Enjoy it before Vista comes with all its DRM polluted hardware/software :!:
(to remind you : you wont' be abble to read a HD-DVD or a blu-ray in HD resolution if you don't have a certified projector or monitor to display it. You will be limited to standard resolution :twisted: )

Yep Karl, Linux would be nice.

Or .... a Win2000/XP minimal Installation just including FFdshow and for example MPC!.
A Little Purebasic selfmade Appl. would be set as Startup where you could see a nice Background and a Filerequester or DevicePlaybackRequester would be shown. The selected File/Media would be played back using MPC in CLI Mode or Mplayer.exe or Zoomplayer. MPC is still the most flexible, as beside CLI Support you can use a wirelss Mouse on your Couch Table for choosing Subs/Audios etc. using the right-klick-tab on your mouse :D

That above is just a "thought" for a playback only HTPC, so still no DVB or TV serving support.

Se bad sideeffect is .... the HTPC needs more time to to startup compared to a SAP and it consumpts MUCH more power and as you heared, the Electricity-Industry (at least in germany) did rise their prices for the next year about 30%!!! no matter which company.

@ Phil

Yep, thats a mess realted to DRM! I read about it.
Really? I though it will be fully crypted till it arrives the Outputdevice?
Means the Graphicscard as a projector LCD TV would be connected via VGA Plug or DVI plug. But maybe they would only support DVI Plug so the Data still will be served crypted via DVI and the Displaydevice itself does decrypt (as you said) ... hmmmm.

But I didn't thought that at least a standard resolution of for example 720x576 could be seen if no certified device is used for outputting the Video.

But imho .... just wait for the cracks in india or russia where shurely they will crack that protection for personal-only backup purposes ;)
On the other side ....AFAIK they did gave the SAP industry a timelimit for 1 Year to change the electronic. But I dont think people will change their equipment in that time? Is everybody a millionary ?

The best protection against WAREZ is making offered Products more attractive than warez! Would be easely done by reducing prices on DVDs or AudioCDs.
If I do go to our Big Electronic Store "Saturn" they often do sell in "nice Price actions" several good blockbusters for 9,95€.
Not Imagine how much Power a PC does consumpt when running through days to obtain the same DVD-9 Quality :)

Same in the Music CD Industry. Economists did tell them "Sell your stuff for 9,95€" and Warez is DEAD! And still you will gain more than now.
I remember when an ACTUAL Longplay did cost about 14,90 Marks (about 7,50 Euros now). CDs are much more less expensive to produce and even If ou take into account the Countrys economic inflation, that beast of Audioo CD easely could cost now about 9,95€! And they would still gain.

Warez is illegal, no doubt --- bit its not only a robbery behaviour, its also a revolution against hell-price-monopols and also the only choice if you want a backup of an audioCD for Car-playing purposes. I would never store originals in my car, neither carrying the CDs every time with me.

Inc, some feedback...

I've been playing these days with MeGUI and x264 encoding. It looks to me that, for the same filesize, it's less blocky.
Related to speed, a little slower than CCE.
I made a text file with x264. exe -h output, and you're right, maybe I'll be encoding from command-line soon. It has less options than mencoder, for instance. The problem is that in the help it doesn't explain in detail what each parameter is for, and I'll have to "study" in Google a bit. And x264 encoding is so different.. key frames intervals of 250... for those used to divx or xvid encoding it's not surprising, but for me it's difficult to know if it will be better to insert plus b-frames, more or less key frame interval, and so.
I manage well now in mpeg-1 -2 world, this is completely different. But as I like to test and learn, I don't mind.
For instance, I tried loading notch matrix in x264, and the result was terrible: blockier and a light's on/off effect. I want to try other matrices, from xvid world, to see if it was just an error when loading custom matrices, or notch matrix doesn't work well with this way of encoding (or maybe they tweaked the code to make it look worse when notch is in :lol: . Just kidding). I don't know what the default matrix is, do you know it?. What matrix would you recommend, for general encoding?.

I need some directions. I muxed an MP4 with 2 audio and 2 .srt subtitle streams. In mediaplayerclassic I just can see 1 audio (I didn't install the splitter) but in windows media player I can select both audios. Why this strange behaviour?.
And related to subtitles, vsfilter.dll is in the same folder as mpc, but I cannot select any subtitle in mpc, nor in wmp, what can I do?.

I know that this is just a toy, nowadays. But I'm curious about its possibilities...

