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Which Video Player and Encoding methods do you use

Hi all
Just thought i would share my findings.
I am using MX Video Player as my video player.
I use Mizzu Movies as the front end for it - it really is very very nice and will auto get information, reviews, trailers etc etc for movies.
To convert my Blu Ray mkv files, DVD rips or pretty much anything i use DVD Catalyst on Windows 7 PC
I use the asus transformer HQ settings and select partial border removal.
Using all the above results in very nice looking movies with flawless playback.
I travel abroad quite a lot and everyone who see's me using the Asus for movies on the plane is very interested in what i have.

For Blu-rays I've found DVD Catalyst 4 to be inadequate because of sync issues. I've also read that by turning off Blu-ray Telecine will correct this issue but it doesn't. So, I had to look at other software to rip and convert my Blu-rays. Also DVD Catalyst 4 set my Kaspersky Antivirus Heuristic virus detection off and said it was performing in a way similar to a virus or trojan.
I've found that Aiseesoft Blu-ray Ripper works really well and is my favorite. It has video acceleration and will utilize you're AMD (app acceleration) or a NVidia video card with (Cuda technology). It's normally $39 but you can get it HERE for $23.40 with the coupon code 'SMRT-ADEK'. HERE is a guide as to what settings to use for the TF. It tends to make my videos a little less in size than Pavtube does. i.e., Aieesoft Blu-ray Ripper will create a file say 2.5gb in size while Pavtube is a little higher. Also, since I have an AMD/ATI video card it will accelerate the ripping process to nearly half the time as Pavtube due to the fact that Pavtube doesn't support AMD/ATI acceleration, just NVidia Cuda technology. Also, Aieesoft Blu-ray Ripper will automatically preserve forced subtitles while Pavtube you have to actually check ON a tick box for it to pick up forced subtitles. Also it has a video preview while ripping while Pavtube does not. Incidentally you can turn this feature on or off, whichever you prefer.
Another great software would be Pavtube Blu-ray Video Converter Ultimate which runs $65 but you can get it for $37.70 HERE with coupon code 'SOFT-K8TT'. It makes flawless videos for the TF using the XOOM settings. HERE is a guide on how. It has video acceleration just for NVidia video card. It will also let you select not only different subtitles but allows for 'Only allow forced subtitles'.
Incidentally, both rippers have built in AACS ripper technology and can even rip the new AACS-24 copy protection which is the newest copy protection format. So there is no need to also run AnyDVD HD in the background while you rip to be able to rip. A huge plus in my book.
I use either Dice Player or MX Video to play my movies in HW acceleration mode.
This is the Pavtube settings. Right click on the picture and 'Save As' to download a short single chapter MP4 file to test on your TF.
This is the Aieesoft settings. Right click on the picture and 'Save As' to download a short single chapter MP4 file to test on your TF.
cheers...
EDIT: Please read further into this thread as things have changed drastically. Thanks

I use the extremely convenient VidsOpt script for reencoding and remuxing x264/MKV. I tried out some other ripping tools like DVD Catalyst and XviD4PSP but they were cumbersome and too heavy on my system (only 2.8GHz P4/1GB RAM). After this step, there is really no reason not to use the stock player since MP4 files can be HW decoded (video and audio). If I am watching something with subtitles or the occasional XviD I will use MX Video.

AcIdC0R3 said:
For Blu-rays I've found DVD Catalyst 4 to be inadequate because of sync issues. I've also read that by turning off Blu-ray Telecine will correct this issue but it doesn't. So, I had to look at other software to rip and convert my Blu-rays. Also DVD Catalyst 4 set my Kaspersky Antivirus Heuristic virus detection off and said it was performing in a way similar to a virus or trojan.
Click to expand...
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What Sync issues are you referring to AcidCore? I am aware of audio sync issues if you play the created video files on a PC using Windows Media Player, but this is due to some codec-issues with WMP itself. This is also mentioned in numerous locations on my website. For device playback as well as playback using Quicktime or VLC, the files should play just fine.
As for the Kaspersky, it doesn't like it when an app is running the conversion as a separate process. I have tried to work with them, but it is easier for them to mark something than to actually unmark something. DVD Catalyst is clean.
As for the links you provided, those articles are loaded with affiliate-links, meaning that those articles are mainly written to lure people into a purchase so that the guy who wrote them gets about 50% of the purchase price for the sale.

