Database Users

Video playback

Hi,
I've started to look into DVD conversion for WM5 and with the number of people here with the same device I am curious to know what results others have found to be the optimum settings for video compression and playback.
I guess the questions I would like answered are;
- what video player software do you use on your Universal?
- what software have you used to convert DVD to WM5
- what settings have you found to provide the best results? (frame rate, bit rate, cropping, display size, etc)
- did you use any hacks to improve the playback (registry hacks or eliminated software etc).
Regards
Michael

i'm using WM Encoder... it works perfectly... maybe u can try it out...
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...02-e496-465a-bba9-b2f1182cdf24&DisplayLang=en

Hi,
So what settings have you found work best with this media encoder?
Michael

Select Pocket PC widescreen (CBR) for video and CD Quality (CBR) for audio, check 259kbps and you're good to go...
works for me... hope it will for you...
Cheers...

Hi,
But is that the best resolution the Universal can do?
Michael

you can try encode with better resolution, but it will appear the same, some will be worst unless u have a big screen... cos big resolution medias will automatically resize to fit in your media player and it'll take up more space...

Will this play in full screen in WM10?

Full screen mode... Select Pocket PC widescreen (CBR) for video and CD Quality (CBR) for audio, check 259kbps

nonentity said:
i'm using WM Encoder...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i havent had any luck with this... i think its because i dont have a DVD decoder for my Windows Media Player (on my PC)
my DVD drive came with a copy of InterVideo WinDVD, which plays DVDs fine - but Windows Media Player doesnt recognise DVDs (the menu Play -> DVD... is greyed out)
does anyone know of:
- free (or cheap?) decoders for WMP that would get WM Encoder to work? or
- an alternative encoder that comes with its own decoder?
thanks!

dalelane, I don't use WM encoder myself, (I'm a VirtualDub man) but if you want a very comprehensive set of codecs do a quick Google search for the "K-Lite Codec Pack" or the "Ace Mega Codec Pack". Both are free, and if you still can't use WM Encoder after you've installed those codecs, then it's obviously not meant to be...

Video Playback
Can anyone advise a way of increasing the size of video playback in so called full screen mode to actually fill the screen?

You've got two options:
1) Encode it in a resolution that fills the screen, i.e. not 320x240 but 640x480. The problem with this is that it will probably not play smoothly.
2) Use a decent media player that can resize a 320x240 video to fill the screen like TCMPMP. (Free)
You'll find a link to download TCMPMP elsewhere on the forum. I've tried it and it works a treat.
All this info is available elsewhere of the forum if you do a bit of searching.

Movies I've ripped for my Dell Axim X50v with fairusewizard light and the default 2-pass XVID settings file size 700MB play fine on My JasJar using TCPMP. The only setting I change in Fairuse is the resolution. I make it as close to 640x480 as possible from the list of resolution it gives you.

Best bitrate for videos on Hermes?

I am stating to convert some of the movies and to be played on my hermes on the go, but eventually I found out that the movies converted thru pocketdivxencoder eventually dropping out frames.
I want to know the best setting for converting video for Hermes...
Is it better to convert to WMV at a particular bitrate than converting to DiVX?
THanks a lot.

If you're gonna use the ATI Imageeon Decoder, video bitrates can go up to 1.2MBps, but you will sure get a lot of artifacts. if you intend to use Raw Frame Buffer, video bitrate can go up to 700KBps (audio 128KBps), but also remember that Pocket PCs can play higher bitrates without dropping frames when the video is wider, e.g. playing a 16:9 movie clip is somehow easier than playing a clip with 4:3 aspect ratio.
BTW If you want to stream the audio to your BT Headset while watching a clip, a video bitrate of 410KBps (audio 128KBps) is good, but you will have to use the ATI Decoder.
Cheers!

Rockman27 said:
I am stating to convert some of the movies and to be played on my hermes on the go, but eventually I found out that the movies converted thru pocketdivxencoder eventually dropping out frames.
I want to know the best setting for converting video for Hermes...
Is it better to convert to WMV at a particular bitrate than converting to DiVX?
THanks a lot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You need to use TCPMP player and download the ATI imageon fix cab (search for it), a few adjustments and your pocketdivx converted films will play perfectly.

i use sompy media encoder, its free and has a stting for pda screen size and sound that is realy good, just load the file and away you go.

