Did some more testing overnight with this awesome codec. The results are simply amazing especially at the file size. Using some of Spots HDV files, I could get a 66MB file down to 11MB and it was transparent. You could NOT tell which wastheHDV and which was H.264.

Then I tested some DVD source material and even up-res'd to 1280x720 and it looks perfect. Encoding process does take some time but theend result is worth it.

Now for the beautiful part. Using the same bit rate for H.264 as I do for Mpeg-4 ASP, I get a smaller file size and better quality.

If you dont own Nero Suites, I highly suggest you purchase it. HD-DVD is almost here and this is a huge part of it.

Cheers.

that link does not work.

Ijust re-checked the link and it works for me still. I would link it here but have no clue how to link on this forum.

<-- like that.

The link is an ftp site that only allows 1000 connections.

It works, but may give an error if too many connections are in use.

MainConcept also has an H.264 codec out. Why is Ahead's any better?Both encoders are stand-alone apps. Which means they won't integrate with Vegas. I betcha in the next release of Vegas, H.264 will be included for free.In fact, 3iVX has been out for a while now, it encodes to HD and it integrates well with Vegas. 3iVX is an H.264 codec.

"MainConcept also has an H.264 codec out. Why is Ahead's any better?Both encoders are stand-alone apps. Which means they won't integrate with Vegas. I betcha in the next release of Vegas, H.264 will be included for free.In fact, 3iVX has been out for a while now, it encodes to HD and it integrates well with Vegas. 3iVX is an H.264 codec.
"

I tested MC's latest a month ago and itwas painfully slow and the output quality was horrendous.

Also, 3ivx is NOT H.264 AVC. 3ivx is an Mpeg-4 ASP implementation so the two codecs are night and day. I purchased 3ivx last year and was impressed with the quality but things have changed since.

Again, note that H.264 AVC is what will be used on HD-DVD/Blu Ray discs along with WM9V. No way 3ivx would ever make it as a required format. Let me put it this way. I took the Swan HDV file that Spot posted at 68MB and encoded using the Cinema Definition (1280x720) and the file size was 5MB and you could not tell the difference b/t the source and the transcode.

I haven't tried the H.264 codec myself but I'll take your word for it that it's better than WMV9, if that's the case then it'll be awesome, WMV9 quite blew me away as it was with 1080 HD at 6MB/sec.
All of which begs the question, why does Sony think the consummer needs BluRay with all it's attendant complications and expense when with these advanced codecs and faster silicon red laser DVDs hold more than enough to deliver stunning HD?
Last I heard BluRay was only going to use mpeg-2 which is why it needs so much capacity.
Bob.

Nero Digital is gorgeous. That's all there is to say about it. We're doing their CES tradeshow videos, and we're blown away by its quality. Bob, it's better than WMV, no doubt.

I keep shaking my head and wondering just how much more compression there is in there. Back in the early 90's there was MPEG1, which was pretty cool; then came MPEG2 and we all were amazed that, somehow, most of the irrelevant data was "squeezed" out of the raw bitstream.

WMV then comes along, promising comparable quality for maybe half the bitrate. Now there's 264, which I gather is about a factor of 2 again better than WMV!

Amazing.

Thanx for the feedback. I've tried Nero Recode and like the results, altho' useage is a bit cumbersome. I wish their codec was accessible by V5

Now let's all wish that MS could also adopt H.264 like apple did. WMV was nice when it hit version 9 compared to other offering, but it's losing ground now.

It'll always be a game of leapfrog. Always has been, likely always will be. It's so easy to be a follower, because you can see what someone else has done, figure out how you can do it better, and do just that. Then they see your work, etc, etc. Windows Media hasn't really lost any ground in the eye of the user, just in the eye of authors, but in the end, people only care if they can play it on their system without downloading anything, and whether it looks good. I'm confident Microsoft has something up their sleeve too. Although I'd love to see 264 be the predominant standard since it's a little more open.

The problem that MS faces is that WM9V is a closed code base. That is why the Mpeg-4 variants have become so awesome in quality because anyone can implement them with the correct coding knowledge.

MS tried to corner the market on an HD codec and it did well there for a while. But as I said several times in other threads here and other places, H.264 AVC was the future. The only advantage MS still holds in the digital distribution world is the DRM for its files. Once DRM is available for H.264 AVC for content owners/distributors, the game will then be over for MS.

Furthermore, MS dropped the ball with the WM9V codec. If world domination was what they wanted, they should have pushed for set tops much earlier than they did. For two years, all we have heard about was vapor ware players. People are getting tired of having to sit at their computers to watch a 2 hour movie unless you have a really comfortable chair.

What I also think is quite telling is MS' Media Center PCs. You would think that MS would have released their systems with some sort of windows media capture hardware card/encoder but in its third release, it STILL uses Mpeg-2.

With regards to Ateme's implementation, it is the best on the market and will only keep getting better with each release. Before Friday, the only other MAJOR H.264 AVC encoder availble was Sorenson's Squeeze ( I bought this also) and it lacked major quality. When I tried Sorenson, I was quite disappointed in the output quality and its even slower. Then I found out that Sorenson didnt fully implement all of the features in the specs.

As an aspiring content owner/distributor, I believe the future is this:

H.264 AVC/HE-AAC audio wrapped in a digitally protected MP4 file that inlcudes the menus/chapters/subtitles etc... This is why before when people were posting their Vegas 6 features wishes I included MP4 container support. Hopefully someone will implement AES or Blowfish type encryption to secure the files.

I do know Sony is developing their own implementation of H.264 AVC, but I think it will be hard pressed to get better quality. The only advantage I could see is faster encode times but keep in mind, H.264 AVC is VERY complex calculations.

The beauty now is we encode our material for HD-DVD and then when the tools to author HD-DVD are here, market turn around time is next to none.

As I said before, EXCITING TIMES!

Apple has adopted the codec for the next release of Quicktime next year.

http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2004/jun/23quicktime.html

do the download from within the update section of the nero website, it actually works.

there are a number of bugs in this implementation, including little compatability with other media players... the latest vlc media player barely shows a picture, but there is no video on my nero player, lol.

these issues are to be expected with a consumer product like nero, but from what little i can see within the vlc player, this implementation of h.264 has potential... thanks pmasters for the heads-up!

http://forum.doom9.org/forumdisplay.php?s=a8bb212a718000ece2fafe12f1874444&forumid=54 for some relevant info.

How does it work? Do I use the recoder to convert Spots raw HDV footage to be viewed in Nero Showtime?

I'm a great believer of advanced codecs and faster silicon (that's wht I keep saying I think BluRay is wasted effort by Sony) however I did some interseting comments on these thoughts from the Canopus engineers.
Their spin kind of amazed me, for sure for low bandwith (<5MB/sec) mpeg-4 and WMV9 excels. But for the best quality video if you have bandwidth to burn you still cannot beat mpeg-2 or even mpeg-1.
If what they're saying holds true the Sony may have the right idea with BluRay, I'd love some feedback from anyone whose got the experience to comment.

Bob.