MeGUI x264 presets.

[Sharktooth]

EDIT
WARNING
- MeGUI does not install x264 encoder presets via the updater anymore, as it used to do in earlier versions. It is now recommend to use the 'Target Playback Device' option in the 'x264 configuration dialog' instead.
- You can still create and import x264 encoder presets at your convenience. But the presets mentioned in this post will certainly be outdated and not supported correctly by current MeGUI versions.
/EDIT
Here's a list of the new MeGUI x264 presets. They will replace the old ones.
So, ensure to DELETE ALL the old x264 profiles/presets BEFORE IMPORTING this ones:

MeGUI presets in Japanese (wiki) (http://x264.tobinaka.com/index.php?Presets)
Thanks to tobinaka

DXVA-HD-Anime_Toons Fast
DXVA-HD-Anime_Toons HQ
DXVA-HD-Fast
DXVA-HD-Balanced
DXVA-HD-HQ
DXVA-HD-Extra Quality
DXVA-HD-Insane
DXVA-SD-Anime_Toons Fast
DXVA-SD-Anime_Toons HQ
DXVA-SD-Fast
DXVA-SD-Balanced
DXVA-SD-HQ
DXVA-SD-Extra Quality
DXVA-SD-Insane

The "DXVA" group presets ensure DXVA hardware compatibility and good compression/quality. The 'FAST' tagged profiles are consistently faster but have a bit lower compression/quality (this is true for other preset groups too). Those presets replace the old HQ and AE ones. The SD and HD tags mean for Standard Def and for High Def. encodings.

Device-Archos605
Device-Cellphones_PDAs-Level1.0
Device-Cellphones_PDAs-Level1.1
Device-Cellphones_PDAs-Level1.2
Device-Cellphones_PDAs-Level1.3
Device-iPhone
Device-iPod 5.5G
Device-iPod
Device-PSP
Device-Zune

The "Device" group presets, is for Portable Devices compatibility.

Standalone-AppleTV
Standalone-AVC-HD
Standalone-PS3-Xbox360
Standalone-PS3-Xbox360_Fast
Standalone-Xbox_HiRes
Standalone-Xbox_LoRes
Standalone-Blu-ray
Standalone-Blu-ray_Fast
Standalone-HD-DVD
Standalone-HD-DVD_Fast

The "Standalone" group presets, ensure compatibility with Stand Alone players and devices.

Unrestricted 1pass ABR
Unrestricted 1pass ABR Fast
Unrestricted 1pass MaxSpeed
Unrestricted 1pass Const. Quality Anime_Toons
Unrestricted 1pass Const. Quality Fast
Unrestricted 1pass Const. Quality Balanced
Unrestricted 1pass Const. Quality Extra Q.
Unrestricted 1pass Const. Quality HQ
Unrestricted 1pass Const. Quality Insane
Unrestricted 1pass Lossless
Unrestricted 2pass Fast
Unrestricted 2pass Balanced
Unrestricted 2pass HQ
Unrestricted 2pass Extra Quality
Unrestricted 2pass Insane
Unrestricted 2pass Anime_Toons Fast
Unrestricted 2pass Anime_Toons Balanced
Unrestricted 2pass Anime_Toons HQ
Unrestricted 2pass Anime_Toons Extra Q.
Unrestricted 2pass Anime_Toons Insane
Unrestricted 2pass QuickTime for Windows

The "Unrestricted" group presets is for people not caring about hardware compatibility and are particularly good for mid-high/high end completely software PC playback (without DXVA videocards). Those ones are good to replace HQ and AE presets too. 1 pass ABR presets are not recommended. Those are there only because the encoder support that mode OR if you need fast encodings and somewhat have bitrate limits, try to not use them. 2pass or other modes will produce way better results. The maxspeed preset uses constant quality and minimum settings.

Additional notes: If you dont know what preset to choose or you're uncertain, use the DXVA HD or SD (depending on the source definition: SD - standard definition, HD - High definition) presets as default encoding presets or Unrestricted 2pass HQ or Balanced.
All anime/toons of all presets groups have Psy-RDO DISABLED and a higher deblocking filter values.
The presets are made for MeGUI however you can port or include them in other encoding GUIs or Apps.
The presets should work but I assume no responsibilities for anything that could happen (including and not limited to exploding cats or psycho bunnies) blah blah blah... usual stuff.