@digitall.doc

Hi mate! Custom matrices are only available at High Profile in H.264 AVC (see the table posted by Incredible in previous message ;) ).

Cya!

a) h264 (x264) gots a total different approach and also a high Keyframecount
doesn't end up in a getting worth "gop" by reaching the Gops lenght. Thats only just one advantage of a lot.

b) you cant use a regular h263 matrix! A matrix used for h264 has to be set up different.

c) you have to install matroska splitter using the installer (before do unregister the nero splitter as told above). The Vobsub.dll isnt the one for MPC. the Vobsub.ax AFAIK is the one which has to be registered in your win32 folder (wich should be done by the installer).
If you can see the new splitter in the "filters" tab in MPC there maybe also you can see the VSfilter from the VobSub installation.
I had no problem, so it should be there :)

MeGUI ...
 

@Incredible

Hi mate! I've playing with MeGUI aiming to encode for MPEG-4 container with dual audio (AAC is really great, I'm impressed with the quality reached with so low bitrate in my tests). I did obtain great results with x264 @MAIN PROFILE with low bitrate video (=1000 Kbits/s).

I also tried mencoder out to encode for MPEG-4 ASP. Mencoder is very quick in encoder, but I've ended up with chroma channel swapped. Not a big trouble, I just used a 'SwapUV()' in script, but this is something weird to me. Also did a encoding with SNOW codec being used and the results were very good considering the same low bitrate (=1000 Kbits/s). Now, I'm gonna try THEORA out. :wink:

If you have some advises about MPEG-4 encoding target for give to me I'll appreciate so much!

Cya!

Thanx danpos, in fact I was encoding with x264 High Profile. In MeGUI you just can load custom matrix if you choose High Profile, if not this option is greyed out 8) .
I tried loading the MPEG matrix, and obtained the same lights on/off effect.
Incredible, you say
I prepared both custom matrix with ffdshow vfw codec configuration, introducing manually the matrix and saving them in .cfg format. Is there another way to do it?. I would like to test x264 with notch, how am I supposed to set up my custom matrices?.

Related to vobsub, I just moved the vsfilter.dll to mpc folder, I didn't install vobsub. I'll try installing it. May I move vsfilter to mpc folder?.

I'll try also MatroskaSplitter way. Didn't want to install so many things in this PC.... :roll:

Inc, I don't want to make you waste your time while programing a new nive tool (me generous :twisted: ), but...
.... "rxregsvr.exe" no se reconoce como un comanto interno o externo, programa o archivo por lotes ejecutable....

so I could't deregister nero parser, and I don't dare to install matroska splitter without this first step.

I also tried muxing with vobsub subtitles instead .srt, and reinstalled vobsub (I see DVobSub.ax in system32), but nothing works, I cannot activate subtitle option in mpc neither wmp... :(

Try regsrv32.exe

@Doc

YOU HAVE TO install the VobSub (VSFilter) from scratch! The dll. isn't used by MPC. MPC uses Dshow Filters and VsFilter.ax will be installed as Dshow Subtitle decoding filter out of the installing process if the insataller is used.

And ... as said, you cant directly set a h263 matrix to a h264 quantisation routine. notch is mpeg 1/2 h263 specs based 2x (8x8) . h264 needs a total diff block allocation as 8x8 4x4 etc.

Thanx Phil. regsvr32.exe did the trick.

Inc, I explained myself badly. I did reinstall vobsub-2.23 from scratch. I later found DVobSub.ax and Vobsub.dll in system32. No vsfilter.dll there. I rebooted (just in case). But nothing happens :( .

....good. While writting I installed MatroskaSplitter, and that was the key. Now, under mpc when right-click I can see under filters new settings:
- ffdshow mpeg-4 video decoder (decoder settings in fdshow)
- D:\video\video.mp4, where I can select audio and subtitle
- a series of number and leters between {}, where I see vobsub subtitle settings.
And I can see in systemtray three icons: ffdshow, vobsub and matroskasplitter.
So it's close to work... still not working. I cannot see any subtitle. I will try again, will remux files, will reopen mpc... try, try, try,.... and post what happened.
Thanx for the help.

VSFilter is an Avisynth plugin, it can be found at http://sf.net/projects/guliverkli .

Thanx Boulder, I already tried with VSfilter.dll in the folder, but it didn't work.

I know you will be all testing the latest fine new Inc tool. I post willing than in a week or so ( :lol: ) you will do different things...