Take a look HERE ive used plenty of videos encoded this way and works a treat.
In coreplayer (aka TCPMP) i use Directdraw as ATimageON produces artifacts until they allow a non-rgb filter to be used.

mrvanx said:
Take a look HERE ive used plenty of videos encoded this way and works a treat.
In coreplayer (aka TCPMP) i use Directdraw as ATimageON produces artifacts until they allow a non-rgb filter to be used.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for your guideline and I have got some satisfactory conversions.. but when I switch to DirectDraw in TCPMP, it gives me black screen no matter which type of video files I am playing.
When I switch back to ATI Imageon, sometimes it will work but sometimes I will get weird screens (the whole screen got messed up and "jumping around"). The only perfectly working selection for me is RAW or GDI.
Am I doing something wrong in the setting with the directdraw and atiimageon? Thanks again.

With bitrate size there is a law of diminishing returns. After a certain bitrate you will not notice the difference on the Hermes screen.
After years of encoding/transcoding. I have settled on these paramters as the other variable is trying to fit as much onto my MicroSD as possible.
Video DivX @ 350 kbps, high quality, 2 pass.
Audio AAC 64 kbps 44 KHz (SSR profile)
Using MP4 as the container.
The quality is pin sharp. Using higher bitrates for me yield no benefit when viewed on the phone. The filesize comes out at approx 170 meg for 1 hour.
When I get back I will upload some samples of stuff I've done and I don't mind watching on the phone, typically 4:3 like The Wire and of course the Simpsons.

Wam7 said:
With bitrate size there is a law of diminishing returns. After a certain bitrate you will not notice the difference on the Hermes screen.
After years of encoding/transcoding. I have settled on these paramters as the other variable is trying to fit as much onto my MicroSD as possible.
Video DivX @ 350 kbps, high quality, 2 pass.
Audio AAC 64 kbps 44 KHz (SSR profile)
Using MP4 as the container.
The quality is pin sharp. Using higher bitrates for me yield no benefit when viewed on the phone. The filesize comes out at approx 170 meg for 1 hour.
When I get back I will upload some samples of stuff I've done and I don't mind watching on the phone, typically 4:3 like The Wire and of course the Simpsons.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What program do you use to do this encoding? I would like to try out your settings on a few movies i have been waiting to encode myself.

Globalrebel said:
What program do you use to do this encoding? I would like to try out your settings on a few movies i have been waiting to encode myself.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For a long while I was doing it manually with Virtual Dub Mod and demuxing audio etc but this can be arduous when doing a lot of stuff.
Nowadays I tend to use WinMenc .61 with the Mencoder binaries. It's not the best GUI in the world, in fact it's pretty plain and could do with updating but it gives the control I need, batch encoding, and is very fast.
I wiill link them all here when I eventually get home.
You could try PocketDivX encoder (and Lathe) which use Mencoder as well but were half the speed for me when it comes to the 2nd pass when I tested them. IIRC they don't give as much control either.

Alas no time to give links to binaries just yet but Google might help if you're in a rush. Here is a quick sample of Prison Break with the above settings.
http://www.wam77.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/Prison.Break.S02E18.Clip.350kbps.mp4

Found a bit of time
Download Winmenc http://yawoogle.googlepages.com/winmenc.0.61.zip
Download MPlayer http://oss.netfarm.it/mplayer/builds/mplayer-rtm-svn-23169.7z
Download Mencoder http://oss.netfarm.it/mplayer/builds/mencoder-rtm-svn-23169.7z
Download PthreadGC2 ftp://sourceware.org/pub/pthreads-win32/dll-latest/lib/pthreadGC2.dll
Place all in the same folder. Run Winmenc.
If you want to try my options download this http://www.wam77.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/Mp4_PocketPC_DivX350_AAC_320.240.ini
and then click on load profile and point it to the file. (There are others in the default profile dir that you can play with)
This will also do Xvid, DivX, X264, mpeg2 (in .avi container) with 2 pass options. If you want ultra sharpness you can try higher bitrates but I can not tell for most things. If you also want to keep the file size fairly small I have found 350 kbps to be a good trade off. Run a few tests at different bitrates and decide for yourself.

