Database Users

Video Compression/Convert XDA Exec

I know this probably got disscused but i cant seem to find anything releated to what im going to ask if i am blind kindly guide me in the right direction.
OK I have been using Blaze Media Pro software i tried quite a few settings still unsucsseful trying to get a full 700meg 800meg AVI, MPG ect movie to compress to a nicely small and rather no video viewing loss file. So i want some people to share their settings and what software they are using. If it helps most of what i am trying to compress and covert are xvid, divx ect I am hoping you will tell me setting for diffrent types if their are any.
Thanks For Any Help Given....

I have not used the program you speak of.
However, I have spent years reencoding movies etc etc & one program that I have come across which is just the ticket for encoding movies for my Xda Exec is Pocket DivX Encoder (the commerical version of which is 'called Lathe').
If you get bored one day I highly recommend you try it out - you won't be disappointed (well I hope you won't be anyway). Oh, and I use TCPMP to play my movies, everything else I tried came a poor second.
Andy

Ehhhh..... Ehhhh.. mmmmm..... what settings are you using i downloded pocket Divx and i was trying the VGA one E800. These things still take along time to convert if you was to covert 800meg file how long does it take. I was hoping a full screen decent sound and good compression please let me know what settings.
P.S i am using the TCPMP, i think the windows one is absoultley crap still trying to get into the ROM to remove that crap aswell as File Explorer. Ahh well thats another stroy.

I use PocketDVDStudio with the DivX encoder and found 15frames/sec, video 149kbps and audio 96kbps gave a file size of 600Mb for a film lasting 2 hours 17mins, quality excellent. It took a lot of attempts to get the best combination for the Universal.
cheers cjb

Yo!
Setting I go for are:
The best way to conciderably reduce file size AND increase relative quality is to reduce the frame size. If you find this 'unacceptable' or shocking so to speak, concider that a VCR played on your massive (in comparison) TV at home uses an effective frame size of 352 x 288 (PAL) 352 x 240 (NTSC).
Now the Xda Exec screen size is 3.6" (@640 x 480), compared to say my TV which is 28". (Of course the Exec is viewed close up, the TV far away) - so concider a reduction factor of about 1.5 for comparitive viewing pleasure.
Hence I always use a 1/4 VGA frame size, factored by 1.5ish, and rounded such that both x&y sizes are divisible by 16 (due to the way that Mpeg4 encoding works) i.e. 256x192 {this results in a staggeringly low 16x12=192 macroblocks for the encoding process to deal with, hence very small file sizes).
Further reductions in file size can be achieved by reducing the frame rate but I'd choose 15fps as an absolute minimum.
Oh, for best quality resulting video for lowest file sizes use the XviD codec - Install the latest Koepi version for best results. Again use an absolute minimum of 3 pass encoding for best video quality results.
Finally the Audio - reduce the file size taken up by the audio stream by re-encoding to use Mono, MP3, lowest bit-rate: you won't notice the difference (apart from the stereo of couse).
Andy
BTW - the conversion process is all pretty much button clicking when I use Lathe, and a 3-pass encode usually takes under 1 1/2 to 2hrs on my 3.6Ghz beasty. Hell this program even encodes straight from DVD source!!!!

hi ppl! I use the Smartmovie 3.11 for pocket pc, is good

Pocket DVD Studio
cjb said:
I use PocketDVDStudio with the DivX encoder and found 15frames/sec, video 149kbps and audio 96kbps gave a file size of 600Mb for a film lasting 2 hours 17mins, quality excellent. It took a lot of attempts to get the best combination for the Universal.
cheers cjb
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi, Can Any one give me the Pocket DVD Studio full version so that i can split and convert my Video from MPEG to Avi for pocket pc. It has so many good features like remove Black screen from Movie.
Thanks

