real max screening frame rate : 15,18 20fps ?

I have always wondered if the real *screening* frame rate (M6 SP) was not simply limited on a hardware basis (QVGA 15fps here)

indeed you can encode at 15,18 and even 20fps and the M6 will accept the file ; okay but this does not mean that the source encoded frame rate will turn as 18 or 20 frames moved to the screen ofthe M6 ; they may quite simply dropped as as a consequence of a ( here above supposed ) QVGA/15fps hardware limitation

quite honestly I have not taken time to make further 'investigation' than between a 15fps versus a 18fps encoded movie ;and it turned I could not really tell from the eye

now this was not really fast action movie , so it may turn hard for the eye to tell from 15 to 18 here

if anybody has made serious investigation here , with his eyes only, I would like to hear anyway . Now in the end only a fast shutter apn could *really* tell how many frames are screened, and I lack such beauty

I am pretty much sure that even 25 fps would be no problem for this kind of display. The processor is the bottle neck here. And from what my eyes tell me, the M6 reaches the promised 20 frames only with low data rate scenes. Once the action starts, it drops down to something between 10 and 15.

I think you are correct pointing the relation to the bit rate ; that's also why it makes the investigation so tricky

now I keep quite reasonable as for bit rate ( between 220 and 280kbits for video stream and 128k or less for audio) , which I think ('feel') the processor has no pb at all with this here

indeed VBR is another point here ; 240k average can turn 500 or more on fast action...

again I make no statement , I simply ask ; since my own investigation is quite insufficient , as based on only one movie , no super fast action in addition, and 15 versus 18 tested . Lack of time ...

Still I would hardly tell any difference , if any ; and the total bit rate is quite certainly no pb here

oops, now I recall having made a 25fps encode with the same overall 'contrained' bit rate ( video @280 audio@128 or even possibly 96 ) and the M6 would not accept the movie ; here I think the 25fps was simply rejected but not on a bit rate basis but quite probably as an 'unvalid' frame rate

BatMan's Q5 and Qx profiles give you a feeling on what is possible with libav and xvid. libav works with higher bitrates because xvid is difficult to hold in leash (everything slightly over 500 kbit will make the Meizu crash, and the xvid designers forgot to implement a maximum_bitrate feature). Still xvid seems to produce slightly better output quality on the M6, which comes on the expense of encoding performance.
Oh and 25 fps is only valid for the M3 Music Card. The M6 MiniPlayer accepts only videos up to 20 fps.

I will look at Batman's encoder and libav . Actually I have only used VDub (and XviD) from the very first day; I looked after a possible B frame support and ..nope; so the encoding possibilities remain quite basic , that is Mpeg4 Simple Profile @Level3

keeping target bit rate below 300k has proved to produce always compatible bit rate movies , whatever the frame rate ; (just too normal anyway as for the frame rate 'role' here)

from many observations bit rate control in XviD is somewhere between 0.5 to 2 ; that's what I like here ( confortable but not too large VBR) ; but yes it lacks some max_bit rate ; you have to be just a bit careful on your target bit rate...

Originally Posted by BobbyQ

BatMan's Q5 and Qx profiles give you a feeling on what is possible with libav and xvid. libav works with higher bitrates because xvid is difficult to hold in leash (everything slightly over 500 kbit will make the Meizu crash, and the xvid designers forgot to implement a maximum_bitrate feature).

I was working on that you know. Xvid is quite good to keep on a leash, it has a whole scala of profile-code of which the parameters can be easily edited. But I don't have the time currently, and I'm afraid I won't find it for a very long to come. I might post what I have here sometime soon, so others with no life can experiment and perfect the Xvid-meizu-profile. To bad, I was quite close to fixing the last stutters at average bitrates of 440 kbit/s at 20fps.

I aknowledge having never tried larger bit rates than 320k , (makes final use of that is) , and finally even keeping lower somewhere around 250k ; the reason is quite obvious , that is I can store quite a few movies on a 8GB M6

and...they do not look visibly worse than @400k (imho) ; a screen @163dpi helps quite a lot there , compared to say a 19"LCD with screen @86dpi ; this you also have to take in account when thinking of bit rate versus visible 'crips' quality

now if as BobbyQ states the M6 will collapse with >500k bit rates , as I assume this concerns average duration (short anyway) peaks too , then I cant imagine an "average bitrates of 440 kbit/s at 20fps" except as a defacto CBR set profile

well okay , now what a waste of bits , and file size then, for almost quite sure ( in most circunstances) no better looking video than <280k VBR

Unfortunately the lack of ASP profile/level support in M6 lets little margin for any clever encoding tweaks ; these are almost reserved to ASP @level5 , the best part of (mpeg4) XviD ; at least imho

Zzzzchrrr Zzzzchr ... Hm ? ... what was the question again ? hrrhrr XD
if you want to have a quick overview, just drag a test video into BatMan and enter "a" (="all profiles"). This will encode all profiles in a row, so you can compare afterwards. By the way, I am using average=max bitrate (approx.) in Q5 to achieve highest possible quality.

