DIVX 5! Film

5. mars 2002

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What's New in DivX 5.0

DivX 5.0 introduces a new generation of DivX™ video technology, optimized for "true content": full-sized, full-speed video content that people actually enjoy watching, not small, low bitrate video that hurts your eyes and makes you bang your head against your monitor in frustration. We want you to enjoy watching your DivX videos, and we work hard to satisfy that need for movie-lovers everywhere.

DivX 5.0 raises the bar for video technologies everywhere with a universal architecture, increased optimizations and encoding performance, significantly improved visual quality, MPEG-4 compatibility including a new MPEG-4 based DivX file format, a complete command line interface for advanced users, and a host of other improvements that will appear to novice and power users alike. This page contains more information about these new features, and a version history summary is also available.

Compatibility with all Versions of DivX™ video content

We take seriously the responsibility to make DivX video backwards-compatible, so that once you have invested the time and effort to encode your videos into DivX format, you won't be left out in the cold by a future release.

DivX 5.0 continues this tradition and is capable of playing back all versions of DivX technology, from 3.11 alpha and earlier, to version 5.0 and later. This includes all of the advanced new video tools introduced in DivX Pro. If you have a piece of content encoded in any version of DivX, you can be sure that DivX 5.0 will play it back

AMD Optimizations

Let the conspiracy theories end here. We heard our people's cries and have responded! DivX 5.0 includes full and complete optimizations for AMD Athlon processors, including the Athlon XP processor. We worked together with Advanced Micro Devices and their engineers to ensure that you get absolutely the best possible DivX performance out of your AMD processors. All Athlon users should see significant decoding and encoding performance improvements of up to 20%. Enjoy.

Improved Encoding and Decoding Performance

DivX 5.0 improves encoding and decoding performance across the board. The AMD optimizations contribute to one part of the story, but we've also gone through each algorithm, and optimized like crazy to deliver better performance to all users of DivX video

The combination of DivX 5.0 software and the newest modern CPUs makes Double Real Time encoding speeds at full-screen (4CIF) resolutions a reality. We've not only met the holy grail of real-time encoding, we've blown right past it. On properly configured dual-processor machines, it's even possible to achieve up to Triple Real Time (70+ fps) encoding speeds for full-screen video. (And no, we're not kidding.) This kind of encoding performance makes DivX technology a no-brainer choice for both personal encoding and high volume professional encoding needs. And while those with the faster processors benefit the most, we've also built 5 pre-defined settings of performance/quality levels into the codec so that users with slower CPUs can choose to trade off quality for improved encoding performance, if that's what is most important to you. (Hey, we suggest you stick with the highest quality, but whatever floats your boat.)

Decoding performance also sees a performance boost in DivX 5.0. DivX is now able to perform software-based, full-speed decoding of high-definition (HD) resolution video on today's modern processors. You can expect full-speed playback of 720p (1280 x 720 pixels) HD video on newer processors and full-speed playback of 1080p (1920 x 1080 pixels) HD video on the very newest CPUs. There's just no better way than DivX to watch HD videos.

Faster Two-Pass Encoding

DivX 4.0 introduced a two-pass variable bitrate (VBR) encoding mode into the DivX video feature set. The first pass of the encoding writes a log file that is used by the second pass of the encoding to intelligently allocate the data so produce the best possible visual quality.

DivX 5.0 improves the two-pass encoding mode by reusing the motion vectors calculated by the first pass during the second pass of encoding. This makes the second pass up to 30% faster over the equivalent operation in DivX 4.x.

Smaller File Sizes

With every release, we get better and better at stuffing more visual quality into the same number of bits, and DivX 5.0 is no exception. Using all the features of DivX 5.0, you should expect up to 15-20% smaller files compared to DivX 4.12 when encoding video at an equivalent level of visual quality. So put that hard drive purchase on hold; you don't need it.

MPEG-4 Compatibility

DivX is the world's most popular and widely distributed MPEG-4 compatible video technology. Version 5.0 supports decoding of MPEG-4 Simple Profile, MPEG-4 Advanced Simple Profile, and H.263 video. (All levels are supported.) DivX 5.0 also supports encoding MPEG-4 Simple Profile (ISO/IEC 14496-2) compatible video. There still exists some confusion about the relationship between DivX video and MPEG-4, maybe because of the massive FUD put out by big companies that should know better. We hope this puts that confusion to rest.

DivX™ MPEG-4 File Format

DivX 5.0 can encode and decode the brand new DivX™ file format, based upon the MPEG-4 file format. DivX can now create fully MPEG-4 compatible video files including the file format. The new file format allows you to take advantage of all the new advanced video tools and algorithms (some of which aren't available in the AVI file format), improves audio/video synchronization, and breaks the old 2 GB file size barrier of AVI files.

In the future, the new file format will also allow multiple video and audio channels, subtitles built into the file itself, and many more new features. Encoding your videos in the new DivX™ file format today means you can take advantage of these new features in the future as they roll out.

We also provide a conversion tool that allows you to convert your AVI files with 5.0 video content into the new DivX™ file format. So you'll always have the option to upgrade to the newest file format.

