Fastest .mv4 to .avi or .mp4 Mac converter?

[dorayme]

Are there any facilities to convert, for example, a 2.5GB m4V file to
avi or mp4 in under say an hour (rather than *several* hours) on a
2.26 GHz Mac with 4GB RAM running Snow Leopard?

--
dorayme

[BreadW...@fractious.net]

Probably, though it depends a lot on the output settings. If
you recompress it to a low resolution, crappy format, you
can probably do it quite fast.

BTW, you don't say what kind of processor nor how many cores.
There's a world of difference between, say, a core 2 duo and
a quad-core i5.

Note that an .m4v file *is* an mp4 file. You can just change
the file extension. (well, okay, then - you can "convert" it
instantaneously!)


--
Plain Bread alone for e-mail, thanks. The rest gets trashed.

[dorayme]

In article <yobvcnn...@panix2.panix.com>,

BreadW...@fractious.net wrote:

> dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> writes:
>
> > Are there any facilities to convert, for example, a 2.5GB m4V file to
> > avi or mp4 in under say an hour (rather than *several* hours) on a
> > 2.26 GHz Mac with 4GB RAM running Snow Leopard?
>
> Probably, though it depends a lot on the output settings. If
> you recompress it to a low resolution, crappy format, you
> can probably do it quite fast.
>

To keep the same quality (or as close as)

> BTW, you don't say what kind of processor nor how many cores.
> There's a world of difference between, say, a core 2 duo and
> a quad-core i5.
>

OK, I will tell you and maybe you can tell me how many hours of
conversion the difference between the two is. Core 2 Duo

> Note that an .m4v file *is* an mp4 file. You can just change
> the file extension. (well, okay, then - you can "convert" it
> instantaneously!)

Unfortunately, an m4v file won't play on my tv via the usb no matter
what I call it. mp4's and avi's play ok. I think the m4v has some sort
of protection on it.


But my problem is *more general*. Now and then an avi file won't play
or will play on the tv badly with visible frames alternating with
blanks. Easy fix is converting an avi to mp4 or even to avi via
streamclip and saving under a new name enables! Fine for small files
but when it comes to big, it takes many many hours, (3 hours have gone
and I am only 34% complete converting a 2.5GB m4v to avi!).

I am thinking it is simply how it is with my MB and not much can be
done about it. I don't mind waiting but not with my MB... I might try
on my G4 Quicksilver which is doing nothing at the moment and though
it is likely even slower, I feel comfortable it working away for days
even.

Still, I am wondering about this stuff if there are any faster
algorithm apps that do not lose quality.

Have been ruminating on looking for a Snow L capable older mini with
better specs than my MB, especially more RAM.

--
dorayme

[gtr]

I've been doing a LOT of this kind of stuff over the past week while
attempting to convert avi files--and their accompanying subtitles
files--to another format.

From other discussions upstream, you are using ffmpegX, correct? I've
used it recently to do something similar and it does it in less than an
hour, IIRC, and certainly less than "several" hours.

I believe I've done it with Quicktime too in recent months.

What programs have you used so far in your hunt?

And also--are you using Lion?
--
I do not feel obligated to believe that the same God who has endowed us
with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forego their use.
-- Galileo

[dorayme]

In article <2012020409234457373-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> On 2012-02-03 22:34:22 +0000, dorayme said:
>
> > Are there any facilities to convert, for example, a 2.5GB m4V file to
> > avi or mp4 in under say an hour (rather than *several* hours) on a
> > 2.26 GHz Mac with 4GB RAM running Snow Leopard?
>
> I've been doing a LOT of this kind of stuff over the past week while
> attempting to convert avi files--and their accompanying subtitles
> files--to another format.
>

Excellent. Have you converted files of over 2.5GB that are m4V to avi
or mp4 in less than an hour?

> From other discussions upstream, you are using ffmpegX, correct?

I have this week been successfully using MPEG Streamclip to convert
smaller files of the order of 350MB. I open the file in it and choose
export from the File menu.

For example, I had some .avi files that played fine on my Mac but for
inexplicable reasons not in a TV that plays most .avi files fine (via
USB stick). My fix was to convert the files to shake them up, like you
juggle and tap a pack of cards to make them all line up, and this
worked fine. I converted from avi to mp4 and even from avi to avi and
then the converted files worked fine on the TV.

> I've
> used it recently to do something similar and it does it in less than an
> hour, IIRC, and certainly less than "several" hours.
>

Good to know, so how, specifically, do I get your success to do a
simple thing like putting a m4v through any converter, the result
being of similar quality, and it taking an hour or less for an
excellent quality film of 2 to 3GB?

> I believe I've done it with Quicktime too in recent months.
>

> What programs have you used so far in your hunt?
>

QT and MPEG Streamclip.

> And also--are you using Lion?

See above.

--
dorayme

[gtr]

On 2012-02-04 21:58:35 +0000, dorayme said:

>> I've been doing a LOT of this kind of stuff over the past week while
>> attempting to convert avi files--and their accompanying subtitles
>> files--to another format.
>
> Excellent. Have you converted files of over 2.5GB that are m4V to avi
> or mp4 in less than an hour?

I'm going the other way from avi to other formats. 1.5gig took around
40 minutes if memory serves.

>> From other discussions upstream, you are using ffmpegX, correct?
>
> I have this week been successfully using MPEG Streamclip to convert
> smaller files of the order of 350MB. I open the file in it and choose
> export from the File menu.
>
> For example, I had some .avi files that played fine on my Mac but for
> inexplicable reasons not in a TV that plays most .avi files fine (via
> USB stick). My fix was to convert the files to shake them up, like you
> juggle and tap a pack of cards to make them all line up, and this
> worked fine. I converted from avi to mp4 and even from avi to avi and
> then the converted files worked fine on the TV.

Good to hear your. I fed an avi and .srt file to SubMerge to merge the
two files to a single m4v file. But the audio came out garbled. I
tried a couple of times (each costing me about 1.75 hours. Finally I
fed the avi (alone), to ffmpegX. I converted the avi to "DivX ffmpeg"
which it displays as "AVI DivX" in the "Target Format" part of the
summary pane. Then I fed that with the subtitles to SubMerge and it
worked perfectly.

In sum I think I was just converting from Avi to Avi. I won't project
your timing for this, but in my situation the ffmpegX process was much
quicker than anything else I'd tried over the course of a week. So you
might want to try that and compare your timing.

>> I've used it recently to do something similar and it does it in less than an
>> hour, IIRC, and certainly less than "several" hours.
>
> Good to know, so how, specifically, do I get your success to do a
> simple thing like putting a m4v through any converter, the result
> being of similar quality, and it taking an hour or less for an
> excellent quality film of 2 to 3GB?

I can only advise you to try the above and check your watch. I don't
know what speed of processor you have, how the OS differs or doesn't
and couldn't guess about these things.

>> And also--are you using Lion?
>
> See above.

Either "yes" or "no" would have been quicker to type. Skimming, I see
no reference to OS above.

[gtr]

On 2012-02-04 20:13:05 +0000, Michael Vilain said:

> In article <2012020409234457373-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:
>

>> On 2012-02-03 22:34:22 +0000, dorayme said:
>>
>>> Are there any facilities to convert, for example, a 2.5GB m4V file to
>>> avi or mp4 in under say an hour (rather than *several* hours) on a
>>> 2.26 GHz Mac with 4GB RAM running Snow Leopard?
>>
>> I've been doing a LOT of this kind of stuff over the past week while
>> attempting to convert avi files--and their accompanying subtitles
>> files--to another format.
>>
>> From other discussions upstream, you are using ffmpegX, correct? I've
>> used it recently to do something similar and it does it in less than an
>> hour, IIRC, and certainly less than "several" hours.
>>
>> I believe I've done it with Quicktime too in recent months.
>>
>> What programs have you used so far in your hunt?
>>
>> And also--are you using Lion?
>

> I have a few AVI files with subtitles and NONE of them convert to other
> formats with subtitles successfully. So, I kept the files and will
> watch the movies in that format.
>
> I've used Handbreak, Aiseesoft's Video Converter, and MacX DVD Video
> Converter. None convert the subtitles.

Which format subtitles are you speaking of? I have found that if I
have an .avi and .srt file I can convert them to an AVI by using
ffmpegX. Though I certainly found out the hard way, after about 20
tries.

At some point I realized that the file-naming hierarchy would allow
only alpha in the folder names, and the source file name. One folder
had a dash and parentheses. Once stripped, it choked on a comma in the
filename. Once it was all alpha or blanks it merged beautifully:

Source: AVI / Target: AVI Divx (listed as the option DivX ffmpeg).

Filters: Use "Load subs" to select the .srt file. The "vob" settings
above this are irrelevant to this process. I also change the font pos.
from the default of 80 to 95 instead. Sometimes I goose the font size
from 1 to 2.

While the processing is underway, if you go to the queue panel and
click the "info" element it will tell you what is going on as soon as
it starts. If you look for subtitle and it says it couldn't find the
file, you can halt it rather than waiting an hour. Note also that it
seems (I can't confirm) that the line where the filename couldn't load,
only displays up to the point that the program barfed, and no more. In
this way you might be able to tell which element it is choking on in
the file naming.

[dorayme]

In article <2012020414243868670-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> On 2012-02-04 21:58:35 +0000, dorayme said:
>

...

>
> I can only advise you to try the above and check your watch. I don't
> know what speed of processor you have, how the OS differs or doesn't
> and couldn't guess about these things.
>

My ffmpegX.app seems rather broken, or takes just as much time as the
other converters I use. If you ever get to convert a good quality avi
file of over 2.5GB to avi or m4v to avi or anything to anything at all
preserving the quality roughly in under an hour, if you are feeling
articulate and generous (maybe if you have a miraculous cure from
something and your mood is especially buoyant), maybe give some
detailed clues on your steps.

> >> And also--are you using Lion?
> >
> > See above.
>
> Either "yes" or "no" would have been quicker to type. Skimming, I see
> no reference to OS above.

Yes, fair enough, it confirms to me that you are not getting all the
details I posted, usenet newsreader software and servers are
unreliable things. In the post to which you reply I repeated the words
I actually started the thread with.

