Announcement of a new Bitrate Viewer

[konran]

Hello,

I'm not sure if this is the appropriate place for that: My new Bitrate Viewer 1.0 for Windows is released. It is a rewritten from scratch version of an existing tool for MPEG analysis. You can check the quality of your encoding with the graphical output.

Well, the idea is not new - but there are some new nice features you might have missed with other tools of this kind ... and if you know the original old tool with a similar GUI you may remember its problems with file sizes above 2 gigs. This new one doesn't have this problem at all!

The tool is free for now and I hope you like it - whoso needs it. Just see this:

http://www.winhoros.de/docs/bitrate-viewer/images/BitrateViewer-4.08GB-MPEG2.png

And the web page is here:
http://www.winhoros.de/docs/bitrate-viewer/

Have fun!
Konran

[canuckerfan]

awesome! I was recently looking for a good free one. this will more than meet my needs. thanks!!:)

[Sharktooth]

uh... something like that for mpeg4 (asp/h.264) would be definatly more useful to me.
are you planning to add support for those formats?

[linyx]

@Sharktooth
It appears to have decent support for mpeg-4 already.

[Sharktooth]

not AVC though :(

[blutach]

sharktooth,

You need to read this (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=52597) in full and carefully.

konran - thanks heaps!

Regards

[konran]

@Sharktooth
It appears to have decent support for mpeg-4 already.
Yes it has. It does (almost?) everything that FFMpeg can handle. You only don't get the extended information on the left panel side for file formats other than MPEG-1/MPEG-2.

[jeffy]

Thank you very much for a very useful tool!

[Sharktooth]

sharktooth,

You need to read this (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=52597) in full and carefully.

konran - thanks heaps!

Regards
as an OSS developer i know that... maybe i was misunderstood. i really appreciate the tool, i just asked if the developer had plans to add a feature.

[blutach]

OK, understood. It didn't come across that way, that's all. All the best.

Regards

[linyx]

Oops, forgot to say thanks up there ^ . Thanks!:thanks: your tool is very useful.

[konran]

Ok, thanks for your first tests. I've upped a new version of my Bitrate Viewer 1.0.2 with some bug fixes.

The help issue reported is now done (thanks Les), the help page also corrected and updated and the installer changed a little. Please have a look at the download page (http://www.winhoros.de/docs/bitrate-viewer/download.html) again.

Cheers,
Konran

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Yes it has. It does (almost?) everything that FFMpeg can handle.

Looks like a handy tool. Unfortunately the current version will either crash or not process the entire file with H.264 streams.

Would be cool if you could fix that :)

:thanks:

[konran]

Looks like a handy tool. Unfortunately the current version will either crash or not process the entire file with H.264 streams.

Please read the help file: the main intention for the tool are DVD formats ... anything beside is nice to have for now. I'll code full support of BD formats when bluray gets "the" state of the art, i.e. when all those people who now burn DVD's for their movies will do that with BD instead. I don't know quite if h.264 is also common in use for BD? If yes it will be in there then. The problem for the moment is mainly the exact stream specs to code that.

The one question of interest acc. to your crashes is: When do they happen? Immediately after open? Normally it should work as FFmpeg has built-in h.264 support. So maybe your streams are improper - I already had x264 files in MKV containers that run fine.

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Please read the help file: the main intention for the tool are DVD formats ... anything beside is nice to have for now. I'll code full support of BD formats when bluray gets "the" state of the art, i.e. when all those people who now burn DVD's for their movies will do that with BD instead. I don't know quite if h.264 is also common in use for BD? If yes it will be in there then. The problem for the moment is mainly the exact stream specs to code that.

I know your tool is for MPEG-2 in first case. But with the strong movement towards HD footage and H.264, the support of H.264 would be nice.

BD supports MPEG-2, VC-1 and H.264. I think only VC-1 and H.264 are commonly used on BD discs. H.264 is the more efficient format!

The one question of interest acc. to your crashes is: When do they happen? Immediately after open? Normally it should work as FFmpeg has built-in h.264 support. So maybe your streams are improper - I already had x264 files in MKV containers that run fine.

I tested a H.264 file (MP4 container) that was created with x264 and it crashed instantly after open.

Also I tried several other H.264 files form MP4, MKV and AVI container. Often your viewer only showed a part of the file.

BTW: It seems the scale of the chart is fixed. I think it would be better if the scale would be adjusted according to the maximum bitrate of the current file.

[konran]

BD supports MPEG-2, VC-1 and H.264. I think only VC-1 and H.264 are commonly used on BD discs. H.264 is the more efficient format!

I tested a H.264 file (MP4 container) that was created with x264 and it crashed instantly after open.

Also I tried several other H.264 files form MP4, MKV and AVI container. Often your viewer only showed a part of the file.

