Raw x264 and avc2avi

[raziel666]

Hi
I have a raw x264 stream encoded with megui and i'm trying to convert it to avi, either with the megui muxer avc2avi or with avc2avi_gui. The thing is that I enter the fps of the raw video (23.976) and the avi I get shows 23.975 on Vdubmod / vdub and 23.976 on gspot. Which should I believe? Am I doing something wrong? Is there any other tool to convert raw x264 to avi? Thanks a lot.

[Sirber]

1) The FPS is just rounded differently by gspot and vdub
2) AVI is evil :devil:

[Kurtnoise]

AVI is evil :devil:
Completely no sense...Are you trolling ?

[Sirber]

Completely no sense...Are you trolling ?nope, but I'm sure it's a general common sense that AVI is not the best container for AVC.

[Sharktooth]

it's infact the worst (on par with ogm and eventually .divx or any other avi based container...).

[GodofaGap]

Boohoohoo! Cry me a river.

Can we please have at least one thread with the words AVI and h264 without everybodies silly opinions? (Yes this was rethorical, I know we can't)

raziel666: It is a bit difficult to say which one is correct. avc2avi asks for a float while the frame rate in AVI is stored as a fraction of two integers. So it could be something is going wrong there, or it could be you are just seeing a rounding error. The only way to find out is muxing your audio with it and check if you have gradual desynch. Worst case, you'd get a desynch of more than 0.1s in one hr, so should be noticable. But you can correct for this with VirtualDub.

[Sharktooth]

It's not a silly opinion. It's a fact.
The raziel666 problem is a rounding error but it's always better to check...

[GodofaGap]

1. It is an opinion because the criteria for judging if AVI is better or worse are completely arbitrary. If raziel666's criterion is being able to open the file in VirtualDub, or not wanting to install things like Nero or Haali's splitter you can't say MP4 or MKV is a better choice.

2. He asked a question about a possible frame rate error, not if AVI was "evil" or not. It is always very worrying to see how the doom9 crowd is trying to turn a simple question about AVI in an MP4 campaign.

[raziel666]

Thank you for all your answers. There's no particular reason for this, I was just toying with avc2avi (after all the experimentations with the MeGUI / x264 - after all the last time I was involved with this kind of stuff was in the old DivX / GKnot days...).
The thing is that I wanted to make sure that it's not some problem of avc2avi or mine for some reason. Has anyone else tried this conversion?
Is there any other tool for this? I had once found a file named mpeg4ip-1.4.1.tar which was supposed to be some MP4 tools and had an prog for conversion from avc to avi, but it was its source code and I think it's linux only, so I didn't give a try.

P.S. : The video in question is about 25min long, so I guess the video/audio desynch won't be that notable, will it?

[Sharktooth]

1. It is an opinion because the criteria for judging if AVI is better or worse are completely arbitrary. If raziel666's criterion is being able to open the file in VirtualDub, or not wanting to install things like Nero or Haali's splitter you can't say MP4 or MKV is a better choice.

2. He asked a question about a possible frame rate error, not if AVI was "evil" or not. It is always very worrying to see how the doom9 crowd is trying to turn a simple question about AVI in an MP4 campaign.
1. it's a fact that avi was not meant to support variable bitrate. it's a fact that avi was not meant to support some codec features (b-frames, multiple reference frames, etc). it's a fact avi has a huge overhead (and that goes against the codecs compression efficiency). it's a fact developers had to hack things into avi beyond the specs (packet bitsream hell and other stuff) to make things "work" but usually there are synching or other problems.
From the above FACTS, AVI and any AVI based containers are the WORST thing on earth to store modern codec streams.
Please document yourself before speaking. End of discussion.

2. I answered his question implicitly warning him his problem may be caused by AVI itself.

[Sharktooth]

Thank you for all your answers. There's no particular reason for this, I was just toying with avc2avi (after all the experimentations with the MeGUI / x264 - after all the last time I was involved with this kind of stuff was in the old DivX / GKnot days...).
The thing is that I wanted to make sure that it's not some problem of avc2avi or mine for some reason. Has anyone else tried this conversion?
Is there any other tool for this? I had once found a file named mpeg4ip-1.4.1.tar which was supposed to be some MP4 tools and had an prog for conversion from avc to avi, but it was its source code and I think it's linux only, so I didn't give a try.

P.S. : The video in question is about 25min long, so I guess the video/audio desynch won't be that notable, will it?
avc2avi should work pretty well. IIRC i tried it on a whole movie and i didnt experience the desync after remuxing audio.
however 25 mins wont be enaugh to visually spot the desync.

[GodofaGap]

1. it's a fact that avi was not meant to support variable bitrate. it's a fact that avi was not meant to support some codec features [...] multiple reference frames, etc). it's a fact avi has a huge overhead (and that goes against the codecs compression
Please stop repeating this nonsense, you are just factually wrong and it has nothing to do with the question at all!

[bond]

raziel666, can you post the exact commandline you fed avc2avi with plz
regarding the mpeg4iptools you mentioned: the mp4 muxer included in this set of tools is called mp4creator. an alternative to mp4creator is mp4box (gpac)
both are available here (http://celticdruid.no-ip.com/xvid/)


GodofaGap, its a fact that avi has various downsides. some mentioned by sharktooth and all have been discussed a lot already. so plz everybody cool down, there is no need for a flamewar

[Sharktooth]

What flamewar? it's just that GodofaGap just ignored the forum rules (he didnt use the search to get informed), he's spreading NONSENSE coz of his ignorance and just assuming he knows it all without knowing anything about codecs and containers.
I just explained the possible causes of raziel666 problems.

[Tommy Carrot]

Sharktooth, actually GodofaGap is right, some of the things you keep stating about avi are not true. Avi has absolutely no problem with multiple reference frames, the "huge" overhead is about 5-6 kbps (in other words, irrevelant), packed bitstream is not used in the case of x264 in avi, and there is no sync issue during playback. VFR is indeed not really supported, but you gotta admit it's not the most important feature, outside the anime-geeks i don't think anyone would have any use for it. But otherwise, you're absolutely right. ;)

I know you and most of the people involved with x264 are more interested in pushing megui, and vfw support will inevitably be stopped soon, but at least try to stay to the facts when you're pushing your agenda. ;)