"Are there any facilities to convert, for example, a 2.5GB m4V file to
avi or mp4 in under say an hour (rather than *several* hours) on a
2.26 GHz Mac with 4GB RAM running Snow Leopard?"

--
dorayme

[gtr]

On 2012-02-05 00:14:19 +0000, dorayme said:

>> I can only advise you to try the above and check your watch. I don't
>> know what speed of processor you have, how the OS differs or doesn't
>> and couldn't guess about these things.
>
> My ffmpegX.app seems rather broken, or takes just as much time as the
> other converters I use.

Hmm. Broken it may be. I was having significant problems until I
downloaded and re "located" the mencoder and the other outboard
elements it needs. I'd point you to ensuring those are up to the
latest incarnation. It took me a few tries before I figured it out.

> If you ever get to convert a good quality avi
> file of over 2.5GB to avi or m4v to avi or anything to anything at all
> preserving the quality roughly in under an hour, if you are feeling
> articulate and generous (maybe if you have a miraculous cure from
> something and your mood is especially buoyant), maybe give some
> detailed clues on your steps.

I've been doing a bunch of conversions but mostly the files are rarely
larger than about 1.5g. If I encounter something at 2.5 I'll
stop-watch it.

> And also--are you using Lion?
>>>
>>> See above.
>>
>> Either "yes" or "no" would have been quicker to type. Skimming, I see
>> no reference to OS above.
>
> Yes, fair enough, it confirms to me that you are not getting all the
> details I posted, usenet newsreader software and servers are
> unreliable things.

As are humans and even more so "readers".

[dorayme]

In article <2012020416371172078-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> On 2012-02-05 00:14:19 +0000, dorayme said:
>
> >> I can only advise you to try the above and check your watch. I don't
> >> know what speed of processor you have, how the OS differs or doesn't
> >> and couldn't guess about these things.
> >
> > My ffmpegX.app seems rather broken, or takes just as much time as the
> > other converters I use.
>
> Hmm. Broken it may be. I was having significant problems until I
> downloaded and re "located" the mencoder and the other outboard
> elements it needs. I'd point you to ensuring those are up to the
> latest incarnation. It took me a few tries before I figured it out.
>

OK, I will take another look. Mine is an unregistered one. It invites
registration and I am happy to do this and pay if i can see it does
what I want but so far not so and not better than other free
facilities. perhaps if your register and pay, it magically works
better in the things that are said to work without rego. I know there
are sophisticated things that won't work without rego, things to do
with sound facilities. My needs are very simple really.

> > If you ever get to convert a good quality avi
> > file of over 2.5GB to avi or m4v to avi or anything to anything at all
> > preserving the quality roughly in under an hour, if you are feeling
> > articulate and generous (maybe if you have a miraculous cure from
> > something and your mood is especially buoyant), maybe give some
> > detailed clues on your steps.
>
> I've been doing a bunch of conversions but mostly the files are rarely
> larger than about 1.5g. If I encounter something at 2.5 I'll
> stop-watch it.
>

No need to to do anything so detailed, the test is simple: with a
2.5GB or more good or high quality film, when you are converting, do
you seem to see Our Maker? Do you think about life but more
emphatically closer approaching death? Do you feel your mortal
allotment on earth ebbing away? Do you have visions of yourself as a
skeleton, in a coffin, being greeted by and having to explain
*everything* to St Peter at The Gates? Do you even feel frustrated at
the CPU being so busy for so long and remaining busy even when you
have been on a round-the-world-trip and made a temporary hop back to
base to see if your machine has not caught fire from overwork or the
conversion is complete? <g>

--
dorayme

[Leonard Blaisdell]

In article <dorayme-9293D0...@news.albasani.net>,

dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

> "Are there any facilities to convert, for example, a 2.5GB m4V file to
> avi or mp4 in under say an hour (rather than *several* hours) on a
> 2.26 GHz Mac with 4GB RAM running Snow Leopard?"

Have you tried Quicktime 7 Pro? Yep, it still costs money and it's still
around. I have no idea how fast it is for what you want. Here's a
screenshot of its export options: <http://i40.tinypic.com/v7qohj.png>.
It still works on Lion and it's thirty American bucks. I keep it in my
utilities folder. Just a thought.

leo

[dorayme]

In article <leoblaisdell-1035...@News.Individual.NET>,

Hi Leo, thks for the thought, yes, I have had that for a long time.
Perhaps I should just fire up a doing-nothing-at-the-moment Powermac
QS and just let it run for a day or whatever it takes to convert big
movie files! QT is not slower than anything else.

In fact, let me give you some figures, a 2.5GB m4v movie of good
quality to export in QT to avi at default settings, it projects a time
of 3hrs and 40min, when it actually settles to do the job, it predicts
4.5hrs.

So, what I am really asking is if there even *could there* be any
software that speeds this up but maintains the quality. Obviously if I
could run my present software on the machine that beat Kasparov at
chess a few years back, Bob would be my uncle, but that is a different
matter.

It is all such a mystery to me! You have this m4v or avi or mp3 or 4
or x or z or abracadabra and in this file is a whole bunch of 1's and
0's and a converter somehow looks at all these things and rearranges
them somehow and for icing on the cake saves as with name and
different ending. The name and ending are not so important, they just
tell computers a few things about what apps to try. Fine. But what
mysteries are in the patterns of the 1's and 0's and it must take a
long time to look at all of these billions of things - ever tried to
find a familiar face in a footie crowd, in cop shows they sometimes
turn up to games because they know their man is there and they scan
the crowds with binocs!

--
dorayme

[Leonard Blaisdell]

In article <dorayme-60CCCF...@news.albasani.net>,

dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

- ever tried to
> find a familiar face in a footie crowd, in cop shows they sometimes
> turn up to games because they know their man is there and they scan
> the crowds with binocs!

Well there are lots of ones and zeros in 2.5 GB, so Watson should be
able to process the file in a snap. If it's not playing there now,
you'll love "A Person of Interest" if it ever plays on Oz TV.

leo

[gtr]

On 2012-02-05 00:51:51 +0000, dorayme said:

>> Hmm. Broken it may be. I was having significant problems until I
>> downloaded and re "located" the mencoder and the other outboard
>> elements it needs. I'd point you to ensuring those are up to the
>> latest incarnation. It took me a few tries before I figured it out.
>
> OK, I will take another look. Mine is an unregistered one. It invites
> registration and I am happy to do this and pay if i can see it does
> what I want but so far not so and not better than other free
> facilities.

No need. Mine is unregistered. I'll likely pitch in now that I've
dound a specific need for it, and figured out what the hell I was doing
wrong. Other than the need I have right now it looks very capable.

But FIRST figure if you can make use of it, then pay the shareware if
it's of value.

Another to try is this one:

http://www.iskysoft.com/imedia-converter-mac.html

It does a boat load of things and looks very capable. It costs $65 or
something, but again you can figure out if it will do what you want to
first, and then buy it if you want to. Until you pay the fee it lays a
watermark over everything.

>> I've been doing a bunch of conversions but mostly the files are rarely
>> larger than about 1.5g. If I encounter something at 2.5 I'll
>> stop-watch it.
>
> No need to to do anything so detailed, the test is simple: with a
> 2.5GB or more good or high quality film, when you are converting, do
> you seem to see Our Maker?

I see him now--we're having a beer. But I use a stop-watch all the
time; most of my work is in music.

[dorayme]

In article <2012020423424884299-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> Another to try is this one:
>
> http://www.iskysoft.com/imedia-converter-mac.html
>
> It does a boat load of things and looks very capable. It costs $65 or
> something, but again you can figure out if it will do what you want to
> first, and then buy it if you want to. Until you pay the fee it lays a
> watermark over everything.

Let me download it, can you wait a sec or two? 19.9MB and coming down
at 230KB/sec...

OK fired up. 2.5GB file opening ... loading .. 20 sec ... Now what? Ah
there is a convert button and also there is a menu item called
convert. Lets try the latter and see if it gives me some idea or
choice of what to covert it to... mmm... let's try the other.. same
thing, a dialog to say it will either make a watermark or limit the
output audio to 3 min ... mmm... wonder whether it will do both and
how this affects the time taken...

It is saying that it will take about an hour to an hour and a half for
a trial m4v of 2.5GB and if I try avi output may be better. I might
try it and see. Thanks for this GTR, if it works it is still better
than several hours!

I shall likely want to see if there is anything free before shelling
out, and need to think about if it has to process sound if this takes
exrtra time... why am I so careful, my Dad was a big spendthrift and
my mum was generous to a fault? <g>

--
dorayme

[Greg Buchner]

In article <dorayme-AD9744...@news.albasani.net>,

dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

> In article <yobvcnn...@panix2.panix.com>,
> BreadW...@fractious.net wrote:
>
> > dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> writes:
> >
> > > Are there any facilities to convert, for example, a 2.5GB m4V file to
> > > avi or mp4 in under say an hour (rather than *several* hours) on a
> > > 2.26 GHz Mac with 4GB RAM running Snow Leopard?
> >
> > Probably, though it depends a lot on the output settings. If
> > you recompress it to a low resolution, crappy format, you
> > can probably do it quite fast.
> >
>
> To keep the same quality (or as close as)
>
> > BTW, you don't say what kind of processor nor how many cores.
> > There's a world of difference between, say, a core 2 duo and
> > a quad-core i5.
> >
>
> OK, I will tell you and maybe you can tell me how many hours of
> conversion the difference between the two is. Core 2 Duo

I did some tests with Handbrake...

Mac Mini: 2.53 GHz Core 2 Duo
Windows PC: 2.4 GHz Core i5-2400s

Handbrake running on the Windows PC was about three times faster than
the Mac Mini. For the particular file I was testing with at the time,
the Mac Mini was doing about 32 frames per second and the PC was doing
around 90 frames per second. Settings were the same on both copies of
Handbrake.

Does that give you a good enough example of the speed difference between
the two?

Greg B.

--
Actual e-mail address is gregbuchner and I'm located at gmail.com

[dorayme]

In article <null-F49A69.0...@news.us.easynews.com>,

Greg Buchner <nu...@none.invalid> wrote:

> In article <dorayme-AD9744...@news.albasani.net>,
> dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
>
> > In article <yobvcnn...@panix2.panix.com>,
> > BreadW...@fractious.net wrote:
> >

...

