[JeffElkins]

I'm just starting to encode movies from blu-ray, and my current equipment (1.83 Core Duo, 2GB RAM) is ridiculously slow. Handbrake wants 18 hrs to encode 720p and 40+ hrs for 1080p. A standard DVD takes about an hour. What should I be looking for hardware-wise that will do a reasonable job for HD, but not cause my wife to file for divorce? I'm comfortable building my own box, and will use linux for my OS.

If you can cite some real-world performance examples I'd greatly appreciate it.

p.s. this machine won't be used for viewing.

[Geeba]

For video encoding use a Quad core... a Q6600 will probably fit your current mainboard and will go to 3.0Ghz on air cooling alone. Reasonably cheap now to on ebay too.

Mine demolishes my 2.4Ghz Core Duo machine for movie ripping.

[wjsteele]

What speed are you getting on a Q6600 when encoding an avarage length (say 90min ish) movie at 720p & 1080p. Just trying to decide if its a reasonable speed boost from the 6 hours I'm currently getting from Handbrake at 720p.

[JeffElkins]

What speed are you getting on a Q6600 when encoding an avarage length (say 90min ish) movie at 720p & 1080p. Just trying to decide if its a reasonable speed boost from the 6 hours I'm currently getting from Handbrake at 720p.

wjsteele, what are you using to rip a 720p in 6 hrs?

[thethirdnut]

FYI.

Using an i3-540 w 4 GB RAM, Mythbuntu 10.04 64-bit, Handbrake SVN:

2 hours bluray rip takes approx 3-4 hours. This is keeping 1080p and CQ RF=19.

An i7, etc would likely be faster BUT this is a 24/7 server also running a 6 x 1.5TB raid array. Uses 110 W idle.

[BLKMGK]

I'm running an i7 920 clocked to a bit over 4ghz on water. It flies through encodings but I still want to go faster! The 6core is too much cash, the new SandyBridge hardware looks VERY good and ought to do 5ghz with my cooling system so consider this closely if you MUST have new hardware. I have beaten guys with dual 4core XEON systems with my i7. Given a choice, with budget a factor, go more cores\threads over more speed. I have had older 4core CPUs of the Q6600 class running slower STOMP C2D running faster clocks. Multi-threading FTW!

That said... I have looked at some of the commercial software out there. MediaConverter7 is the best I've found so far. It will use my NVIDIA GPU (not a high end one) AND my CPU. It doesn't max out my CPU though which is odd. Anyway, it can do a BD encoding in under an hour - seriously. That is about 2.5x faster than my CPU alone and a big change over software I tried out a few years ago that ONLY used my video card and not CPU - same video card too.

That said, they only give base and main profiles but with tweaking the quality looks to be equal to my original setup. It's only $40 or so but I've not decided to switch to it fulltime just yet. On a budget, and possessing a supported GPU, I'd try this for the price for sure - they have a decent trial period. Yeah, this is Windows software but the speed is sure damned nice! Oh, it supports writing to MKV containers but insists on inserting an audio track <shrug>

[Geeba]

What speed are you getting on a Q6600 when encoding an avarage length (say 90min ish) movie at 720p & 1080p. Just trying to decide if its a reasonable speed boost from the 6 hours I'm currently getting from Handbrake at 720p.

For video encoding you will notice a serious increase over your core2 - whats the model number of your mainboard?

I cant remember exact times - I'll try to test tonight but its roughly a quarter of the time my 2.4Ghz Core2/4Gb RAM machine takes.

[dashford]

The new Sandy Bridge processors use QuickSync to transcode video (anandtech), and according to phoronix this feature should eventually be supported on linux too:

One interesting thing that has emerged though is that this quarter (Q1'2011), Intel will evidently be enabling Sandy Bridge video encoding support under Linux too. Not only is there video decoding support right now for Sandy Bridge if using the latest Git of libva and the Intel DRM (Direct Rendering Manager), but encoding support is said to be coming too.

Of course, there's no guarantee that it will be achievable by Q1'2011!

[wjsteele]

wjsteele, what are you using to rip a 720p in 6 hrs?

I'm running with an Intel CPU E8400 Core 2 Duo (overclocked from 3Ghz to 4Ghz) on a Gigabyte P35C-DS3R motherboard with 6Gb memory and Windows 7 64 Pro. I'm not too bothered about the 6 hours for a 720p encode just wondered if this was reasonable (looks like it is with Handbrake).

I have had quicker times with other software but I prefer the quality that Handbrake produces, the results are always excellent. Only drawback with Handbrake is that it doesn’t use any GPU resources, although I believe that this is reason for the quality it produces. I have read many topics comparing CPU Handbreak to GPU encodes from other software, CPU wins hands down every time although GPU encodes are quicker they just don’t have the same quality (yet?).

QuickSync also looks promising but again falls down on quality, hexus.net recently ran an article detailing its encoding prowess.

[dashford]

QuickSync also looks promising but again falls down on quality, hexus.net recently ran an article detailing its encoding prowess.

I wonder is this a current limitation of the drivers rather than a hardware issue, there's a chance that quality and encoding options might steadily improve.

[BLKMGK]

I would point out that MANY of the various packages out there use the SAME opensource tools with different wrappers and profiles. meGUI, HandBrake, and others use x.264 for instance. so speed and quality ought to be the same with the same settings. DO try to use tools that are 64bit on 64bit OS though. The GPU encodes I've done have been very very good but it has bothered me that the tool I find that works best doesn't just offer the High profile and allow me to tweak. It also bothers me that my questions about it have gone unanswered on their forum. I DO think that you can get an encode that's as good if you tweak settings. That said, you have some limited input as to what can be tweaked. So, rather than risk hosing up an encode I have stuck to CPU only but I cannot say for sure, based on what I have seen with my eyes, that this is better.

As for Sandybridge - I'm excited! However it sounds like you only get access to the encode if you hobble your system and allow it to do the video display - I think this sucks. I have a good discrete GPU and just want access to the encode functions. From what I saw from the x.264 folks it also looked lieik Intel designed the hardware accelerations and THEN contacted folks in the community for input and testing vs contacting them early on <sigh> so there's no telling if it will be worthwhile or how long it may take to get used. Just the raw speed of the new CPUs though ought to make them worthwhile but it sounds like to swap over I may have to do a reinstall of my OS - boo! I'm on the fence...

The 6 hour encode on that C2D doesn't sound bad. Do a movie like Watchman though and you will cry - it's HUGE! A CPU with more cores WILL help and the later ones could clock too