TX264 0.9.8 - GUI for x264 with audio encoding support

[ozok]

Hello Dextor,

1) Do you mean program settings (output folder path etc.) or profiles (pre-defined)? In both cases it is really strange. I'll need more information about that problem because i cannot think anything that may cause it.
2) I might be completely wrong but in Turkey we use "," as decimal mark. As my system is Turkish, default values are with comma. If your system uses "." as decimal mark, default values are invalid so it makes sense that it starts to change from smallest valid value.
3) Yes qcomp values were passed wrong (60 instead of 0.60). Thanks.

DRC is in my to-do list. It will be on next release but i cannot say when that will be released.

I also recommend you to use preset and profiles. With a bit of experimenting you can find best options for your device. I started TX264 to encode files my low-end android phone.

[Dextor]

Hi ozok,

1) I mean a saved "Pre-defined" state, the line just below output folder in the main window. My experience is such that it got deleted only when the program exited unexpectedly (I do not recall the reason, maybe I forced the PC to shutdown while TX264 was working) - the *.pdo file in the "PreDefs" folder was just gone. This doesn't happen if I exit the program the normal way.
2) I understand. But people from English-speaking countries (and surely other countries) where "." is used as decimal mark might have problems with TX264. I don't know if delphi has an option to input the "defaul system decimal mark" into a text field... But x264 uses a "." in its parameters so perhaps it would be acceptable to just use "." everywhere regardless of the user's regional preferences? I'm sure people would understand what "0.1" means even if their country (such as your country, Turkey, or my country, Czech rep.) uses "," as a decimal mark...
3) No problem - I will just use the manually added parameter until the next version...

Well my device is compatible with "Baseline" profile and 4.1 Level, but I like to experiment and enable as many additional features as my Gio can handle, because I convert all the videos I acquire from any source to H264/AAC mp4 files and I like the videos to have as much quality and small filesize as possible, while maintaining compatibility with my Galaxy Gio (which isn't a very good thing, as the Gio doesn't support any advanced x264 option... )

[Atak_Snajpera]

ofcourse you can force any decimal symbol in delphi

decimalseparator := '.';

[ozok]

TX264 converts "," to "." when it passes it to encoders. But if I missed a point where it is not converted let me know.

@Atak_Snajpera thanks, i did not know that.

[ozok]

I've decided to release a new version. With it, many backends are updated and skins are removed because they caused very annoying flickers.

Change log:

--0.8.5
-Added: Support for FHGAACENC
-Added: DRC
-Removed: Skin which caused performance issues
-Fixed: qcomp values were passed wrong (thx to Dextor)
-Fixed: Unable to use Ogg Vorbis bitrate mode
-Updated: x264 to rev 2216
-Updated: MediaInfo to 0.7.60
-Updated: QAAC to 1.43
-Updated: FFmpeg to 2012-10-10 build from ffmpeg.zeranoe.com
-Updated: mkvmerge t0 5.8.0
-Updated: mkvextract to 5.8.0

[Dextor]

The new look is really good under Windows 8. I liked the skin, but without it it's even better (at least on Win8)... FGH-AAC is a great addition, I think I'll use it now (I would use Quicktime AAC, but who wants to install Quicktime, right?) I did not check the qcomp, as I use presets now, but I believe you fixed it.

I'm having one problem now, which I did not have with the 0.8.4 version - if I use the "force constant FPS" option, the video is encoded with wrong FPS: I have a video with 23.976 FPS and it gets converted to 25 FPS. I noticed this because the audio was out of sync... In the log it is clear. 25 instead of 23.976. In 0.8.4 this error did not occur...

LOG HERE

I try to fix this by adding custom parameter "--fps 23.976" temporarily...

[Dextor]

Unchecking the "force constant fps" option and adding custom parameters to x264.exe ("--force-cfr --fps 23.976") worked correctly without confusing x264 with two "--fps" parameters. I hope you fix this soon though, as I will be using this excellent tool a lot now... I need constant fps, otherwise my poor Gio refuses to play the files...

[ozok]

It looks like TX264 cannot extract FPS information from source, 25 is the default value it returns in case of error. Can you send me a sample? You can extract a clip from video using Avidemux i think.

[pandy]

initial buffer occupancy suggested as % but value can be set from 0 to 1

[ozok]

Originally Posted by pandy

initial buffer occupancy suggested as % but value can be set from 0 to 1

i will fix it asap. thank you.