> > > There's a world of difference between, say, a core 2 duo and
> > > a quad-core i5.
> > >
> >
> > OK, I will tell you and maybe you can tell me how many hours of
> > conversion the difference between the two is. Core 2 Duo
>
> I did some tests with Handbrake...
>
> Mac Mini: 2.53 GHz Core 2 Duo
> Windows PC: 2.4 GHz Core i5-2400s
>
> Handbrake running on the Windows PC was about three times faster than
> the Mac Mini. For the particular file I was testing with at the time,
> the Mac Mini was doing about 32 frames per second and the PC was doing
> around 90 frames per second. Settings were the same on both copies of
> Handbrake.
>
> Does that give you a good enough example of the speed difference between
> the two?

It tells me that *maybe*, using the software I have tried, if my
processor was some equivalent to Core i5-2400s, that conversions that
have taken up to 6 hrs would take maybe under 2. So, I am thinking
from your information (thanks for this, of course), that on processors
that do not completely break the bank, there could be a doubling in
speed, roughly.

The rest of any possible gains will be due to software. Different
softwares take different times and I would love to know more about how
they gain their efficiencies.

Do the slow turtles (like QT Pro) stop for cups of tea on the way? Do
they come across gangs of 1's and 0's that try to mug them? The
digital police are called, there is an investigation, the culprits are
jailed and the converter needs to wait till their sentence is finished
and they come back to work the lines or are assigned to fulfil their
work in chain gangs? Or the software manages without them, cutting out
frames?

Are some softwares naturally more aggressive than others and pick
fights with totally innocent 1's and 0's and seeing how there are so
many of the latter, have a tough time of it, the 1's and 0's being
very loyal to each other.

Perhaps size of software matters? Converters containing powerful
armies of 1's and 0's might be able to subdue large unruly movie
files? Wars are sometimes won by sheer weight of numbers. But equally
true perhaps a smaller smarter army will prevail against a larger one.
I feel conflicted on this.

--
dorayme

[PhillipJones]

Anyone tried MplayerX, or Switch

[PhillipJones]

Or even Prism

[gtr]

Do they work with Lion?

[dorayme]

In article <dorayme-197978...@news.albasani.net>,

dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

> So, I am thinking
> from your information (thanks for this, of course), that on processors
> that do not completely break the bank, there could be a doubling in
> speed, roughly.

tripling in speed!

--
dorayme

[gtr]

Without previous references it's difficult to know what's been
concluded. Have you improved your speed with something or other?

[dorayme]

In article <2012020519004947666-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> On 2012-02-05 23:51:28 +0000, dorayme said:
>
> > In article <dorayme-197978...@news.albasani.net>,
> > dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> >
> >> So, I am thinking
> >> from your information (thanks for this, of course), that on processors
> >> that do not completely break the bank, there could be a doubling in
> >> speed, roughly.
> >
> > tripling in speed!
>
> Without previous references it's difficult to know what's been
> concluded. Have you improved your speed with something or other?

Not yet, no. I am thinking that $50 software you discovered would
probably help out in reducing the time but I am still wondering about
the issue because it is not clear to me that the evaluation times are
a true indication (they sometimes don't process the audio) and
probably, frankly, to see if there is free. Also need to understand
more about all this business.

Know any good digital movie stuff usenet groups where I can try for as
much unpopularity as here? <g>

--
dorayme

[Warren Oates]

In article <dorayme-069503...@news.albasani.net>,

dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

> Not yet, no. I am thinking that $50 software you discovered would
> probably help out in reducing the time but I am still wondering about
> the issue because it is not clear to me that the evaluation times are
> a true indication (they sometimes don't process the audio) and
> probably, frankly, to see if there is free. Also need to understand
> more about all this business.
>
> Know any good digital movie stuff usenet groups where I can try for as
> much unpopularity as here? <g>

You're asking the right questions in the right place. Other groups will
be Windows-centric, at best.

What you're not doing is exploring the command-line options, where
everything is free and will probably do what you want. You're also
ignoring the fact the 2.5 gigs is still a big file.
--

... do not cover a warm kettle or your stock may sour. -- Julia Child

[PhillipJones]

MplayerX definitely does. and the other are by Company called NHC
Software I believe they have a version for Lion now. Prism Definitely is
an Intel only App (Version 1.28).

Switch version 4.15 definitely is an Intel only app by same company.

[dorayme]

In article <4f2fcf32$0$23940$c3e8da3$a8a6...@news.astraweb.com>,

I am not in any shape, way or form *ignoring* the latter. But you are
right about the former. But before I plunge into doing anything that
someone on usenet suggests, I tend to want to build confidence in
hearing that the aim is specifically achievable in the specific
experience of my non-necessarily-so-specific betters.

In Homicide Life on the Street, in the episode "End game", there is
this creep on a massage table listening to his masseur tell him how
she would like to do this and that sexual favour for him because he
was a hero to her (she admired his fighting ability from some bar room
brawl). The creep was lying on his stomach and kept asking her to be
more specific. He probably was getting off on hearing the details, I
don't know. Suddenly one of a number of homicide detectives, who had
slipped into the room, was holding a gun to his head and saying "If
you move, I'll shoot!" and the guy mutters, without losing his cool,
"That's better" meaning in the context "That's very specific".

--
dorayme

[Warren Oates]

In article <dorayme-BF3FDF...@news.albasani.net>,

dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

> I am not in any shape, way or form *ignoring* the latter. But you are
> right about the former. But before I plunge into doing anything that
> someone on usenet suggests, I tend to want to build confidence in
> hearing that the aim is specifically achievable in the specific
> experience of my non-necessarily-so-specific betters.
>
> In Homicide Life on the Street, in the episode "End game", there is
> this creep on a massage table listening to his masseur tell him how
> she would like to do this and that sexual favour for him because he
> was a hero to her (she admired his fighting ability from some bar room
> brawl). The creep was lying on his stomach and kept asking her to be
> more specific. He probably was getting off on hearing the details, I
> don't know. Suddenly one of a number of homicide detectives, who had
> slipped into the room, was holding a gun to his head and saying "If
> you move, I'll shoot!" and the guy mutters, without losing his cool,
> "That's better" meaning in the context "That's very specific".

I love your zen.

My favourite Homicide episode is where Vincent D'Onofrio gets cut in
half by the subway train.

What exact avi format are you trying to convert? I don't have any "avi"
files that big, but I could probably create one from something I've got.
Load it into the QT7 player, do a "get info" (CMD-I) and tell me what
the audio and video codecs are.

[dorayme]

In article <4f306d63$0$9526$c3e8da3$12bc...@news.astraweb.com>,

Warren Oates <warren...@gmail.com> wrote:

> In article <dorayme-BF3FDF...@news.albasani.net>,
> dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
>
> > I am not in any shape, way or form *ignoring* the latter. But you are
> > right about the former. But before I plunge into doing anything that
> > someone on usenet suggests, I tend to want to build confidence in
> > hearing that the aim is specifically achievable in the specific
> > experience of my non-necessarily-so-specific betters.
> >
> > In Homicide Life on the Street, in the episode "End game", there is
> > this creep on a massage table listening to his masseur tell him how
> > she would like to do this and that sexual favour for him because he
> > was a hero to her (she admired his fighting ability from some bar room
> > brawl). The creep was lying on his stomach and kept asking her to be
> > more specific. He probably was getting off on hearing the details, I
> > don't know. Suddenly one of a number of homicide detectives, who had
> > slipped into the room, was holding a gun to his head and saying "If
> > you move, I'll shoot!" and the guy mutters, without losing his cool,
> > "That's better" meaning in the context "That's very specific".
>
> I love your zen.
>

Thank you.

> My favourite Homicide episode is where Vincent D'Onofrio gets cut in
> half by the subway train.
>

There are so many fabulous episodes that I am hard put to name a
favourite. It is a work of genius, well written, funny, sad, sardonic,
you name it. Occasionally, it is spoilt by the one thing that modern
film makers do badly, at least in Western countries, *larding* music
over things like they *pour* sentimentality over most filmic things.
But this is only occasionally bothering me with this series,
everything else is as good on re-watching as when I first saw it in
the 90's.

Absurd as it might seem to some, I think some things are actually
sublime and will live for a thousand years. Like? Like the end of the
episode Crosseti.

Crosetti commits suicide. There is pressure within the Homicide Dept
not to find it so because then he would be denied a police guard of
honour. But the verdict inescapable.

Det. Frank Pembleton, a complex, deeply religiously torn Catholic, was
having "an argument with God" and refused to attend the church funeral
service itself, to the dismay and bafflement of the other detectives.

The service proceeds and when it comes out of the church, there is a
hired saxophonist leading, hearse and then people walking behind
slowly. As they came level with the front of the Police Dept building
where they all worked, there was a lone figure in full uniform, even
white gloves, he straightened and saluted slowly as the hearse drew
level. It was Det. Frank Pembleton. Soon the credits rolled. Not even
in all of Shakespeare is there anything particularly greater than
that! And trust me, I know.

> What exact avi format are you trying to convert? I don't have any "avi"
> files that big, but I could probably create one from something I've got.
> Load it into the QT7 player, do a "get info" (CMD-I) and tell me what
> the audio and video codecs are.

This is how I opened the thread:

Are there any facilities to convert, for example, a 2.5GB m4V file to
avi or mp4 in under say an hour (rather than *several* hours) on a
2.26 GHz Mac with 4GB RAM running Snow Leopard?

Here is an example of the details of one typical film that takes too
long to convert on any of my present and tried facilities:

Format: H.264, 1280 x 694, Millions
Photo - JPEG, 640 x 347, Millions
AAC, 2 channels, 48000 Hz

Data size: 2.55GB

Data rate: 3,232.68 kbit/s

Current size: 1280 x 694 pixels (Actual)

Convert to preserve quality is the aim and faster than paint drying!
Never mind why (though I have explained).

--
dorayme

[Warren Oates]

In article <dorayme-88F758...@news.albasani.net>,

dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

> Format: H.264, 1280 x 694, Millions
> Photo - JPEG, 640 x 347, Millions
> AAC, 2 channels, 48000 Hz

Okay. And the original is in m4v, right? And it's not "protected?" And
you want to convert it so it plays on your fancy new teevee (where you
watch all those pre-Idol American teevee shows where they (the
Americans) were actually trying to do something interesting despite
their highly hemmed-in-by-bullshit-moral-values restraints (don't get me
started)).

