Staxrip 100 hour ETA in 3rd pass for 7 hours video. Is that too long for amd2800+

[qwan]

I am encoding a 7 hour video (4 files I used the combine option in stax rip) with stax rip.
The source is vhs ripped avi file.
It is currently encoding.
Here are the stats

---------- AviSynth Script ----------

AVISource("E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Volume 1 Gerson Therapy - Overview and Patient Testimonials.avi","E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Volume 2-1 Gerson Therapy - at Home.avi","E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Volume 2-2 Gerson Therapy - at Home.avi","E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Volume 3 Gerson Therapy - Food Preparation.avi",audio=false)
BicubicResize(512,384,0,0.5)

---------- Audio Encoding ----------

Command Line: "C:\StaxRip_1.0.0.1\Settings\Applications\BeSweet\BeSweet.exe" -core( -input "E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Volume 1 Gerson Therapy - Overview and Patient Testimonials.mp3" -output "E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Volume 1 Gerson Therapy - Overview and Patient Testimonials_AudioOutput.mp4" ) -azid( -c normal -L -3db ) -ota( -d 0 -g max ) -bsn( -vbr 0.3 -2ch )

---------- Audio Encoding Statistics ----------

Start time: 6:34:25 PM
End time: 7:31:12 PM
Duration: 00:56:46
Speed: 223 fps
Size: 226.3 MB
Bitrate: 74.85 kbps
Video Bitrate: 450 -> 435

---------- x264 Single/First Pass Encoding ----------

Command Line: "C:\StaxRip_1.0.0.1\Settings\Applications\x264\x264.exe" --pass 1 --bitrate 435 --stats "E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Temporary Files\Volume 1 Gerson Therapy - Overview and Patient Testimonials.stats" --bframes 3 --b-pyramid --direct auto --filter -2:-1 --progress --threads auto --no-psnr --no-ssim --thread-input --subme 1 --analyse none --me dia --ref 1 --output NUL "E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Volume 1 Gerson Therapy - Overview and Patient Testimonials.avs"

---------- x264 Single/First Pass Encoding Statistics ----------

Start time: 7:31:12 PM
End time: 4:33:06 AM
Duration: 09:01:53
Speed: 23 fps

---------- Second Pass Encoding ----------

Command Line: "C:\StaxRip_1.0.0.1\Settings\Applications\x264\x264.exe" --pass 2 --bitrate 435 --stats "E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Temporary Files\Volume 1 Gerson Therapy - Overview and Patient Testimonials.stats" --bframes 3 --b-pyramid --direct auto --filter -2:-1 --progress --threads auto --no-psnr --no-ssim --thread-input --subme 1 --analyse none --me dia --ref 1 --output NUL "E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Volume 1 Gerson Therapy - Overview and Patient Testimonials.avs"

---------- Second Pass Encoding Statistics ----------

Start time: 4:33:06 AM
End time: 10:51:04 AM
Duration: 06:17:58
Speed: 34 fps

---------- Third Pass Encoding ----------

Command Line: "C:\StaxRip_1.0.0.1\Settings\Applications\x264\x264.exe" --pass 3 --bitrate 435 --stats "E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Temporary Files\Volume 1 Gerson Therapy - Overview and Patient Testimonials.stats" --ref 16 --bframes 3 --b-pyramid --weightb --b-rdo --bime --direct auto --filter -2:-1 --analyse all --8x8dct --no-fast-pskip --subme 7 --me esa --trellis 2 --mixed-refs --progress --threads auto --no-psnr --no-ssim --thread-input --output "E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Volume 1 Gerson Therapy - Overview and Patient Testimonials_EncoderOutput.264" "E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Volume 1 Gerson Therapy - Overview and Patient Testimonials.avs"


As you can see the 1st pass took 9 hours and the second pass took 6 hours. Now the third pass is showing an eta of 100 hours since the past 10 hours.
It is encoding at 1.99fps and it is using all the CPU supported capabilitie(MMX, MMXext, SSE, SSE3 and 3DNOW).