DOWNLOAD (http://mirror05.x264.nl/Sharktooth/MeGUI/profiles/MeGUI-x264_generic_profiles_v85.zip)
(mirror (http://www.webalice.it/f.corriga/megui/MeGUI-x264_generic_profiles_v85.zip))
Ver.85
Changelog:
V50: Initial release
V51: The Unrestricted 2pass preset now uses slower/higher compression settings but 1 less ref frame.
V52: All the Unrestricted 2pass presets were missing the "Turbo" option for first pass. Insane does not use Turbo 1st pass.
V53: Changed Unrestricted 1pass Constant Quality Trellis = 1 to 2
V54: Changed Unrestricted 1pass Constant Quality Deblocking to -1,-1
V55: Limited the max b-frames number in some presets due to this: https://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=139827
V56: Renamed Unrestricted 2pass -> Unrestricted 2pass HQ. New Unrestricted 2pass Balanced preset. More bframes tweaking.
V57: New Unrestricted 1pass Const. Quality presets (HQ, Balanced, FAST). They replace the old one. AVC-HD and BD maxbitrate & buffer tweaks.
V58: Added Device-Zune preset. B-Frames updated to 3 in Device-PSP preset.
V59: Min Keyint -> 2 in all Blu-Ray and AVC-HD presets. Weighted B-Prediction disabled on any Anime/Toons presets.
V60: New Insane presets for DXVA group. Fixed Trellis 1 -> 2 in DXVA HQ presets.
V61: Revised/Fixed VBV settings for most of the restricted presets. Too much changes to list them. Also Trellis 1 -> 0 in Device-PSP preset (due to Psy-RDO).
V62: Revised settings for Device-PSP preset... added some more juice. Removed b-pyramid from all DXVA group presets... this time it is FOREVER until x264 gets properly patched.
V63: Rised the min-keyint value to 4 in all HD-DVD presets.
V64: DVXA-SD-HQ preset still had b-pyramid.
V65: New Balanced presets in DXVA group. Some tweaks here and there... too much to list.
V66: Restored min-keyint value to 2 in both HD-DVD presets. Disabled AQ in all Anime/Toons presets (it did more harm than good).
V67: Tweaks, Tweaks, Tweaks... too much to be listed (most are concerning Trellis) and removed b-pyramid from DXVA-SD-Balanced preset (it was not meant to be there).
V68: Updated partition types for Device-iPod, Device-iPod 5.5G and Device-Zune presets.
V69: Fixed the Device-PSP preset (messed up in the previous version).
V70: Various VBV buffers changes for Device group presets. Trellis 0 to 1 in Device-PSP preset. New Device-Cellphones_PDAs-Level1.3 preset.
V71: Revised all VBV max bitrate and buffers in all restricted presets. Renamed Device-AppleTV -> Standalone-AppleTV (changed group).
V72: Removed b-pyramid from DXVA-SD-Anime_Toons (missed it in a previous update)
V73: New Extra Quality presets for both DXVA and Unrestricted groups. New Unrestricted 1pass Const. Quality Insane preset. All Insane presets are even more insane. Extra Quality presets are a blend between HQ and Insane presets settings. Other minor tweaks.
V74: General tweaks discussed here: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=1180105#post1180105
V75: Completely new Anime/Toons presets.
V76: Changed AQmode 2 to 1.
V77: Updated psy options format for the new MeGUI version
V78: Removed Psy-Trellis (set to 0) in all presets coz it's too much experimental. Set b-adapt to 2 where it was possible without hurting speed too much and on all the Insane presets.
V79: Limited the number of B-Frames when b-adapt 2 is set for encoding speed reasons.
V80: Rised the number of B-Frames in Unrestricted presets to 16 where b-adapt 1 is used. All HQ presets now use b-adapt 2.
V81: Presets format updated due to the recente changes in x264 API plus some very slight changes in some options.
V82: Fixed subme mode from 7 to 9 in Unrestricted 1pass Const. Quality Insane.
V83: Fixed some typos in presets names. Added Unrestricted 1pass Const. Quality Anime_Toons preset. Added P4x4 partitions option where possible.
V84: Added Device-Android G1 preset based on kosmonaut findings (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=145137).
V85: Fixed VBV Buffer size for Standalone-Blu-Ray presets.