I don't know what the JPEG is doing there: is that the poster or
something? I don't think that that would stop it from playing, but you
can't have jpegs in avi anyway.

Your new teevee (or your set-top box) plays mp4s?

Have you tried simply renaming the file from file.m4v to file.mp4?

I must have an m4v ... oh yeah, I made them myself. So, on a very small
file (but with the exact same codec "parameters" as yours) simply
renaming it to mp4 converts it to mp4. It took several nanoseconds. Of
my time. I don't think the Mac actually noticed, it was doing something
else a the time.

You _can't_ just change the extension to avi. So I ran it as simply as
possible through ffmpeg:

ffmpeg -i file.m4v -sameq file.avi

It puts out MPEG4 video with mp3 audio (one of the restraints of avi) at
128k. You can alter the bit-rate on the command line.

It takes about 200 frames per second to convert (you have to do your
math) on my older Intel Mac Pro. Like I said, 2.5 gigs is a big file.
Work on shorter samples (you can edit bits out with QT7 or Streamclip)
for quality and to see if it plays in your living room.

Patience Grasshopper.

[gtr]

On 2012-02-07 00:16:31 +0000, Warren Oates said:

> In article <dorayme-BF3FDF...@news.albasani.net>,
> dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
>
>> I am not in any shape, way or form *ignoring* the latter. But you are
>> right about the former. But before I plunge into doing anything that
>> someone on usenet suggests, I tend to want to build confidence in
>> hearing that the aim is specifically achievable in the specific
>> experience of my non-necessarily-so-specific betters.
>>
>> In Homicide Life on the Street, in the episode "End game", there is
>> this creep on a massage table listening to his masseur tell him how
>> she would like to do this and that sexual favour for him because he
>> was a hero to her (she admired his fighting ability from some bar room
>> brawl). The creep was lying on his stomach and kept asking her to be
>> more specific. He probably was getting off on hearing the details, I
>> don't know. Suddenly one of a number of homicide detectives, who had
>> slipped into the room, was holding a gun to his head and saying "If
>> you move, I'll shoot!" and the guy mutters, without losing his cool,
>> "That's better" meaning in the context "That's very specific".
>
> I love your zen.

For zen, that's a big shopping cart.

> My favourite Homicide episode is where Vincent D'Onofrio gets cut in
> half by the subway train.

I loved the early seasons with Ned Beatty.

> What exact avi format are you trying to convert? I don't have any "avi"
> files that big, but I could probably create one from something I've got.
> Load it into the QT7 player, do a "get info" (CMD-I) and tell me what
> the audio and video codecs are.

While running every forgotten utility on my hard-drive to test it's
Lion utility and/or its need for upgrade I recently rediscovered
"MediaInfo Mac", now called Media Inspector 1.31 and has a $5 fee. It
sure is handy in providing a lot of info.

http://mediainspector.massanti.com/

So is an entirely different program, (which looks like a Windows port
of) a utility still called Mediainfo:

http://www.videohelp.com/tools/MediaInfo

[gtr]

That sounds vaguely familiar, can you give me more details?

>> What exact avi format are you trying to convert? I don't have any "avi"
>> files that big, but I could probably create one from something I've got.
>> Load it into the QT7 player, do a "get info" (CMD-I) and tell me what
>> the audio and video codecs are.
>
> This is how I opened the thread:
>
> Are there any facilities to convert, for example, a 2.5GB m4V file to
> avi or mp4 in under say an hour (rather than *several* hours) on a
> 2.26 GHz Mac with 4GB RAM running Snow Leopard?
>
> Here is an example of the details of one typical film that takes too
> long to convert on any of my present and tried facilities:
>
> Format: H.264, 1280 x 694, Millions
> Photo - JPEG, 640 x 347, Millions
> AAC, 2 channels, 48000 Hz
>
> Data size: 2.55GB
>
> Data rate: 3,232.68 kbit/s
>
> Current size: 1280 x 694 pixels (Actual)
>
> Convert to preserve quality is the aim and faster than paint drying!
> Never mind why (though I have explained).

Why don't you upload it somewhere, and some of the people here who
clearly have nothing better to do with their aimless lives, waiting for
the recession to end, waiting for expensive but ultimately irrelevant
projects with apparently bottomless resources to begin, once again,
pissing their money into the wind, will have something to do by taking
a crack at it?

That wouldn't include me, by the way, because the projects I'm
withering on the vine waiting to rematerialize wouldn't ultimately be
vacuous, but instead would be meaningful--must be meaningful or there
is really no reason to go on living.

[dorayme]

In article <2012020709023957277-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> On 2012-02-07 03:10:57 +0000, dorayme said:
>

...

I will assume for a moment that you have not got shares in the RSI
medical business and trying to drum up more business by getting me to
type even more than I already do. <g>

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Crosetti>

The episode I refer to is in Season 3 and is called "Crosetti"

...

> > This is how I opened the thread:
> >
> > Are there any facilities to convert, for example, a 2.5GB m4V file to
> > avi or mp4 in under say an hour (rather than *several* hours) on a
> > 2.26 GHz Mac with 4GB RAM running Snow Leopard?
> >

>

> Why don't you upload it somewhere...
>

Because the file is too big for the chances of anyone bothering to
download it from an asshole like me?

Because, if anyone cannot get hold of a movie in m4v of around this
size themselves, why would I think they would be motivated or even
competent to actually say if they know from specific experience on a
file of this size it can be put through any converter to avi or mp4 in
less than an hour on a MB of my specs which I have given?

Because maybe the movie I have is a libellous expose of Jolly Roger
and Michelle and they could sue me?

Because ... by God, you do have a technique for getting me to type on
and on. You're good! You're *very* good!

--
dorayme

[dorayme]

In article <2012020708563630134-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> While running every forgotten utility on my hard-drive to test it's
> Lion utility and/or its need for upgrade I recently rediscovered
> "MediaInfo Mac", now called Media Inspector 1.31 and has a $5 fee. It
> sure is handy in providing a lot of info.
>
> http://mediainspector.massanti.com/
>
> So is an entirely different program, (which looks like a Windows port
> of) a utility still called Mediainfo:
>
> http://www.videohelp.com/tools/MediaInfo

Thanks for these references.

--
dorayme

[Greg Buchner]

In article <dorayme-197978...@news.albasani.net>,

Or tripling as you mentioned in your follow-up post. After playing with
stuff on the PC I built, I definitely want, at a minimum, a quad-core i5
Mac. Unfortunately the iMac doesn't work for me. No place to put it and
the 24" display I currently use with my KVM and other computers.

> The rest of any possible gains will be due to software. Different
> softwares take different times and I would love to know more about how
> they gain their efficiencies.

Often the ones that are faster tend to take shortcuts on video quality.
I've noticed that with a few different programs I've tried at work to
convert some work-related videos into different formats.

> Do the slow turtles (like QT Pro) stop for cups of tea on the way? Do
> they come across gangs of 1's and 0's that try to mug them? The
> digital police are called, there is an investigation, the culprits are
> jailed and the converter needs to wait till their sentence is finished
> and they come back to work the lines or are assigned to fulfil their
> work in chain gangs? Or the software manages without them, cutting out
> frames?

The last time I used Quicktime (long time ago) it ran only 1 thread, and
as such only used 1 core, when converting video. This would have been
pre-Quicktime X.

I've gotten to the point where I use Handbrake for any video conversion
I do that involves going to MP4. I haven't found anything better for
free.

[dorayme]

In article <null-658D9C.2...@news.us.easynews.com>,

Greg Buchner <nu...@none.invalid> wrote:

> In article <dorayme-197978...@news.albasani.net>,
> dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
>
> > In article <null-F49A69.0...@news.us.easynews.com>,
> > Greg Buchner <nu...@none.invalid> wrote:
> >
> > > In article <dorayme-AD9744...@news.albasani.net>,
> > > dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> > >

...

> > The rest of any possible gains will be due to software. Different
> > softwares take different times and I would love to know more about how
> > they gain their efficiencies.
>
> Often the ones that are faster tend to take shortcuts on video quality.
> I've noticed that with a few different programs I've tried at work to
> convert some work-related videos into different formats.
>

I would bet on you being right about this.

> > Do the slow turtles (like QT Pro) stop for cups of tea on the way? Do
> > they come across gangs of 1's and 0's that try to mug them? The
> > digital police are called, there is an investigation, the culprits are
> > jailed and the converter needs to wait till their sentence is finished
> > and they come back to work the lines or are assigned to fulfil their
> > work in chain gangs? Or the software manages without them, cutting out
> > frames?
>
> The last time I used Quicktime (long time ago) it ran only 1 thread, and
> as such only used 1 core, when converting video. This would have been
> pre-Quicktime X.
>
> I've gotten to the point where I use Handbrake for any video conversion
> I do that involves going to MP4. I haven't found anything better for
> free.
>

Yes, thanks for the info. I just got down the latest version, I assume
64-bit version is right for my late 2010 Macbook. Seems to open and I
will see... Am trying it now on a m4v and telling it to keep the
target size to roughly the same and call the conversion .mp4 and it is
using Video Codec h.264 (x264). The sound is set at AAC (CoreAudio)
Bitrate 160. It is saying it will take a couple of hours, the film is
about 90 min long.

I better look into this command line business that Oates keeps talking
about. I keep running into roadblocks on this but will persist.

--
dorayme

[dorayme]

In article <4f3131d8$0$2202$c3e8da3$a909...@news.astraweb.com>,

Warren Oates <warren...@gmail.com> wrote:

> In article <dorayme-88F758...@news.albasani.net>,
> dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
>
> > Format: H.264, 1280 x 694, Millions
> > Photo - JPEG, 640 x 347, Millions
> > AAC, 2 channels, 48000 Hz
>
> Okay. And the original is in m4v, right? And it's not "protected?" And

> you want to convert it so it plays on your fancy new teevee ...
>

It plays fine on *anything* on the Mac, e.g., QT. And yes, it would be
nice to play these on the TV via USB stick, not possible as they are.
How are they? How should I know, they end in .m4v? The file looks very
nice to me, it has a name, it does not sting me when i approach, it
lets me change its name like some pussy cats let me stroke them. How
do I know what protected means, no matter how much I read about it -
what does it actually come down to in 1's and 0's, perhaps it has some
2's and 3's in it that the Mac ignores but the TV chokes on? It is not
shy of my Mac, plays in almost all my movie software. It *flaunts
itself* on Macs.

