2008-07-24, 03:44
Well, after some initial tests with audio codecs, it seems that AC3 is going to the best option for people encoding H.264 for the Xbox.
My first test was encoding a video with 6-Channel Vorbis OGG and encoding the same video with 6-Channel AAC. I purposely maxed out the video settings on both to force skipped frames. That resulted in two videos that skipped a TON of frames, however the AAC file skipped a lot more than the OGG.
So then I encoded that same video with the same settings with 6-Channel AC3 audio, and that resulted in a video that dropped 40% less frames than the OGG and AAC.
So that proves that if you are looking to preserve your 6 channels, go with AC3 no matter what. The Xbox has less trouble decoding this format than any of the others.
I did not test MP3 yet, but seeing as you can't make a MP3 truly 6-channel, it would be safe to assume that the Xbox requires very little processing power to decode a 2-channel MP3, and probably even less for a 2-channel OGG (because OGG requires less CPU power than MP3). So if you are going for 2-channel audio, then I suggest either MP3 or OGG or AC3, but NEVER AAC.
So, to break it down...
6 Channels
--- AC3 (best option)
--- OGG (for vids with NO complex scenes)
--- MP3 (not possible)
--- AAC (never use)
2 Channels
--- AC3 (best option)
--- OGG (2nd best)
--- MP3 (3rd best)
--- AAC (for vids with NO complex scenes)
Hope this helps everyone out... Thanks goes to PKOneTwo for the valuable tip.
My first test was encoding a video with 6-Channel Vorbis OGG and encoding the same video with 6-Channel AAC. I purposely maxed out the video settings on both to force skipped frames. That resulted in two videos that skipped a TON of frames, however the AAC file skipped a lot more than the OGG.
So then I encoded that same video with the same settings with 6-Channel AC3 audio, and that resulted in a video that dropped 40% less frames than the OGG and AAC.
So that proves that if you are looking to preserve your 6 channels, go with AC3 no matter what. The Xbox has less trouble decoding this format than any of the others.
I did not test MP3 yet, but seeing as you can't make a MP3 truly 6-channel, it would be safe to assume that the Xbox requires very little processing power to decode a 2-channel MP3, and probably even less for a 2-channel OGG (because OGG requires less CPU power than MP3). So if you are going for 2-channel audio, then I suggest either MP3 or OGG or AC3, but NEVER AAC.
So, to break it down...
6 Channels
--- AC3 (best option)
--- OGG (for vids with NO complex scenes)
--- MP3 (not possible)
--- AAC (never use)
2 Channels
--- AC3 (best option)
--- OGG (2nd best)
--- MP3 (3rd best)
--- AAC (for vids with NO complex scenes)
Hope this helps everyone out... Thanks goes to PKOneTwo for the valuable tip.