind sharing to the public ;) I still check it so if I see your email i'll make sure to work on the tool and email it back to you.

Tekkamanii@hotmail.com

can you guys put a guide step by step how to do this,,i have the same proablem,,downloaded subs for a movie and try to inport in to the tmpge 3 and just dont what to go,,i try with subtitle workshop to save in a lot of different format and still does not work,,please can you uys explain step by step how to do this,, ,,to put them manual (copy) will take forever man,,, thanks

Hey im using TMPGEnc 4.0.0.9 and i cannot import .srt subtitle files.. is this a problem in the actual program its self? can i upgrade and maybe they fixed it?

When you click on TRACK settings and then VIDEO tab there is a list of fields that provide information about and setting pertaining to the video. Couple of questions.

1) I see the max bitrate (non edit field) and underneath it Bitrate which I can edit. Is this the Average bitrate (for VBR)? or is it the bitrate that will be used if the video is rendered?

2) Underneath is a horizontal slide bar for Video Quality. Whenever I bring in a new clip and view this tab the video qualitity is always about 90% and I move it to 100%. Is there a way to configure it to always be 100% and why would I want a less that 100% quality picture, especially since I don't see that changing this value to 100% causes my file size to increase?

Thanks

1) Default is VBR 1pass and the bitrate that you can change is the avg, which should be automatically set based on the first clip you import if you have Smart Rendering prioritized. Even if you change this number it will not affect your first clip if it qualifies for Smart rendering, TDA3 uses this number to re-encode the rest of your track to match this bitrate.

You can change the Max bitrate if you select re-encode as below, but this will re-encode everything even your MPEG-2 compliant files.

2) This is similar to the JPEG quality slider, since its 10% difference, your file size won't change much nor quality but they keep it at 90% because it makes a bigger difference in speed. Probably best to keep it at 90 you won't notice any degrade in quality and it will be faster.

Thanks for the explanation. Sorry, I'm full of questions. Another question regarding the settings on the Video tab.

I understand that VBR 1 pass is the default but I generally select 2 pass since I keep reading that it gives better quality. I've been editing out some scenes in some clips by splitting and removing the sections I don't want. This means that I end up with 2 or more clips in my track. If I select to link the clips, I only have VBR 1 pass as an option. Why is that?

Thanks

I'm not sure the technical reason for this, but they placed a little message under the clip linking that some rate control mode will be limited. You could get 2 pass if you set it to re-encode all as below.

Thanks. I keep forgetting that I can click to re-encode it with other options.

What is the difference between the begin of chapter (Flag icon) and the "["? If I create a new chapter the "[" follows anyway. Seems like you should only need one but have to guess that there is a reason or purpose of having both. Can someone explain how they would be used separately? The online help gives a definition of what each are but seems to be lacking (at least for a beginner like me) how you would use them.

Thanks

There is a difference, more or less unimportant but good way to organize. The flag tells you that the current frame is a key chapter which can be used in your Menu as a chapter. The bracket '[' is the start frame selection bracket ']' is the end frame, these two can appear depending on where you have the frame selected. They can appear independently of the chapter so you can have it selected in mid chapter or anywhere really. Play around with it to see what it does but really isn't that important.

Hello!
I have installed a trial version.
When I try to edit a MPEG file and to visualize the video, I have no sound.
To obtain the sound I have to click twice on the "Mute" botton.
However, when I make the conversion, I obtain a MPEG file without sound, even if in the status bar the audio conversion is indicated.
Any solution???

Thats a bit weird, can you tell me what audio codec your source file uses? TMPGEnc 2.5 only supports Linear PCM, MP2, and maybe AC3 if you buy their AC3 plug-in. You're probably missing a codec.

i have downloaded the application and extracted it too any old place (maybe my first mistake) and then i get the templates and extract them too where is specified in the guide i am using.
but upon opening the application i dont see the option other and when i went ahead anyway and tried using just a ntsc format it said that the avi file i wanted to convert i got an error message,,,
can someoone run me through how to get the application and the templates to work together please...
thanks dan

all i want too do is convert avi files into kvcd to be able to burn onto cd-r,s and watch on my dvd player...

I'm assuming you are referring to the settings template .mcf files. These you will want to extract it to ~\TMPGEnc 2.5\Template\Extra\ directory then click on the Load button on the lower right corner between setting and save button. You can also manually locate the .mcf file anywhere you extract it to on your HDD.

But it seems like this might not be your main problem. If you get an error message like that then there might be something wrong with your AVI file. Could be that you don't have the codec to decode it.

I am trying to create MP4 playable on my PSP with TMPEG 4.0 (Trial)
The source is MJPEG, 15fps, 320x240.
I tried using ISO MPEG4, Portable Game console as container and several different settings (level 2 and 3, 15 and 29,97 fps, different bit-rates) but always the PSP tells me the format is unsupported.
Am I doing something wrong or TMPEG is unable to output this format?
I've looked everywhere (this and other forums, FAQs) but haven't find an answer yet, and my purchase decision relies heavily on being able to create PSP video.
Can someone help me?

The PS3 is somewhat related to the PSP, so I'll share what I've learned. For me the PS3 will only accept MP4's that use AVC, not the ISO setting. Try the AVC MPEG4 with the portable game console container, main profile, at level 2 or 3, and your original 15 frames per second. If the main profile encode doesn't work then you could try changing to the baseline profile.

If you want some somewhat convoluted but helpful reading on what the PSP can handle for MP4 then go here: http://www.pspvideo9.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=4

Fuzz54 is probably right about the format. AVC also gives you a better quality and bitrate higher than 768kbps. Of course AVC format will also make your file size larger than ISO encodes. If you stick with ISO, then try changing the bitrate to CBR or VBR and setting the Quantization mode to MPEG instead of H.263. That might work.

I have one .m2v file plus one .wav file, and want to make now one mpg2 file.

I go to FILE-->MPGE TOOLS-->SIMPLE MULTIPLEX

I choose my .m2v file - ok
I choose my .wav file - error message pop ups

Multiplexing Linear PCM stram to system strem is not supported

So, what do I wrong ?

thx a lot,
bernhard

I'm guessing your using TMPGEnc 2.5, which doesn't support WAV files for multiplexing. You need AC3 or MPEG-1 Layer 2 audio for it to work, so try converting your wave file to AC3 or MP2 then multiplex shouldn't give you an error.

Hey, i would love the the posibility to add logos (watermarking) to the movies i encode with tmpgenc this is the only let down with the program.

Best Regards
Morten

I second this, this is the only let down of the software