Poor TCPMP Performance

I have tried to pull the threads of the various discussions on these forums of device speed and TCPMP into one place (my brain, to be specific), but I'm still not getting the performance out of TCPMP that I really want and, frankly, expect (given that I can get better performance on my 2 year-old Tapwave Zodiac). Here are the basic details:
o) Running an O2 with WM 5.0, version 5.1.195
o) ROM version 1.30.107 WWE
o) TCPMP 0.71, "Smartphone" version, all plugins installed
o) Settings: Video at 100% (converted to 640x480 resolution); smooth zoom 50%; dithering enabled; Intel XScale enabled;
o) All applications save WM 5.0 native apps installed on a 2GB SanDisk SD card
o) All test video files installed on card as well
o) All programs closed by hand prior to running TCPMP
o) Tried files converted by DivX Converter, Lathe, Dr. DivX, and PocketDivX Encoder
o) tried both in portrait and landscape mode, with and without going to "full screen" mode
(I wanted to run Pocket Hack Master to try to tune the device prior to running TCPMP, but it causes my Exec to hang; that's covered in a separate post.)
The output is, well, okay--the image is sharp--but all panning and motion is somewhat jerky. In my experience, this generally indicates that the processor can't keep up with the demand, and one should encode using a lower video and audio bit rate until you find the optimum settings. However, I have tried (in Dr. DivX and DivX Converter) bit rates from 1000kbps down to 500kpbs, and still am seeing jerkiness.
So my questions are: has anyone else seen this behavior? And does anyone have an suggestions for improving TCPMP performance? Install the VGA hack, perhaps? Upgrade to a newer ROM version? Hope that it gets better when I perform system tuning with Pocket Hack Master (should I ever get it to work)? Overclock my device using PHM? Encode at a significantly lower bitrate? Use a different tool for encoding? I am open to suggestions.
Note: I can encode ripped DVDs (using DVDShrink) at 800-1000 kpbs video, 128 kbps audio, and have them viewable on my Tapwave Zodiac using the Palm version of TCPMP with no jerkiness or jitter.
Thanks for any help.
Doug

I have a similar problem. I have encoded a few videos at 700 kbps video and 128kbps audio that run fine when my XDA is plugged into the mains or to the computer, but jitter when it's running on battery. I tried it first thing after charging today with the battery at 98%. The video was still jittery. Tried it again plugged into the mains and it's fine!
Here's one of the files I encoded. Spoilers for Season 10 of Stargate SG1 and Season 3 of Stargate Atlantis, if you care.
(Edit: Hmm - the forum wouldn't load the file. I've a rapid share link instead)
http://rapidshare.de/files/34374785/SG1_LemonScene.rar.html
Stargate SG1 Season 10 - "The Pegasus Project", Lemon Scene, 33 seconds. Xvid 700 kbps video, Lame 128 kbps audio, Frame rate 23.976.

I had problems like this but after changing every setting in tcpmp and still having no joy, i downloaded Sompy MovieEncoder its a free program for the pc, it takes your movie files and recodes them to a smaller rate etc, file quality will decrease, but less resoures on the ppc are used when playing the movie file.
its the only solution i could find
if there is any other solution i would love to know

I have the same problems using both pocketdivxencoder and smartmovie, when I use VGA settings. I just encode everything in QVGA resolution now, and it's a bit grainy, but at least no lag.

Still zeroing in on getting this working the way I want (caveat: I am much pickier than most people about sharpness, jitter, pixilation, and the like), but I have managed to get some improvement in playback. Here's what I'm finding so far:
o) Using Pocket Hack Master (which can only be used when my device is plugged in to either the wall charger or the USB sync cable; don't ask me why), I have hard-set the system speed to 520MHz, and have set the speed for TCPMP to "maximum" so that it overclocks when I run it.
o) I converted several test files (I have a set; I'm obsessive) at 500kbps video, 80kbps audio, 40KHz audio frequency.
This gives smooth playback except when there is too much data, i.e. when there's a lot of motion in the image and its a complex image. (Trees with lots of leaves seem to be a good test case.) For example, in the scene in "The Incredibles" where Mr. Incredible is shaking a tree to get a cat out, the image freezes a bit. In the scene in "The 40 Year-old Virgin" where Our Here is biking down a tree-lined street and the camera pans up to the trees, the image freezes a bit. Images like that.
It's unfortunate that I have to ramp the bit rate down so low, although on this screen--as opposed to a QVGA screen--the images are much sharper at lower bit rates. Even so, I still want to see what other people say about, for example, using "true" VGA mode, different versions of TCPMP, and the like. It would be nice to be able to convert in the 700-800kbps range; in my past experience, that gives a good compromise between image sharpness and file size. (I personally don't mind a movie taking up a GB of space; I want that movie to look good, dammit!)
Doug

I had the same problem. It got fixed when in installed XCPUScalar and cranked my Uni to 520 MHz.
Good:
+ No more jerkyness in any of my divx video's. (Don't know the bitrates on them)
Bad:
- 520 MHz is a big drain on the battery.
- Some stability issues when changing CPU speeds.
Edit:
When plugged in the mains, the Uni speeds up to 520 MHz. Thats why it will play fine when plugged in, but not on battery.