dvdcatalyst said:
What Sync issues are you referring to AcidCore? I am aware of audio sync issues if you play the created video files on a PC using Windows Media Player, but this is due to some codec-issues with WMP itself. This is also mentioned in numerous locations on my website. For device playback as well as playback using Quicktime or VLC, the files should play just fine.
As for the Kaspersky, it doesn't like it when an app is running the conversion as a separate process. I have tried to work with them, but it is easier for them to mark something than to actually unmark something. DVD Catalyst is clean.
As for the links you provided, those articles are loaded with affiliate-links, meaning that those articles are mainly written to lure people into a purchase so that the guy who wrote them gets about 50% of the purchase price for the sale.
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Actually, when I ripped the movie Wanted it played just fine on WMP but on both Dice and MX the audio was out of sync with the video. I felt like I was watching a dubbed movie or something. I tried three different settings with Catalyst and I got the same thing. Also when I ripped the movie Apocalypto which the whole movie is subtitled and Catalyst overwrote the subs with some kind of font that looked like it had some type of halo effect to it. I had to enable the Booster Pack 2 in order for it to pick up the subs at all. All other movies seemed OK though.
As for the links, I bought both Aieesoft Blu-ray Ripper and Pavtube at a 40% discount each which was a big plus in my book.

AcIdC0R3 said:
Actually, when I ripped the movie Wanted it played just fine on WMP but on both Dice and MX the audio was out of sync with the video. I felt like I was watching a dubbed movie or something. I tried three different settings with Catalyst and I got the same thing. Also when I ripped the movie Apocalypto which the whole movie is subtitled and Catalyst overwrote the subs with some kind of font that looked like it had some type of halo effect to it. I had to enable the Booster Pack 2 in order for it to pick up the subs at all. All other movies seemed OK though.
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Did you try the stock player?
The files dvdcat creates are optimized for hardware playback on the Tegra2. While MX and Dice can play a lot more video file types, their settings can get in the way of how the file plays. Using the stock player the videos should play just fine.

dvdcatalyst said:
Did you try the stock player?
The files dvdcat creates are optimized for hardware playback on the Tegra2. While MX and Dice can play a lot more video file types, their settings can get in the way of how the file plays. Using the stock player the videos should play just fine.
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I just tried playing it with the stock player and it's still out of sync.
My settings are:
Player Screen Size: 864x432
Video Quality: 2250kbps
Video Mode: 1 pass
Sound Quality: 160kbps
Audio Mode: stereo
Conversion Format: h264_xoom
Framerate: 30

AcIdC0R3 said:
I just tried playing it with the stock player and it's still out of sync.
My settings are:
Player Screen Size: 864x432
Video Quality: 2250kbps
Video Mode: 1 pass
Sound Quality: 160kbps
Audio Mode: stereo
Conversion Format: h264_xoom
Framerate: 30
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What did you convert?
from Bluray using dvdcat's Bluray mode or using file-mode (just the m2ts file directly)
Besides the settings you mentioned, you also mentioned the telicine option. Are there any other settings in "Global" that you enabled?
Try resetting DVD Catalyst to its defaults:
* Make sure DVD Catalyst is not running
* Click on "START" > "RUN" (or hold down the windows-key on your keyboard and tap the "R" key)
* In the run dialog, type in:
%appdata%
and click OK
*delete the "DVD Catalyst 4" folder
After that, start dvdcat, and if you want to convert Bluray (icw AnyDVD HD or something similar), enable power user, and enable the checkmark in the Bluray tab in Global Settings.
Then just select your profile, and leave the rest of the settings as they are.

so far i have tried about 5 different methods to convert to mp4 from mkv etc
I have used dvdcat to convert about 10 movies so far and have not run into sync problems.
I have left most things on default so dont find it cumbersome at all, in fact I found it a lot easier to use than most others, i do have a quadcore 4gb windows 7 64bit system though so runs pretty fast. I use eset nod32 smart security which is a superior product to kaspersky without false positives.
I will also play around with more options in time.
Nice to see some alternative methods here though which I will also try.
Any other methods guys?
Sent from my Transformer TF101 using xda premium

dvdcatalyst said:
What did you convert?
from Bluray using dvdcat's Bluray mode or using file-mode (just the m2ts file directly)
Besides the settings you mentioned, you also mentioned the telicine option. Are there any other settings in "Global" that you enabled?
Try resetting DVD Catalyst to its defaults:
* Make sure DVD Catalyst is not running
* Click on "START" > "RUN" (or hold down the windows-key on your keyboard and tap the "R" key)
* In the run dialog, type in:
%appdata%
and click OK
*delete the "DVD Catalyst 4" folder
After that, start dvdcat, and if you want to convert Bluray (icw AnyDVD HD or something similar), enable power user, and enable the checkmark in the Bluray tab in Global Settings.
Then just select your profile, and leave the rest of the settings as they are.
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Click to collapse
Yeah, it was the first Blu-ray that I tried to transcode. Let me try your recommendation and see what I come up with. Thanks.