Now is this normal, I have used HQ insane quality and have given all the setting as high like quality setting on 7.

I have earlier encoded smaller videos(45minute) at the same extreme quality setting in 3 hours(same 3 pass 350 bit encoding).
for the entire encoding process.(on this same machine).

What I wanted to know if this is the normal, if yes then can I pause it just in case of power failure and resume it again(or can i resume it if my computer shuts down as a result of a power failure).
I had unsuccesfully tried to encode another 1 hour video earlier(with the same settings) it was showing the 3rd pass eta around 20 hours. Infact i left it on and it encoded but there was an audio delay. Later I realised that the source was flawed and when I used Vdub to extract audio as wave it always gave a 2 minute audio delay.(the original plays fine thoug).
well so I assumed that the source had a problem thats why it took so long.

But now this avi seems fine. Infact I have encoded one of the files long ago(before I faced this "long time problem" with the earlier avi) and it was succesful and did not take that much time.
The only problem was I had set the bitrate to 290 which was too less and I got bad quality(reason being that 290 bitrate is good enough for 320* resolutions this video is 640* resolution) so I decided to try again with a higher bitrate of 450.

Anybody please help and tell me everything i allright or am I doing something wrong.

Ofcourse I would like to add that earlier I used to always use the source template as Mpeg2(even for avis). Now i have started using the avi template for the last two videos which I faced a problem with.
So could this be a problem.
Please help thank you,
My power might fail any time and I might never finish this encoding. :-(

[Sharktooth]

select a more "sane" profile.
HQ-Insane, as the name says, is insanely slow.

[nm]

Your --pass parameters are wrong. From x264 --help:
-p, --pass <1|2|3> Enable multipass ratecontrol
- 1: First pass, creates stats file
- 2: Last pass, does not overwrite stats file
- 3: Nth pass, overwrites stats file
Which means that you should use --pass 3 for the intermediate passes (second pass in your case) and --pass 2 for the final pass (third pass for you).

However, 3-pass encoding is totally insane (as in no quality gained) for videos that are longer than a few minutes or so. I'd use CRF in your place.

[stax76]

It's a bug in StaxRip, a fix can be downloaded here (http://www.planetdvb.net/non_drupal/staxrip/StaxRip_unofficial.exe).

[qwan]

It's a bug in StaxRip, a fix can be downloaded here (http://www.planetdvb.net/non_drupal/staxrip/StaxRip_unofficial.exe).
Thanks stax I will download the fix and let you know. I have used the same setting and ripped videos before and it takes a lot of time but not more than 4 hours for a 45 minute video.
Right now I am using an edited HQ insane profile in Megui and the ETA is 10 hours, which is absolutely fine. Which in response to Shartooths post>>I know its insanely slow, but i cant be insane upto the tune of 101 hours??

Nm I am not sure what you are trying to tell me to do, but I think it is a bug like stax has suggested, I will try that and if it doesnt work i will bug you :-D to explain it to me in details.
And about quality of 3 pass encoding I have read a very heated discussion on a board on 3 pass encoding and it is was concluded that 3 pass shows extreme quality differences on low bitrate(below 500 or 600 kpbs).
Above that it is a waste of time. I have seen visible difference in 2 pass and 3 pass encoding my self. It is obvious the quality difference. And I use a bitrate of 190 to 250kps.
I have encoded the same file twice and I used a 45 minute The Daily show avid release of 175 mb. I encoded it down to 75 mb without out any visible loss using 3 pass encoding @ 250 kbps.(video bitrate is only 190, 60 kps for audio). I have done the same on a 2 pass encoding with extremely high settings and the quality is horrible to get the same quality I needed to use 450 kps bitrate and the file size more than doubled.

