I've been experimenting with different methods and bitrates, and have run into a few things. I'm using BitRateViewer for comparisons.

I've gotten results I really like using 2-pass VBR with an average of 2520, and maximum of 4000-5000. The resulting files have been the same or smaller than CBR 2520kbps SVCD files and the quality has been much better in scenes with lots of motion.

The downside, though, is obviously the time required to encode, so I've been messing with the CQ_VBR method, but have had little success. It seems that the results that I'm getting are very similar to CBR. I can't seem to get enough variation in the bitrate.

Just as a test, I've tried setting the minimum at 0 and the maximum at 5000, and encoded multiple files with the quality set to various percentages between 25 and 75. There never seems to be any more variation in the bitrate than there is in a standard CBR of the same video. It seems that all that I'm doing is making CBR files for which the bitrate is automatically determined by the quality slider rather than imputting the bitrate manually.

Is this a result of something I'm doing wrong or is it just a limitation of the program not scanning the clip twice?

Sorry if this has already been addressed, but I didn't find a message dealing with exactly the same issue.

Thanks.

Your mostly right the quality slider basicly balances the quality with file size.I usualy use quality at 100 witch seems to allocate the max bitrate for complex scenes but less complex scenes seem to get the same bitrate no matter what quality you set...vbr 2 pass will allways give you better quality for the file size.........

In my experience, using the right settings and using Constant quality(CQ) you should get results pretty close to a 2 pass encode and much better than Automatic VBR or CBR, regarding the quality and file size, when viewing with bitrate viewer.

Try this:

Bitrate Max - 4000 Min - 1800

Quality - 65

VBV buffer -112

Motion search precision - normal

Under the Quantize matrix:

Check soften block noise

Intra - 35 Non Intra 35


This should fit a 90-100 min movie of nice quality on two 80min cd's (you may need to reduce the audio bitrate a little depending on the type of movie)

The bitrate variance will also depend on the movie.
If you have a movie with lots of high action and quiet scenes the bitrate should vary a lot.
If the movie is quite calm all the way through then the bitrate isn't going to vary quite so much.

ASHY

I have like the results I am getting with using CQ_VBR. I set it to 52 quality and range from a min of 0 to a max of 2500. The VBV buffer size is 40 and the resolution is 352x240. My results take me about six to seven hours to finish a 120 min movie and I am very satisfied with the quality. I have never tried 2 pass VBR. Good luck. -Pit Bullz

yes i have divx5 i must need more? do i just do a google search for codecs? thanx

divx5 only works for divx5 but I think divx4.12 works on divx3x-divx4x. So get divx 4.12...

I created a SVCD mpeg2 file with 2 audio streams using the multiplex tool. I verified there were indeed 2 audio streams by loading the file into the "de-multiplex" tool.

Then I used Merge & Cut to cut the clip into smaller sub-clips. The resulting sub clips only have one audio stream.

I suspect tmpgenc forgot to handle secondary audio streams when cutting/merging.

This was tested on version 2.54.37.135.

maybe the problem is that svcd does not support multiple audio streams but I think plain mpeg2 does....I have done what you are doing before but when i went to burn it only one audio track showed up,maybe this would work ,get a audio mixing program(cool edit,sound forge) and mux the 2 audio streams into one and then mux that with your video......

I was able to use tmpgenc to create an SVCD mpg with 2 audio channel and was able to switch between the 2 audio channel in a SVCD compatible DVD player.
I just can't "merge & cut" the file and retain both audio channels.

1 is nandub v1.orc2

nandub isn"t a codec it is a program for encodeing files to divx format,have you downloaded any divx codecs?if not do it ,......

i have some of the movies i downloaded that work fine with media player. when i use tmpg or virtua i have no picture. is there anway to convert these so they can be encoded for a vcd? thanx ive learned alot today already but i have a long way to go!

make sure you have the proper codecs installed on your machine because media player uses external codecs, post back with the specs of your avi file.......

And another thing movies downloaded off the net at places like "kaaza" are full of errors because the limited bandwidth and the way that files are split up in to pieces so that you can download them faster.I used to try to encode movies that I downloaded but I decided to do it right and get a dvd-rom,because 3/4 of the files i downloaded would crash the system or I would get encodeing errors..you should put your avi file in "virtua dub" and scan the stream for errors to see if the file is corrupted,media player will play corrupted files so don"t use that as a medium for thinking the file is fine...

I think I speak for quite a few people when I say if I could get my hands on the DVD's I wouldn't bother searching Kazaa trying to find the movies I want to watch, however beggers can't be choosers!

What you are saying about the files not downloading is however not correct. The problem is not with Kazaa but with the original files people are sharing. These are often poorly encoded, or even worse are pieced together from bits of other downloads that they only partially completed but couldn't be bothered to wait to complete.

If the errors with the files were being caused by Kazaa then it would be totally useless for sharing any types of software because a single instruction wrong could cause most simply not to install.

hi all.
the problem i have is that when i open a wav file as the audio source in TMPGenc, it tells me this file type is not supported!
i'm quite sure it is indeed a wav file, since i created it using DVD2AVI.
any ideas?
thanks.

try raising the "wav" file reader in the "vfapi plugins". dvd2avi also makes mpeg audio if the source is mpeg audio.......

thanks, but, nah - didn't work.
when i open the wav file with winamp it says - "waveform-audio file has no FMT chunk". do you know what might that mean?
thanks again.

I don"t know what it means but it probably is the reason for your problems, go back to dvd2avi and get the audio again, there might have been a problem when you were extracting the "wav" file...or you can try to load it in a audio encoder like "db power amp" and encode the wav to wav, basicly make a copy...