READ CAREFULLY: Download the archive. Delete all the MeGUI x264 presets before importing these ones. Import the presets using the MeGUI File->Import Presets menu'.
If you want to get back the old presets, delete these ones and use the Force Reinstall option in megui Options->Update for the x264 presets.

[rack04]

Fantastic. Thanks for all your hard work.

My observations:

Are the HQ tags going to be removed from the DXVA profiles? Not that it really matters but just to be consistent with the other profiles. Should the ones that are "not recommended" even be included?

[Sharktooth]

not recommended means the encoder can do much better with 2 passes but... if you need really FAST encoding an have bitrate limits, you can ignore the 'Not recommended'.
DXVA presets are all HQ presets, even the fast ones.

[Nightshiver]

Aww, so you're not keeping the old AE (anime) presets? If not, I'll probably not want to update unless one of the new presets can do the same job.

[Sharktooth]

Use the Unrestricted (better choice) or DXVA presets for Anime.

[Nightshiver]

Is there a particular one that most closely resembles AE-Maxquality? Might be the unrestricted 2pass insane... Another question. Are the DXVA 2pass for all of them?

[Sharktooth]

Unrestricted 2pass insane it's even better than AE-Maxquality but may be a bit slower. That's if you need to hit a filesize or bitrate.
I'd use Unrestricted 2pass. In both cases i would edit the profile or create a new one starting from one of those 2 and rise the inloop filter values to 1 and 1...
If you want i can add two general HQ anime presets in the Unrestricted and DXVA groups.

Edit: Too late, you convinced me.... added.

[smok3]

ok, so i'am not a megui regular, but how about all this acronims (PD, SA), how about 'PortableDevice' and 'Standalone' instead?

(looking at the gui, encoder settings has a full-width pulldown, so that should not be a problem?)

[Sharktooth]

dang, i was thinking the same. ill see what i can do.

edit: done.

[Sharktooth]

pff... damn windows and M$... lost all presets...
proceding with a hard undelete... crossing fingers.

[rack04]

not recommended means the encoder can do much better with 2 passes but... if you need really FAST encoding an have bitrate limits, you can ignore the 'Not recommended'.
DXVA presets are all HQ presets, even the fast ones.

So should it be DXVA-HD-HQ_Fast?

[Kurtnoise]

First, congrats for the update. :) Hoping you haven't lost everything...:/


I vote to rename/remove 2 things :
"PortableDevice" to "Device". I think it's more appropriate (or let just the device type as name). Plus, I don't think that the PS3 and the Xbox are portable. ;)
Standalone : is it really necessary ? BluRay and HDVD is self explanatory imo...



and btw, is it useful/interesting to keep the Insane preset ? It should be removed (just my opinion though...)

[smok3]

or merge portableDevice and Standalone into TargetDevice or only Device (or Hardware maybe).

[Sharktooth]

First, congrats for the update. :) Hoping you haven't lost everything...:/


I vote to rename/remove 2 things :
"PortableDevice" to "Device". I think it's more appropriate (or let just the device type as name). Plus, I don't think that the PS3 and the Xbox are portable. ;)
Standalone : is it really necessary ? BluRay and HDVD is self explanatory imo...



and btw, is it useful/interesting to keep the Insane preset ? It should be removed (just my opinion though...)
..probably the Xbox presets will be moved under the SA group...
just done.
however im trying to recoved the files. the damn NTFS is a rotten POS.
Insane is there for Insane PPL. I can assure you there are a lot...

[saint-francis]

Thanks Sharktooth. I'm looking forward to checking these out. I appreciate the effort.


Insane is there for Insane PPL. I can assure you there are a lot...

