[MPlayer-users] rawrgb -> Divx: -idx makes incomplete file

[D Richard Felker III]

On Tue, Jul 29, 2003 at 06:59:07AM -0700, Alan Murrell wrote:
> [Automatic answer: RTFM (read DOCS, FAQ), also read DOCS/bugreports.html]
> Hello,
> 
>   Mandrake Linux (9.1)
>   MPlayer/MEncoder (0.90)
> 
> 
> I have a 53GB rawrgb file that I am attempting to convert to Divx.  When I 
> first converted it to Divx (3-pass), it was great quality, but I was unable 
> to seek in it because there was no index.  The file size was what I wanted: 
> 700MB (more or less).
> 
> I re-encoded (again, 3-pass), but this time used the -idx option.  The 
> resulting Divx was again great quality, I was able to seek, but the resulting 
> file size was only 181MB and was only about the first 10-15 minutes.
> 
> Here is my encoding set:
> 
> mencoder source_file.avi -ovc frameno -oac mp3lame -lameopts br=128:vbr=3 -o 
> "frameno.avi"
> 
> mencoder source_file.avi -oac copy -ovc lavc -lavcopts 
> vcodec=mpeg4:vbitrate=695:vpass=1 -o /dev/null -
> 
> mencoder -idx source_file.avi -oac copy -ovc lavc -lavcopts 
> vcodec=mpeg4:vbitrate=695:vpass=2 -o "output_file_Divx.avi" -
> 
> As I mentioned, not using the '-idx' option in the thrid pass gives a perfect 
> file, only without the seeking.
> 
> Any ideas, tips, pointers, etc. on how to get around this would be 
> appreciated.  Would the '-forceidx' option be better, or is ot bascially the 
> same thing?

The -idx and -forceidx options have nothing to do with index in output
file. They're only for rebuilding the index in the input file, e.g. if
you want to use -ss when encoding a file with no index. -forceidx may
also be useful in some cases for recovering damaged files, but neither
of these options is what you want here.

Why not just take the good (but unseekable) file you got without -idx,
and use mencoder -oac copy -ovc copy to give it an index??

BTW, you've probably found a bug in mencoder, but I have no idea what
the cause might be... :((

Rich