Awesome guide Wam.
Using your setttings I have been playing with the x264 codec. It's alot more demanding on the cpu. however it does produce very noticeable far superior results over divx. It also takes a good 2x more time to encode, but nvm that the end result which counts.
Getting x264 playing on hermes appears to be a slight headache for some.
TCPMP used to support it, now doesnt.
So you have 2 options CorePlayer or old beta version of TCPMP 72RC1.exe
IIRC I remeber reading the coreplayer is newer more effeciant by approx 10% than the tpcmp x264 beta decoder. I also had a bit of a headache getting the aac audio codec working.. maybe cos I have a wm2003 device. I clicked on and installed far to many differnt things to know how I fixed it .
Also apprently the ATI ImageOn boosts performance nicely for 264 files. but causes problems with divx xvid etc.. which are commonly used.
1) get new rom ak3.. 2)install atifix + If you set zoom to 100% - artifacts dissapear.
Nice thread here. - http://70.84.52.18/corecodec.com/forum/index.php?topic=3723.msg22042#msg22042 - srry if cross forum linking isnt allowed..
I have only a dell axim x5 - maybe 5 years old now, but it has a 400mhz intel xscale cpu which I guess is comparible to what the hermes samsung cpu can do. So my testing regarding performance maybe a bit off. I can confirm though x264 codec is the way forward. All the new devices use it for good reason.. ipods. playstaion portables, blueray. hd tv's.
A little more clarifcation needs to be done. to provide us all with the ultimate setup. one thing for sure. wams settings are great. and produce fantastic results. the software he reccomends - winmec is real nice and easy to use..
I also spent a fair bit of time with MEgui front end and, it has so many more options.. which could be a bonus but was just too confusing for me. Also winmec and Megui may have shifted the timing of frames off a tiny bit.. I'll need to check on a longer file to see if there was any syncing issues.
I'll be back soon with a definative guide.

Oh yeah x264 is definitely the way to go and the improvement are easily noticed for the same bitrate.
I did a few x264 but this was back before WM6 (AKU 3.3) and the ATI fixes and I could play smooth BUT without audio which wasn't much use.
I might give them a try again when I have more time to play but for the time being DivX is giving me good results... and is quick!
Oh I am using TCPMP 0.81. I would use Coreplayer 1.04 but until they fix the negative audio sync bug I am forced to use TCPMP.

Smooth video viewing possible? (h2.64)

Heya folks, i am wondering if it is possible on TCPMP to view a hi res video smoothly, i first got the H2.64 format invalid error but shortly after fixed that with the TCPMP ffmpeg addon but now the video i want to watch doesnt run smoothly,
anyone have any ideas how to set it up and if so if they are willing to provide the presets
Cheers everyone
exemike
Sorry title error, i meant to say H.264 =)

OK
MAKE AN OVERCLOCK! TO 260MHZ With Batterystatus or Omapclockplus

i dont think that will work, i tried a h.264 video on my exe aswell and it was just as slow.
maybe i need to convert the video

exemike said:
maybe i need to convert the video
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's exactly what you should do.
I use a nice freeware conversion tool for WinXP called SUPER, which converts videos to a specific compression of AVI that's optimized for Pocket PC. Just select "AVI (for Pocket PC)" as the output container, and bob's your uncle. Works great: is formatted to fit the screen correctly, and goes into full screen mode flawlessly. You can even strip the audio tracks from strictly visual media (your p*rn, for example...)
Now, sure, you're going to lose some resolution, but you had to know that was going to happen anyways viewing it on a 320x240px screen, right?
Download SUPER

YES
Myrddin Wyllt said:
That's exactly what you should do.
I use a nice freeware conversion tool for WinXP called SUPER, which converts videos to a specific compression of AVI that's optimized for Pocket PC. Just select "AVI (for Pocket PC)" as the output container, and bob's your uncle. Works great: is formatted to fit the screen correctly, and goes into full screen mode flawlessly. You can even strip the audio tracks from strictly visual media (your p*rn, for example...)
Now, sure, you're going to lose some resolution, but you had to know that was going to happen anyways viewing it on a 320x240px screen, right?
Download SUPER
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yep the super converter is SUUUUPER!!!! i use it too... and can recomend to you the AVI format our devices can view smothly without overclock a video at lest 230 mbps.

thank you very much guys, I really am enjoying this wizard very much and having it play videos just makes it so much better
now I just have to read the big book on how to upgrade to wm6
thanks again guys,
exemike

Youre welcome men
Be sure to read evrything!!!! and ask somuch more ok?
Its our pleassure to give you the needed info about what you will do.

hehe thanks q will bear that in mind and be sure that I will have lots of questions, after all like I said for a device growing in age it really is brilliant.