@nm I think that quality increase is significant for low bitrates. I have been using it for files more than a few minutes. The major consensus is not about the lenght of the video but rather the bitrate anything above 500kbps and a 3 pass is useless.
What is CRF btw. How do I use that?
Will it give me similiar filesizes(45 minutes 320* resolution tv rip into 75mb with HE aac audio 60kps)
Thank for all your replies:thanks:

[nm]

I have encoded the same file twice and I used a 45 minute The Daily show avid release of 175 mb. I encoded it down to 75 mb without out any visible loss using 3 pass encoding @ 250 kbps.(video bitrate is only 190, 60 kps for audio). I have done the same on a 2 pass encoding with extremely high settings and the quality is horrible to get the same quality I needed to use 450 kps bitrate and the file size more than doubled.
I doubt the reason for those quality differences is the number of encoding passes, especially since you have apparently been doing 2-pass encodings instead of 3-pass if you have used StaxRip (that's essentially what I said in the last reply concerning the --pass parameters). Are you sure that equivalent encoding settings were used in both cases for the final pass and that there weren't differences in preprocessing?

@nm I think that quality increase is significant for low bitrates. I have been using it for files more than a few minutes. The major consensus is not about the lenght of the video but rather the bitrate anything above 500kbps and a 3 pass is useless.
Well, I haven't seen such differences nor heard of people generally using or recommending a third pass for low-bitrate encoding.

What is CRF btw. How do I use that?
Use search (or Google). It has been discussed so many times over that it is getting boring to repeat :)

[burfadel]

You have:
--ref 16 (excessive reference frames)
--subme 7
--me esa (very excessive)
--no-fast-pskip

Try something like --ref 5 as after 5 ref frames the returns are neglible. The only time this is not true is with 'static?' animation such as Family Guy, South Park etc etc. Real life footage or movies etc the scene changes too much for the extra reference frames to be benefical.

--me esa is a very excessive search method and is not for normal use. Even --me umh is too much, try hex for speed, barely noticeable if noticeable at all quality loss.

Use subme 6 or even 5. 7 is excessive unless you have a fast quad core!

Update x264 to rev 748 (or later) from www.x264.nl

Copy over the staxrip version. This would be faster than the one that came with version Staxrip 1.0.0.1

[qwan]

I doubt the reason for those quality differences is the number of encoding passes, especially since you have apparently been doing 2-pass encodings instead of 3-pass if you have used StaxRip..........
I have been using only 3 pass encodings. That is what i am trying to say. I have used only 3 pass encodings in the past with the very same settings in Staxrip, it used to take long times(4 hours or upto 10 hours for long video to encode entire video). Here it is taking 101 hours just for the 3rd pass.
The only thing I changed was the source template, i used to use mpeg2 template as i used to rip dvds and never occured that i should use the avi template for avis. So i thought maybe this could be a problem


Well, I haven't seen such differences nor heard of people generally using or recommending a third pass for low-bitrate encoding.
Well you havent see enough then :-P. I have searched this info years back when i was just trying out x264. I found an x264 file on the web which had great quality at 200kbps. I tried to encode same files with the same lenght(the dailyshow episodes) but just got horrible quality. I was not using staxrip I was using those mainstream enocoders and none of them have 3 pass. When i heard of 3 pass i wanted try it and that is when i found staxrip. During my search I found this thread which had screenshots that proved a 3 pass has no significant quality difference at all.
After I did a 3 pass in staxrip i went back to that forum and registered just show my screenshots.
That guy was one of the most knowledgable guys on x264 and very articulate when writing that post. He just pointed out to me that he had mentioned in his post that 3 pass did not make any difference under bitrates below 500kbps.
I had just "skimmed" through his post as it was long and i had missed that part out.
Well before assuming things why dont you try encoding a daily show episode in a 2 pass and a 3 pass in staxrip using 190 kpbs for video and 60 kps for audio and then comment on the subject.


Use search (or Google). It has been discussed so many times over that it is getting boring to repeat :)
Thanks I will search for it in the forum, because i did not relate to CRF. I dont know if it is an encoding process or a profile, You can not know much in an acronym or else I would searched for it myself.

You have:
--ref 16 (excessive reference frames)
--subme 7
--me esa (very excessive)
--no-fast-pskip

Try something like --ref 5 as after 5 ref frames the returns are neglible. The only time this is not true is with 'static?' animation such as Family Guy, South Park etc etc. Real life footage or movies etc the scene changes too much for the extra reference frames to be benefical.