I feel a little frustrated. I followed all your advises, and I managed to make MatroskaSplitter take the control. Now I decode with ffdshow and can change between audio streams. I can see the subtitles in the mp4 file, selectable (when right-clicking in systray on matroska icon), and subs off by default. But when I select a subtitle:
- I get an error window (named MKx) that says: "Reconnect error 80040217".
- When I accept the error, mpc keeps playing with no subs, but when right click the sub appears selected......
.....
What can I do?.
I thought that maybe it was badly muxed (I'll take a look at command in MeGUI and at MP4Box help to see), but I don't think so since MatroskaSplitter showed subtitle streams there.

Any suggestion?. I know it is of no importance at all, but I don't usualyy leave things not working, when they are supposed to work if everything is done OK.
THX

Demux the subtitles with mkvextract and use them as external subtitles in ffdshow. This is the only efficient way I found.

OK Phil, that could be a way.

I also managed to see the subtitles through vobsub: when mpc starts playing it "calls" MatroskaSplitter, VobSub ('cos I configured MatroskaSplitter to load VSfilter when is started) and ffdshow. I see them in systray. So, when it plays the film, I can open VS from systray and load an external subtitle, taht is shown on the film.
But I'd rather play subtitles from mpc, since they're also muxed in the MP4 stream, without needing to load them externally. That's how I understood it works with Inc, he manages to play MP4 from mpc, including subtitles...

When you install Haali's splitter, you are asked for disabling or not internal mpc splitter. Perhaps you should try both choices and see if there is a difference there.

Note : personnaly I use Zoomplayer and I can see the subtitles entry in the track list but when I switch nothing appears, and when I change the audio track, very often I lost the audio... and the subtitles appear ! So don't worry, the splitter has some problems.

Thanx Phil, I'll try it out.

If it's a problem in matroska, then I feel reliefed, as hopefully it will be fixed in next updates.

And what about VLC player?. Well, in case it's a MatroskaSplitter problem, changing the player won't resolve it.

Thanks @Inc for point me this thread. I did miss it when you splitted original thread.

Then, i re ask my questions here:

1 - Do you know (all) how near is that future?
2 - Do you know what is most probably that format?
3 - Can, today, any format, duplicate all DVD features?
4 - Can any SAP play it?

Despite any questions are answered here, i would wish make some reflexions (i don't know if it is the correct word).

1 - It seems that the future is here. Maybe it deserves a specific place (subforum) here as it seems that some of our partners already are testing/playing h264 codecs, and we need to walk together new technologies. I don't know anything about it, but we can construct together a place where find out info about this, and not stay waiting in the pre-history.
2 - ?
3 - We see that there are players that plalys mp4, but it can use chapters?
4 - Already answered.

I think a subforum regarding h264 isnt that useful as KVCD didnt applied any specs like a diff. matrix or something similair wich would give an approach like it has been done to mpeg1/mpeg2.

Regarding to player support.
ASP Codecs (listed in the link some posts above) are supported by most mpeg4 SAPs, like Divx, XVID, mpeg4.
AVC Codecs like h264 ones arent supported at the moment by any SAP.

Regarding Chapters. These are supported in the mp4 container format, also supported by the XORO HSR4000 for example.

BUT! Be aware that these SAPs are still tricky and dont support non PAR1:1 streams which imho is a quality loss as the full height isnt reproduced while the encoding if the width of 720 cant be exceeded.

MKV is a much better container format as also (imho) Menues are supported any some more features.
But here also no SAP does support it (till now).

If you wana play with h264 and mkv then if TV is the target, you have to think about a HTPC.

Actually:

1) H264 is the most advanced codec in the world. With this codec we can encode 720p source with very high quality at ~ 1-2 Mbps. See this exemple ... MPEG4 ASP make this encoding at ~quant 8 for the same size.

2) MPEG4 ASP / LC-AAC / MP4 with chapter/subtitle is supported by SAP (more and more) and you can make that with Nero Recode. You can make anamorphique 720*576 encoding for SAP.

3) DivX container is actually the most advanced (for MPEG4) container. You can make integral menu reencoding with exactly the same structure than the original DVD menu and compatibility with SAP will coming.

4) First HD SAP will coming too and you can read full HD MPEG4 ASP encoding
http://forum.surdvd.com/viewtopic.php?t=43651


There are not a MPEG4 problem but MPEG2 source saturation (very high motion with very high complex texture -> very high quant for vbv MPEG2 compliant stream ) ... I have this PAL DVD ...