[ozok]

Update:

--0.8.6
-Fixed: Range of initial buffer occupancy is now from 0 to 100 (thx to pandy)
-Fixed: Problems with some files with vfr (thx to Dextor)
-Fixed: A few UI errors
-Updated: MediaInfo to 0.7.61
-Updated: FFmpeg to 2012-10-20 from ffmpeg.zeranoe.com

[Flipe]

My old computer (with Linux only) should die in order to run across this great tool. Thanks, ozok, for it!

My knowledge of encoding and programming is very superficial, contrary to what appears to be the rule here in this forum, but I will still try my best to contribute to the development of this tool, in view of the problems I had using it the last days (and to be fair caused actually by the behaviour of ffmpeg and x.264 rather than from this tool), even if it is only by making proposals. My apologies in advance if the following proposals are plain stupid or if they were already discussed in this forum and I failed to find them:

1) Ffmpeg cannot decode some AAC streams correctly (such as. but not only, the ones in a MOV file) and exits with an error. This is documented here and is caused by the value of the channel element being 1.0. The solution given in the mentioned page is described in this link and consists on extracting the audio and converting with faad before processing it further. It would be great if this solution or an alternative one would be implemented in Tx264.

2) x.264 cannot deal with certain resolutions, such as the following " ffms [info]: 450x338p 0:1 @ 15/1 fps (vfr)" causing the following error " x264 [error]: height not divisible by 4". It would be nice if the program would automatically adjust the resolution to a valid one closest to the one of the input (if you prefer with a warning so that the user knows it).

3) I am not sure of this, but I think I read somewhere that for HE-AAC encoding the 3GPP-based libaacplus provides much better quality than NeroAAC. If this is the case, it would be also great if this option would be available in a similar manner than NeroAAC (that is, the user should provide a compiled ffmpeg with AACplus functionality, as a compiled version of ffmpeg with libaacplus is also not distributable).

Thanks again for this great application that simplifies encoding to h.264 for basic users like me.

[Dextor]

Originally Posted by Flipe

3) I am not sure of this, but I think I read somewhere that for HE-AAC encoding the 3GPP-based libaacplus provides much better quality than NeroAAC. If this is the case, it would be also great if this option would be available in a similar manner than NeroAAC (that is, the user should provide a compiled ffmpeg with AACplus functionality, as a compiled version of ffmpeg with libaacplus is also not distributable).

You know you can use FhG AAC with TX264 since version 0.8.5, right? According to some listening tests I saw (but which did not include libaacplus, and I think they used LC-AAC @96kbps), FhG AAC, which TX264 uses, had virtually the same sound quality as QuickTime AAC, which was the winner of that test. I'm only speculating now, as I have never used libaacplus, but I think no AAC codec is much better than the FhG's one... And according to those tests FhG AAC is also a bit better than Nero AAC. I personally can confirm this, as to me, 32kbps (VBR, quality setting 1) FhG AAC (HE AAC) sounds much better than 48kbps (VBR, q 0.2) Nero AAC (also HE AAC). Just my opinion though.
The test is here: http://listening-tests.hydrogenaudio.org/igorc/aac-96-a/results.html (yeah it's LC AAC, not HE AAC)

Edit: factual correction etc.

[ozok]

Originally Posted by Flipe

...

1) Ffmpeg cannot decode some AAC streams correctly (such as. but not only, the ones in a MOV file) and exits with an error. This is documented here and is caused by the value of the channel element being 1.0. The solution given in the mentioned page is described in this link and consists on extracting the audio and converting with faad before processing it further. It would be great if this solution or an alternative one would be implemented in Tx264.

I could not really reproduce that problem. Did it happen to you while using TX264? If so, can you send me a sample? (nothing larger than 50mb)

Originally Posted by Flipe

2) x.264 cannot deal with certain resolutions, such as the following " ffms [info]: 450x338p 0:1 @ 15/1 fps (vfr)" causing the following error " x264 [error]: height not divisible by 4". It would be nice if the program would automatically adjust the resolution to a valid one closest to the one of the input (if you prefer with a warning so that the user knows it).

In the next release, TX264 will check if entered width and height values are divisible by 4,8 and 16. I am also planing to check input file if resizing is disabled.

