XviD guide

XviD is the latest MPEG-4 codec and the first true open source one. Once finished it will be released under the GPL license. In a recent codec comparison I found that XviD gives surprisingly good results despite the early alpha status. If being a beta tester doesn't scare you then XviD could be the codec for you.

To give you the fastest encoding method possible without too much hassle I chose to use Gordian Knot as frontend for most of the encoding action. For a detailed overview over every option in XviD please have a look at Koepi's XviD Options Explained document.

You will need the following software for this guide:

GordianKnot Rippack & update
GordianKnot Codec pack
stable XviD binaries or development XviD binaries (guide is based on uManiac's stable binary dated 11/27 and Koepi's dev build dated 12/24 respectively)
Robot4Rip

Step 0: First time setup

You will only have to perform this step once.

Install the GordianKnot Rippack, then install the GordianKnot system pack. Make sure that if you don't have the Div5 codec installed yet you activate that option when you install the system pack. Last but not least install Robot4Rip and make sure it is installed at the same place as GordianKnot (if you didn't change anything when installing GKnot you won't have to worry about Robot4Rip).

Then also install the XviD codec.

Step 1: Basic GKnot Setup

This step will teach you how to set up GKnot for a perfectly good looking rip.

Step 2: Avisynth script creation

In this step we're going to create an AviSynth frameserver AviSynth script to frameserve the video into VirtualDub.

Step 3: Video encoding

Configure the codec and encode the video in 2 pass mode using Virtualdub. If you prefer to use the development builds (they may not always be stable...) here's the guide for the XviD development tree. And last but not least, the guide for XviD 1.0.

Step 4: Join Audio and Video

Nandub can handle both CBR and VBR (ABR is a kind of VBR) audio and is therefore best suited for the task.

Step 5: Splitting

If you created a movie for more than 1 CD you have to split it up now.

Step 6: Playback

Just a small note on the playback filter settings:

Brightness should be rather obvious.

The 6 options correspond to the 6 quality settings in the DivX4/5 filter:

Level 1 corresponds to Horiz. Deblock (Y), Level 2 to Horiz. Deblock (Y) and Vert. Deblock (Y), Level 3 to both Y deblocks and Horiz. Deblock (C), Level4 is all deblock options, Level 5 all deblock options and Y dering, and Level 6 is all options enabled.

The two Deblocking options in the Y (luminance: how bright the picture is) plane have the most visible effect so they should be turned on first. If the video is still blocky also turn on the deblocking in the C plane (Chrominance, information about the colors).

The X and Y tresholds can be used to set the strength of the filtering. Setting these to a higher value means less smoothing but not as effective deblocking.

Flip video can be used if for some reason you see the video flipped on your screen.

Last but not least I'd like to thank Koepi for his excellent XviD Options Explained document on which parts of this guide are based on.

This document was last updated on December 11, 2003