BTW: It seems the scale of the chart is fixed. I think it would be better if the scale would be adjusted according to the maximum bitrate of the current file.

I've never seen VC-1 but H.264 for sure is a point of interest. Maybe a spec of H.264 will find its way to me - next year, because I'm just offline for the next 2 weeks.

For your second case you tell when such a file is really displayed but only partially - this should be an issue for the FFmpeg part of the tool which I can't control - beneath giving bug reports to the FFmpeg line. Before I can do that I need sample files for each of the streams you mentioned that cause a crash. Please contact me again via PM as of Jan 03.

For your BTW: try a double click on the chart! It does an autoscale and the ranges are in steps of 1, 2, 2.5, 3, 5 - each with 10% limit exceed. So if your file has 33.000 kbps it can be displayed within the 30.000 scale range. What do you think? I think that should be convenient enough.

[LoRd_MuldeR]

For your second case you tell when such a file is really displayed but only partially - this should be an issue for the FFmpeg part of the tool which I can't control - beneath giving bug reports to the FFmpeg line. Before I can do that I need sample files for each of the streams you mentioned that cause a crash. Please contact me again via PM as of Jan 03.

In fact your tools seems to crash with all MP4 and MOV files I throw at it.
You can download one of the 1080p trailers from Apple web-site to reproduce.

For your BTW: try a double click on the chart! It does an autoscale and the ranges are in steps of 1, 2, 2.5, 3, 5 - each with 10% limit exceed. So if your file has 33.000 kbps it can be displayed within the 30.000 scale range. What do you think? I think that should be convenient enough.

I didn't see that. I think it's fine for most files. But I got one sample (Crowd Run 2160p) where the widest scale still isn't wide enough...

[turbojet]

Thanks for the nice bitrate viewer, just a few things I would like to see in it:
- Zoom graph horizontally with mouse wheel and have a scroll bar on the bottom if it exceeds the frame width. This is so frames can be looked at on a closer scale.
- Mention or even goto min and max bitrate frame sizes

Would these be a possibility in the future?

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Thanks for the nice bitrate viewer, just a few things I would like to see in it:
- Zoom graph horizontally with mouse wheel and have a scroll bar on the bottom if it exceeds the frame width. This is so frames can be looked at on a closer scale.
- Mention or even goto min and max bitrate frame sizes

Would these be a possibility in the future?

I think it's okay to tell you that I had some private discussion with konran about his BitrateViewer (mainly to fix MP4/MOV input) and he told me that there are plans to add an option to open a zoom-able view of the graph in a separate window. Also he has plans to add an option to save and/or print the graph...

[turbojet]

ok thanks for the heads up

[konran]

Hi all,

this is an update notice for my Bitrate Viewer version 1.0.3 available now. There are some bugfixes and some little features added. Look into the changelog (http://www.winhoros.de/docs/bitrate-viewer/changelog.html) for more information.

Cheers,
Konran

[blutach]

Thanks konran.

Regards

[konran]

Hello again,

this is an update notice for my Bitrate Viewer 2.0 :)
You'll have many new features - one of them is a zoomable display. See the changelog (http://www.winhoros.de/docs/bitrate-viewer/changelog.html) for details.

Regards,
Konran

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Thank you :)

Question: When I select a range and zoom in (left click), how can I zoom out to 100% again?

[konran]

Question: When I select a range and zoom in (left click), how can I zoom out to 100% again?

Hey dear, what about reading the new HTML pages I just made for that? zoom_view.html (http://www.winhoros.de/docs/bitrate-viewer/zoom_view.html) is a good place to start.

For impatiancy: click the [Z] or double click the orange part of the zoom indicator.

cu, Konran

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Hey dear, what about reading the new HTML pages I just made for that? zoom_view.html (http://www.winhoros.de/docs/bitrate-viewer/zoom_view.html) is a good place to start.

For impatiancy: click the [Z] or double click the orange part of the zoom indicator.

I see now :)

What about using the Mouse Wheel for Zoom In/Out in addition to the hotkeys?

[olyteddy]

Cool Tool. TNX. Just used it to verify that my hardware MPEG2 encoder is indeed a VBR encoder.

[konran]

What about using the Mouse Wheel for Zoom In/Out in addition to the hotkeys?
Really a great idea!!! - If I only knew how i.e. what message it is to track the wheel? I never did it so far :-(

Cheers,
Konran

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Really a great idea!!! - If I only knew how i.e. what message it is to track the wheel? I never did it so far :-(

Maybe this one:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms645617(VS.85).aspx

[konran]

Maybe this one:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms645617(VS.85).aspx
Well yes, thanks! That's it exactly. I'll give it a try.