--me esa is a very excessive search method and is not for normal use. Even --me umh is too much, try hex for speed, barely noticeable if noticeable at all quality loss.

Use subme 6 or even 5. 7 is excessive unless you have a fast quad core!

Update x264 to rev 748 (or later) from www.x264.nl

Copy over the staxrip version. This would be faster than the one that came with version Staxrip 1.0.0.1

Thanks for the tips burfadel.
I never played around with these setting as when i did my research i found out that this increased the time a lot. I am aware or this, but like I told you the overall time taken to encode a video with these extreme settings was only 4 hours. So i really did not matter, I just thought lets keep it I just started finding the lowest bitrate I could use without any quality loss. I though keeping this setting high would allow me to go lower. Maybe I should try your recomendations and see if it really is that worth it. I need to find a smaller file to test.

My real problem is still not answered. burfadel earlier I used to record with these same setting and the video did not take such a long time(4 hours is long I know for a 45 minute video but i did not mind) But now it is taking 24 hours just for the 3rd pass in a 1 hour video. The framerate at which it encodes the 3rd pass is around 1.99. After I got the new version of staxrip and in the stats I just posted the framerate was a little higher @ 2.99.

I was hoping someone would shed light on this. Is this too slow.
Apart from the fact that i have encoded videos faster with these same setting. anyone else doing a 3 pass encoding or know about these, do they think that 2.9 fps is too slow.
You can see from the stats the first pass and second pass encoded at 23fps and 34 fps respectively.

[nm]

I have been using only 3 pass encodings. That is what i am trying to say. I have used only 3 pass encodings in the past with the very same settings in Staxrip, it used to take long times(4 hours or upto 10 hours for long video to encode entire video). Here it is taking 101 hours just for the 3rd pass.
But those 3-pass StaxRip encodings have actually been 2-pass encodings with 1 wasted pass, because StaxRip used wrong parameters for the second pass. So the good quality at low bitrate was not due to 3-pass encoding but other settings or filtering.

My real problem is still not answered. burfadel earlier I used to record with these same setting and the video did not take such a long time(4 hours is long I know for a 45 minute video but i did not mind) But now it is taking 24 hours just for the 3rd pass in a 1 hour video. The framerate at which it encodes the 3rd pass is around 1.99. After I got the new version of staxrip and in the stats I just posted the framerate was a little higher @ 2.99.
This is quite a normal framerate for those encoding settings on your CPU. Maybe you previously encoded with a much lower resolution (320x240, for example), or with completely different settings (perhaps without knowing: you should compare the settings stored within your files by x264). So your problem is clearly in the overkill settings.

[qwan]

But those 3-pass StaxRip encodings have actually been 2-pass encodings with 1 wasted pass, because StaxRip used wrong parameters for the second pass. So the good quality at low bitrate was not due to 3-pass encoding but other settings or filtering.
If that is the case then why did I not get the same quality when i tried it with the same settings in two pass, i am not trying to argue here but I really want to find out If I have been wasting my time. Can you send me a 2 pass profile I can use that will give me the same quality. I need a low file size too and I have heard that 3pass gives you the exact filesize.
Since you are so confident i dont mind tying it out again, so please give me an edited profile and I will encode the same file twice and see the difference.


This is quite a normal framerate for those encoding settings on your CPU. Maybe you previously encoded with a much lower resolution (320x240, for example), or with completely different settings (perhaps without knowing: you should compare the settings stored within your files by x264). So your problem is clearly in the overkill settings.
Yes you are right It is clearly the case, the resolution I was encoding was indeed 320*.
But the time taken was too long. I donwloaded the fixed version given by stax and i got the time down to 10 hours. See I have posted the stats below.
When i did a calculation this is the exact time I should expect as this video is at a resolution of 512* and it is 1 hour 38 minutes.
This was indeed a bug as this same file was showing me 24 hours ETA.
I would really like to eliminate the 3rd pass with a little compromise in filesize(10 hours is still long and I have more than 7 hours of video to encode so even with the bug fix it is going to take too long), So please NM help me out here.
Thank you

Also stax thanks for the fix.