The Guide
Well people you have all read the threads so i thought i would translate everything to one simple guide.
First of all, this should hopefully work for most Htc's out there (from what i've read and understand anyway)
Second First of all
You should download the program (Freeware) TCPMP, which can be downloaded at the provided link.
http://picard.exceed.hu/tcpmp/
Personally i downloaded the 0.72RC1 but any of the versions should work farely well.
Secondly you should take the time to download some of the additional plugins for the player, commonly for the program we will be using, the ffmpeg plugin i think is suggested but also the avc and aac video and audio codecs from another site i have provided.
Aditional Plugins
http://picard.exceed.hu/tcpmp/test/
This is the AVC and AAC codecs, commonly used for H.264 videos, although the wizard struggles with really high quality videos sometimes may be worth overclocking to get the performance you want
http://www.box.net/public/gk97uv7x1o
Addons worth having for sure though
Next you will need to download a program, yes another magnificent piece of freeware known as Super
http://www.erightsoft.info/GetFile.php?SUPERsetup.exe
When the installation is complete, run it, install it, and open it up, from there
When you run the program for the first time, one main menu will setup, the base of the program, now im sure on first sight its like lots of new buttons to press, well its not really that, all you need to do is set where you see (1) and the formats for the output container, just selec avi for Pocket pc, immediately, pocket pc res and settings are loaded.
The settings i am using for my MDA Vario (HTC Wizard) are 320:240 video scale, 4:3 aspect, 25fps, a bitrate of 128 and hi quality + 48k audio for the video options,
for audio i am using a frequency of 22050, 2 channel, 48kbps bitrate and default dvd language select.
further towards the bottom of super you will see what looks to be an input box, anywhere within the white area right click and select add media, add your video (any video you like) and hit ok, the file should input itself, and there should be a checkbox under the active colum, tick it and then further down the program hit encode, wallah, your video should encode perfectly for your wizard, heck you can try other presets to differ your performance.
Open the vid in TCPMP and it should happily play.
For youtube videos etc, there are altho online + downloadable programs to convert to different programs for youtube directly.
http://www.vixy.net/
This is the program with the installable converter, it is freeware but expires every so many months, but its always put back up for download again, dont know why they do that really but it is a good program.
Another program which is reliable online and has lots of options is
http://mediaconverter.org/
Hope this guide helps newcommers someone.
Thanks to Q and Myrd for the information =)

Sweet
I use Lathe 1.5, been using it for almost 2yrs
Works great

exemike said:
The settings i am using for my MDA Vario (HTC Wizard) are 320:240 video scale, 4:3 aspect, 25fps, a bitrate of 128 and hi quality + 48k audio for the video options,
for audio i am using a frequency of 22050, 2 channel, 48kbps bitrate and default dvd language select.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
One more thing would help me pretty much. Could you add which video (h.264 / h.263 / h.262 / xvid / mpeg4 / msmpeg4 / ...) and audio (mp3 / aac / wma / ...) codecs you're using?

Video Transcoding Tips?

I'm planning to transcode some video to watch on my universal via SD card, the presets on WinFF (Win32 wrapper to FFMpeg) are numerous but going to try 3GP @ 320x240x15fps, anyone else achieved this and if so what rates/sizes/formats did you use?

?
Transcoding ?? Why would you need it ? Unless the videos are HD, the Universal has the power to play them fine (most of them very fine ). If the space is your problem, I suggest a bigger SD-card.
I think it's a waste of time those ~30 minutes needed for conversion of a movie that lasts @ 90 min; and I'm pretty sure that you'll delete the movie after you'll watch it.
PS: for best results use TCPMP (freeware) or Core Player (not freeware). The Media Player is much slower and it supports few codecs.

Transcoding
I agree
There is no need for this as the UNI has all the power needed to play films with ease. If space is an issue google for DVD Catalyst. It's freeware and can reduce the size of DVD's down to about 275Mb.
Then just play them through the TCPMP as suggested by GNotten as this is far superior

I USE MKV videos with coreplayers .... they save so much space compared to other video formats and the video quality is far better than other format... one movie is around 250~300 mb...

