PMP format still required for the PSP?

[Sgt_Strider]

Why are there still people encoding videos in the PMP format for their PSP? I thought with the latest firmware allows the direct encoding into the MP4 format to view at full PSP resolution. Am I missing something here?

[Ranguvar]

Nope, you're not missing anything. In fact, MP4 AVC now can have more efficient settings than PMP AVC, and both are better than PMP DivX/Xvid.

Some people still like PMP for its slightly lower battery life, saving bookmarks, and a few other things I can't quite remember... check out PMPlayer Advance.

I myself use MP4.

[Olebrumm71]

For me the single most important feature of the PMP AVC player would be the support for external subtitle files.

[Ranguvar]

PMPlayer Advance will play videos with external SRT subtitles :)

Although, most good PSP MP4 converters, such as XviD4PSP, will 'burn' the SRT into the video. I recommend v4.115 over the latest 5.xxx build. XviD4PSP will also do the PMP AVC encoding.

[mahsah]

Bah, I always get "Unknown format" with the 480x272 mp4 files... am I supposed to place them anywhere else then the MP_ROOT folder?

[Atak_Snajpera]

Put them in Video folder and make sure you have new firmware

[Ranguvar]

You must have firmware >= 3.30. Custom firmware is fine.

Place the videos in ms0:\VIDEO\, where ms0 is your memstick.

[Assassinator]

Nope, you're not missing anything. In fact, MP4 AVC now can have more efficient settings than PMP AVC, and both are better than PMP DivX/Xvid.

Some people still like PMP for its slightly lower battery life, saving bookmarks, and a few other things I can't quite remember... check out PMPlayer Advance.

I myself use MP4.

Yeah, PMP was popular mainly in the past. Don't really see people using it anymore.


As for encoding your own MP4 AVC vids, use main profile, level 3. And the below frame sizes...
|
V
For PSP resolutions:
>=firmware 3.30
- arbitrary resolutions up to 480x272
- also supports 720x480 and 352x480
>=firmware 5.00
- adds support for 640x480
>=firmware 5.50
- support for 720x576 added (though not officially stated)

--partitions all supported. Can't remember VBV - I believe Sony has put a restriction on this as there was a hack to raise the maximum bitrate to 16384kbps (but still don't know the VBV params).

I don't personally know the exact VBV bounds either, but the MeGUI PSP profile uses --vbv-bufsize 10000 --vbv-maxrate 10000, so I just stole that part of the settings from them.

[Rumbah]

You mustn't forget --ref 3 if you use a preset higher than normal or you use -tune animation.

So just resize to a supported resolution and use x264 with any preset and tuning you like and use:
--profile main --level 3 --ref 3

You won't need any VBV settings. You can even use 16 b-frames but only 3 refs are allowed.

[Comatose]

You have to use -psp when muxing with mp4box.

[Assassinator]

You mustn't forget --ref 3 if you use a preset higher than normal or you use -tune animation.

So just resize to a supported resolution and use x264 with any preset and tuning you like and use:
--profile main --level 3 --ref 3

Yeah, ref 3.

Also, the PSP used to have trouble with the old b-pyramid (results in weird artifacts), but b-pyramid's been updated recently, so I don't know if there are still problems or not, haven't tested lately, will do the next time I encode something for the PSP.

You have to use -psp when muxing with mp4box.

Hmm... Didn't even know that parameter existed, it didn't in old MP4Box versions. Never used it but all my muxes still worked anyway. :P