Transcode to keep 99% of quality but reduce size

[fpdave]

I dont think I'm asking the impossible, but I dont know my way around the ffmpeg cmd line (and suspect that if I do learn it then something more valuable regarding the .NET framework will pop out of my head to make room!!), and would like to transcode my mpgs into a format that kept 99% of the quality and yet maybe halved the disk space.

The standard XVID setting is about the best of the DIVX, XVID WMV1200 settings that come as standard, but the quality loss is too great and size is reduced to 25% of original. So, there is plenty of room to have better quality.

in config.xml the cmd line for XVID is defined as: -y -i {SOURCE_FILE} -f avi -ab 224 -ac 2 -acodec mp3 -deinterlace -vcodec xvid -b 1250k -vtag XVID {DEST_FILE}

can anyone suggest improvements to the cmd line that might give me what I want.

[fpdave]

Oh yes, forgot, VBR is a pain as GBPVR isnt very good at FFWD/FBWD thru the file at playback, so a fixed bit rate would be best. Now I am asking the impossible.

[HtV]

You could try to raise the bitrate, if you double it to: 2500k, the file size would double to ~half the original. I wanted to suggest -sameq but that implies using vbr.

The ffmpeg docs are here: http://ffmpeg.mplayerhq.hu/ffmpeg-doc.html#SEC9

So there's no need to put it into your head.