Biffert said:
I had the same problem. It got fixed when in installed XCPUScalar and cranked my Uni to 520 MHz.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm assuming the XCPUScalar is some kind of system performance tuning application, yes?
Doug

dougom said:
Biffert said:
I had the same problem. It got fixed when in installed XCPUScalar and cranked my Uni to 520 MHz.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm assuming the XCPUScalar is some kind of system performance tuning application, yes?
Doug
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes indeed, it allows scaling the Intel XScale CPU in the Uni to a speed of choice, or autoscale based on CPU load.
http://www.immiersoft.com/index.html
It works for me, although I have some stability issues when changing speed to often.

I use O2 Exec with Dopod 900 latest rom with TCPMP V 0.71
it run very well in my device.
I use Pocket Divx encoder. I just set the out put to be VGA PPC resolution.
No fuzzy, slow or any bad grainy.
Or I just got lucky

i get much better performance from WM10 encoded with DVD to Pocket PC 3.6.2 @ 640x480 wide screen (stearo bluetooth headphones) it's so good it's addicting. gives my 42 inch plasma a rest
TCPMP is jumpy for me.but you get more optiuons to play arounf with WM10 work out of the box.
i use WMV files.
i also use DVD Decrypter and Wondershare Pocket DVD Studio at 480x368. not as good.

skywriter said:
i get much better performance from WM10 encoded with DVD to Pocket PC 3.6.2 @ 640x480 wide screen (stearo bluetooth headphones) it's so good it's addicting. gives my 42 inch plasma a rest
TCPMP is jumpy for me.but you get more optiuons to play arounf with WM10 work out of the box.
i use WMV files.
i also use DVD Decrypter and Wondershare Pocket DVD Studio at 480x368. not as good.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So you encode with "DVD to Pocket PC" 3.6.2 @ 640x480. That's a new tool on me; do you have a pointer to it? And what video and audio bit rates are you encoding with?
Also, are you running Win2K, or XP? (Or, heaven forfend, something else?) And when you say you are using WM 10, is that on the desktop, or on the Exec?
Thanks,
Doug

dougom said:
skywriter said:
i get much better performance from WM10 encoded with DVD to Pocket PC 3.6.2 @ 640x480 wide screen (stearo bluetooth headphones) it's so good it's addicting. gives my 42 inch plasma a rest
TCPMP is jumpy for me.but you get more optiuons to play arounf with WM10 work out of the box.
i use WMV files.
i also use DVD Decrypter and Wondershare Pocket DVD Studio at 480x368. not as good.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So you encode with "DVD to Pocket PC" 3.6.2 @ 640x480. That's a new tool on me; do you have a pointer to it? And what video and audio bit rates are you encoding with?
Also, are you running Win2K, or XP? (Or, heaven forfend, something else?) And when you say you are using WM 10, is that on the desktop, or on the Exec?
Thanks,
Doug
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i use XP. it's WM10 on the uni, WM plays no part in encoding. other than three video form factors the audio and video rates are slidersm i would have to look in the file properties.. so it's a very dumb tool that gives pretty good results.

This works great for me:
DVD Catalyst 2.1 ($24.95 USD-much less than others!) is really fantastic. It is the only decoder that not only has a great UI but really works and is fast! The developer has worked really hard to get this program to work well and he is on the way to win more awards. You can download a fully funtional trial version. Go to http://www.dvdcatalyst.com/ and give it a try.
The settings I use is:
Output: Pocket PC DivX
Screen Size: 640x480 VGA PPC
Video Quality: 500-600 Kbps (depends on length of movie and if I want one or two movies on my 1G card)
Audio Quality: 112 Stereo Kbps
I use TCPMP and under Video options have Intel XScale selected for the driver.
Best results are after a soft boot to regain leaked memory and disable automatic mail checking or anything that might run periodically in the background and suck up CPU time.
The picture and sound are great.
Regards,
Gordo

When I clock the CPU to 520 MHz (The factory maximum for the Uni CPU) I get much much better results. If I do nothing with the speed the jerkyness occurs no matter how much I tweak it.
To see if it is a solution, play a video that is jerky when you are running on battery. Plug the Uni in the mains and play the video again, you should be able to see a significant difference (Uni goes to maximum speed when plugged in)

my uni hangs above 520mhz. i don't mind a bit of occassional jerkiness. i cannot use WIFI at the same time as BT HP (any application).
what i need is way to rip my matrix DVD's to watch! they are devious. i want to teh freedom to play them on my media of choice. i've bought many 100's of both DVD's and CDs, i've played the game long enough ny now.

