Encoding Hardware, what's important for fast encodes?

[tominator]

Hi.
I'm using a 3,0Ghz P4 with 512MB RAM and an integrated graphics card. Unfortunatly this is all I know about my system. I don't know what kind of RAM (guessing DDR) and I have no clue what type of mobo I have and so on.

I encode WMV-streams from DVD-movies (m2v- and ac3-files) demuxed with DVDDecrypter. I use ProCoder 2.0 for this.

I encode one file with two bitrates (1500Kbit with 128Kbit audio) and (800Kbit with 128Kbit audio). Both 2-pass. I encode 24/7 all year round.

The encoding takes forever (12 hours and more/movie).

I would like to know what I can do to speed up the process.

1, How much would it help if I got more RAM? Should I get 512 for a total of 1GB or should my total be even more?

2, Would a new graphics card help? In that case are there any cards you recommend?

3, I've been reading a bit about encoding cards. Should I get one of these? What do they do anyway? What exactly am I looking for? Is it an mpeg2-encoding card I want?

Thanks heaps.

[BigDid]

Hi.
I'm using a 3,0Ghz P4 with 512MB RAM and an integrated graphics card. Unfortunatly this is all I know about my system. I don't know what kind of RAM (guessing DDR) and I have no clue what type of mobo I have and so on...
Hi,

Use Cpuz to get more info on Cpu, motherboard and Ram.
1, How much would it help if I got more RAM? Should I get 512 for a total of 1GB or should my total be even more?..
Go for 1Gb or more; also depends if you own the PC or not...
If you own it, dual core is, after RAM the best move; more on the subject: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=112621
See also a new computer thread: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=114368
and GPU prices: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=114692
All this I.M.O. :)

Did

[tominator]

Thanks a whole lot.

But would a dual core processor actually cut my encoding times in half or what?

[shakey]

Dual core would significantly speed up encoding if the codec you're using is multi-threaded. If it's only single-threaded then you'll notice at most only a very slight speedup.


My biggest suggestion would be (if you can) to ditch wmv and go for something like xvid. You'll suddenly find encoding is much faster and better quality. And the latest build is multi-threaded so could make use of your new dual-core cpu :D .

[tominator]

I'm sorry to say I can't ditch WMV. I'd love to be making xvids but I can't.

Is WMV multithreaded?

Ive been trying to make sense of the whole GPU thing mentioned by BigDid but I'm afraid I don't understand. I didn't think the graphics card had anything to do with the encode. Am I wrong?

[BigDid]

Thanks a whole lot.

But would a dual core processor actually cut my encoding times in half or what?
For Xvid, anywhere between -30 to -80% time, see: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=861082#post861082 and following.

Also for other encoders, follow the links in the above "x264 & XVID on dualcore CPUs" thread, there are some comparison charts with xvid, wme, etc...

Did

[tominator]

Ive been trying to make sense of the whole GPU thing mentioned by BigDid but I'm afraid I don't understand. I didn't think the graphics card had anything to do with the encode. Am I wrong?

Thanks again BigDid. You wouldn't happen to have a response to this?

[BigDid]

Thanks again BigDid. You wouldn't happen to have a response to this?
I can only answer regarding Xvid and the answer is no regarding the encoder. It can be used for a few filters (preprocessing) in avisynth like fft3dgpu. In the future hardware encoding may generalize but it's not the case actually see: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=114567

Did

[UofC]

It realy depends on the enviroment but CPU speed and hard drive speed are the limiting factors. In your case dvd to hard drive, the dvd will limit you.

1) More ram wil only help if the program can buffer data but the CPU should be faster then the dvd drive anyways. I do not think ram will do much.

2) New graphics will do little other then make the preview smoother. It is not required or needed for encoding. If you do video editing then yes it will help.

3) Encoder cards are for live or other formats. If you are taking a TV signal in the card can do the conversion on the fly and leave more CPU for the encode.

It comes down to dvd burner/readers are slow. Dual core do help but do not beat two single CPUs.

