I have video conversion issues with Mac software. Damn!!
I’m sorry to say that NOTHING beat VirtualDub … (;o;) … I continue to run it on a virtual machine.
(Author or someone with a wonderful hearth (and mind) … compile/create it under Mac!!) Onegaishimasu!!
Since I need to convert huge video files (1280×720 or H264) to a lower resolution (704×396) with Divx/Xvid codec, recognized properly by my Pioneer home DVD player, I have played a bit with the most common video converters. My home DVD player is recent, works very well, it detects even subtitles but new formats are not recognized. It’s a pity. The producer claimed an upgradable firmware but… well until now no updates are available.
FFMPEGX convert the file. The conversion must be made with mencode engine (ffmpeg engine corrupts always mp3 audio, also if you do a direct copy of it). I don’t know why. Conversion with fixed quantizer does not work, it converts always with the specified bitrate, also if you set Qmin and Qmax at the same value (to have fixed quantizer, as documentation explain). It’s old and buggy. Crashes often. Even watched on computer the result files are damaged.
So I have abandoned it.
VISUALHUB makes great conversions with a good speed but if XVID codec is used, the result file is not compatible with my home DVD player (video trigger and jump always). And I do not use any Qpel or advanced options.
Played on computer they are OK. I must force the use of MPEG4 codec to produce a readable file for my home DVD player. With MPEG4 result file is smaller, compatible, but it has a little lower quality. However the difference is very small. At least it can be used.
Currently I convert with it only the 1280×720 version of Tokyo Shojo because they cannot be converted converted on Windows, the PC crashes always when start to read these types of files (on 4 different machines!). I think it’s a codec incompatibility. Strange, they are played correctly… With Visualhub instead the conversion goes well. A good point of Visualhub is that it can read nearly everything.
HANDBRAKE is completely buggy, crashes 8 times over 10. Its conversion engine is the fastest, it’s true, nearly 3 times faster that other programs but the converted files have the same unreadability of these produced with Visualhub, but this time with both XVID and MPEG4 codec. This is bad. As Visualhub files, they can be played well on the computer but not on my home DVD player. I have analyzed the log files, the converted videos and I have found a lot of dropped frames during conversion, videos trigger always. At this stage Handbrake with XVID/MPEG4 codec cannot be used to convert decently a video. Add that it can resize only at FIXED resolutions and you will trash it immediately. With this program is NOT possible to convert a 1280×720 file to 704×396. Bad.
AVIDEMUX is very promising. It have a lot of options that other converters does not do. It’s a sort of Virtualdub “clone” for Mac. But as Visualhub and other progs, it’s based on these ffmpeg/xvid conversion engines so the results are the same as Visualhub. Avidemux have all the options that other converters misses. It works very well but it’s a lot slower than VisualHub.
EDIT: Version 2.4.4 produces XVID compatible files for my home DVD player! Hurrah!!
MPEGSTREAMCLIP is a good jewel in the panorama of converters. It’s the only one that can convert files using DIVX codec (forget applications based on QuickTime!). As Visualhub have a lot of options (resize, adjust video, etc.). It misses (in my opinion) the direct pass-through of MP3 audio (copy without re-encode). It’s available for AC3. This force the user to convert the video without audio and mux the audio in the final file with Avidemux. It’s a pity. I abandoned it because files converted with DIVX codec are bigger than those created on Windows.
Currently XVID codec for OSX exists but it’s an old version, until today the v1.2.1 XP version is not available on Mac. But the old codec works. With the above limitations. I use the updated version on Virtualdub until new version will be available for Mac. Divx6 also exists on Mac. But, for unknown reasons, with same conversion parameters (quantizer, quality, optimizations) the result file produced on Mac is about 1,5 times bigger than the file produced with Divx6 for Windows (320Mb on Xp and 458Mb on Mac). It’s lame. After I have noticed this I have stopped the use of Divx for Mac.
From this point of view the Mac software is again a step behind the software for XP.
Create a virtual XP machine in Virtualbox, install Koepi XVID codec, MP3 acm codec, Virtualdub with AC3 and MPEG2 fcc-handler plugins and you can have a system ready to create compatible files for most of the home DVD players. All freeware.
Many thanks to the authors.
