Difference between H.264 and x264

[Vauxhall95]

Could someone explain to me what the difference is between h.264 and x264? I'm assuming they are different codecs; however if I have a media center which explicitly states it will play H.264 and mkv files, does that mean it will/should play x264 files? If not, what would I have do to get those files to work (re-encode?, if so with what software)?

Thanks,

Vaux

[Dark Shikari]

MPEG-4 Part 10, aka H.264/AVC, is a standard. x264 is an encoder that implements that standard. That is, x264 is a program that outputs H.264 files.

MPEG-4 Part 2, aka MPEG-4 ASP, is a standard. Xvid and Divx are encoders that implement that standard.

MPEG-2 is a standard. HC, CCE, TmpegEnc, etc are encoders that implement that standard.

etc, etc, etc

[microchip8]

x264 also doesn't implement yet all the specifications/options of the full H.264/AVC standard, but I'm not aware if any of the other H.264 encoders does that either

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Don't mix up "Codec" and "Format/Standard"

H.264 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.264) = a standard for video compression. It's a video format, specifications, documents, etc.
x264 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X264) = an encoder that (partially) implements the H.264 standard. It's a piece of software you can use to create H.264 video.

[foxyshadis]

x264 also doesn't implement yet all the specifications/options of the full H.264/AVC standard, but I'm not aware if any of the other H.264 encoders does that either

What's really more important for the question is whether the player supports the full standard, which is also never the case. Hardware players are always more restricted than software players, and won't play everything that the encoders can create. Depending on the capabilities of your player and the profiles your videos were made with, you may need to re-encode some or all of them.