Okay, so i'm converting a divx avi to a mpeg2 (svcd). At random points while encoding, the encode will stop, and give me the error: "Read error occurred at address 00481F19 of module 'TMPGEnc.exe' with 8002E38E." Of course, the addresses change, but the message is always the same. It happens at random parts of the encode, but usually not too far in, the farthest i've ever gotten was 11% done (but it's crashed at 4,5,6, and everything else in between really). I am relatively new to TMPGEnc, but i've been following tutorials on vcdhelp.com for all my actions. I extracted the audio from the avi to a wav file, so that shouldn't be the problem. My hardware shouldn't be the problem either, as far as i can tell, i'm running a 1.9ghz p4, 512mb ram, geforce1 ddr vid card, plenty of hard drive space, etc. Please let me know if you need me to provide any more info. Anyway, i'd just like to find out how to fix this problem, so that i can use TMPGEnc to make a good encode of this divx file. By the way, after getting this message, i hit ok, and of course the encode has been stopped. I then close out of the program. What has been done of the encode is still around though in the location i specified, and i've always checked this and the video works fine, and the audio is there and is just fine as well. Oh, and also i have both divx 3.whatever and divx 4 codecs installed (no divx 5 though, admittedly). Anyway, any help would be greatly appreciated, thanks!

bump

Hey

Hey,i d/l tmg so i could convert my 24 avi to a mpeg.Ok,i did that.But i still cant drag it to nero and put it on a cd so i can play it on my cheap 80 $ dvd player.Help plz

you need to tell us more info like the avi file specs,and what you are trying to do (eg)-vcd svcd, the settings you used in "tmpgenc" and the error that "nero" gives you when you try to drag the file in to burn....we can"t read minds....

Hello. I can read minds. ;-)

Actually I made this mistake myself the first time and I'm betting you did the same as me.

You need to actually make a "VideoCD" not just a CD with an MPG file on it. Nero isn't that great for VideoCD, I think VCDEasy is far better - I've had much more success with it!

Take a look at this page - it has both Nero and VCDEasy tutorials. I think you will agree VCDEasy is much easier for making VideoCD. It also has the bonus of being free! Great partner to TMPEnc.
http://www.vcdhelp.com/author.htm

I have used both NERO and VCDeasy many times and don't know how you have arrived at both the conclusions that VCDeasy is both easier and better than NERO.

Nero IS one of the best programs out ther for VCD.
Just ask anyone in here who does regular VCD burning.

It all depends on your requirements.
As far as I'm concerned if you don't want to bother with chapter points then there is little point in using VCDeasy and to disagree with you, Nero is an easier program to use for VCD than VCDeasy (even though VCDeasy isn't that hard either).

There are more settings to take care of before a burn in VCDeasy than Nero requires.
Nero is simply drag, drop and write. No need for specifiying chapters or bin files and XML files or the like.

Also I think success with a program depends on the person that's using it and if you find NERO hard to use then I'd quit encoding now before it does get too complicated for you.

ASHY

Hi,

We have had a couple of problems. The first time we burned a VCD and tried to play it in our DVD player, it played in slow, choppy motion.

Now every time I try to run TMPEG and start it, it doesn't run smooth in the preview window. I have tried everything under deinterlacing header and nothing seems to work. Please help! Thanks. ALEX

P.S. The DVD is a NTSC non-interlaced video

It isnt supposed to run smooth in the preview window,it only shows one frame in 18,or 36,if it runs really chopy in your dvd player it doesn"t have to do with de-interlace.maybe you should post the method you used to encode like the bitrate,resolution frame rate and so forth.......

What do you mean the DVD is NTSC non interlace video?

I doubt it's non interlaced as it would have to be to play in your DVD player.

How do you know it's non interlaced?

ASHY

I think I understand what you mean.
Are you saying the DVD is progressive frame and is encoded to 23.976 FILM.

ASHY

Hi. Ever since I updated my computer to Win Xp, I can't convert movies. As soon as I click on browse, a error message pops up and then have to close. Can anyone help me??

What error message?There have been a lot of poeple complaining about compatibility issues with win xp..But I know that it does work for most poeple in xp...Do you still have your old opperateing system? try running dual operateing systems to try to get around the problem but I"m sure someone will have some sort of solution for you......good luck

how can i turn an avi file (divxmpg4) to a regular mpeg1/2?
i tried but i only got the video but no sound
what am i doing rong here?
do u know of some way i can encode avi(divxmp4) to mpeg1/2?

Well it seems that the audio format of your avi file is not supported by "tmpgenc".try extracting the audio and convert it to wav with "virtua dub" and use that as your audio source..but first find out wat the audio format is, if it is "ac3" you will have to convert it with a "ac3 decoder",but most other formats can be converted with "virtua dub"...

Hi,

Yes you can, but you need to do a little more than just open the AVI with TMPGEnc. I've done this with about 10 movies now and it doesn't add much time to encoding process. Just follow the guide on this page!

http://www.vcdhelp.com/divxtovcd.htm

Hope this helps!

Can't load audio for Divx files.

It used to work before, but now I get a message when loading the divx file for the audio.
Here is the error message
File:"C: est.avi" can not open, or unsupported.

Thanks in advance.

Can you get the video in just not the audio? if it says is is unsupported that means it is unsupported,not all audio formats are supported in "tmpgenc".What format is the audio file? Try encodeing the audio to wav with a audio converting program,and if the audio is "ac3" you need a "ac3 decoder" to change the audio format....

I'm trying to convert divx to Mpeg. (So I loaded the .avi for the audio part as well as the video) I think the audio is just MP3.
I can do the conversion for the same file before, but after I reboot the computer today, TMPGEnc gives me that error message.

By the way, any program that can extract the audio track in a Divx file?

Thanks

the best program for extracting the audio from avi is "virtua dub" you can find it in the "tools" section at "www.vcdhelp.com