I'm one of those people. I often (about once a week or so) use the HQ insane profile. With the power of affordable processing these days and looking at what's on the horizon for processors I'm personally not too excited about Hardware decoding. I do have a question about the DXVA profiles though. How many reference frames will they use? With MPC HC I'm now getting hardware acceleration with 10 reference frames and the current DXVA profiles only use something like 3.

[Sharktooth]

Depends on the resolution SD or HD. The DXVA profiles are made to be compatible with ALL DXVA decoders (including powerDVD and MPC).
Obviously MPC's decoder has less limitations than cyberlink's, but a couple of additional refs (when there are already 3 or more) do not change your life and neither the encoding quality.

[saint-francis]

but a couple of additional refs (when there are already 3 or more) do not change your life and neither the encoding quality.

Are you saying that the difference between 3 and 10 reference frames is negligible?

[Sharktooth]

yep. more then 3 refs = negligible gain and using more refs = enormous encoding times.
i swear!!! i definatly lost all files dated after 18 july 2008... on 2 different HDDs... thanx NTFS!!!

[Dark Shikari]

yep. more then 3 refs = negligible gainI'd put the cutoff more around 4-5. And more than 5, even, is certainly not for animated footage or CGI.

[Sharktooth]

3 was chosen for DXVA or other HW compatible presets.
Unrestricted presets have more refs, expecially the anime one.

[Dark Shikari]

3 was chosen for DXVA or other HW compatible presets.
Unrestricted presets have more refs, expecially the anime one.Isn't the limit 4, not 3, for 1080p 4.1?

[Sharktooth]

dunno i threw a random number (3, but it could have been 4 as well) coz i lost the presets and i didnt remember if it was 3 or 4... or whatever. my memory is really short lately...

edit: the limit depends on the DPB size.

[smackbadger]

Shouldn't PSP be under PortableDevice, since PSP=PlayStation Portable right?

[Kurtnoise]

I'm one of those people. I often (about once a week or so) use the HQ insane profile.
what is the real gain to use a such preset ?

[yesgrey]

not recommended means the encoder can do much better with 2 passes but... if you need really FAST encoding an have bitrate limits, you can ignore the 'Not recommended'.

I think it would be a good idea including this as a note in the first post. It's better have all the relevant info there, and this question will arise more often... After a few thread pages the people will only look at the first post, nothing more...

[Sharktooth]

yes, i added the info.

@smackbadger: yes, was already there... i just pasted the wrong name.

[canTsTop]

what is difference between DXVA and PS3-Xbox360 presets? isn't this the same thing?

[Sharktooth]

buffers.

[check]

Why not combine the 'portable devices' and 'standalone' categories into a 'hardware players' or similar category? The split between them is a little arbitrary.

[Sharktooth]

could be an idea. but id like to keep them separated.

[Sharktooth]

EDIT: moved to the first post.

[kurt]

dunno i threw a random number (3, but it could have been 4 as well) coz i lost the presets and i didnt remember if it was 3 or 4... or whatever. my memory is really short lately...

edit: the limit depends on the resolution.
jap, it's 4 for 1920x1088, look here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=972503)....

btw: thanks for all your efforts, these presets are much appreciated!

btw2: when driving with Popcorn Hour, I should stick with Standalone-PS3-Xbox360, right?

[Sharktooth]

i left 4 refs for HD even if some old DXVA video cards/drivers do not support 4. for the same reason i thought to take out b-pyramid but i didnt.

btw2: dunno... but if you find any info about the exact playback capabilities i can make a preset... :)

[saint-francis]

what is the real gain to use a such preset ?

Using crf I have consistently noticed a 3-7 % reduction in size as compared to using a profile like HQ Slow. Using HQ Insane it only takes about 4-6 hours for me to encode the average DVD (depending on the .avs). I don't use such settings on HD content. I did once and it took over 24 hours.

[Sharktooth]

what is the real gain to use a such preset ?
Almost none, really. It's just for the ppl that want to "squeeze even the last drop of juice from the fruit", no matter how much time it takes.

[Sharktooth]

Presets updated. If you have V50 please download V51.

[TheRyuu]

All anime/toons of all presets groups have Psy-RDO DISABLED and a higher deblocking filter values.