AcIdC0R3 said:
Yeah, it was the first Blu-ray that I tried to transcode. Let me try your recommendation and see what I come up with. Thanks.
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You are welcome,
If you run into complications or have questions, rather than using this thread, maybe shoot me an email instead. I don't mind answering on forums, but I don't think this thread is the place for it though.
email is my username at gmail dot com.

I have to say that by taking your advice and setting things back to default that the Blu-ray rip came out perfect. It even came out smaller in size and the cropping was perfect. While most of my movies play in letterbox (black bars above and below the picture) that after ripping with DVD Catalyst and then playing in MX Video that I had no letterboxing. It played full screen. Stock video player and Dice Player both still played it in letterbox. The video setting was defaulted to 1280x720 and the video formatted out to 1280x544. There was no sync issues any more. Time to rip the movie Wanted using Aieesoft Blu-ray Ripper took a little over 2 hours and the time it took DVD Catalyst to rip the same movie was just over 40 minutes. Impressive to say the least.

Video player : Built-in video player
Encoder : FFMPEG (git-latest) command line. transcoding to playable MP4 format.

I just changed my dvdcat setup to just removing black bars from the video file instead of remove partial borders and quality is now better.
Removing partial borders lowered the resolution to 1072 x 512

raze1000 said:
I just changed my dvdcat setup to just removing black bars from the video file instead of remove partial borders and quality is now better.
Removing partial borders lowered the resolution to 1072 x 512
Click to expand...
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I always use "remove from file" (the default) myself. The other ones cut off part of the video to get more screenfill. If you use a video player other than the stock, you can usually zoom the video anyway if you want full-screen.

I've been re-transcoding my movies using DVD Cat and while the movie Underworld "Evolution" ripped perfectly using default settings Underworld did not. It's defaulted to just removing the black bars but it shoved the video to the left and it was severely cut off on the left. I looked all through the settings and couldn't find anything to fix this. Although when I went to 'Preview' the setting was defaulted to 1.33:1 and the first little picture with the borders was selected. I had to put it down to 1.35:1 movie default and choose the second little picture without the borders. Strange; as it made it 1280x405, so it was constrained but it fit and had no borders on the TF.
Needless to say, DVD Cat is going to take some trial and error to figure it all out.

Underworld is a bit tricky because it is so dark.
In Global > Borders, you can increase the scan-point count, which should eliminate the issue you experienced. It is quite rare, but its tied to the way DVD Cat actually detects borders on movies. Rather than using fixed values, it takes screenshots of the movie at 5 (default) points, and then looks for the actual borders.

dvdcatalyst said:
Underworld is a bit tricky because it is so dark.
In Global > Borders, you can increase the scan-point count, which should eliminate the issue you experienced. It is quite rare, but its tied to the way DVD Cat actually detects borders on movies. Rather than using fixed values, it takes screenshots of the movie at 5 (default) points, and then looks for the actual borders.
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I remember seeing that. It's set at 5 right now. Is that a setting under the borders tab that's selectable or is it always on? I'm at work so I can't look at the software at the moment.

its defaulted at 5, but you can change it to something like 7 or 8.
I've only ran into the issue 3 times.
twice with episodes of 24, where the shots were taken during the time-display part, and Underworld 1

So what setting do you recommend; 7 or 8? I guess I'll just have to tinker with it when I get home. What is your final file dimmensions on Underworld 1 after transcoding with DVD Cat?

[Q] IFO support?