Originally Posted by trane

I aknowledge having never tried larger bit rates than 320k , (makes final use of that is) , and finally even keeping lower somewhere around 250k ; the reason is quite obvious , that is I can store quite a few movies on a 8GB M6

and...they do not look visibly worse than @400k (imho) ; a screen @163dpi helps quite a lot there , compared to say a 19"LCD with screen @86dpi ; this you also have to take in account when thinking of bit rate versus visible 'crips' quality

now if as BobbyQ states the M6 will collapse with >500k bit rates , as I assume this concerns average duration (short anyway) peaks too , then I cant imagine an "average bitrates of 440 kbit/s at 20fps" except as a defacto CBR set profile

well okay , now what a waste of bits , and file size then, for almost quite sure ( in most circunstances) no better looking video than <280k VBR

Unfortunately the lack of ASP profile/level support in M6 lets little margin for any clever encoding tweaks ; these are almost reserved to ASP @level5 , the best part of (mpeg4) XviD ; at least imho

You have no idea what you are talking about. If you would have read my message a bit more thorough, maybe you would have. I AM talking about VBR with an average of 440kbit/s. As you can read: XviD-profile support is pretty well adaptable in the source. By using the stuff provided there, one can optimize the ouput of XviD in such a way that it is 100&#37; compatible with the M6. I and BobbyQ have already BETA-tested some stuff, and most stuttering is gone & for me no and for BobbyQ very little A/V desync. :D

Next to that: Quality CAN get a lot better. There is more to quality than just pixelation, as you are talking about here. Detail smudges, frame overlapping, etc. are all part of the game. But I started this profile to get rid of certain incompatibilities on which the M6 decoder will choke or stutter when using XviD or MPEG4 in general.

first try to keep a bit cool ...

then I only take interest in facts not self proclamed gurus with magic formulas where there can't be ! just take time to see what's possible with Simple Profile @level3 and you will have learned something

first possibly the useless of so called VBR 440k ....caping at 500k ! that's makes no sense ! YOU (prove you) don't know much about compression inners( ?) ; sorry I dont' mean to be rude

but all is there :

>>I started this profile to get rid of certain incompatibilities on which the M6 decoder will choke or stutter when using XviD or MPEG4 in general.

I have NEVER experienced any kind of stutter on my M6 , simply provided because I know what (no nonsense) bit rate is about

again if you intend a max_bitrate @500k , then it makes NO sense to look after "VBR with an average of 440kbit/s" ; it is simply nonsense and poor compression understanding

what you describe here is simply CBR ! I have nothing against it having used it for long in the glorious days of Real ; but it was for live stream where (control on) network bandwidth is almost the premium factor. Hence the use of CBR

now if you have such high skills as you credit yourself , you should know you will get much better efficiency and control on final quality with the use of well tempered VBR ; not wasting bits where there is little use

now indeed if YOUR challenge is to waste bits using as many as the M6 will eat just before it chokes, well that's (to me) the kind of silly challenge like eating 10 burgers in 2 minutes

again such so called BETA-tested guru 'profile' starts from a wrong approach not to say again total misunderstanding , ie : "I AM talking about VBR with an average of 440kbit/s"

BTW, I simply hope you are there not responsible for the stuttering complain (on M6 decode) I have read , but with scepticism having never experienced any , with VBR <300k average ; then the processor simply does not choke or stutter ; no magic here

this also keeps the file reasonably small and quality is just about the same as some who say or think "Quality CAN get a lot better" when more bits are used and wasted , with no visual benefit

I have found much more questioning problems on the hardware side of M6 ( having two of them ) , especially on the LCD 'consistency' Meizu gets from Samsung .The two screens behave totally differently and as a consequence a given file fully okay on one can show some severe 'clouding' and 'color banding' artefacts on the other . This kind of drawback IS far beyond any magic behind some 2007 self-tested guru-proclamed "profile"....on yet 10 years old brave old Mpeg4 Simple Profile @level3

did you take interest in such hardware issues ?

did not mean to be rude ; the thread was going cool until you flame for no reason that I can understand . okay, I am sorry if I have hurt your guru status there ! it was not on purpose anyway since I hardly know anybody there . BTW if you are such a 'profiler' guru on SP@level3 go and thread yourself on Doom9. You should shine and receive some warm welcome ...

hare, hare ! see ya

while reluctant to spend some time looking after fancy claims on this brave old Mpeg4 Simple Profile , I thought it was fair to give a chance ...

