x264-how many releases?

[nicco]

Sorry people, but there's a lot of confusion about new releases of x264 in my mind.
Actually I can download an .exe from this thread
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=80910
And use it vith VirtualDub like I do with other codecs (xvid,divx),
THEN there is a Doom9's GUI in this thread http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=87567 that (if I understood well)
make me encode x264 through mencoder.
Then I can decode my x264 movie in my favourite media player (MPC for example) with ffdshow only (and nero if I have it installed), but there are some functions wich are not supported yet (b-frames???-maybe I'm outdadet).
Then thre is a sex264 codec which have to come out yet...

Can someone clear my mind?

[Doom9]

x264 is encoding application agnostic, just like the libavcodec codecs and xvid. VfW is still the most popular way to use video codecs on Windows, hence the VfW version of x264. sex264 was the starting point for the x264 VfW, and it seems syskin is still using it for his own projects. But normally, you should use the regular VfW version - the work on sex264 will inevitably go into the official x264 VfW GUI.

mencoder is a whole different way of encoding. mencoder actually supports a lot of codecs. It does not use the VfW framework and is platform agnostic. So, you can use it to encode on Windows or Linux and it works just the same. And you might only know XviD as VfW codec as well.. but you can encode XviD with mencoder as well.

x264 does not have a decoder. Hence, ffdshow is required (ffdshow is a wrapper for libavcodec which does the x264 decoding).


So basically you have two ways of encoding: VfW and mencoder, and one way of decoding (ffdshow).

[virus]

just to add even more confusion :D there's my encoding pack (mencoder+x264, avs2yuv and scripts), which can be used under MSYS/Cygwin to do automated multipass encodings (AVS -> AVI), and can be eventually coupled with Doom9's GUI if you are interested in x264 only (no lavc and other stuff included in my build, to keep the size small).

You can find it here (http://www.webalice.it/riccardo.stievano/video_stuff/x264.html). Download size 720 KB, zipped.

I also try to cut down on the number of updates so to make a new build only when relevant changes to the core are committed. Changes to VfW (which has nothing to do with mencoder) or cosmetic improvements are simply ignored.

virus

[bond]

basically as a rule of thumb: always use the tool with the most recent date if you want to use the latest version of x264 :D

[Sharktooth]

@virus: look at the x264 development thread... i think an update with r126 is needed :)

@nicco: to ALWAYS get the latest build continue to check that thread.
I usually check the SVN everyday and if there are new revisions i will compile and post them in that thread.
Maybe i should start a separate thread with daily vfw and commandline builds hoping some mod will make it sticky... :)

edit: i started a separate thread: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=89979

[nicco]

Thanks to all!:)