Best performing OS for Handbrake

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TonyTheTechie
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Best performing OS for Handbrake

Post by TonyTheTechie »

I have been using Handbrake for quite sometime on my MacBook Pro to rip both DVDs and BluRay. I was to start ripping to the H265 format to take advantage of the smaller file size/better quality scenario, but on my MacBook Pro running MacOS 10.13 it is painfully slow.

I am thinking of building myself a new system specifically for ripping my disks to my Plex server (I have a collection over 3,000 strong), but I was wondering which is the best OS to run Handbrake on - Windows, Mac or Linux?

Regards

Tony
rollin_eng
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Re: Best performing OS for Handbrake

Post by rollin_eng »

Technically it shouldn’t matter but I imagine you could streamline Linux better.

Also certain features like Intel hardware encoding is only available/better supported on Windows.
TonyTheTechie
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Re: Best performing OS for Handbrake

Post by TonyTheTechie »

Does Handbrake support multicore processors. If so what is the maximum number of cores that Handbrake will use?
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s55
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Re: Best performing OS for Handbrake

Post by s55 »

Yes. There is no maximum per say but it depends on the circumstances. For some source/settings/hardware it might only be 2, for other situations it might max out 16. Users with large core counts often run multiple instances if they don't get full utilisation.

OS is largely irrelevant.
CrazyMarty
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Re: Best performing OS for Handbrake

Post by CrazyMarty »

Just to offer a single data point, for minimal transcoding of 4k input (mostly just autocrop and dropping foreign audio and subtitles, passthru of my native audio/subtitles), I max out 16 LCPUs @4.0GHz on Ubuntu 17.04 in a VM on a Win10 host getting ~12fps. (Yes, it's an annoying setup; long story; source data is on network; destination to local SSD.) Blu-ray is more like 80+% at 30-60fps, and DVDs are (network) I/O bound, even at 350+fps.
Woodstock
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Re: Best performing OS for Handbrake

Post by Woodstock »

OS - Windows has not-so-good AAC audio encoding, but has QSV hardware support. Mac has superior AAC audio, but no QSV support.
mduell
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Re: Best performing OS for Handbrake

Post by mduell »

A VM is not a good benchmark for... anything.
TonyTheTechie
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Re: Best performing OS for Handbrake

Post by TonyTheTechie »

Thanks for your comments
Ronin
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Re: Best performing OS for Handbrake

Post by Ronin »

Handbrake seems to be optimized to max out at six CPUs, according to various independent tests I read online. After that you get massive diminishing returns or no return at all. I have never seen any one OS perform significantly better than any other OS and yes macOS does support Intel hardware acceleration for video, and has definitely supported QSV (Intel Quick Sync Video) since Mountain Lion for Apple and third party apps so no, Windows does not have an advantage there.

A Mac Mini with an internal SSD and a quad core processor is an ideal candidate for this just. Its tiny, very quiet (essentially silent), extremely reliable and secure (both the hardware and the OS) and you can use any number of UNIX/Linux scripts to automate the process, saving you a lot of work sorting out the scripts yourself.

The only way that I see to make an even better system is to buy a robotic stacker (I don't remember what they are called anymore) that will hold a few hundred DVDs at a time, the robotic arm pulls one disc off the stack and inserts it into the DVD drive (the robot software sends commands to the DVD player to open and close the tray) then when the Rip has been completed it will open the tray, pick up the disc and then place it on a different stack. Any disc that results in failure code dis dropped off in front of the unit so you don't have to go searching for it. Its an elegant system and can handle hundreds of discs at a time, so you can keep it full at all times and just let it run day and night (your collection would probably be done by the end of the week. We had these at work (nor for ripping DVDs obviously, LOL) and they ran undisturbed day and night for years, all we had to do was to remember to load another 500 discs into the input stack, to keep the unit well fed (as well as emptying the completed stack). Its a big leap to a system like this, its expensive, a pain to set up and after the first week when al the discs have been completed then you have a very expensive system that has no further use.

Thats why I think that having a Mac Mini sitting next to you (so you can be the robot and swap the discs) is probably the most practical approach.

You can use MakeMKV to Rip the discs to .MKV format because this is faster than using Handbrake (with the enabling libraries installed), then setup a script to hand off the .MKV files to Handbrake which will process them into usable (compressed) .MP4 files. The total time of Ripping with MakeMKV plus Handbrake is no faster than using Handbrake alone, but using MakeMKV means that you can swap the discs anywhere from two to three times more often per hour than using Handbrake alone. At some point you will have loaded all the discs via MakeMKV, and can put the discs away but the processors will be transcoding and compressing the .MKV files into .MP4 files for two to three times longer than it took to load the files initially. Of course this will continue to operate in the background with no intervention from you.
mduell
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Re: Best performing OS for Handbrake

Post by mduell »

Ronin wrote: Wed Jun 20, 2018 9:00 pmHandbrake seems to be optimized to max out at six CPUs, according to various independent tests I read online.
LOL, that's some rich BS.

Certain sources and settings may not scale well beyond 6 CPUs, but HB is optimized for many many more on appropriate encodes.
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BradleyS
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Re: Best performing OS for Handbrake

Post by BradleyS »

@Ronin this is one of many posts I've seen from you with misleading statements. While I assume it is likely not intentional, perhaps avoid giving others advice on this forum while you're still trying to understand the concepts yourself. Thanks.
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