---------- Third Pass Encoding ----------

Command Line: "C:\Program Files\StaxRip\Settings\Applications\x264\x264.exe" --pass 2 --bitrate 433 --stats "E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Temporary Files\Volume 1 Gerson Therapy - Overview and Patient Testimonials.stats" --ref 3 --bframes 3 --b-pyramid --weightb --b-rdo --bime --analyse all --8x8dct --no-fast-pskip --subme 7 --me esa --trellis 2 --mixed-refs --progress --threads auto --no-psnr --no-ssim --thread-input --output "E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Volume 1 Gerson Therapy - Overview and Patient Testimonials_EncoderOutput.264" "E:\The Gerson Therapy - Healing Incurable Illness Vol 1-4\Volume 1 Gerson Therapy - Overview and Patient Testimonials.avs"

---------- Third Pass Encoding Statistics ----------

Start time: 2:02:58 AM
End time: 12:12:50 PM
Duration: 10:09:52
Speed: 5 fps

[nm]

If that is the case then why did I not get the same quality when i tried it with the same settings in two pass, i am not trying to argue here but I really want to find out If I have been wasting my time.
Hard to say without seeing the encoding logs and perhaps short sample encodes.

Can you send me a 2 pass profile I can use that will give me the same quality.
Sorry, I can't use StaxRip since I don't have Windows and it doesn't seem to run with Mono and Wine. I can take a look at the profiles if you upload them somewhere (like http://pastebin.com), but maybe some StaxRip user could help here.

I need a low file size too and I have heard that 3pass gives you the exact filesize.
So does 2-pass. The ratecontrol may fail on very short clips, but on long videos such as yours, it works as well as 3-pass.

I would really like to eliminate the 3rd pass with a little compromise in filesize(10 hours is still long and I have more than 7 hours of video to encode so even with the bug fix it is going to take too long)
You still have "--subme 7 --me esa --trellis 2" there. Substitute that with "--subme 6 --me umh --trellis 1" to make it faster without visible quality reduction. And maybe use --ref 5 instead of --ref 3 because that would cancel out the small quality drop without slowing encoding down too much.

[qwan]

Hard to say without seeing the encoding logs and perhaps short sample encodes.

I will provide you one, I will even post the profiles used.


Sorry, I can't use StaxRip since I don't have Windows and it doesn't seem to run with Mono and Wine. I can take a look at the profiles if you upload them somewhere (like http://pastebin.com), but maybe some StaxRip user could help here.
I will do that


So does 2-pass. The ratecontrol may fail on very short clips, but on long videos such as yours, it works as well as 3-pass.
hmmmm ok I am willing to sacrifice a few mb if I gain considerable in time. So I am will definately try what you are suggesting


You still have "--subme 7 --me esa --trellis 2" there. Substitute that with "--subme 6 --me umh --trellis 1" to make it faster without visible quality reduction. And maybe use --ref 5 instead of --ref 3 because that would cancel out the small quality drop without slowing encoding down too much.

Now should I lower these settings mentioned above with a 2 pass???? Or are you trying to save me time on the 3 pass.

Now I will be encoding a video in two pass so do i keep the subme at 6 and ref at 3 and trellis at 1?????
Or do I use my insane settings?

Thank you for you reply

[nm]

Now should I lower these settings mentioned above with a 2 pass???? Or are you trying to save me time on the 3 pass.

Now I will be encoding a video in two pass so do i keep the subme at 6 and ref at 3 and trellis at 1?????
Or do I use my insane settings?
Use the faster settings in both cases. However, I'd probably use --ref 5 instead of --ref 3 (for the final pass in two and three passes).

The slower the final pass settings, the smaller the difference is between two-pass and three-pass encoding times because StaxRip seems to be using very fast settings for the first passes.