I think anime should have 0:0 deblocking and toon 1:1 but that's just me. Good anime has detail you know.

The same can be said about possibly using psyRDO in anime to keep fine details (possibly gradients, or gradfun gradients, or even some noise).

Edit: Why is no-dct-decimate on with anime/toon. Shouldn't that be off?

[Sharktooth]

1,1 is the same as the old AE presets. no one ever complained. 0,0 and 1,1 difference is almost unnoticeable.

[Sharktooth]

another update. V52. Re-download. Now it's all in the first post.

[kurt]

i left 3 refs for HD since some old DXVA video cards do not support 4.

btw2: dunno... but if you find any info about the exact playback capabilities i can make a preset... :)
PCH uses the same Sigma Chip as PS3 (8635) but is limited in RAM of course. I'll try to find out the max settings... lately I was driving with this commandline very well (720p encodes though):

--pass 2 --bitrate 4500 --stats ".stats" --level 4.1 --ref 3 --mixed-refs --bframes 3 --b-rdo --bime --weightb
--direct auto --nf --subme 6 --trellis 1 --partitions p8x8,b8x8,i4x4,i8x8 --8x8dct --ipratio 1.1 --pbratio 1.1
--vbv-bufsize 9000 --vbv-maxrate 24000 --qcomp 0.5 --me umh --merange 12 --threads auto
--thread-input --progress --no-psnr --no-ssim --output "output" "input"

any hints what to change (for maxing out)?

[Sharktooth]

i edited the post you quoted coz i actually did the contrary of what i initially said...

[mozzle]

Sharktooth,

Thanks so much for all your hard work; the presets are indispensable! Sorry about your computer issues.

I had a couple questions about the new presets (V.52), specifically the Unrestricted 1pass Constant Quality preset.

1) I may have misinterpreted something along the way but it was my understanding that Trellis 1 was not compatible with the new PsyRDO. I know PsyRDO automatically turns off Trellis 1 if detected but is Trellis 1 still the official "Recommended Value" for Constant Quality?

2) It appears you have modified quite a few of the presets' Deblocking values. I just wanted to confirm that you didn't mean to change the "Recommended Value" for Constant Quality.

3) Is there a specific reason that "No Fast P-Skip" is unchecked in all of the 1-pass presets?


Thanks again for all of your effort!

[Sharktooth]

1) right. x264 will automatically disable trellis if set to 1 and if psy-rdo is enabled. if the preset contains trellis 1 then it's an error. Trellis with Psy-RDO can be only 0 or 2. 2 is better but slower.

2) i modified all the -2,-1 in -1,-1 since i've seen some slight more oversharpening when psy-rdo was introduced (i've changed monitor too in that period, so it may be also due to that).

3) fast pskip is an optimization, i wont use no-fast-pskip in non insane profiles.

[Sharktooth]

Another update: V53.
Changelog & download link in the first post.

[mozzle]

Sharktooth,

Thanks for the quick reply.

FYI, I'm getting a 404 error on http://mirror05.x264.nl/Sharktooth/MeGUI/profiles/MeGUI-x264_generic_profiles_v52.zip

Looks like the URL still references the previous version (v52).

[Sharktooth]

try now... it didnt update the link.
i've also added a mirror.

[mozzle]

Thanks Sharktooth.

By the way, I primarily do CRF encoding using the Constant Quality preset. I would like to experiment with some of the other presets using Constant Quality. I know you recommend using "Spatial" for B-Frame Mode in CQ. So I would assume that I should change B-Frame Mode to "Spatial" when using a 2-pass preset (e.g. "Insane") in CQ mode, correct?


Thanks again!

[Sharktooth]

Auto is not good for 1 pass (CQ, CRF or ABR). Spatial seems better to me...
However the Unrestricted CQ preset is quite good. There are very few other options to tweak to rise compression/quality.
Just set your preferred CRF and let it go... ;)

[JarrettH]

Reply for the new thread :P

Good to see you in better health :devil:

[Sharktooth]

not much better but at least i can see/read/type a bit better now :)
feel free to test the new presets and to report problems, inconsistencies, etc... :)