skywriter said:
my uni hangs above 520mhz. i don't mind a bit of occassional jerkiness. i cannot use WIFI at the same time as BT HP (any application).
what i need is way to rip my matrix DVD's to watch! they are devious. i want to teh freedom to play them on my media of choice. i've bought many 100's of both DVD's and CDs, i've played the game long enough ny now.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I find that "Matrix: Reloaded" is an excellent test film for seeing how well conversions work. It has scenes where there is rapid regular motion, CGI, and plenty of other stuff going on that gives your CPU a good workout.
I'm still tweaking to try to get a good result. I personally *do* mind jerkiness; I can watch films converted at 800-1000kbps on my Zodiac; I would love to get the same kind of performance on my Exec. I will keep trying.
The only reason I mention the desktop/laptop OS is because my understanding is that you can get better handshaking between WM10 on the desktop and the version of WM on the Exec, and WM10 doesn't run on Win2K. Also, I may be getting some strange behavior during encoding because I'm running on Win2K rather than XP, so perhaps the codecs aren't working quite right. I don't know why that would be, but this stuff seems to be as much an art as a science. When my new laptop comes in (any day now!) I will give it a try.
Doug

For folks who are interested, I seem to have found a method for conversion and playback that works fairly consistently with a variety of films. Very little of this information is stuff that I have discovered on my own; most of it is culled from this and other newsgroups. Thanks to everyone for all their advice.
Here's my method.
Tweaking your Universal
Install Pocket Hack Master--You are going to want to set your Universal to run at 520MHz normally, and then test the other available clock settings using PHM's Speed Configuration option. I would then advise you to use the Application Speed option of PHM to force the speed of TCPMP to the highest available clock speed, overclocking your CPU if need be. Yes, this will burn battery power insanely, but if you want a smoother playback, this helps. (520MHz provides decent playback, however.)
It is worth noting that I bumped into some weirdness running PHM. Specifically, you either need to disable the Universal's built-in scaling functionality in PHM by choosing Edit > Settings > Advanced > Disable Device Built-in Scaling, or only run PHM when it is plugged into line current. Otherwise, you might experience a system hang, a screen white-out, or other irritating symptoms that can only be escaped with a soft reset.
Install Magic Button--This is not a requirement, but it helps when you are trying to make sure none of your applications are running while you run TCPMP.
Turn Off All Your Applications--Anything else running in the background will slow down your playback.
Reboot Your Universal Before Playback--This clears up any unwanted crap from your buffers.
Verify All Applications Are Off--On your Today screen on your Universal, select Start > Settings > System > Memory > Running Programs. Turn off anything that is running. Yes, I know; everything should be turned off as a result of your soft reboot, but I'm paranoid. Skip this step if you aren't as paranoid as me.
Conversion
Prior to converting my movies, I rip them using DVD Shrink, which I prefer over DVD Decoder. I don't really think it matters, though. I then encode using Dr. DivX. Here's the info:
Film clips: "Serenity" (television pilot); "Matrix Reloaded"; "The Incredibles"--this collection gives me a good cross section of animation, CGI, live action with little motion, live action with lots of motion, and live action/CGI combined
Conversion tool: Dr. DivX 1.0.7, using the latest DivX codec (6.2.5, I believe).
Video Bit Rate: 700kbps
Audio Bit Rate: 80kbps
Resolution: Make sure your width is 640; set your height based on whatever your film's aspect ratio is (For 16:9, 352 or 368 pixels; for 2.35:1, 272 pixels). It is important to use a width of 640, as TCPMP runs better when you set the Zoom to 100%.
I use two-pass encoding. I suspect that different films will require different video bit rates, probably varying between 500-800kpbs. This is just a guess, however.
Playing Your Movies
I playback with TCPMP. Personally, I haven't had a lot of luck using Windows Media, and Mitch (the author of DVD Catalyst) says that he has had better luck with *.avi format than *.wmv.
I use the following settings in TCPMP:
Speed: 100%
View > Zoom: 100%
View > Pixel Aspect Ration: Square
View > Orientation: Follow GUI
Video > Smooth Zoom (Only 50%)
Video > Dither (enabled) (To help minimize pixilation of the image)
Video > Quality > Normal
Video > Video Driver > Intel XScale
Video > Streams > Video (enabled)
All Other Settings: defalt
So there you have it. Is it a little bit of a pain? Heck yes. Is it worth it to get smoother playback? Well, it is for me; you have to decide if it's worth it for you.
Happy viewing,
Doug

Has anyone thought of running these videos through Benchmark mode (File > Benchmark in TCPMP) so that people trying to assist can get a better picture of just how jerky the video playback is?

