VirtualDub is a pretty good video editing/encoding tool. I've been using it for years and what I can say is the fact that I was quite pleased with it.
The interface is a little bit classic, but if you like the functionality more that eye candy interfaces this application might be a good option for you.
This application doesn't come with built in or bundled codecs except the support for MPEG 1 standard. It uses the installed codecs from your Windows OS and it is doing a pretty good job because you may select advanced settings to everything. This is working both for video and audio codecs and is including the support for every subset of MPEG 4 standard (DivX, Xvid, WMV, ASF, etc.). If the codec has the support for encoding and not just for decoding then you may use it.
Another thing that I love about this application is the fact that it is more than free, it is OpenSource, so it has the community support. This means lots of useful filters for every encoding activity and even more: a MPEG 2 mod for this application because the original doesn't support this standard. Another thing that is great is the fact that the producers of some well known codec packs are including plugins for this application. One of those packs is
ffdshow MPEG 4 decoder. So the application has the support for plugins, filters, everything you want for video encoding activities, just name it.
Another nice thing that the application does is the support for video capture. If your video source is properly installed in your operating system, then VirtualDub may capture the signal from that video source and encode it into a video file that you can store on your hard drive.
Since the producer is just a single person the application is not perfect. Sometimes it's crashing for a certain reason or from a reason you might never discover. Certain limitations can appear if you are overclocking some of your hardware components. If you do overclock your CPU you might get an unexpected crash or the application simply refuses to do its job.
Pluses: it's an OpenSource application with nice community support, there are a lot of plugins and filters for this application, the fact that it's OpenSource means that you can find mods of this application with extended functionality and less bugs compared to the original. It is very customizable in order to obtain maximum out of it. It has a nice batch converting/encoding module.
Drawbacks / flaws: it's a little buggy, it's hardware depending sometimes (unexpected crashes), the interface looks a little old. The application is sometimes hard to use if you aren't used with video encoding tools. It doesn't check if the audio stream is compatible with the video stream so you might get an unusable output file. I do recommend the use of mp3 audio codec. Another thing that is missing is the complete support for the Apple MOV video format.
In conclusion: This is a nice, well developed and free application that can suit your own needs for video encoding.
version reviewed: 1.8.1
VirtualDub Publisher's Description
There are lots of programs that let you "edit" video. And yet, they're frustratingly complex for some of the simplest tasks. VirtualDub isn't an editor application; it's a pre- and post-processor that works as a valuable companion to one:
Reads and writes AVI2 (OpenDML) and multi-segment AVI clips.
Integrated MPEG-1 and Motion-JPEG decoders. Remove and replace audio tracks without touching the video. Extensive video filter set, including blur, sharpen, emboss, smooth, 3x3 convolution, flip, resize rotate, brightness/contrast, levels, deinterlace, and threshold. Bilinear and bicubic resampling -- no blocky resizes or rotates here. Decompress and recompress both audio and video. Remove segments of a video clip and save the rest, without recompressing. Adjust frame rate, decimate frames, and 3:2 pulldown removal. Preview the results, with live audio.
You can take a captured clip, trim the ends, clean up some of the noise, convert it to the proper frame size, and write out a better one. Don't see a video filter you want? Write your own, with the filter SDK.
Build 23604 (1.6.9, stable): [July 10, 2005]
[bugs fixed]
* Extended workaround for Huffyuv joining problems to capture mode
(pre-zeroing format block).
* Hex editor would warp to a random location when using the mouse wheel for
the first time.
* Currently displayed frame was not updated after a reload (F2).
* Fixed errors when opening YCbCr (YUV) videos that had nonstandard bit
depth or image size values in the frame header.
* YV16 input is now supported; previously it could be written but not
re-read.
[regressions fixed]
* Fixed sporadic audio compression errors at end of render.
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