[konran]

Well yes, thanks! That's it exactly. I'll give it a try.
... and it works fine with it. Soon you'll have version 2.1 online, together with some bugfixes for the zoom stuff.

[Who Am I ?]

thanks a lot for your application , very handy indeed :)

[LoRd_MuldeR]

I noticed that BitrateViewer 2.0 will crash with one of my MKV files. Here is the what the debugger says:

$ gdb ./BitrateViewer.exe
GNU gdb 6.8
Copyright (C) 2008 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law. Type "show copying"
and "show warranty" for details.
This GDB was configured as "i686-pc-mingw32"...
(no debugging symbols found)
(gdb) run
Starting program: d:\BitrateViewer/./BitrateViewer.exe
[New thread 4644.0x136c]
Error: dll starting at 0x77d40000 not found.
Error while mapping shared library sections:
NOT_AN_IMAGE: No such file or directory.
(no debugging symbols found)
Error: dll starting at 0x77d40000 not found.
Error: dll starting at 0x77c20000 not found.
(no debugging symbols found)
(no debugging symbols found)
[New thread 4644.0x1294]
(no debugging symbols found)

(no debugging symbols found)
[New thread 4644.0x13fc]

Program received signal SIGFPE, Arithmetic exception.
[Switching to thread 4644.0x13fc]
0x10011db7 in AvLib!?ProcessGroupHeader@CMpeg2Mngr@@IAEHAAPBDAAHK@Z ()
from d:\BitrateViewer\AvLib.dll
(gdb) bt
#0 0x10011db7 in AvLib!?ProcessGroupHeader@CMpeg2Mngr@@IAEHAAPBDAAHK@Z ()
from d:\BitrateViewer\AvLib.dll
#1 0x10014143 in AvLib!?CheckAndProcessStartCode@CMpeg2Mngr@@IAEHK@Z ()
from d:\BitrateViewer\AvLib.dll
#2 0x000001b8 in ?? ()
#3 0xb8010000 in ?? ()
#4 0x0323f880 in ?? ()
#5 0x00010000 in ?? ()
#6 0x03330340 in ?? ()
#7 0x100143c4 in AvLib!?HopToNextTagPos@CMpeg2Mngr@@QAEHEPAVCDWVecSup@@@Z ()
from d:\BitrateViewer\AvLib.dll
#8 0x00000008 in ?? ()
#9 0x000001bc in ?? ()
#10 0x000001b8 in ?? ()
#11 0x0323fa8c in ?? ()
#12 0xffffffff in ?? ()
#13 0x0000000c in ?? ()
#14 0x03330340 in ?? ()
#15 0x00000000 in ?? ()
(gdb) c
Continuing.

Program received signal SIGFPE, Arithmetic exception.
0x10011db7 in AvLib!?ProcessGroupHeader@CMpeg2Mngr@@IAEHAAPBDAAHK@Z ()
from d:\BitrateViewer\AvLib.dll
(gdb) c
Continuing.

Program exited with code 0200.
(gdb)

I uploaded the first 5 MB of the 700 MB file, as that is enough to reproduce the crash:
http://uploaded.to/?id=cvu9av

[konran]

I uploaded the first 5 MB of the 700 MB file, as that is enough to reproduce the crash:
http://uploaded.to/?id=cvu9av
As I've told you a crash on .mkv and the like may happen ... but I'll have a look - just tell me how to treat a .7z, it's no extension I know and .zip or .mkv doesn't work for it!

[buzzqw]

www.7zip.org

BHH

[LoRd_MuldeR]

As I've told you a crash on .mkv and the like may happen

I just wanted to report. Other MKV's that I created the same way don't crash and work perfectly fine :)

just tell me how to treat a .7z, it's no extension I know and .zip or .mkv doesn't work for it!

What? You never used 7-Zip? :eek:

Please see http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/7z for info.

You can uncompressed .7z archives with 7-Zip (http://www.7-zip.org/) or WinRAR (http://www.rarlab.com/) for example...

EDIT: buzzqw was faster ;)

[konran]

I just wanted to report. Other MKV's that I created the same way don't crash and work perfectly fine :)
Yes, that was good you've reported ... I've coded an ugly bug when I enhanced the tool to show the frame mode display - so I went deeper into the MPEG interface and with some MKV files it found parts of the file where no frame rate was found. The frame rate is divisor in some calculations ... so it crashed. You'll find an update soon :)
What? You never used 7-Zip? :eek:
Not yet. Of course I will ... as long as I'm using that windows machine. Normally I go for the Mac

Cheers, Konran

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Looking forward :)

[LoRd_MuldeR]

... and it works fine with it. Soon you'll have version 2.1 online, together with some bugfixes for the zoom stuff.

Sorry, do I miss something or did you decide to suspend the release?

