ATI Avivo XCode released!

[Morpheus_xx]

Released today: http://www.chip.de/downloads/c1_downloads_18000750.html

It comes with a bulk of direct show filters that allow following formats:
MPEG 1
MPEG 2
MPEG 4 (DivX, Generic, Sony PSP)
WMV
H.264 (AVI, Generic, Sony PSP)

I'm starting the first test now...

[bond]

what does generic mpeg-4/h.264 mean? is there no special support for the ipod anymore as shown in the screenshot?

[Doom9]

too bad I don't have an ATI card, but the 7800GT simply blows ATI out of the water when it comes to games and so my choice was easy.

[Morpheus_xx]

some screenshots from the directshow filters:

video encoder
video encoder with opened dropdown
audio encoder
video mux

[Doom9]

I think there's one shot missing: the first screen without the dropdown activated , so that you can actually see what you can configure.

And an app with the standard MFC icon from a company like ATI? Why does that smell funny? And the whole thing is two weeks old already?

And isn't ATI located in Canada, not in Silicon Valley?

[bond]

thx, so it seems "generic" mpeg-4/h.264 means .mp4

cant be ati was so smart to realise that the ipod uses plain .mp4...

[Morpheus_xx]

my very first impression:

speed: ~ 25 fps for my avisynth input (also using fanfilter)
cpu load: 50% (Athlon Dual Core)

quality: less than xvid

VDub can arrive nearly the same fps but with ~100% cpu load.

PS: what happens when you try to use the tool with a non-ati board???

[Doom9]

PS: what happens when you try to use the tool with a non-ati board???

It doesn't start, telling you you need a 1xxx card.
Please try a regular 3 line script (d2v source, crop and resize) and compare that to VDub.. it's so much more meaningful as filters tend to distort results and you can't quite place the results when you're not used to using those filters.

[bond]

Originally Posted by Morpheus_xx

quality: less than xvid

haha

can you upload somewhere two small .mp4 (generic) files, with h.264 and mpeg-4, created with that encoder plz

PS: what happens when you try to use the tool with a non-ati board???

the download page says it will not work

[Richard Berg]

http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2645&p=2

The decoder is hard-limited to various resolutions depending on which model card you have. Anand doesn't say, but it's probably limited to a certain profile (below HP) as well.

The encoder is not yet GPU accelerated, but this quote was nice to see:

So, is ATI getting into the software business with the Avivo Video Converter? No. In fact, ATI is providing these algorithms and hooks to partners like Nero so that regardless of what software application you're using, you will get the best performance assuming that you have ATI hardware.

Similar things were said in the Firingsquad interview last month, but nothing came of it afaik. Will be interesting to see if they are willing to work with OSS codec developers.

[acidsex]

1080p decoding of H.264 AVC sounds awesome but how much does those x1800 cards go for?

edit: just saw what they go for $400. Thats ridiculous for a video card. Might be better off saving $400 and putting it towards next generation HD-DVD player where playback shouldnt be a problem.

[mod]

I've not been able to open the .zip archive, tried latest 7zip, Winzip, Winrar..
If it's legally possible, could someone post here an uncompressed and recompressed version? I would really appreciate it.

[Yong]

Originally Posted by Doom9

It doesn't start, telling you you need a 1xxx card.

Please correct me if im wong,
Its work for me altough i only have ATI Radeon 9600XT.
I ingored the AvivoXCode.exe and run regsvr32 to register the wbocx.ocx, atidvcr.dll and atixcode.dll manually.
encoding works fine with graphedit.

[Selur]

it would also be interesting to know if different ATI card provide different encodeing/decoding support or if a small 1xxx card would be enough.

@yong: what's your encoding speed, do you get any hardware support with your card?

[Doom9]

@Yong: well, I only tried running the binary, I didn't even bother installing. I guess I should try it after all, but looking at the msu codec comparison, ATI isn't exactly a performer in the areas I'm looking for.

[Morpheus_xx]

short test clip 40seconds:

LoadPlugin("C:\Programme\video\AviSynth 2.5\plugins\dgdecode.dll")

clip="d:\Capture\test\test"

MPEG2Source(clip+".d2v")
LanczosResize(720,304)

results

encoder  codec  bitrate(codec)     bitrate(result)   enc.time
avivo    h264   abr1600            eff534            13s
avivo    h264   abr2400            eff864            13s
avivo    h264   abr800             eff231            11s
vdub     x264   cbr800             eff823            50s
vdub     xvid   cbr1000            eff943            26s

[slavickas]

Our reference point is our test bed running the trailer in Quicktime 7, which isn't GPU accelerated, and comparing that to Windows Media Player 10 with the Cyberlink H.264 decoder

Being faster then QT isn't big deal , and I was thinking of getting X1300 AGP once it arrives (I'm not gamer and not willing to spend $$$ on vga)

[bond]

without knowing the used codec settings, speed and quality comparisons mean nothing, therefore:

Originally Posted by bond

can you upload somewhere two small .mp4 (generic) files, with h.264 and mpeg-4, created with that encoder plz

[Yong]

Originally Posted by Selur

it would also be interesting to know if different ATI card provide different encodeing/decoding support or if a small 1xxx card would be enough.

@yong: what's your encoding speed, do you get any hardware support with your card?

Just done some encoding test, i *think* its encode pretty fast with MPEG1 video 640x480 , 3844 frames @ 24fps.

Hardware support? encoding or decoding? Later i will try to modify something to let my x264/MPEG4 ASP and etc etc video clips play with dshow ATI MPEG video decoder

BTW, the mp4(the header is different form mp4 thats created by x264) files created by ATI file writer have problem with halli media splitter but playable by quiktime player with some jerkiness(b frames problem?).

@Doom9:
It encode pretty fast but the quality is crappy @ 256kbps... compare with x264(ive done a lot of encode with x264 @ 256kbps)

[bond]

my comments:

- qt7 is a damn slow decoder, it definitely shouldnt be used as a benchmark
- apple trailers use multiple slices. a decoder can be also speeded up by making use of this, without a gpu, so as a test sample a clip without multiple slices should be used to really see the speedup get by the gpu
- the encoders speed values are obviously totally useless, as for a valid speed comparison you would need to use exactly the same settings in both encoders, which the comparison writer surely didnt do.
- "ipod video format" is plain .mp4. i dont like this product-centric naming sheme...

last but not least i am wondering if cyberlink still uses the moonlight avc decoder?