> I don't know what the JPEG is doing there: is that the poster or
> something? I don't think that that would stop it from playing, but you
> can't have jpegs in avi anyway.
>

Well, I just gave the specs from movie inspector in QT as you told me
to. Perhaps it has some sort of preview or icon or poster or favoured
frame marked or embedded?

> Your new teevee (or your set-top box) plays mp4s?
>

Yes

> Have you tried simply renaming the file from file.m4v to file.mp4?
>

Yes.

...

> I must have an m4v ... oh yeah, I made them myself. So, on a very small
> file (but with the exact same codec "parameters" as yours) simply
> renaming it to mp4 converts it to mp4. It took several nanoseconds. Of
> my time. I don't think the Mac actually noticed, it was doing something
> else a the time.
>

> ffmpeg -i file.m4v -sameq file.avi
>
> It puts out MPEG4 video with mp3 audio (one of the restraints of avi) at
> 128k. You can alter the bit-rate on the command line.
>
> It takes about 200 frames per second to convert (you have to do your
> math) on my older Intel Mac Pro. Like I said, 2.5 gigs is a big file.

Tell me one thing, did you maintain the same visual and sound quality?

> Work on shorter samples (you can edit bits out with QT7 or Streamclip)
> for quality and to see if it plays in your living room.
>

Keep in mind that my present techniques work (but too slowly for big
files, acceptable for under 1GB) to get files to play on my TV (when I
come across something that does not naturally play). Getting the magic
ingredient of the extra MPEG 2 component has opened many doors.

If you mean I should experiment with terminal things to see if I can
get it right with small clips and this is faster (as might be
predicted by doing the maths) then Bob might be my uncle, yes, good
point. But see below.

About the maths (do you Canadians also say "math" like the yanks? How
strange!), 200 frames per sec eh? Let's see now... one file of 2.5GB I
have plays (allegedly) at 24 fps, goes for 94 min, 5640 sec so 135,360
frames in the whole movie, right?

So eating up at 200 fps in converting, it should take 677 secs, 11
mins. Right? Or looking it at it differently, you are converting at
nearly 10 times the speed it plays, so 11 mins would sound right. And
you keep the quality? Is this heaven?

Why do I need to use *small* clips? How impatient and angry do you
imagine I am? I *always* have a spare 11 mins. I have many spare 11
mins. This thread was about me not having spare time in the order of
paint drying or humans evolving from lobe-finned fish.

--
dorayme

[Warren Oates]

In article <dorayme-AB7644...@news.albasani.net>,

dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

> Tell me one thing, did you maintain the same visual and sound quality?

Yes. That's the "-sameq" option. It passes the Warren Oates Subjective
Benchmark "Looks Pretty Good" Test too. The audio comes out as MP3 at
128 instead of AAC at whatever; the video is listed as "simple profile"
mp4 at 3100 kbits instead of h264 at 1400 kbits (sounds "better" but
that's an area I'm not proficient in). You can change the audio and
video bit rates on the command line; you can also change the codecs, but
there's some stuff that the Mac (even with Perian) can't play out of
avi; I don't know a whole lot about avi, it's a Windows thing.

I use very simple command line invocations of ffmpeg to give an idea of
how to use it. It has certain "presets" built in based on what the
developers think you mean by "mp4" or "avi" and so on (and what
libraries you've built it against). There are a pergola of websites and
forums dedicated to what you can achieve with it. It's an incredibly
powerful program; personally, I only scratch the surface.

>
> > Work on shorter samples (you can edit bits out with QT7 or Streamclip)
> > for quality and to see if it plays in your living room.
> >
>
> Keep in mind that my present techniques work (but too slowly for big
> files, acceptable for under 1GB) to get files to play on my TV (when I
> come across something that does not naturally play). Getting the magic
> ingredient of the extra MPEG 2 component has opened many doors.
>
> If you mean I should experiment with terminal things to see if I can
> get it right with small clips and this is faster (as might be
> predicted by doing the maths) then Bob might be my uncle, yes, good
> point. But see below.
>
> About the maths (do you Canadians also say "math" like the yanks? How
> strange!), 200 frames per sec eh? Let's see now... one file of 2.5GB I
> have plays (allegedly) at 24 fps, goes for 94 min, 5640 sec so 135,360
> frames in the whole movie, right?

True, I say "math." My dad said "maths" as did his dad before him. In
this case it's just simple arithmetics. My mother stole sheep one at a
time.

I would count 30 fps, meself.

> So eating up at 200 fps in converting, it should take 677 secs, 11
> mins. Right? Or looking it at it differently, you are converting at
> nearly 10 times the speed it plays, so 11 mins would sound right. And
> you keep the quality? Is this heaven?
>
> Why do I need to use *small* clips? How impatient and angry do you
> imagine I am? I *always* have a spare 11 mins. I have many spare 11
> mins. This thread was about me not having spare time in the order of
> paint drying or humans evolving from lobe-finned fish.

Smaller clips offer more instant gratification. You can see if something
works or not very quickly and move on to a different version. I know you
can toddle off and make a cup of tea or work on your novel for the 15
mins (overhead, overhead) that it takes to encode the whole movie, but
it also eats up disk space. Hmm, this:

ffmpeg -i file.m4v -sameq file.mp4

re-encodes the whole thing to an mp4 container nicely, but it takes 4
times as long (55 fps); do you really want to spend almost an hour on
your novel?

[Warren Oates]

In article <dorayme-4B7F78...@news.albasani.net>,

dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

> Yes, thanks for the info. I just got down the latest version, I assume
> 64-bit version is right for my late 2010 Macbook. Seems to open and I
> will see... Am trying it now on a m4v and telling it to keep the
> target size to roughly the same and call the conversion .mp4 and it is
> using Video Codec h.264 (x264). The sound is set at AAC (CoreAudio)
> Bitrate 160. It is saying it will take a couple of hours, the film is
> about 90 min long.

I tried Handbrake, converting .m4v to .mp4. Using the MPEG4 (ffmpeg)
option, I get slightly faster transcoding speeds than from the command
line. Even going to h264, I get about 75 fps. On the other hand, I have
a Mac Pro Dual Core Xeon 2.66, if that makes a difference. I'm working
with a 3-minute file that doesn't take 3 minutes to convert.

Don't worry about the file size; if you can handle 2.5 gig files in the
first place, it's hardly an issue. The important thing is the bit rate.
The default for Handbrake seems to be 1500. Try it out. Use small clips.

[Greg Buchner]

In article <4f32802e$0$2174$c3e8da3$9f40...@news.astraweb.com>,

In a video test I just did, taking a 21 minute, 40 second video that is
1920x1080 and using Handbrake to convert it to 1280x720 (Constant
Quality set to RF:25, Audio set to AC3 passthru as I didn't want to
disturb the DTS 5.1 that it was at) and it was running at about 70 FPS
converting on my PC. (Windows 7 64-bit, 3.4 GHz Core i7-2600, so 4 real
cores, 8 virtual cores with Hyperthreading.) But Windows was involved
so it was only using about 70% of the processor to do this conversion.
Sometimes it'll do close to 100% processor utilization, other times it
won't.

[dorayme]

In article <4f32802e$0$2174$c3e8da3$9f40...@news.astraweb.com>,
Warren Oates <warren...@gmail.com> wrote:

Well, file size and my Handbreak (Version 0.9.5 x86_64) and the MPEG4
option cocktail may be an issue, it quits suddenly on Start with these
options. But last night I used it with H.264 option and after a couple
of hours it made a version that played brilliantly on the TV and no
loss of quality. But two hours!

--
dorayme

[dorayme]

In article <4f327c7c$0$2182$c3e8da3$9f40...@news.astraweb.com>,

Warren Oates <warren...@gmail.com> wrote:

> In article <dorayme-AB7644...@news.albasani.net>,
> dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
>
> > 200 frames per sec eh? Let's see now... one file of 2.5GB I
> > have plays (allegedly) at 24 fps, goes for 94 min, 5640 sec so 135,360
> > frames in the whole movie, right?
>
>

> I would count 30 fps, meself.
>

OK, I got this from somewhere on my example... I forgot where... but
your idea sounds more correct (it is high quality). So at 30 fps, for
5640 secs it is 169200 frames in the whole movie. So eating up at 200
fps in converting, it should take 846 secs, that's about 14 mins.
Right?

So 14 mins rather than 11. Either would suit me fine if the quality is
not lost.

But I have yet to do it and no one I know has done it. You are making
arguments that it is doable, you are giving intelligent evidence about
it. What remains is for someone, I will try for it to be me, to
actually do it. And if I can do it in 14 minutes, even under 30 mins,
it will be beers all around. I say in another post how Handbrake
failed to achieve such speeds under MPEG4 settings (it quits suddenly).

--
dorayme

[Simo...@canada.com]

In article <dorayme-527328...@news.albasani.net>,

At the risk of getting a rap on the mouth, do you have an app on your
Mac telling you what the processor(s) are doing when you are doing this
conversion? What else is happening? I am thinking something like
iStat? Maybe you are confusing your processors and they are trying to
do three things at once?

S.

[Warren Oates]

In article <dorayme-569231...@news.albasani.net>,

dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

> But I have yet to do it and no one I know has done it. You are making
> arguments that it is doable, you are giving intelligent evidence about
> it. What remains is for someone, I will try for it to be me, to
> actually do it. And if I can do it in 14 minutes, even under 30 mins,
> it will be beers all around. I say in another post how Handbrake
> failed to achieve such speeds under MPEG4 settings (it quits suddenly).

What exact settings are you using when it quits? My Handbrake version
seems to svn3758 x86_64 (2011012001) (I forget where I got it; while it
says svn, about a year old, I don't actually remember compiling it
myself, although I've got a lot of these things lying around mostly
based on ffmpeg).

I set it for "MP4 file", and use the "average bitrate" set at 1500 (the
"file size" I don't care about and "constant quality" is difficult to
work with).