Size and wether or not it could handle it were my main issues. Dont have a problem kicking off a transcode ffmpeg job and wandering off elsewhere while it's busy but i'll give a raw video a go and see how i get on

cycloid said:
Size and wether or not it could handle it were my main issues. Dont have a problem kicking off a transcode ffmpeg job and wandering off elsewhere while it's busy but i'll give a raw video a go and see how i get on
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
well there are really great video players like TCPMP and CorePlayer with which i have to never convert any video... just dran ang drop it from computer to SD and it runs flawlwssly... except rmv... which WMP can play after tweaking but can not fast forwar... except that no problems at all not size nor video format...
Cheers
Rajiv

Please recommend best way to watch veoh, youtube. Also video conversion settings....

Hi!
I want to know if there is a "best" way to enjoy the highest quality and smooth playback from veoh, youtube and also southpark.com .
Also, what settings do you recommend when converting movies, or mainly sitcoms dvds to the player. I want the best I can get without going into choppy mode...gotta love Three's Company on the go
Also recommendations on what program to use paid or free is welcome.
Thanks

I don't know about online website because most of them are usually choppy, but I do know about encoding videos for your Touch Pro2. If you want a free encoder (which I use) for your windows mobile phone it would be Windows Media Encoder (google it) its from Microsoft, it has built in settings for your windows mobile playback and you just have set resolution and how high your quality you would like. Also you could use At0mAng Enhanced D3D Driver to have a smoother movie on Windows Media Player on your Touch Pro 2. Thats pretty much it for putting movies on your Touch Pro 2.

Lots of trans-coders out there, but not nearly so many that can go directly from DVD to a file. Most you would have to rip from DVD first. A great exception is Handbrake (free). If you are going to use either Media Player or HTC album (both of which are accelerated under WM6.5), then you can go straight from DVD to high quality (720xwhatever, 1500kbps video MP4) and it plays flawlessly.

I will try that tonight.
I do have the D3D driver already.
BTW, I tried installing HTC album on my Tilt 2 but all I get is a was unsuccessful error.

Also with the Handbrake quote, you will need to have a unlocked DVD in order to rip your movie. Other that its mostly explained.

Kenchi* said:
Also with the Handbrake quote, you will need to have a unlocked DVD in order to rip your movie. Other that its mostly explained.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was not able to test much so I decided to give my favorite converter a shot (total video converter).
Used the pocket pc or similar profile and made the video (avi file) from 700MB to 400 by reducing quality but it was very choppy.
Then decided to give the original AVI a shot and it runs super smooth with core player (WMP cannot read it). The quality is awesome but way too big.
I tried the Windows Media Encoder 9 but I did not see a specific version that gives me the 400x800 resolution my device has.
Thanks

shaolin95 said:
I was not able to test much so I decided to give my favorite converter a shot (total video converter).
Used the pocket pc or similar profile and made the video (avi file) from 700MB to 400 by reducing quality but it was very choppy.
Then decided to give the original AVI a shot and it runs super smooth with core player (WMP cannot read it). The quality is awesome but way too big.
I tried the Windows Media Encoder 9 but I did not see a specific version that gives me the 400x800 resolution my device has.
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Shaolin, you are looking in the incorrect place, at first it doesn't let you choose your screen resolution because you must select the type of file that fits into a type of device that is going to play that file that you are trying to play in WMP on your phone.
Here are the steps to get the video size you want, which I hope you will try, you must go to the New Session Wizard, then click on Convert a File (If you are trying to convert a video file into WMV).
Then find your source file which is your Video you want to watch on your TP2, after that choose your output (Where you want to put that file after it encoded into WMV)
After click Pocket PC (Note that you won't change resolution here)
After all that, choose specifically Pocket PC widescreen video (CBR), then choose the quality of your Bitrate, Audio, and if you want you can add all the Description to your video file if you'd like. (Note that you won't change resolution here either)
Click next, and DON'T check mark Begin converting when I click finish.
Then click finish, after that click Properties on your Windows Media Encoder 9 (it should be on top with a Check mark inside a paper symbol) and click the Video Size Tab. There at the bottom of the wizard you should find Width and Height, set the Resolution to 800 x 480 if you want to view your video horizantel or 480 x 800 which is vertical ( which I don't prefer ) After all that, your video should be small but at a good quality and allowing you to have free space on your Micro SD card, and it should be playing on WMP on your phone.
Hope this helps, good luck,
Kenichi