[konran]

Sorry, do I miss something or did you decide to suspend the release?
Don't take TV notations as a base for "soon" - "soon" does not mean "now", it means a specific amount of time.

So it's not suspended - just not finished up to now. Before I have the time to code the rest I first have to work for some other projects that will be paid, then the things that are not paid follow.

So see you then ;-)

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Don't take TV notations as a base for "soon" - "soon" does not mean "now", it means a specific amount of time.

I see. The post (one week ago) sounded like version 2.1 was already on its way to appear online. That's why I asked ;)

I'll be patient then...

[konran]

Patience can be dropped now ... version 2.1 is online. You'll have all the bugfixes mentioned before and some new features. You might want to see the changelog (http://www.winhoros.de/docs/bitrate-viewer/changelog.html).

Have fun,
Konran

[dr.schanker]

Hello Konran,

thank you for this handy application. Unfortunately i have some .mpg-files which Bitrate Viewer cannot open.
During the "estimate frame count..." phase the program encounters an error and has to be closed.

AppName: bitrateviewer.exe AppVer: 2.1.0.0 ModName: avlib.dll
ModVer: 2.1.0.0 Offset: 0001c6b0

I uploaded an example (1.4 MB) here (http://www.mediafire.com/file/d1mgmdnz1u2/4to3_SD_PAL_progressive_720x576_25p.mpg).
It's an MPEG2-Program Stream,
Video: MPEG2-Video, 50 frames, 720x576@25p, 4:2:0, Main profile@High level
Audio: MPEG-Audio, 48kHz, stereo, 384 kbps

Whould you be so kind and have a look at this problem?

[konran]

It's an MPEG2-Program Stream,
Video: MPEG2-Video, 50 frames, 720x576@25p, 4:2:0, Main profile@High level
Audio: MPEG-Audio, 48kHz, stereo, 384 kbps

Whould you be so kind and have a look at this problem?
Hello dr.,

there's something strange with your file - it crashes within analysis of the MPEG basic header structure and there is some elementary stream type 275 (0xed) with stream ID 0xaf which is unsupported according to MPEG ISO/IEC specification.

I've just tried to ignore that within the interface but it doesn't help yet. I'll be out for one week now - I'll have a look when I'm back.

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Patience can be dropped now ... version 2.1 is online. You'll have all the bugfixes mentioned before and some new features. You might want to see the changelog (http://www.winhoros.de/docs/bitrate-viewer/changelog.html).

Found it :thanks:

[konran]

Hi dr.,

It's an MPEG2-Program Stream,
Video: MPEG2-Video, 50 frames, 720x576@25p, 4:2:0, Main profile@High level
Audio: MPEG-Audio, 48kHz, stereo, 384 kbps

Whould you be so kind and have a look at this problem?

Just to roll up again here: Sorry, I was mistaken ... there was a bug in my MPEG2 interface that erronously tracked the PES stream map incorrect. I've fixed that and my new version of Bitrate Viewer 2.1.1 works fine with your sample stream.

Could you have a check on it?

@all: New Bitrate Viewer 2.1.1 with this bugfix is located here (http://www.winhoros.de/docs/bitrate-viewer/download.html).

Cheers,
Konran

[dr.schanker]

hello konran,

your new version 2.1.1 works like a charm now. No more crashes and technical infos like resolution, fps and duration are correct.
:thanks:

[JK1974]

Hi,

first of all: Thanks a lot for this great tool. Unfortunately, I have problems here with AVCHD files from Canon HF100 as well as from Panasonic HDC-HS100. The total time seems to be doubled while the Average Bitrate and Peak seems to be only the half of what it should be. The resolution is 1080i50.

Encodings done with x264 work as expected.

Just wanted to check out the average and maximum AVCHD bitrate because e.g. the default value of 8000 kbps in MeGUI for AVCHD looks a little low to me...

EDIT: Despite of the length that is displayed wrong, setting the display mode to "GOP based" gives me just around 7529 kbps as average and 13527 kbps as peak. Can this be really correct for AVCHD camcorders which are said to have around 18 MBit/s (or 24 MBit/s on newer devices)?

EDIT2: I did a reencoding of an AVCHD file with x264 with only 8 MBit/s average - and the resulting file has a little more than half of the size of the original file. So the real average bitrate might indeed be around 15 MBit/s.

[samepaul]

Awesome tool! Works great and didn't crash on my recordings so far.
konran do you have any plans to make GUI window resizable? At least in horizontal direction. Zooming functions like a charm, but on hi-resolution monitor the main window is so small and thus graph as well. Have to choose whether I see detailed data of wide range, although on my display I could potentially have both at same time. :)

[canuckerfan]

any chance this can show the q-factor of encoded clips?