Advanced Support for Existing Encoding Applications

Cool new features aren't much good if your favorite encoding applications don't support them. So you'll be happy to know that we specifically designed all of the new features of DivX 5.0 to work with the most popular video editing and encoding applications, and that no new versions of the applications are required to use the new DivX features!

The DivX 5.0 codec is offered as a Video for Windows (VfW) interface interface, the same interface used by the most common content creation and viewing applications. We have tested DivX 5.0 interoperability with Abode Premiere, VirtualDub, FlaskMPEG, and Gordian Knot. So keep using your existing applications and you'll get all the new features of DivX 5.0 for free!

Reusable Encoding Profiles

The DivX codec includes a large number of settings that can be tweaked and set just right to deliver the very best encoding performance. Advanced users often have their own personal favorite configuration of DivX settings to create exactly the type of video quality they prefer.

One of the disadvantages to having so many customizable settings is that, if you prefer to change a lot of settings to get just the type of encoding you want, you have to re-enter your custom settings every time you encode. DivX 5.0 introduces reusable encoding profiles so you can save your set of favorite codec settings and reuse them over and over again.

What's more, the reusable encoding profiles can be saved and given to other users. So advanced users can create custom-tweaked encoding profiles and make them available to more novice users to help them achieve the best encoding quality.

Quick Configuration Command Line Interface

The new quick configuration command line interface (CLI) in DivX 5.0 is a feature specially designed for power users. The CLI provides you with full control of all encoding parameters and allows you to encapsulate all of your encoding settings in a single command string. This string can be exchanged with other power users to share advanced encoding settings.

New Patent-Pending Rate Control

Rate control is one of the most important parts of video compression, and a good rate control algorithm separates the great video codecs from, well, the ones that suck.

DivX 5.0 introduces a new and improved, patent-pending rate control algorithm that uses dual periodic control loops to achieve the best balance of adjusting to video variations over the short time scale, while controlling and averaging the bitrate over the long time scale. The DivX rate control algorithm was developed as a result of exhaustive testing with a large set of full-length videos using software in multiple environments (e.g., TV, PC, PDA). We think the results speak for themselves.

Improved Encoding Algorithms

Version 5.0 also introduces advanced new processing algorithms that work their magic during the encoding process. These new algorithms are designed specifically to handle many of the most common activities in videos, such as fades, pans, wipes, sudden changes in brightness (e.g., explosions), and flat areas (e.g., water or sky). You should see much improved visual quality in version 5.0 in these specialized types of scenes.

Psychovisual Modeling

One of the coolest and most advanced features of DivX 5.0 is what we like to call "psychovisual modeling." Psychovisual modeling is used during the encoding process and takes into account what's know about the Human Visual System (HVS) to encode to higher visual quality at lower file sizes. While the human visual system has been researched for many years, psychovisual modeling is a new field when applied to real-life videos and movies, and it has never made its way out of the research lab and into a publicly available video technology…until now.

This innovative, DivX-only, patent-pending technique takes into account how humans perceive colors, light, and motion to encode video with higher quality using fewer data. What that means to you is fewer megabytes on your hard drive. :-)

Psychovisual modeling takes data from places in the video where the eye is less sensitive and puts it in places where the eye is more sensitive. It will analyze the frames to be encoded and tweak the encoding settings according to the Psychovisual Complexity Rating (PCR) of the frame, which allows it to save bits where your eyes are less sensitive to use them where your eyes will notice them the most. Psychovisual modeling operates not just single frames of the video, but works over entire video sequences. The key to how psychovisual modeling reduces data is to reduce the data in a way that the human visual system does not notice in a video sequence running a full frame rate, which, after all, only makes sense in a video technology. Seems like common sense, eh?

Universal Architecture

DivX 5.0 allows you to have the exact same video file (including file format and bitstream) playback under different operating systems and applications. It's universal VfW/ACM/QT architecture provides for real interoperability of the video file. Encode everywhere, play everywhere.

Mac® OS Support

With this release, we also introduce an alpha version of the Mac® OS version of DivX 5.0. The Mac OS version provides decoding support for all DivX content, making it the first publicly distributed MPEG-4 compatible technology available on Mac OS that is capable of playing back MPEG-4 Simple Profile and MPEG-4 Advanced Simple Profile video. We are finishing up our final optimizations and putting the finishing touches on the encoder, meaning a full 5.0 release for Mac OS is right around the corner.

Scalable

DivX has always been one of the most scalable of video technologies, and version 5.0 doesn't disappoint. This version of DivX™ technology was tested on a wide range of video bitrates, from very low bitrate video conferencing (28 Kbps) to HDTV resolution video and quality (7-9 Mbps). Whatever your video encoding needs, DivX technology gives you the power and flexibility to meet your needs.

New DivX Player 2.0 Alpha

And last, but certainly not least, the DivX 5.0 release includes a brand new version of the DivX Player application. Version 2.0 alpha of the DivX Player is completely re-written from the ground up and includes the ability to playback video files wrapped in the new DivX™ file format. The application also introduces one of the most advanced skin systems ever seen, which together with the new DivX Skins section on DivX.com, will ensure some very cool new interfaces for the official player application of DivX video. You can read more about the new DivX Player on the What's New in DivX Player 2.0 page.

Now, about DivX 6.0…

Just kidding. That's it for now, folks. Enjoy.