I've the same issues here!
When plugged to the main power all the movies run smooth.
When running without chargin it becomes slow!

has anyone tried converting to .3gp since the TCPMP does support this. I have encoded most of my movies
video format = mp4
codec = CoreASP
video size = 352 x 288
frame rate = 15.000
audio = mp3
audio codec = CoreMP3
format = 48000Hz Stereo
Data Bit Rate = 128 kbit/s
sample rate = 48,000
weighs in around 700mb after compression
After I have made a backup copy of my intended movie using DVDfab HD decryptor:
http://www.dvdfab.com/free.htm
which is absolutely free
...I then use DVD Decrypter, also free, which can be found here:
http://www.doom9.org/index.html?/dvddec-options.htm
in the "Descrambling / Ripping tools" section.
this app wont crack any current CSS keys but what it does is allow me to rip the movie to one single .vob which I then compress with Xilisoft 3gp converter.
the playback is very smooth & clear IMO.
benchmark test:
TCPMP Version 0.72RC1 Benchmark Results
Average Speed 208.60%
Video Frames 10190
Audio Samples 32725921
Amount of Data 53259 KB
Bench. Time 5:25.661
Bench. Frame Rate 31.29
Bench. Sample Rate 100495
Bench. Data Rate 1.3 Mbit/s
Original Time 11:19.333
Original Frame Rate 15.00
Original Sample Rate 48000
Original Data Rate 642 kbit/s
URL \Storage Card\VIDEO\CASINO ROYAL.3GP
Size 693721516
Platform PocketPC
OS Version 5.01
OEM Info HERM100
Clock speed 397 Mhz
Video output ATI IMAGEON 240x320 16bits Slow Lookup
Video zoom 352x288 -> 240x320
Audio output Wave Output 48000Hz 16Bits 2Ch.
BTW - I have ATT 8525

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.

Playing video formats?

The Blackstone is the first smart/windows mobile phone i have had so after recieving my phone i tried some of my video files but (as i expected) windows media wudn't play them, i have seen on other threads that alot of people mention Core Player 1.2.5 and wondered if anyone could give answer me a few quick questions:
1. Does Core Player play most formats (im trying to play x264.mp4 and dixv .avi)
2. Where can i find Core Player?
3. is it a free program? if not how much is it in GBP?

Go to www.coreplayer.com and see for yourself. I think on their homepage they anwser pretty much all your questions.
Ascenca

Thanks - Don't know why didn't find their site!

I had this problem - Core Player 1.2.5 plays all files perfectly on the HD - commuting will never be the same again...

Which version do i need?
CorePlayer Mobile For PocketPC / Windows Mobile
CorePlayer Mobile for SmartPhone
I assume its the SmartPhone version?

This is the version you need: https://www.mobihand.com/cart1.asp?posid=130&pid=8905
(mobile/WM)

HD is a PocketPC

working
Coreplayer 2,5 works perfectly.The PocketPc version the smartphone one is for devices without touchscreen.
Its a commercial software.
Ideal is to use the Qtv display as video output.
I tried different encoded format and the best result is encode the avi files with following attributes:
dimension 640*480
Bitrate between 700 and 750
Framerate 25fps
Audio MP3
Stereo 128kps
Frecuency 44100 Hz.
You can use a higher bitrate till 1200 , but the video doen't play always very smootly then

I tried a couple widescreen (960x540) files in different formats (wmv, mov, avi) with coreplayer 2.5, and none of them would play anywhere near smoothly. the mov played with about 1.5 fps, the wmv with about 5 fps und the avi with something like 7 fps. do any of the numerous settings in coreplayer need to be changed or is the device simply not powerful enough for full native resolution video playback?

just tried some more videos, this time a 1 MBit/s 480x270 wmv file, and even that couldn't be played in any useful way:
played frames: 85
dropped: 447
did you change anything in the core player settings to achieve proper playback?

obstler said:
I tried a couple widescreen (960x540) files in different formats (wmv, mov, avi) with coreplayer 2.5, and none of them would play anywhere near smoothly. the mov played with about 1.5 fps, the wmv with about 5 fps und the avi with something like 7 fps. do any of the numerous settings in coreplayer need to be changed or is the device simply not powerful enough for full native resolution video playback?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Firstly, the issue with the video files comes from the fact that they're larger than the resolution of the screen. (your video=960x540, HD=800x460) This means that as well as decoding and playing the video, it also has to scale the video down to it's resolution. This is why it's stuttering. Full native resolution video playback is 800x640 which, incidentally, is the native resolution of DVDs, so if DVD rips have been encoded properly, should not need resizing or re-encoding to play on the HD. (feel free to be skeptical of this, I don't own a HD yet so can't confirm this)
The 1Mbps file possibly wasn't playing properly for that exact reason, it was 1Mbps. As BerreZ states, the highest bitrate to get good playback is 750Kbp

Thanks, got CorePlayer up and running now works like a dream!