I dowloaded Batman

I tried the so called "Experimental" (waou) High Quality QX 'profile' since it filts my own 'makes sense' XviD target VBR bit rate : 300kbits

and then I simply used my brave old VDub and Simple Profile @level 3 with no particular fancy settings ...

the source movie is 640*360 and it makes some sense to crop and get some closer 4/3 ratio , especially since M6 is 2,4" display ; but I decided not to and only resize 320*240 as is

I mention this since I noticed that ( by default) Batman makes some crop here which ends in some 'larger' image , but at the expense of the original resolution full content . I also do this in Vdub quite often so no particular critic here . I have not much time to spend on Batman so I left the default setting here ; in a way , as it produces some "zoomed" image , some may think this is not the same source movie , or possibly prefer the 'bigger' image. Now as for the encoder the uncroped encode is more bits to code, so a bit more demanding; but never mind let's give this QX an even better chance to stand ...

now having all said , let the facts speak

Experimental QX Profile .....MEGAUPLOAD - The leading online storage and file delivery service
plain vanilla basic Mpeg4 ...MEGAUPLOAD - The leading online storage and file delivery service

for those interested in personal tests , here is the source movie ( not mine at all BTW ; just for convenience here)

http://ultimatesaiyuki.free.fr/AMVs/..._the_Fates.avi

I am quite sorry for "mfb" but the "Experimental QX High Quality Profile" is basicaly just ...plain basic Simple Profile @level3 with no such thing in this QX encodes which matches the emphatic :

"Next to that: Quality CAN get a lot better. There is more to quality than just pixelation, as you are talking about here. Detail smudges, frame overlapping, etc. are all part of the game."

PS : please MFB don't take it personal . I have total respect for you. I just make my point

Do you know me? Nobody writes MFB in caps, except some.... Well, anyway: Who is starting a flamewar here? I post 2 messages of 5 lines each, and the last one prompts you to answer in 2 messages of 50 lines? You're crazy!

Ans yes, SP@L3 is a nice profile, but it's below the level of what the M6 decoder can handle. Blame me for being someone we always wants to get the best out of something....

And you are absolutely right that 440 kbit/s doesn't serve any real purpose, but your 300 kbit/s is a bit low. People here always used ~350-380 kbit/s-ish and that has always given great results. People however are having trouble getting XviD working at those levels, and that's why BobbyQ asked me if it's possible to limit max bitrate in XviD. So, I plunged into the sourcecode of MEncoder, and found what I was looking for: { "sp3", 0x03, 352, 288, 15, 4, 792, 396, 11880, 100, 40*16368, 8192, 384000, 0, -1, PROFILE_S|PROFILE_ADAPTQUANT } I took that, and edited it for the higher values of the M6 so the issues would be constrained, which does seem to happen if I might add. I'm currently testing at 440 because I'm sure it will freak out and will break down, you can make 3 guesses why I do that. :P Again, you're right: I don't know much about encoder internals and I wouldn't dare complain to any devs hanging around at doom9, I did lurk there a few years back though for some easy access to latest developments. And I'm definitely not some kind of guru here, I'm a nobody with an M6 just like the most over here.

Answering to your second post:

To bad to say that you just wasted your time on comparing something that is basically the same. The Qx profile in BatMan had nothing to do with what I cooked up because I have no life. BobbyQ does know about it, and does have access to it, but he doesn't use it in BatMan. The only things related to me in BatMan is that the mencoder-commandline for the Qx profile is almost the same as I used in some video contest a while back here on MeizuMe and that the mencoder.exe used by BatMan is compiled by me because according to BobbyQ it seems te be faster than other compiles he could find. (Which I find rather strange, because I didn't do anything special.) In other words: you compared plain old XviD with SPL3 with plain old XviD (Unlimited profile, BobbyQ?)

This might well be my last post on MeizuMe, this used to be a nice fanforums but unfortunately quality is deteriorating and I haven't had any fun on here for over a month. Having shit thrown over me like now is however a sign for me to step out of the boat.

Originally Posted by mfb

Ans yes, SP@L3 is a nice profile, but it's below the level of what the M6 decoder can handle. Blame me for being someone we always wants to get the best out of something....

definitely you are wrong but never mind ! the M6 will actually not go beyond SP@L3

I ended thinking you have some misunderstanding of what a profile and and a "level" is in Mpeg4

last word : the thread was nice and gentle ; you bursted in a quite unpleasant manner , no ?