Originally Posted by Flipe

3) I am not sure of this, but I think I read somewhere that for HE-AAC encoding the 3GPP-based libaacplus provides much better quality than NeroAAC. If this is the case, it would be also great if this option would be available in a similar manner than NeroAAC (that is, the user should provide a compiled ffmpeg with AACplus functionality, as a compiled version of ffmpeg with libaacplus is also not distributable).

As Dextor stated, aac encoders provided with TX264 should suffice most of the time. If you can find a ffmpeg windows build with libaacplus support, I'd be more than glad to add support for it. So far I could not find one.

Originally Posted by Flipe

Thanks again for this great application that simplifies encoding to h.264 for basic users like me.

You are welcome

[Flipe]

Thanks Dextor and Ozoc for your replies. Sorry for taking a while to reply, I was on holiday a couple of days.

Originally Posted by Dextor

You know you can use FhG AAC with TX264 since version 0.8.5, right? [...]

No, I did not know. As I said, I have a very superficial knowledge of encoding, let alone of all the possible encoders available. I will then use FhG AAC as you propose. Thanks for the tip!

Originally Posted by ozok

I could not really reproduce that problem. Did it happen to you while using TX264? If so, can you send me a sample? (nothing larger than 50mb)

Yes, it happened while using TX264, but as I said, it has nothing to do with it but with ffmpeg itself. I encoded and deleted the file that gave me the problems. I have found another one which appears to have a similar problem but it is 800 Mb. I have tried to select a sample with Avidemux but I guess even if the audio and video streams are copied the extracting and reintroducing it in an mp4 container changes the value of the channel element because then the problem is then gone. Do you maybe know how could I take a sample without substantially changing the information of the container?

Originally Posted by ozok

In the next release, TX264 will check if entered width and height values are divisible by 4,8 and 16. I am also planing to check input file if resizing is disabled.

Great! Thanks for constantly improving the application!

Originally Posted by ozok

As Dextor stated, aac encoders provided with TX264 should suffice most of the time. If you can find a ffmpeg windows build with libaacplus support, I'd be more than glad to add support for it. So far I could not find one.

I guess it is as possible to have ffmpeg with libaacplus support in Windows as it is in Linux (although I am not 100% sure of it because I have no idea of how to do a cross compiling so that it works in Windows). There is no ffmpeg with libaacplus available because it cannot be distributed and must be compiled with this extra library by each user due to some legal limitations. I managed to compile one for linux. But anyway as Dextor and you said, probably there is already an encoder included in TX264 that I did not know of providing good quality at low bit rates, so probably it is unnecessary to complicate things, as it would require each user willing to use it to compile ffmpeg, which probably (I have not much knowledge of programming, either, so maybe I am wrong) requires Linux and cross compiling.

[ozok]

Update:

--0.8.7
-Added: A speed indicator for x264 encoding
-Added: Shutdown, log off and restart post-encode options
-Added: Option to pause between encodes
-Added: Tray icon and balloon hint
-Added: TX264 will check if specified dimensions are valid
-Added: Progress for individual files will be shown in the list
-Added: Overlay icon for Windows 7 taskbar
-Added: TX264 will not add a file twice to the list
-Added: New encoding window layout
-Added: 250 frames will be used if error occures while getting info for preview
-Fixed: File list item color problem
-Improved: Multiple file removing from list performance
-Updated: FFmpeg to 11-05-2012 from ffmpeg.zeranoe.com
-Updated: AlphaControls to 8.03

[ozok]

It seems i overlooked a small bug that caused TX264 to give error after encoding is done. I uploaded new 0.8.7 files and did not change version number as it is really small fix and not many people downloaded it.

Edit: Well, looks like it is still there. In case of that error you can close TX264. Encoded files will be there, they wont be effected.

[ozok]

Update:

--0.8.8
-Added: Reset button to audio effects window
-Added: Many UI changes
-Fixed: Deleting files from list cause visual artifacts
-Fixed: "List index out of bounds" error after encoding is done
-Updated: x264.exe to rev 2230

[ozok]

Hotfix:

--0.8.9
-Fixed: Audio ID problems with some vob files
-Fixed: Deleting selected items from list caused problems

[Hobbe]

Thanks for a great program!
Feature req: Copy video and a auto crop function. Allow subtitles from srt.
Maybe a bug report.. when I encode dts sound to aac the resulting sound have a much lower volume.. Why? Tried qaac and Fhg same result..