I'm waiting for funds to clear so i can finally order one of these bad boys. I'm not too demanding when it comes to video playback on the phone. 700KBPS is the standard encoding of dvd rips isn't it? like, your traditional torrent movie file.So it looks like we can play them on the HD then using coreplayer? I'm not to concerned about HD quality playback and i've been using an XDA2i for 5 years, mainly for clips and such when bored at the bus station .
Maybe with a higher capacity card I might throw a movie or two on there
....IB a n e

BANE said:
I'm waiting for funds to clear so i can finally order one of these bad boys. I'm not too demanding when it comes to video playback on the phone. 700KBPS is the standard encoding of dvd rips isn't it? like, your traditional torrent movie file.So it looks like we can play them on the HD then using coreplayer? I'm not to concerned about HD quality playback and i've been using an XDA2i for 5 years, mainly for clips and such when bored at the bus station .
Maybe with a higher capacity card I might throw a movie or two on there
....IB a n e
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
a)Native DVD resolution is not 800x640
b)700Kbps is not the "Standard Encoding" for DVD rips.
bitrate will depend on the size of the encode, the length of the movie.

Apologies, my mistake.
...Ib a n e

Urgh -it's payware. Another cost.

Is there a decent free avi/media player?

One time, I got a cab, but lost it, with some codecs to play divx and other on the Media player. Does anyone knows something like that??

I just purchased CorePlayer. It gave me v1.3.6 not 2.5. Anyway I have tried a divx and avi film. With both I just saw a green haze for a bit and I needed to soft reset the device to recover.
I downloaded the cab not exe and installed it directly onto the device. My films are on storage.
I get a "Copy & Convert" dialogue box with "Convertion (None)" and it seems to do nothing for a while but it does seem to copy the file across ok. What that means is I can see it in explorer. That said it seems to take several runs at it and the bars never go beyond three or so.
Have I just got the wrong resolution?
Any ideas?

Video playback problems - Coreplayer, TCPMP : SOLVED/SOLUTION

PROBLEM SOLVED - CONCLUSION OF THREAD updated 9/3/10:
1). Coreplayer and TCPMP don't work well on my device when playing back avi (divx/xvid) because they don't support hardware accelaration, although others seem to have no problems which still confuses me. Playback is juddery dropping many frames. I have tried Shasaraks settings (which are the best) and all others with no luck.
2). Because WMP and the HTC player don't support avi (divx/xvid) converting to mp4 is the only option for me.
3). CONVERSION: I have tried many converters including: TMPGEnc.XPress, handbrake, xvid4psp, mediacoder and others. The ones that do work well for the HD2 all have the same problem and that is a delay in audio putting speech out of sync when played back on the device. Even when playing back avi's in coreplayer i had to manualy adjust the sync.
The only converter that works well and is fast and can put the audio in sync for playback on HD2 is winmenc available here (freeware) http://winmenc.blogspot.com/
Download my profile which has the audio sync tweak already in it (thanks to Kr00ton) and put it into the profiles folder. I have tweaked Kenkiller's original profile, see here for info: http://forum.xda-developers.com/show...7&postcount=38
I have changed Kenkillers profile from 2000 to 1000 kbps to save file size and have also got rid off the 2 pass encoding to save time (and lots of it!). You also need to tick FIT TO WIDTH AND SPEED & QUALITY CONTROL AND MOVE IT TO FASTEST. I done various tests and found no noticeble difference to SD videos doing it my way. This speeds up conversion time to around 30 mins for a 700mb avi and keeps the file size about the same as the original.
If you have more time on your hands and or you are converting HD then maybe use Kenkillers original profile, although i converted HD stuff in my profile and it looked great. It all depends if file size and conversion time is an issue for you.
4). For some reason the HTC player still judders for me, i'm pretty sure it didn't do that in stock rom 1.44 but it certainly does on my 1.66 ROM leaving only WMP that performs perfectly It's a shame that it isn't very finger friendly for srolling through the video etc but i'll live with that.
I can only report my findings and experiences, you may not have the same issues i have had. Conversion may wield different reults on other OS's. I'm using windows 7 64 bit and can confirm that when i used winavimp4 converter on xp it was perfect but used on windows 7 it puts audio out of sync. Having said that it is without a doubt the fastest converter i have come accross converting a 700mb file in around 10 mins on windows 7 64 bit. It was around 30 mins on my old xp machine.
5). I can now relax and enjoy my films on my HD2, which is the main reason i bought it!
ORIGINAL 1ST POST
I bought this phone because of its screen. I watch movies on my long journeys to work and i'm getting increasingly frustrated with the phones poor performance on playback.
Coreplayer judders with many dropped frames no matter what settings (tried shasaraks direct draw settings) or version of coreplayer i use and disabling sense and using plane mode makes no difference whatsoever. It will play flawlessly for a while then judder then be ok then judder on and on...
So i decided to convert to mp4:
coreplayer still has poor performance. HTC player was ok but since upgrading to 1.66 it's performing worse than coreplayer now (yes, i did a hard reset after flashing)
The only player that works is wmp. I now have some questions:
1). Is there an option in wmp to sync the audio manualy like in coreplayer? some films are slightly out of sync.
2). are there any other players that work well on the HD2 apart from tcpmp (tried that, same results as coreplayer)
3). CONVERSION:
What are the best settings for video conversion for the HD2? If I can't use coreplayer to play avi this is my only solution and aslo solves the problem of coreplayer not supporting ac3 audio. I'm talking bitrate etc for video and audio. If you are succesfully converting video what converter and settings do you use? PLEASE!
I tried searching but couldn't see a thread dedicated to optimum conversion settings for the HD2.
4). Could the problem lie with my 16gb sandisk sd card? i noticed another thread for the blackstone where a cab was designed to speed up the cards performance by 3 times, is there something like this for the HD2 and would me formatting it to fat 32 make any difference at all to my problem?
This is really winding me up now and i've spent hours messing with settings etc, the one function i really need and it wont perform which i find very surprising for a phone that has this super fast snapdragon processor.
PLEASE HELP ME
END OF ORIGINAL POST, PROFILE FOR WINMENC BELOW