I set the Video codec to MPEG-4, framerate "same as source"; the audio I
just leave as is.

This is a 35 meg 3.5 minute clip; m4v: h264, AAC Stereo 44.1; 29.97 fps;
1400 kbits/sec; 852x480 (don't ask).

Hitting the ol' start button, I get a conversion rate of about 240 fps;
it completes in less than 30 seconds. The resulting file is about the
same size. Increasing the bitrate to 1800 gives better quality, and
doesn't slow things down much (but adds about 8 megs to the result).

On the other hand, how many 2.5 gig movies are you going to have to
transcode? 2 hours isn't so bad; set it up before you go to bed, or
while you're having lunch, or working on your novel.

[dorayme]

In article <4f332266$0$1827$c3e8da3$b135...@news.astraweb.com>,

Warren Oates <warren...@gmail.com> wrote:

> In article <dorayme-569231...@news.albasani.net>,
> dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
>
> > But I have yet to do it and no one I know has done it. You are making
> > arguments that it is doable, you are giving intelligent evidence about
> > it. What remains is for someone, I will try for it to be me, to
> > actually do it. And if I can do it in 14 minutes, even under 30 mins,
> > it will be beers all around. I say in another post how Handbrake
> > failed to achieve such speeds under MPEG4 settings (it quits suddenly).
>
> What exact settings are you using when it quits? My Handbrake version
> seems to svn3758 x86_64 (2011012001)

Version 0.9.5 x86_64 (2011010300) downloaded it yesterday. I had a
previous version in Apps but never used it. I now note that my attempt
to maintain quality ticking the "Large file size" may have broken
things. My motive was to tell the software to not compromise on the
quality too much. It was well meant, honest. But the tooltip that
appears when hovering over this box is sort of frightening, it does
actually say it will pick up its ball and leave the field if I tick it
but still... take a look.

Anyway, I am now trying your suggestion to use Average bitrate of 1500
and fps same as source and MPEG-4(FFmpeg) and no ticking of anything
else or touching anything and hey! It said at first it will be
finished in about 20 minutes. Now that is all I ever wanted from the
start. It is still saying close to 20 mins even though it is a third
way done. But these eta's are often misleading. It is claiming an
average of a bit over 80 fps in its work. Good enough for me. What did
I say before, o yeah, 169200 frames. Eaten up at 80 fps gives about 35
min. That's OK!

The only question now is what the quality will be when it is done, I
will check and get back.

>
> I set it for "MP4 file", and use the "average bitrate" set at 1500 (the
> "file size" I don't care about and "constant quality" is difficult to
> work with).
>
> I set the Video codec to MPEG-4, framerate "same as source"; the audio I
> just leave as is.
>
> This is a 35 meg 3.5 minute clip; m4v: h264, AAC Stereo 44.1; 29.97 fps;
> 1400 kbits/sec; 852x480 (don't ask).
>
> Hitting the ol' start button, I get a conversion rate of about 240 fps;
> it completes in less than 30 seconds. The resulting file is about the
> same size. Increasing the bitrate to 1800 gives better quality, and
> doesn't slow things down much (but adds about 8 megs to the result).
>
> On the other hand, how many 2.5 gig movies are you going to have to
> transcode? 2 hours isn't so bad; set it up before you go to bed, or
> while you're having lunch, or working on your novel.

It is not all that much a practical problem (though I feel more
uncomfortable working my MB so hard and hot compared to my old solid
QS tower), I was on dialup for years and am very patient and
comfortable in management of such issues. (I would happily download
big trailers even though they took hours on dial-up, I would be
working on something else or shopping or whatever, even software
updates that took all night). No, more a matter of interest and
efficiency and picking up clues for all sorts of things on the way.

80% done and 6 min to go...

--
dorayme

[dorayme]

In article <dorayme-964265...@news.albasani.net>,

dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

> In article <4f332266$0$1827$c3e8da3$b135...@news.astraweb.com>,
> Warren Oates <warren...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > In article <dorayme-569231...@news.albasani.net>,
> > dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> >

...

> Anyway, I am now trying your suggestion to use Average bitrate of 1500
> and fps same as source and MPEG-4(FFmpeg) and no ticking of anything
> else or touching anything and hey! It said at first it will be
> finished in about 20 minutes. Now that is all I ever wanted from the
> start. It is still saying close to 20 mins even though it is a third
> way done. But these eta's are often misleading. It is claiming an
> average of a bit over 80 fps in its work. Good enough for me. What did
> I say before, o yeah, 169200 frames. Eaten up at 80 fps gives about 35
> min. That's OK!
>
> The only question now is what the quality will be when it is done, I
> will check and get back.

OK, I have not yet tested on the TV, but looked at it on the Mac on a
26" screen. On this screen it looks ok - acceptable - at the actual
size the movie is supposed to be but not so great in daylight scenes
with skies and other things too at full screen. Whereas the 2 hour
conversion I did last night, not using the MPEG-4(FFmpeg) option, was
like the original, really gorgeous. Not surprisingly, the original and
my long conversion kept the file size (that *did* prove to be
important to me as I suspected.) and the full quality.

Anyway, thanks for your help. It is useful to know that I can do
things quicker if I want to where quality at full screen is not all
that important (for web work, emails and other things)

Can't get something for nothing! It's all a bit like stills isn't it?
You can convert and compress and do quicker and lighter but always at
a cost. Not surprising really when you consider that movie is just a
bunch of stills seen quickly one after the other. (At school I used to
draw little stick figures in running, boxing, jumping actions at the
bottom of pads of paper and flicking the paper so they appear to move.
The sound of the paper flicking was good too, as is the sound of a
movie projector...)

--
dorayme

[dorayme]

In article
<Simon1952-EDD77...@news.newsgroupdirect.com>,

Simo...@canada.com wrote:

> In article <dorayme-527328...@news.albasani.net>,
> dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
>

...
> > ....my Handbreak (Version 0.9.5 x86_64) and the MPEG4

> > option cocktail may be an issue, it quits suddenly on Start with these
> > options. But last night I used it with H.264 option and after a couple
> > of hours it made a version that played brilliantly on the TV and no
> > loss of quality. But two hours!
>
> At the risk of getting a rap on the mouth, do you have an app on your
> Mac telling you what the processor(s) are doing when you are doing this
> conversion? What else is happening? I am thinking something like
> iStat? Maybe you are confusing your processors and they are trying to
> do three things at once?
>

Not sure why my processors would be confused? Often have nothing going
on at all while long conversions are taking place, the convertor is
often the only prgm open and I am elsewhere, squealing tyres outside
police stations and goading them out for a chase to while away some
time...

It is probably just a fact of life that even the best convertors must
put in the time if quality is needed to be preserved, but some torture
you unnecessarily (like SlowTime, even SlowTime Pro). Handbrake is
probably, as one subscriber said, as good as it gets for free. I don't
know what you can get for bucks and it is not easy to find out without
paying.

--
dorayme

[dorayme]

In article <dorayme-931F1B...@news.albasani.net>,

dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

> > In article <4f332266$0$1827$c3e8da3$b135...@news.astraweb.com>,
> > Warren Oates <warren...@gmail.com> wrote:

> > ...

> > > In article <dorayme-569231...@news.albasani.net>,
> > > dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> > >
> ...
> > Anyway, I am now trying your suggestion to use Average bitrate of 1500
> > and fps same as source and MPEG-4(FFmpeg) and no ticking of anything
> > else or touching anything and hey!

Took about 35 mins and reduced it to a bit over a GB and *now* I
*have* tested it on the TV and you know what, it looks acceptable on
that at full screen, the TV not being so high res as my computer
monitor!

So, this Handbrake with the MPEG option is seriously useful and I
thank you again for your advice! Always easier when you chat to
someone who has done these things.

--
dorayme

[Warren Oates]

In article <dorayme-08BD62...@news.albasani.net>,

dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

> Took about 35 mins and reduced it to a bit over a GB and *now* I
> *have* tested it on the TV and you know what, it looks acceptable on
> that at full screen, the TV not being so high res as my computer
> monitor!
>
> So, this Handbrake with the MPEG option is seriously useful and I
> thank you again for your advice! Always easier when you chat to
> someone who has done these things.

I'm glad it worked out.

If you increase the bitrate to 3000, it won't take _much_ longer, and
you'll get better quality.

If you want an exact copy:

ffmpeg -i file.m4v -acodec copy -vcodec copy file.mp4


This is a "passthrough" and takes no time at all -- it's just exchanging
containers. It's akin to changing the file extension. I didnt' mention
this earlier because you don't seem to have ffmpeg and there doesn't
seem to be an option for this in Handbrake (which is mostly designed for
ripping DVDs to mkv anyway) or in ffmpegX (which is hard to figure out
anyway).

[gtr]

On 2012-02-09 05:56:12 +0000, dorayme said:

> Not sure why my processors would be confused? Often have nothing going
> on at all while long conversions are taking place, the convertor is

> often the only prgm open and I am elsewhere...

Your system might still be re-cataloging for Spotlight and other
strange background chores.

> It is probably just a fact of life that even the best convertors must
> put in the time if quality is needed to be preserved, but some torture
> you unnecessarily (like SlowTime, even SlowTime Pro). Handbrake is
> probably, as one subscriber said, as good as it gets for free. I don't
> know what you can get for bucks and it is not easy to find out without
> paying.

So can you please state explicitly your final conclusion on all of
this, when you've reached it. I've followed what I can of the thread
but it does weave in and out...

[dorayme]

In article <2012020910220126656-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> On 2012-02-09 05:56:12 +0000, dorayme said:
>

...

> > It is probably just a fact of life that even the best convertors must
> > put in the time if quality is needed to be preserved, but some torture
> > you unnecessarily (like SlowTime, even SlowTime Pro). Handbrake is
> > probably, as one subscriber said, as good as it gets for free. I don't
> > know what you can get for bucks and it is not easy to find out without
> > paying.
>
> So can you please state explicitly your final conclusion on all of
> this, when you've reached it.

My general conclusions in order of importance:

1. Some of you are the sweetest little pumpkins on this earth and I
love you dearly.

2. Handbrake is pretty good now that I know how better to control the
quality. (See last few posts in date order). The TV does not need the
quality that my high res computer monitor needs, so that is an
immediate gift because pretty well the only reason I convert lately is
for the TV, the Mac plays pretty well anything.