Hello everyone.
Registered user here of the pro version, I was wondering if its possible to implement IFO support when it comes to play a VIDEO_TS folder.
Playing vob files works great. I usually rip the DVD main movie via MakeMKV and play the resulting MKV with MPEG2 flawlessly, but when that main movie is greater than 4 GB I cannot do anything, because my device doesn't support any filesystem other than FAT32. That's why the IFO support would make this OK, copy vob files (1 GB) with IFO file and play as a standard VIDEO_TS folder (Im not talking about menus, just the IFOs)
Thanks

dalecooper said:
Hello everyone.
Registered user here of the pro version, I was wondering if its possible to implement IFO support when it comes to play a VIDEO_TS folder.
Playing vob files works great. I usually rip the DVD main movie via MakeMKV and play the resulting MKV with MPEG2 flawlessly, but when that main movie is greater than 4 GB I cannot do anything, because my device doesn't support any filesystem other than FAT32. That's why the IFO support would make this OK, copy vob files (1 GB) with IFO file and play as a standard VIDEO_TS folder (Im not talking about menus, just the IFOs)
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Normally if you start playing first vob file, then after completing first file mx will play the second vob file automatically. it'll be automatically added to the queue if it's in the same folder. (make sure "back to list" is disable in Settings 》Player)

Thanks.
Yes, I know that. The problem is when the movie has several audio or subtitle tracks, sometimes its unpredictable which one is gonna start with the next vob file, because the vob files by themselves don't have an identification of language other than 0x80-like, so you gotta change the track again and there's a pause that wouldn't be with an IFO file. Also, depending of the methods and tools of extracting the vobs, sometimes the length of the vob gets confused.
I am aware that is possible to watch a whole movie with this, I was just wondering probably this is not a big implementation (almost like a playlist?) and could make the playing of DVD movies an awesome feature. I understand this is not a feature most people would request, but I like not having to convert, just extract the movie, and watch it as is. Even when I know by H264 standards is a waste of space, but with 32gb cards that cheap nowadays, it's comfortable.
Thanks.

dalecooper said:
Thanks.
Yes, I know that. The problem is when the movie has several audio or subtitle tracks, sometimes its unpredictable which one is gonna start with the next vob file, because the vob files by themselves don't have an identification of language other than 0x80-like, so you gotta change the track again and there's a pause that wouldn't be with an IFO file. Also, depending of the methods and tools of extracting the vobs, sometimes the length of the vob gets confused.
I am aware that is possible to watch a whole movie with this, I was just wondering probably this is not a big implementation (almost like a playlist?) and could make the playing of DVD movies an awesome feature. I understand this is not a feature most people would request, but I like not having to convert, just extract the movie, and watch it as is. Even when I know by H264 standards is a waste of space, but with 32gb cards that cheap nowadays, it's comfortable.
Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
We will check out this feature.
Thanks

Hi there.
Great player and thanks very much for all the devs' hard work. I'm wondering, since I have more than 25,000 DVDs in my collection, if there has been any further consideration of implementing a full DVD play feature.
Thanks.

Any update on this? I would be prepared to pay money for a full DVD play feature to be implemented.
Thanks.

[Feature Request] bookmark video

I wish mxplayer has the option for users to bookmark the video like the mvideo player. It will be very convenient for user to go back to certain time spot in the video to replay. It just likes creating chapters for video clip.

It would be a good feature!

Though, MX already remembers last playback position when you return to an unfinished video.

I think it's not answer!.
The questions is about many bookmarks on single video file!.
I am in the same situation like kbwme2006.
Please add a bookmarks/sections on playing a single video who have got a many topics/division/teology parts in one file.
It will be perfect for technician video like TOTURIALs to be add bookmark like simle points.
Of course it will be perfect to can by buttons PREV/NEXT go beetween this bookmars/sections on single film.
This situation is in pot player at PC.
BR temp user.

In my opinion many bookmarks will be perfect. I use PotPlayer too.
It's look like: i (dot) imgur (dot) com / YvKatF2 (dot) png
Shift+Pg[Up/Down] step between those bookmars at the same one video.
The bookmars are saved into separate file next to original played file.

temp159 said:
I think it's not answer!.
The questions is about many bookmarks on single video file!.
I am in the same situation like kbwme2006.
Please add a bookmarks/sections on playing a single video who have got a many topics/division/teology parts in one file.
It will be perfect for technician video like TOTURIALs to be add bookmark like simle points.
Of course it will be perfect to can by buttons PREV/NEXT go beetween this bookmars/sections on single film.
This situation is in pot player at PC.
BR temp user.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think what you are referring to are mkv chapter markers. Mkv videos can have chapter indicators, but MX currently doesn't support interpretation of chapter markers in Mkvs.

CDB-Man said:
I think what you are referring to are mkv chapter markers. Mkv videos can have chapter indicators, but MX currently doesn't support interpretation of chapter markers in Mkvs.
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Hey bro. Bookmarking means keeping records of streaming links for future uses , the same way browser do. I also use lot of tv channel's link for watching them. MX player handle better than the official tv app. So keeping the record ( like a video list) of links in MX Player will be easy for me. I dont need to manually copy from file manager then paste in MX player. Please inform Developer about this feature.