1) no
2) none even close to that
3) can't tell, as I don't really do it much, coreplayer works well for me
4) could be, as coreplayer works well for me.

jonbaker76 said:
4). Could the problem lie with my 16gb sandisk sd card? i noticed another thread for the blackstone where a cab was designed to speed up the cards performance by 3 times, is there something like this for the HD2 and would me formatting it to fat 32 make any difference at all to my problem?
This is really winding me up now and i've spent hours messing with settings etc, the one function i really need and it wont perform which i find very surprising for a phone that has this super fast snapdragon processor.
PLEASE HELP ME
many thanks...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Could well be the card, as it sounds like it gets to the end of a buffer, buffers, then continues, causing the lags.

I know that reporting my own experience is of relatively low usefullness to you as it's not step by step instructions on how to solve your problem, anyway:
1) I use TCPMP to watch AC3 audio-encoded series like frasier
2) I use Coreplayer to watch non AC3 encoded series like sex and the city
3) tcpmp is slower than coreplayer for those videos that coreplayer CAN play, I get ~120% bench for SATC in coreplayer and ~90% in tcpmp, but nonetheless I can watch everything (...that I tried until now) in tcpmp without noticing the slightest issues, and I always "zoom to fit screen", which means the video fills the entire 800x480 resolution
4) I watched videos on my old ipaq 214 as well, sure we're talking about a different device, but we're aso talking about a device with a 600MHz cpu and without an accelerated graphics subsystem (and I do have chainfire patch for the graphics subsystme of my hd2)... well I only used tcpmp on the 214 and no issue there... and I watched the whole Death note series, crappy bench results but no issues with jumps in the video
5) I have a 16gb class 2 sandisk microsd, and despite it being class 2, I get ~7mb/s transfers both ways in the sd reader of my laptop, so if we're using the same memory card, that should not be the problem...
6) probably you watch "heavy" encoded movies?

Look at this:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=5331497&postcount=38
Post Nr. 38 and download th profiles.
Use Winmenc 0.81 Beta (Freeware). Copy the downloaded profiles into Winmenc subfolder "profile".
Edit the profile like told in this thread
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=5341496#post5341496 Post Nr. 32 from krooton.
Important ist to set the audiodelay.
With this solution you can get very good *.mp4 Files with audio in sync playable with Manila album or Mediaplayer.
I tried a lot of things but this was the only way to get good video with audio in sync.
Sorry, but english is not my first language.

For coreplayer i'm using v 1.3.5 build 7340 but the newer 1.3.6 build 7427 also performs the same.
What version are you guys using?
Failing that i'll format the card to fat32 to see if that makes a difference and have a look at that winmenc.
Any other suggestions are very welcome

ephestione said:
6) probably you watch "heavy" encoded movies?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
defo not this. I converted a film to the lowest spec audio and video wise and it resulted in 350mb file... It played the same as the 1.2g original!