3. I might need to learn how to use Terminal better and type
appropriate ffmpeg mumbo jumbo lines for quicker or more flexible
control of all these things. (I need to find out htf to edit stuff
better in Terminal, if I do not prepare it beforehand and copy paste,
it is a damn nightmare).

--
dorayme

[gtr]

On 2012-02-09 21:35:44 +0000, dorayme said:

> 2. Handbrake is pretty good now that I know how better to control the
> quality. (See last few posts in date order).

That was the part where I hoped you could explicitly state your conclusions.

[Warren Oates]

In article <dorayme-502E29...@news.albasani.net>,

dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

> 2. Handbrake is pretty good now that I know how better to control the
> quality. (See last few posts in date order). The TV does not need the
> quality that my high res computer monitor needs, so that is an
> immediate gift because pretty well the only reason I convert lately is
> for the TV, the Mac plays pretty well anything.

Your tv won't play anything better than 1080p (but, y'know, that's
pretty standard good); I doubt if your Mac will output anything beyond
that either. The newer bigger iMacs will display 1440p, but nobody
produces anything at that resolution.

The hardware inside your tv is better at fooling you than the Mac. I
have an ancient WD Live that plays some of my real old crappy Motion
Jpegs on my ancient 720p tv really gud. The Mac says "wtf is this shit?"
and makes it look like, y'know, shit.

[dorayme]

In article <2012020914011922271-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> On 2012-02-09 21:35:44 +0000, dorayme said:
>
> > 2. Handbrake is pretty good now that I know how better to control the
> > quality. (See last few posts in date order).
>
> That was the part where I hoped you could explicitly state your conclusions.

I am not sure quite what you want. Conclusions without the context of
the problems can be pretty unsatisfactory.

--
dorayme

[dorayme]

In article <4f344964$0$32083$c3e8da3$40d4...@news.astraweb.com>,

Sounds right enough to me, yes.

There is an actual size for movies just as there is an actual size for
bitmap digital pics. Generally, if I view any of these things at
larger than the native px size, I notice a loss in quality: loss of
sharpness, pasteurisation effects (my spell check will not allow
posterization)... Whether it bothers you depends on your needs and
taste and personality.

On my 1920 x 1200 26" computer monitor, these effects are very
noticeable to me. YouTube at full screen is simply ridiculous but I am
amazed that it seems often not to bother others! Even using TV station
streaming facilities, the situation is uncomfortable for me at full
screen. If there is the rare thing I need to catch up on from
broadcast, the 13" Macbook screen is much better because while
smaller, it is sharper and at full screen sort of acceptable. A movie
that looks fine on my big monitor at fullscreen (in spite of its
native size being smaller) will not generally look fine if it is
converted to more than half its file size using greater compression
etc.

On the Mac, one has great control for size, no matter what monitor is
used but this is not the case for TVs. If I look at some movie or film
or clip on the Mac and I want the theatre effect yet run it at smaller
than fullscreen, this can be controlled for by using QT7 player (but
no other that I know of on my Mac). One can plug a TV into a Macbook
to solve this problem but it sure is less convenient that using a USB
stick. (I know that one can wireless over stuff to TVs with the right
equipment, that is a different matter).

--
dorayme

[Tom Stiller]

In article <4f344964$0$32083$c3e8da3$40d4...@news.astraweb.com>,

That's strange. I have an HDHomeRun device which will display HDTV on my
iMac and a few of the channels broadcast 720p which looks better than
than those that broadcast 1080i, probably because the iMac is a proscan
device.

In any event, the video looks as good as it does on my big Samsung TV

--
PRAY, v. To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf
of a single petitioner confessedly unworthy. -- Ambrose Bierce

[Steve Fenwick]

In article <tom_stiller-CFB7...@news.individual.net>,

Tom Stiller <tom_s...@yahoo.com> wrote:

> In article <4f344964$0$32083$c3e8da3$40d4...@news.astraweb.com>,
> Warren Oates <warren...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > In article <dorayme-502E29...@news.albasani.net>,
> > dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> >
> > > 2. Handbrake is pretty good now that I know how better to control the
> > > quality. (See last few posts in date order). The TV does not need the
> > > quality that my high res computer monitor needs, so that is an
> > > immediate gift because pretty well the only reason I convert lately is
> > > for the TV, the Mac plays pretty well anything.
> >
> > Your tv won't play anything better than 1080p (but, y'know, that's
> > pretty standard good); I doubt if your Mac will output anything beyond
> > that either. The newer bigger iMacs will display 1440p, but nobody
> > produces anything at that resolution.
> >

JVC 4k camera, under $5k:

<http://pro.jvc.com/prof/attributes/features.jsp?model_id=MDL102132>

Steve

--
steve <at> w0x0f <dot> com
"Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of
arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to
skid in sideways, chocolate in one hand, sidecar in the other, body thoroughly
used up, totally worn out and screaming "WOO HOO what a ride!"

[gtr]

You had a problem, you reached a conclusion. I thought you might state
explicitly what it was. But I can do the leg work, dump in all in one
large heap, and if I am in a similar situation and can sort through all
of it just, as you did.

[gtr]

On 2012-02-10 03:08:58 +0000, Steve Fenwick said:

> In article <tom_stiller-CFB7...@news.individual.net>,
> Tom Stiller <tom_s...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> In article <4f344964$0$32083$c3e8da3$40d4...@news.astraweb.com>,
>> Warren Oates <warren...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> In article <dorayme-502E29...@news.albasani.net>,
>>> dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
>>>
>>>> 2. Handbrake is pretty good now that I know how better to control the
>>>> quality. (See last few posts in date order). The TV does not need the
>>>> quality that my high res computer monitor needs, so that is an
>>>> immediate gift because pretty well the only reason I convert lately is
>>>> for the TV, the Mac plays pretty well anything.
>>>
>>> Your tv won't play anything better than 1080p (but, y'know, that's
>>> pretty standard good); I doubt if your Mac will output anything beyond
>>> that either. The newer bigger iMacs will display 1440p, but nobody
>>> produces anything at that resolution.
>>>
>
> JVC 4k camera, under $5k:
>
> <http://pro.jvc.com/prof/attributes/features.jsp?model_id=MDL102132>
>
> Steve

Oh, if it were only about $4.5k under $5k...

[dorayme]

In article <2012020922020398018-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> On 2012-02-09 22:57:00 +0000, dorayme said:
>
> > In article <2012020914011922271-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:
> >
> >> On 2012-02-09 21:35:44 +0000, dorayme said:
> >>
> >>> 2. Handbrake is pretty good now that I know how better to control the
> >>> quality. (See last few posts in date order).
> >>
> >> That was the part where I hoped you could explicitly state your
> >> conclusions.
> >
> > I am not sure quite what you want. Conclusions without the context of
> > the problems can be pretty unsatisfactory.
>
> You had a problem, you reached a conclusion. I thought you might state
> explicitly what it was. But I can do the leg work, dump in all in one
> large heap, and if I am in a similar situation and can sort through all
> of it just, as you did.

I am still puzzled by what you want. The answer to my original
question and follow up post is

1. "No, but there is better than Streamclip. Handbrake for example,
with various options we have discussed. On my MB, you don't have to
wait for hours on end as I was facing in Streamclip and QT, but you do
have to wait for about a couple of hours on my MB.

2. If you want not to notice any loss of quality on many high res
screens when pushing the dimensions a little past the natural ones,
you can't avail yourself of various compression strategies. But you
can avail yourself of compression like the MPEG option and bitrate
parameter in Handbrake to do a good enough job for some screens, in
particular my Sony TV and then the conversion is really reasonable
like 2.5GB to 1.1GB in 35 min or so.

Is this specific enough?

--
dorayme

[Warren Oates]

In article <tom_stiller-CFB7...@news.individual.net>,
Tom Stiller <tom_s...@yahoo.com> wrote:

> That's strange. I have an HDHomeRun device which will display HDTV on my
> iMac and a few of the channels broadcast 720p which looks better than
> than those that broadcast 1080i, probably because the iMac is a proscan
> device.

I download tv shows at 720p sometimes, and they look better on the tv
than the 1080i I get from my satellite. On the other hand, the lo-res tv
shows I download look just as good as what I get from my satellite. I
wish I could get Cogeco here.

>
> In any event, the video looks as good as it does on my big Samsung TV

I'm talking about stuff that's low quality to begin with. The Mac at
full screen displays these little movies pretty badly, while the WD Live
"blows them up" to 720p and they look pretty reasonable on my my 37" tv.
They're 4:3, so they're pillar-boxed into the center of the screen.

[Warren Oates]

In article <nospam-6E2A8F....@news.eternal-september.org>,
Steve Fenwick <nos...@nospam.invalid> wrote:

> <http://pro.jvc.com/prof/attributes/features.jsp?model_id=MDL102132>

I presume that that's meant for me. I know that there are devices that
capture very high resolutions, and some games are released at 1440p and
so on. I was speaking about tv shows and movies that you'd rent or
download.

[Paul Sture]

On Fri, 10 Feb 2012 08:35:44 +1100, dorayme wrote:

> 3. I might need to learn how to use Terminal better and type appropriate
> ffmpeg mumbo jumbo lines for quicker or more flexible control of all
> these things. (I need to find out htf to edit stuff better in Terminal,
> if I do not prepare it beforehand and copy paste, it is a damn
> nightmare).

If you give us some example commands, some of us will no doubt come up
with a script or two that you can run, just passing the file name as a
parameter.


--
Paul Sture

[Warren Oates]

In article <dnjf09-...@news.sture.ch>, Paul Sture <pa...@sture.ch>
wrote:

That's supposing that she needs to do the same thing every time. It also
means that she'd need the libraries and whatnot to compile ffmpeg
against to get it to do some of the things she wants.

I have a script that uses 3 different command line apps, simply to
re-encode 5.1 AAC audio (which my amp won't decode) into AC3 and
re-arrange the stupid AAC channel mapping to the 5.1 that everyone else
seems to use.