"You have no idea what you are talking about. If you would have read my message a bit more thorough, maybe you would have."

next time , be polite, have respect for other people. Since they may know more than you ....think ! just blame you here

oops BTW I just tried the 440k option : "mouarf" in french ! lost bits , same "quality" , even at double size on 86dpi display ; so on M6 163dpi normal size , it is just lost bits ; 4 or 8GB is not such a big capacity for waste

I don't have much time now to type any long stories, but I think it's a good idea that I step in now. First of all, mfb is absolutely right : you compared normal xvid with normal xvid because I indeed don't use mfb's customized profile in BatMan yet - simply because it is not finished due to mfb's lack of spare time.
Other than that, being a regular reader at Doom9, I have to shake my head and wonder about the attitude you are showing here, because at Doom9 I have never read something as offending as your contributions here.
I strongly ask everybody to calm down, and really think about what he is going to write. This forum is by no means a stage for braggarts. It's a help forum and to a degree a place for technical gossip.
So, everbody here at meizume will be very happy to benefit from your technical knowledge, trane. May it be a good discussion, a piece of software, or just a helping hand.

Peace.

Edit : One more thing ..
(taken from BatMan's help/FAQ)
2.2 Why is XviD support declared "experimental" ?
- as advanced as XviD is, in my tests for BatMan the libavc was faster and more reliable. XviD can under the right circumstances produce much better motion smoothness and overall quality. But the biggest flaw in XviD is that its bitrate can't be effectively limited. That is the reason why I had to reduce the bitrate in Qx to 310 kbit/s. If the bitrate grows too high in action scenes, the Meizu starts to stutter. The many video converters which generally support XviD deny the fact that it starts to stutter when you have fullscreen action movies. With widescreen and black bars, the bitrate does not get so high, and the Meizu chip does not stutter. You're free to experiment with it, and I respect the many people who still stick with it, so I left it in the menu. If you have any proof that I am wrong, let me know.

Hmm, i don't get why all the flame war here. I use VirtualDub to convert my videos, Avisynth is used too, but for the only purpose of properly converting the framerate. At the default unrestricted XviD profile, videos kept crashing unless i chose a ridiculously low bitrate. I switched the profile to Handheld and all the issues went away.

I encode at 448kbps video / 112kbps audio, and the resulting video plays smooth on the M6. No stuttering, no slowdowns, no nothing. Indeed, it may be a bit overkill, so i'll make a few tests at 384kbps to see if the quality is identical, considering that the sample video was 361kbps and looked almost perfect.

Stay tuned for my conclusions and keep the flames away!

Originally Posted by Th3_uN1Qu3

Hmm, i don't get why all the flame war here. I use VirtualDub to convert my videos, Avisynth is used too, but for the only purpose of properly converting the framerate. At the default unrestricted XviD profile, videos kept crashing unless i chose a ridiculously low bitrate. I switched the profile to Handheld and all the issues went away.

I encode at 448kbps video / 112kbps audio, and the resulting video plays smooth on the M6. No stuttering, no slowdowns, no nothing. Indeed, it may be a bit overkill, so i'll make a few tests at 384kbps to see if the quality is identical, considering that the sample video was 361kbps and looked almost perfect.

Virtualdub is nice, avisynth is nice. MEncoder is te best Linux-users have though, but it's far from bad.

You use the dxnhandheld-profile from XviD? How do you pass the resolution restrictions? dxnhandheld has a restriction of: 176x144. So, if that profile works good for you, with a few adaptations it should work perfectly on the M6. I have been looking at the wrong direction (SP-profile) all this time........

P.S: What other settings do you use? 20fps, fullscreen? Else it might still stutter on it.

Originally Posted by mfb

Virtualdub is nice, avisynth is nice. MEncoder is te best Linux-users have though, but it's far from bad.

You use the dxnhandheld-profile from XviD? How do you pass the resolution restrictions? dxnhandheld has a restriction of: 176x144. So, if that profile works good for you, with a few adaptations it should work perfectly on the M6. I have been looking at the wrong direction (SP-profile) all this time........

P.S: What other settings do you use? 20fps, fullscreen? Else it might still stutter on it.

Works just fine on my M6SL. As about restrictions, look what i get in the encoder configuration:



It lets me run just about any resolution or framerate through it. :D I use 20FPS (convert using Avisynth for smooth results) and always crop to fullscreen.

Today when i left for my grandparents' town i watched a full-length movie on the bus (Hot Rod) encoded with the Handheld profile, 420kbps video, 112kbps 48kHz audio directly from a DVD source. The only moment it stuttered at the beginning of the movie, on the Paramount logo screen. It only happened once and the movie itself was played back really smooth.