I used handbreak to convert to MP4 and then used the built in player in sense.
Seemed to be HW accelerated as 45minutes of playback took about 8% of the battery charge and I would expect doing soft decode of H264 would take more than that.
Only downside was waiting 15minutes to go from 720p to iPhone profile in handbreak. I am going to experiment with remuxing
Jim

I have created a preset in handbrake specifically for the HD2 - Let me get home and post it back for you.
have been using this - converted about 20 movies and loaded up around 10 on the HD2 for a trip. All of them played perfectly in HTC album (Looks like it's hardware accelerated). Approx 4-5 hours on a single full charge (around 2 1/2 movies back to back).
Best part - converstion takes about an hour on a 4 yr old laptop - should happen much quicker on new ones.
Source files are all mkv (for Blu-ray rips) or iso (for standard DVD)

vivek310 said:
I have created a preset in handbrake specifically for the HD2 - Let me get home and post it back for you.
have been using this - converted about 20 movies and loaded up around 10 on the HD2 for a trip. All of them played perfectly in HTC album (Looks like it's hardware accelerated). Approx 4-5 hours on a single full charge (around 2 1/2 movies back to back).
Best part - converstion takes about an hour on a 4 yr old laptop - should happen much quicker on new ones.
Source files are all mkv (for Blu-ray rips) or iso (for standard DVD)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
please do mate, looks like a nice converter, if you post the sttings you are using i'll give it a bash tonight.
I don't know what is going on with coreplayer, i used it a while ago and it played lovely, about 2 drops in 10 mins. I just tried again, 11 drops in 10 seconds what does this tell us!?!?!?!?

Could also be that you have something running in the background that's using the CPU badly...

This thread is worth checking out for video settings: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=582122
A converter that is reasonably idiot-proof (although its maximum bitrate is a teensy bit too low, IMO) is MP4ForHD, which you can find here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=478050 I think it lets you incorporate an audio delay into the video (thus negating the need to do it in the player).

I've bought Core PLayer and Kinoma PLay but the only one i use to play my videos and series is TCMP, its litter and complete doing its tasks.
I prefeer TCMP.

kilrah said:
Could also be that you have something running in the background that's using the CPU badly...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Is what i thought but no, everything is shut down. Does the same after a soft reset. Disabling sense and using plane mode also makes no difference.
But like i say, soemtimes it works and sometimes it drops like a mother f*****
it's completely random
what i will try is another sd card, i got the 2gig one indoors, i'll put the same vid on that and report back... all rather boring but it's doing my head in and i don't like being beaten

Shasarak said:
This thread is worth checking out for video settings: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=582122
A converter that is reasonably idiot-proof (although its maximum bitrate is a teensy bit too low, IMO) is MP4ForHD, which you can find here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=478050 I think it lets you incorporate an audio delay into the video (thus negating the need to do it in the player).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thanks, will take a look

I just don't see the point in encoding especially for a mobile device.
That's iphone madness, not ours
I've been watching videos encoded for proper pc's since when I had my ipaq hx2400 back then, after that I kept doing it with my ipaq 214, and now I am happily doing the same on the HD2. I am sure there's something that's preventing jonbaker from watchgin movies normally, and using an alternate encoder is not a "solution" but a complication. Occam would say the same.
More specific info on file size/length/codec/bitrate/tcpmp-coreplayer bench results/microsd transfer rate (tested with read/write operation in usb disk mode) would be useful.

If memory card access is causing the problem with CorePlayer then you could try increasing the amount of memory CorePlayer uses to buffer. You could also try out these registry settings which sometimes improve SD card performance: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=5547319&postcount=8

Shasarak said:
If memory card access is causing the problem with CorePlayer then you could try increasing the amount of memory CorePlayer uses to buffer. You could also try out these registry settings which sometimes improve SD card performance: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=5547319&postcount=8
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
any chance you can suggest what i increase the settings to in the coreplayer memory buffer? not sure what im doing there! wouldnt mind giving that a go.

jonbaker76 said:
any chance you can suggest what i increase the settings to in the coreplayer memory buffer? not sure what im doing there! wouldnt mind giving that a go.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm operating entirely on guesswork, so no, no chance at all!!! I guess it needs to still be small enough that there is no danger of running out of memory on the phone, but larger than the default value. Might not make any difference, of course, depends on what's causing the bottleneck.
Have you tried getting CorePlayer to play video and audio in the background and then opening up the task manager to see what the CPU usage is doing? That might at least tell you whether it's a lack of processing power as opposed to something else.

Shasarak said:
Have you tried getting CorePlayer to play video and audio in the background and then opening up the task manager to see what the CPU usage is doing? That might at least tell you whether it's a lack of processing power as opposed to something else.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
RIGHT i set coreplayer to play in background: BUILT IN TASK MANAGER:
mem - 7.94m CPU sitting around 45 - 65%, then will drop to around 20% then back up to 60%
RESCO TASK MANAGER:
mem - reports 2.68m
don't know why they give different results memory wise don't think resco task manger gives cpu usage
is all that normal?