Various problems with latest eRightSoft SUPER

[Tomcat76]

Hello all -- long time no see

I have been into video editing a lot lately, and frequently used eRightSoft's SUPER as one of the programs to help me with this task. I've been using version 2010 build 37 for a really long time before I decided to upgrade to the latest version a couple of days ago.

The only real problem I had with the older version is that the FFmpeg encoder was unable to output widescreen 720p HD videos; 960x720 (4:3) worked, and so did 1080x720 (3:2) but only if the video lasted a few seconds. MEncoder *was* able to cope with 1280x720 and 1080x720 resolution vids just nicely. The only time I needed to use FFmpeg in this context was when I wanted to crop or pad the video, which MEncoder can't do (at least not in SUPER). Having to downsize the video to e.g. 1024x576 while cropping with FFmpeg and resize it back to 1280x720 with MEncoder is not a preference of mine.

For completeness' sake, I'll mention that I usually output videos in an AVI container using "Raw Uncompressed" as the video codec and "WAV PCM 16 LE" as the audio codec. Framerate, resolution, sampling rate and number of audio channels obviously depends on the input file and what I want to do with it. Most input files are FLV or MP4 files from YouTube, and recorded online ASF stream files.

After the upgrade to the latest version (2012 build 51) and having used it for several days, the following problems came to my attention:

1) After I click on the "Encode (Active Files)" button, there is a delay of about 30 seconds before processing actually begins. This delay is also present for every video file when multiple files are to be processed subsequently.

2) The function "Disable Audio" is broken. After clicking "Encode (Active Files)" and waiting for 30 seconds, the program reverts to normal and acts as if it has finished processing, yet no output file is created. No error message appears.

3) Similarly to problem #2, I am unable to create .WAV files from AVI files; no output file is created.

4) With older versions of SUPER, I noticed that it could only mux video and audio streams if the file containing the video stream did not contain an audio stream and if the file containing the audio stream did not contain a video stream. Seeing that I can't create either type with the new version of SUPER (see problems #2 and 3), I decided to just drop the two media files (identically formatted AVI files) into the program window and started the muxing process, but it failed with the message "Invalid!" for the first stream file. So much for muxing.

(I need this functionality because sometimes video and audio streams in the input files are out of sync, oftentimes after converting ASF to AVI. I normally cut or add a few video frames to the AVI file using Pinnacle Studio and output that to a new AVI file, create a .WAV file from that with SUPER and then mux it with a silent version of the original AVI file, yielding a file that is hopefully in sync. This is indeed a hit or miss scenario, but that's what you get when using freeware applications. Luckily I'm usually spot on.)

5) When using a custom video scale size, it's very hard to enter values in "Do not encode the first" and "Encode only for a total duration of" boxes. After typing one character (eg, "1" in the "Do not encode the first" box), the focus is automatically changed to the Width box in the Video Scale Size section of the program's interface. If I want to type a "5" after the "1", I need to click inside the "Do not encode the first box", use the arrow-right key on my keyboard, and then type "5". Very annoying. This doesn't happen if one of the predefined resolutions is chosen in the Video Scale Size section.

6) When I switch between FFmpeg and MEncoder, the framerate always changes automatically to 29.97fps. Most videos I make have a framerate of 25fps. This is yet another thing to be added to the pile of things that you need to watch out for when using SUPER.

7) Every time I want to make a video greater than 640x480, I get a big warning message saying that large resolutions will create bigger files and more system resources are required to process them. This is when I get one of those well-duh-huh moments. Seeing that the message cannot be disabled, it makes SUPER feel like a program from the 1980s in this day and age of HD video.

That's about it. I wish I could revert to the older version, but anyone who has ever tried that will know that it won't work. SUPER stores information about the most recent version having been installed in some hidden location, blocking operation of an older version.

Any help is greatly appreciated, as I need to process more videos.

If of help, I'm on Windows 2000 so there is no System Restore feature.

[Yzöwl]

I thought you'd died…

Welcome back!

[Tomcat76]

Yzöwl... Thanks for the re-welcome.

I'm still alive. I've just been busy....

[allen2]

To find what is modified when upgrading, you could try installing in a VM windows 2000 like your install then install the first "super" version then run installrite to monitor the install of the lastest version. Then installrite should tell you exactly what was modified and you should be able to fix your actual windows 2000 install.

As a side note, i also used "super" a few years ago but as it wasn't stable and a real open source project; i replaced "super" with avidemux and i find it a lot better and more tunable.

[Tomcat76]

Hi Allen. Thanks for the reply.

I followed up on your suggestion to give avidemux a spin. Quite a crash dummy, and it gives me an error upon every launch (The procedure entry point DecodePointer could not be located in the dynamic link library KERNEL32.dll), but otherwise it's a pretty decent app. It's actually the first "alternative" to SUPER of all that I've tried over the years which outputs files in a good (if not the same) quality. I still need to find out where to find the "slow motion" setting and how to create files larger than 9,000MB, the latter because Pinnacle Studio doesn't seem to recognize the audio track if the file is split up. Avidemux also doesn't support 32-bit ARGB for the video, the format I'm using when capturing from my capture card with VirtualDub (video preview is distorted/greenish/upside down). ASF files don't seem to be supported either (crash).

Inspite of the problems, though, I intend to keep this because it has some really useful features.

InstallRite... yes... How could I forget? I'll try this on one of the other computers here.

Edited May 7, 2012 by Tomcat76