Have you tried copying to the hard drive then doing the conversion? A drive can read upto 60MB/s, a DVD rom can read upto 21.6MB/s at 16x.

[tominator]

Have you tried copying to the hard drive then doing the conversion? A drive can read upto 60MB/s, a DVD rom can read upto 21.6MB/s at 16x.

This is what I do all the time. I demux using DVDDecrypter. In other words I put the files on the hard drive. Then I use ProCoder 2.0 to make the conversion.

So an encoding card will not help in my situation? What are the "other formats" besides live encoding cards will help with?

Could my hard drive be so slow that I could get better results if I got a faster one?

[shakey]

Looking at how long the encode takes, I'd think that the speed is being limited by the cpu, as it does not take 12 hours to read an mpeg2 stream from a hard disk (the dvd data).

Your best bet would be to get a faster cpu (dual core if the encoder is multithreaded). Another 512MB ram would also be a very good idea. You could go for 2GB total, but that might mean ditching your current stick and buying two 1gb sticks (more expensive/hassle).

[tominator]

Looking at how long the encode takes, I'd think that the speed is being limited by the cpu, as it does not take 12 hours to read an mpeg2 stream from a hard disk (the dvd data).

Your best bet would be to get a faster cpu (dual core if the encoder is multithreaded). Another 512MB ram would also be a very good idea. You could go for 2GB total, but that might mean ditching your current stick and buying two 1gb sticks (more expensive/hassle).

Okay, but how do I find out if my encoder i multithreaded? I use WMV 9. I don't know if Im using advanced profile though. How do I find out?

Thanks a lot for all the help everyone.

[Inventive Software]

What encoding application are you using to encode to WMV9? Are you using VirtualDub and the VCM codec, or WMNicEnc or Windows Media Encoder?

[tominator]

What encoding application are you using to encode to WMV9? Are you using VirtualDub and the VCM codec, or WMNicEnc or Windows Media Encoder?

Im using Canopus ProCoder 2.0.

[shakey]

On the Canopus ProCoder website, it lists this as one of the features:

Multiprocessor and Hyper-Threading support for faster encoding

So it might well be multi-threaded

[tominator]

On the Canopus ProCoder website, it lists this as one of the features:



So it might well be multi-threaded

Hmm. Im getting a bit mixed up here. Is it the program that does the encode that has to be multithreaded or the actual encoder (read WMV)?

[theReal]

More ram wil only help if the program can buffer data but the CPU should be faster then the dvd drive anyways. I do not think ram will do much. That is bullsh*t, the DVD has nothing to do with the speed here. tominator said he already has the .vobs demuxed on hdd and the encoding takes ~12h per movie.

I don't know if wmv9 is multi-threaded, but I wanted to add that what basically makes encoding faster is FSB speed, memory clock speed and cpu clock speed. These three are the usual suspects if you are looking for the bottlenecks.
512MB RAM should be enough if you're only encoding (I am myself stuck with 512MB but the only RAM-problematic progs that I use are photoshop cs and premiere 1.5, encoders don't use that much RAM).
With a new board, new RAM and new cpu (all of which brand-name quality with highest possible clock speeds) you'll definitely get faster encoding, even without multi-threading!

[tominator]

That is bullsh*t, the DVD has nothing to do with the speed here. tominator said he already has the .vobs demuxed on hdd and the encoding takes ~12h per movie.


Thanks everyone.

Just want to say that I personally think that a big reason to why its taking so long is that Im actually encoding two bitrates (1500 and 800) into the same file which must take longer than only one.

[UofC]

tominator,

Dual bit rates will indeed greatly increase the load ergo slower transocdes. If you want more speed get the biggest CPU you can afford to install. Dual core does help but a single core can compare if you are doing a single transcode.

Perhaps a D805 system overclocked nightly would yield the results you are looking for. They are cheap and reach stellar speeds at the cost of a higher electricity bill. Do a search and you will find results on the performance of the CPU.

Real,

Perhaps it was my fault and I was not clear. I simply stating that memory is not a big player in encoders. A dvd read will indeed slow the process because of the extra step. It is good that tominator is copying to the hard drive.