[gtr]

On 2012-02-10 06:47:04 +0000, dorayme said:

> I am still puzzled by what you want. The answer to my original
> question and follow up post is
>
> 1. "No, but there is better than Streamclip. Handbrake for example,
> with various options we have discussed. On my MB, you don't have to
> wait for hours on end as I was facing in Streamclip and QT, but you do
> have to wait for about a couple of hours on my MB.

Thank you. What specific options optimized this process in your usage?

> But you can avail yourself of compression like the MPEG option and bitrate
> parameter in Handbrake to do a good enough job for some screens, in
> particular my Sony TV and then the conversion is really reasonable
> like 2.5GB to 1.1GB in 35 min or so.

I too have a Sony TV. What were the MPEG options and bitrate
parameters you concluded with?

[gtr]

Is there any reason to think that ffmpegX wouldn't run these scripts as
rapidly as manual typing into a CLI? After all (it appears to me) that
once options are selected on ffmpegX it simply hands it off to another
program/process altogether.

[gtr]

Oh cool. I'm beginning to get it. I myself have to make a ffmpegX
pass to burn my avi to avi-with-subtitles. Then I would like to
convert the avi-with-burned-subtitles to a VOB architecture to burn to
Toast so Toast won't go through the encoding phase again. I can see
what multiple-command scripting would free my time up from monitoring
the process at the very least.

Admittedly it would be nice to convert .avi/.srt straight to VOB with
soft subtitling, but so far I have been unable to get ffmpegX to do
that.

[Warren Oates]

In article <2012021009215794565-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> Admittedly it would be nice to convert .avi/.srt straight to VOB with
> soft subtitling, but so far I have been unable to get ffmpegX to do
> that.

Have you looked into mkv? Handbrake will build you a Matroska file, and
you can have all the subtitle tracks you want, and chapters too. I'm not
sure why you need VOB files. Are you playing the DVD on an older set-top
box? My life got a lot simpler when I bought a WD Live; it plays just
about anything (and it's a couple of years old now).

[Warren Oates]

In article <2012021009183927263-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> Is there any reason to think that ffmpegX wouldn't run these scripts as
> rapidly as manual typing into a CLI? After all (it appears to me) that
> once options are selected on ffmpegX it simply hands it off to another
> program/process altogether.

FfmpegX has a pretty clunky way of fine-tuning its "call" to ffmpeg. It
would be nice if it would let you add some additional switches. There's
a lot of stuff in ffmpeg (a lot of it way beyond my comprehension).

FfmpegX uses both ffmpeg and mencoder. I don't know anything much about
the latter, but I'll download it and see what it can do, although it's
part of Mplayer, which I really don't like very much.

[dorayme]

In article <dnjf09-...@news.sture.ch>, Paul Sture <pa...@sture.ch>
wrote:

Truth is that I better start learning a few more fundamentals about it
myself. But thanks for the thought.

--
dorayme

[Greg Buchner]

In article <4f332266$0$1827$c3e8da3$b135...@news.astraweb.com>,
Warren Oates <warren...@gmail.com> wrote:

> This is a 35 meg 3.5 minute clip; m4v: h264, AAC Stereo 44.1; 29.97 fps;
> 1400 kbits/sec; 852x480 (don't ask).

I recognize that as the output of an anamorphic DVD. Keeps the full 480p
vertical resolution but stretches the normal 720 horizontal resolution
to get the 16:9 widescreen. Probably your best size option for
converting anamorphic DVDs as it keeps the largest number of original
pixels.

Greg B.

--
Actual e-mail address is gregbuchner and I'm located at gmail.com

[Greg Buchner]

In article <dorayme-527328...@news.albasani.net>,
dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:

> In article <4f32802e$0$2174$c3e8da3$9f40...@news.astraweb.com>,
> Warren Oates <warren...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > In article <dorayme-4B7F78...@news.albasani.net>,
> > dorayme <dor...@optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> >
> > > Yes, thanks for the info. I just got down the latest version, I assume
> > > 64-bit version is right for my late 2010 Macbook. Seems to open and I
> > > will see... Am trying it now on a m4v and telling it to keep the
> > > target size to roughly the same and call the conversion .mp4 and it is
> > > using Video Codec h.264 (x264). The sound is set at AAC (CoreAudio)
> > > Bitrate 160. It is saying it will take a couple of hours, the film is
> > > about 90 min long.
> >
> > I tried Handbrake, converting .m4v to .mp4. Using the MPEG4 (ffmpeg)
> > option, I get slightly faster transcoding speeds than from the command
> > line. Even going to h264, I get about 75 fps. On the other hand, I have
> > a Mac Pro Dual Core Xeon 2.66, if that makes a difference. I'm working
> > with a 3-minute file that doesn't take 3 minutes to convert.
> >
>
> > Don't worry about the file size; if you can handle 2.5 gig files in the
> > first place, it's hardly an issue. The important thing is the bit rate.
> > The default for Handbrake seems to be 1500. Try it out. Use small clips.
>
> Well, file size and my Handbreak (Version 0.9.5 x86_64) and the MPEG4

> option cocktail may be an issue, it quits suddenly on Start with these
> options. But last night I used it with H.264 option and after a couple
> of hours it made a version that played brilliantly on the TV and no
> loss of quality. But two hours!

For HD video, that sounds about right for the machine you have. Unless
you start lower the video quality, which is totally subjective. Then
you'll get less time involved.

A friend and I have played around a lot with this and no matter what, it
does take time. There is only three ways to get more speed. Mentioned
one up above, the next is to throw a faster processor at it, and the
last is to put an h.264 hardware encoder in the mix. I don't have too
much information on that last one and don't know if processor have
outstripped devices like that in speed...

[dorayme]

In article <2012021009155782457-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

> On 2012-02-10 06:47:04 +0000, dorayme said:
>
> > I am still puzzled by what you want. The answer to my original
> > question and follow up post is
> >
> > 1. "No, but there is better than Streamclip. Handbrake for example,
> > with various options we have discussed. On my MB, you don't have to
> > wait for hours on end as I was facing in Streamclip and QT, but you do
> > have to wait for about a couple of hours on my MB.
>
> Thank you. What specific options optimized this process in your usage?
>

There was no *one* optimization.

For keeping full quality that played as good as the originalon my
computer monitor and actually played at all on the TV, I opened
Handbrake, picked the source as the 2.5GB m4v file, and did nothing to
the output settings except choose MP4 files and say to save as
file.mp4.

> > But you can avail yourself of compression like the MPEG option and bitrate
> > parameter in Handbrake to do a good enough job for some screens, in
> > particular my Sony TV and then the conversion is really reasonable
> > like 2.5GB to 1.1GB in 35 min or so.
>
> I too have a Sony TV. What were the MPEG options and bitrate
> parameters you concluded with?

That Handbrake with the MPEG option and (default) average bitrate of
1500 was in fact quite acceptable for the TV, it compressing the 2.5GB
to 1.05.

--
dorayme

[gtr]

On 2012-02-10 18:20:14 +0000, Warren Oates said:

> In article <2012021009215794565-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:
>
>> Admittedly it would be nice to convert .avi/.srt straight to VOB with
>> soft subtitling, but so far I have been unable to get ffmpegX to do
>> that.
>
> Have you looked into mkv?

No, but will do so.

> Handbrake will build you a Matroska file, and
> you can have all the subtitle tracks you want, and chapters too. I'm not
> sure why you need VOB files.

I can more rapidly produce a stock DVD for use on both Windows and Mac
boxes, like all the commercial dvd's I encounter.

> Are you playing the DVD on an older set-top
> box?

Older than something, younger than something else.

> My life got a lot simpler when I bought a WD Live; it plays just
> about anything (and it's a couple of years old now).

What does "WD Live" stand for?

[Warren Oates]

In article <null-4C7C1C.1...@news.us.easynews.com>,

Greg Buchner <nu...@none.invalid> wrote:

> I recognize that as the output of an anamorphic DVD. Keeps the full 480p
> vertical resolution but stretches the normal 720 horizontal resolution
> to get the 16:9 widescreen. Probably your best size option for
> converting anamorphic DVDs as it keeps the largest number of original
> pixels.

Actually, it's from 1080i/60 (at 1888x1062) material that we shot
ourselves (our camera-persons did). I wanted a 1.77 highish res copy to
put on the web quickly. I can't remember why I downsampled the audio --
I may have been playing with flv versions at the time or something.

It was part of a 4-camera concert we taped. It was a mess. The cameras
were all over the place and the band performed their worst sets ever
(and we got into this because they were so cool up to that night). Oh
well, put FCP through it's multi-camera paces.

[Warren Oates]

In article <2012021021490650843-xxx@yyyzzz>, gtr <x...@yyy.zzz> wrote:

>
> What does "WD Live" stand for?

http://wdc.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=320

I don't have the "plus" which added hardware to deal with Netflix's
encryption demands. I paid $80 for mine about 2 years ago. It plays
everything. You can plug USB2 devices (inc. thumb drives) in; you can
add a wireless dongle; you can hook it up to your Ethernet LAN (which I
did). It connects and plays most stuff from YouTube -- but it advertises
itself as a "tv device" and YouTube won't stream high-res to it.

Note: there are other devices like this out there. Boxee, e.g.

[Paul Sture]

On Fri, 10 Feb 2012 09:18:39 -0800, gtr wrote:

> On 2012-02-10 13:46:53 +0000, Paul Sture said:
>
>> On Fri, 10 Feb 2012 08:35:44 +1100, dorayme wrote:
>>
>>> 3. I might need to learn how to use Terminal better and type
>>> appropriate ffmpeg mumbo jumbo lines for quicker or more flexible
>>> control of all these things. (I need to find out htf to edit stuff
>>> better in Terminal, if I do not prepare it beforehand and copy paste,
>>> it is a damn nightmare).
>>
>> If you give us some example commands, some of us will no doubt come up
>> with a script or two that you can run, just passing the file name as a
>> parameter.
>
> Is there any reason to think that ffmpegX wouldn't run these scripts as
> rapidly as manual typing into a CLI? After all (it appears to me) that
> once options are selected on ffmpegX it simply hands it off to another
> program/process altogether.

I was thinking that once you find a combination of ffmpeg switches and
option values you simply keep them in a script to save having to remember
then, not to mention avoiding finger trouble problems.

--
Paul Sture