I want to setup bookmarks and have a-b playback and repeat just like androids Act 1 video player has had for years. It's a real shame this simple request has never been implemented as I've been requesting it for years.

Show Title in List instead of File Name

Show Title in List instead of File Name. Can MX Player do this? My videos have imbeded Titles but MX Player is listing them with just file name.

ToolPunk said:
Show Title in List instead of File Name. Can MX Player do this? My videos have imbeded Titles but MX Player is listing them with just file name.
Click to expand...
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I have replied to the same question in simple question answers thread.
Number of files with proper title is very low. What's the issue in listing by name..?
Sent from my SM-G900H using Tapatalk

The issue is that i download a lot of videos from a website of news, conferences, reports and so on. It's a large amount of videos and they give the videos file names based on the content and date released.
They tag the videos with proper titles though. So, if there is no option to list by title i have to go through and rename 100+ videos. Or use the horrible stock player which does list them by title. Obviously though i would rather use MX Player.

For example:
File Name "news_03_13_15.mp4".
Title "Typhon in Japan-Relief Efforts"

So is there a way to show the title instead of file name or not?
Nvm, i see you stated in the other thread that you would inform the developer so i guess it is not an option. That is sad.
That is like not including an option for ID3 tag listing for MP3s because people fail to include them or enter them right. Some people like organization. I once spent hours fixing hundreds of ID3 tags so that my MP3 player would scroll the Artist/Album/Year/Genre. Why not include both options? Most MP3 players i have ever used allowed you to list by filename or ID3 tag for this same reason.

MX player get rid of subtitle enable and diable option?

There was a time that MX player will auto load subtitle that is in the same folder as the movie file, and it is gone now. It does have a option for saving the subtitle file in a specific folder. However, I found this is really hard to do as there are so many exact step to do. Image how am I suppose to do it if I want to watch a movie in my TV system through my USB? In a TV system it is really hard to find the directory.
Therefore, I really wish that this functionality can be back! I suggest that there is an option for disable the embedded subtitle and set the external subtitle as priority.
Please tell me if there is any suggestion! Thank you!

py930828 said:
There was a time that MX player will auto load subtitle that is in the same folder as the movie file, and it is gone now. It does have a option for saving the subtitle file in a specific folder. However, I found this is really hard to do as there are so many exact step to do. Image how am I suppose to do it if I want to watch a movie in my TV system through my USB? In a TV system it is really hard to find the directory.
Therefore, I really wish that this functionality can be back! I suggest that there is an option for disable the embedded subtitle and set the external subtitle as priority.
Please tell me if there is any suggestion! Thank you!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the feedback.
The settings was removed as a part of simplifying the options. We have understood the troubles involved in selecting an external sub. We will change the subtitle selection logic to prefer the external subtitle over the muxed one.

ktsamy said:
Thanks for the feedback.
The settings was removed as a part of simplifying the options. We have understood the troubles involved in selecting an external sub. We will change the subtitle selection logic to prefer the external subtitle over the muxed one.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you, can you tell me a estimating time for a newer version that fix this problem? Just easier for me to check mxplayer's website on schedule.

py930828 said:
Thank you, can you tell me a estimating time for a newer version that fix this problem? Just easier for me to check mxplayer's website on schedule.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
MX player has inbuilt version checking mechanism. So no need to worry about that.
At the moment our developers are busy in bringing more features on board. So, I can't give any ETA at the moment.

Please bring back the global disable subtitles option. Wife is not happy that she has to keep disabling a subtitle for each video she plays. I'd rather have more options then not enough options.

ChrisDos said:
Please bring back the global disable subtitles option. Wife is not happy that she has to keep disabling a subtitle for each video she plays. I'd rather have more options then not enough options.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for your feedback. Your concern is forwarded to our developers team. Kindly wait for some time till we release a update with the solution to address this issue.

Yes. PLEASE allow us to disable subtitles. They are not turning off.

tr3vkam said:
Yes. PLEASE allow us to disable subtitles. They are not turning off.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi,
You can just uncheck the subtitle from the subtitle panel to disable.
If it's not disabled, there can be two reasons.
In Some devices HW decoder renders subtitles automatically due to the poor mediaplayer implementation. It automatically displays the closed captions. Either you can disable closed captions from system settings or you can use HW+ or SW decoder.
It's hard coded to the video frame itself. There is no way to to get rid of it as it's a part of the video frame.