Best way to encode to mpeg4/divx for use on a portable media player?

[btrcp2000]

EDIT: Boiled down question is, what's the best way to get shows recorded into mpeg4/divx and then moved to my portable media player?

I have an Archos av500 that is capable of divx and mpeg4 files. It will mainly be used in the car for kids shows. Ideally, I would like to put a bunch of stuff on and leave it for a while, then wipe and reload it when it gets old, just like an mp3 player. I used the video conversion feature in sage to manually compress one to an avi, and wound up with a 460mb avi of a cartoon (i think I chose "avi good" or something along those lines) that took every bit of an hour and a half to put on the av500 via sync with windows media player.

The av500 has the ability to be recognized as a hard drive as opposed to a "windows device". I wonder if I could set it up as the receiving folder for a 1bunch of re-encodes done by sage, and cut WMP out of the loop?

I have installed sagemc and the newest video tools, for all I know it is working, but I can't see how to get it to compress existing stuff. Or is video tools only intended to automate the compression of a favorite, while sage itself does the manuals?

Sorry for the rambling, but I am drinking from the fire hose here regarding compression. Thanks!

[btrcp2000]

OKay, back again with the same question that nobody answered 2.5 years ago

Only difference is now I have an archos 605. All I want to do is stuff it with kids shows for the upcoming car ride, could care less about quality, just want space. I have found format factory, which seems to be a decent solution.

What format would be best if my priority space? I have some stuff from hdpvr and r5000, as well as analog. Can those digital files even be shrunk much?

tia

[tchapin]

Well, the av500 has a 480x272 resolution, at least according to this review and that it supports these formats: AVI , WMV , MPEG-4 , MPEG-4 SP

So, anything you could do with the video to downscale the videos would reduce the size of the file.

I think the way that you'd go about this is to use Sage Job Queue (SJQ)

You can use it to activate Handbrake command line or perhaps Mediashrink.

With SJQ, you can define rules for what shows you want coverted and when. You could probably automate moving the files.

[ThePaladinTech]

Well I don't know if this will answer your question. I have an Archos 605 and I use this:

http://www.pocketdivxencoder.net/EN_index.htm

works great even has a preset for the 605 if I recall correctly

[tchapin]

If SJQ can't move the files onto the drive for you, perhaps this could

http://lifehacker.com/341950/belvede...lf+cleaning-pc

[sfag]

i use various archos devices.
I use evil penguines auto compress which is an add on for sagetv.
you'll find it here in the forums somewhere.

It will automatically transcode everything to what ever custom format you use.
To set up your own custom format edit the properties file in notepad. I can advise on how to this if you want.

I recommend avi (divx or xvid) for archos's.
Even low res such as 320 * 240 will display fine.

If you prefer the odd manual go you can compress a whole folder using mediacoder (free) .