why is my encoding speed so slow

[fofwp]

can someone tell me why my speed is so slow?

my x264 settings are:
--crf 18 --ref 3 --mixed-refs --no-fast-pskip --bframes 3 --b-pyramid --b-rdo --bime --weightb --direct none --filter -2,-1 --subme 6 --trellis 1 --analyse all --8x8dct --vbv-maxrate 25000 --threads auto --thread-input --cqmfile "C:\Program Files\x264 custom matrices and profiles\eqm_avc_hr.cfg" --progress --no-psnr --no-ssim --output "movie.mkv" "script.avs"

my simple avisynth script is:
DGDecode_mpeg2source("source.d2v")
Spline36Resize() #if needed

some info on my computer:
AMD X2 4400+ Skt939
2x1GB Corsair XMS

with the above i get <10fps encoding. Is this the speed I should be getting. It seems awfully slow to me.

is there any way I can make it faster?

on a side note, has anyone else been noticing that their file sizes have been increasing with constant quality.

Thanks.

[morph166955]

hate to tell ya, but that sounds about right. I get 4-6fps MAX on my P4 3.2HT server that has about 4 gig of ram in it. whats the resolution of the file your using?

[fofwp]

The source is a dvd, and I don't resize unless i crop, so i think the resolution is 720x480.

[morph166955]

yea hate to tell ya...on a system like that and with that kinda source...thats what your frame rate is going to be. if you want some speed comparisons look you can check http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=122318 that thread. be advised though, the source and settings differ from what you have so don't just think that you should be at what they are at numerially.

[R3Z]

can someone tell me why my speed is so slow?

my x264 settings are:
--crf 18 --ref 3 --mixed-refs --no-fast-pskip --bframes 3 --b-pyramid --b-rdo --bime --weightb --direct none --filter -2,-1 --subme 6 --trellis 1 --analyse all --8x8dct --vbv-maxrate 25000 --threads auto --thread-input --cqmfile "C:\Program Files\x264 custom matrices and profiles\eqm_avc_hr.cfg" --progress --no-psnr --no-ssim --output "movie.mkv" "script.avs"

my simple avisynth script is:
DGDecode_mpeg2source("source.d2v")
Spline36Resize() #if needed

some info on my computer:
AMD X2 4400+ Skt939
2x1GB Corsair XMS

with the above i get <10fps encoding. Is this the speed I should be getting. It seems awfully slow to me.

is there any way I can make it faster?

on a side note, has anyone else been noticing that their file sizes have been increasing with constant quality.

Thanks.

That speed seems about right, it also depends on whether you are using other filters or de-interlacing !

The bolded parts will cause encoding speed to slow down, but they are there to increase compressability. You can decrease them and gain speed, but lose compressability.

[fofwp]

so it seems the general consensus it that this is the speed I should expect with my current settings unless I want to lose compressibility.

[chainring]

@ R3Z,

The items you've put in bold lettering, are those the main culprits in slow(er) encoding times?

BTW fofwp, I get around 10-12 fps with a CoreDuo T2500 (2.0GHz)...just for perspective. Oh, I'm using the Sharktooth CRF preset in MeGUI.

Look at these three posts by Tos_Maverick where he got much faster encodes while keeping very good quality.
http://forum.doom9.org/showpost.php?p=959949&postcount=98
http://forum.doom9.org/showpost.php?p=956242&postcount=178
http://forum.doom9.org/showpost.php?p=954514&postcount=166

[R3Z]

@ R3Z,

The items you've put in bold lettering, are those the main culprits in slow(er) encoding times?


Yes, they are the main ones. They will slow down encoding, but they are there to save bits. It really depends on what you want out of your encodes ?

I tend to lower the ME subpixel refinement from --subme 6 to something like --subme 2 as i want to keep as much detail as i can. I see no use in penny pinching space as to me, its not worth making a movie look worse for the sake of space.

These are my settings for keeping as much detail as possible with no real care for space;

--crf 17 --deadzone-inter 4 --deadzone-intra 2 --ref 3 --mixed-refs --no-fast-pskip --bframes 2 --b-pyramid --bime --weightb --direct auto --filter -2,-2 --subme 1 --analyse p8x8,b8x8,i8x8 --8x8dct --vbv-maxrate 1000 --threads auto --thread-input --progress --no-dct-decimate --no-psnr --no-ssim --output "" ""

Depends on the source and the filters used, but i get around 20-40 fps on a e6700.

[fofwp]

R3Z,

Those settings are really great at producing near lossless results, even though i get a final file size a little greater than the original. My average encoding speed was ~22fps. Definitely a keeper.

However, I am looking for 50% compression, otherwise i don't see the point in compressing. Which means i have to use the more cpu intensive settings resulting in lower speed. I guess i can learn to live with the lower speed.

[nm]

However, I am looking for 50% compression, otherwise i don't see the point in compressing. Which means i have to use the more cpu intensive settings resulting in lower speed. I guess i can learn to live with the lower speed.
Or you can sacrifice some quality and use those fast settings with --crf 22, for example. For testing different settings, I'd suggest deciding on a bitrate (or a crf level, but that is not as accurate) and doing sample encodes with different settings. If you can't see much difference between fast and slow settings, use the faster ones.

[R3Z]

Or you can sacrifice some quality and use those fast settings with --crf 22, for example. For testing different settings, I'd suggest deciding on a bitrate (or a crf level, but that is not as accurate) and doing sample encodes with different settings. If you can't see much difference between fast and slow settings, use the faster ones.

Exactly, its just up to what you want :) My encodes that use these settings have been enhanced so that they look much better than the original, so the size doesnt botherf me so much.

[lexor]

taking account of your target, perhaps you may be interested in investigating alternatives, since you are telling us you want 50% compression, and your source is a DVD (all pressed releases are dual-layer), xvid will be much faster and will look practically indistinguishable from x264 if you aim at half DVD size (which would be one DVD5 in your case).

[MoUCLAs]

i have exactly the same cpu and 2x1GB GSkill at 265Mhz. I use the following encoding line:

"D:\Program Files\StaxRip2\Applications\x264\x264.exe" --pass 1 --bitrate 777 --stats ".stats" --bframes 3 --b-pyramid --progress --threads 2 --no-psnr --subme 1 --analyse none --me dia --ref 1 --output NUL ""
"D:\Program Files\StaxRip2\Applications\x264\x264.exe" --pass 2 --bitrate 777 --stats ".stats" --ref 3 --bframes 3 --b-pyramid --weightb --b-rdo --bime --analyse all --8x8dct --subme 6 --trellis 1 --mixed-refs --progress --threads 2 --no-psnr --output "_EncoderOutput.mkv_EncoderOutput.mkv" ""

i encode usually from mpeg-2 720x576 to 576x432 and have ~40fps for 1st pass and ~20fps for second, i use also DeGrainMedian because i encode analog Tv captures.

For DVD encoding without resizing i am making for about 3 to 4 hours, i dont remember exaclty fps..

[fofwp]

I think I will just stick to the settings in my first post. It produces files that are close to 50% of the original depending on the noisiness of the source. But I will try constant bitrate.

My next hurdle is avisynth. As you can see my script is too simple, and I know i can increase my compressibility with a better script.

There are two things i need help with:
1. Noise
2. Blocks

Can someone recommend me some filters that can help reduce these?

@R3Z: what do you do to make the encode look better than the original

@lexor: i tried xvid at q2 using Didee's 6of9 matrix and it just looked terrible. Somehow it amplified the noise which caused the picture to look like goop. I am sure that if I ran some noise filter it would make the picture look better.