Advice/opinions on MeGUI x264 settings before I start a DVD library backup

[jmrenrav]

So after about 4 to 5 weeks of tinkering and messing around with x264 and meGUI I think I have the settings I would like to use to backup my DVD library.

I’m just looking for a few users opinions or advice from people who have done this before, just to make sure I’m not making any mistakes.
Sources will be standard definition.

X264 settings:

Set the slider to “Placebo” and then modify the following…

Profile = High
Level 3.1
Automated 2 Pass
Reference Frames = 8
3 B Frames
B Pyrmaid = On
VBV Buffer = 14000
VBV Max = 17500
M.E. Range = 64
Uneven Multi Hex
program --profile high --level 3.1 --preset placebo --pass 2 --stats ".stats" --slow-firstpass --thread-input --bframes 3 --b-pyramid normal --ref 8 --vbv-bufsize 14000 --vbv-maxrate 17500 --merange 64 --me umh --output "output" "input"

I have done a good bit of encoding using this profile and I’m very satisfied with the results. I have tried CRF and was very unsatisfied with the results, some movies looked good at CRF20, while others didn’t even look good at CRF14.

I spent a good bit of time trying to figure out a “good” way to come up with a target bitrate…well based on everything I tried, I am just going to simply use a percentage of the original source video (demuxed) So for example if the movie is a avg bitrate of 6000, I will encode a half that or 40% of 6000. This makes it easier for me to figure out my target bitrate instead of running it through CRF or CQ first. I also like this method, because the file sizes are always reduced by the same %

I use “Spline36” as my resize filer, and autocrop using a mod 16 resize method. Nothing else selected on Avisynth.

Considering time is not an issue, what do you guys think?

[nurbs]

Why --merange 64?

[jmrenrav]

I was using 24, but then looked at a few forums with people using Handbrake and they use 64 for many of their "insane" profiles, so I figured i'd give it a shot.

[Dark Shikari]

Why set the preset to placebo and then drag the settings manually back to "slower"?

[jmrenrav]

Well unless i'm wrong, I *think* I am trying to maintain DXVA compatibility. I understand that BPyrmaid will break it according to the following

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=972503

but it's also my understanding that it has been fixed.

So in order to maintain hardware compatibility I have to back up reference frames and b frames. I also set buffers and max bitrate. The reason why I back down to Multihex is to speed up encodes, because I've herd that Exhaustive is nearly pointless for the benefit.

I play all my videos back using an Asus O!Play

[nurbs]

Since merange is the search range from the best predicted position I guess using much higer values than the default or 24 in placebo is pretty useless. Probably better to keep --me tesa and keep the range at 24. Maybe using tesa with range 16 could also be more usefull than umh with 64, but Dark Shikari will know better than me.

[quantum5uicid3]

unless youre using some POS video card, DXVA has no restrictions anymore

edit: doing a quick google about that device.

--level 4.1 would probably be better. keep the --vbv-bufsize 14000 --vbv-maxrate 17500 though

[jmrenrav]

It still looks to be a little bit of a gray area for me...but it appears that DXVA 1.0 is Windows XP, 2000 ect and DXVA 2.0 is Vista and up.

So to maintain compatibility on Xp systems or "weaker" stand alone players, I'd have to stay in DXVA 1.0 spec?

Also, isn't the level just a tag used for the decoder? So it doesn’t really do much more then tell the decoder what level of specifications the movie was encoded in?

Here is a good example of where a person ran into DXVA 1.0 vs 2.0
http://forum.eeeuser.com/viewtopic.php?pid=668556
(Post # 20)

[quantum5uicid3]

It still looks to be a little bit of a gray area for me...but it appears that DXVA 1.0 is Windows XP, 2000 ect and DXVA 2.0 is Vista and up.

So to maintain compatibility on Xp systems or "weaker" stand alone players, I'd have to stay in DXVA 1.0 spec?

Also, isn't the level just a tag used for the decoder? So it doesn’t really do much more then tell the decoder what level of specifications the movie was encoded in?

Here is a good example of where a person ran into DXVA 1.0 vs 2.0
http://forum.eeeuser.com/viewtopic.php?pid=668556
(Post # 20)

no, had that person properly configured mpc-hc for h264 dxva playback on xp, their performance wouldve been similar to vista/7. the O!Play is not DXVA anyways, here's a thread where someone did some testing:

http://vip.asus.com/forum/view.aspx?board_id=19&model=O!Play%20HDP-R1&id=20100104204946468&page=1&SLanguage=en-us

[jmrenrav]

hmm What to do then? Should I just shoot for Placebo settings and wait/hope for future hardware support (which the majority is now) or scale back and ensure backwards compatibility, even on slower PC/media players?

I'm curious if there would be a huge difference between 8 and 16 reference frames anyway, from what I understand the results are pretty diminishing.

But again, if time isnt an issue, your thoughts?

[quantum5uicid3]

since your encoding SD sources, I would try this, if you move to HD, then you'll need to scale back the ref and bframes.

program --profile high --preset placebo --pass 2 --stats ".stats" --slow-firstpass --thread-input --b-pyramid normal --vbv-bufsize 14000 --vbv-maxrate 17500 --merange 64 --me umh --output "output" "input"