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• Death of A Micro Center

  21 septembre 2012, par Multimedia Mike — History

  The Micro Center computer store located in Santa Clara, CA, USA closed recently :

  
  
  

  I liked Micro Center. I have liked Micro Center ever since I first visited their Denver, CO location 10 years ago. I would sometimes drive an hour in each direction just to visit that shop. I was excited to see that they had a location in the Bay Area when I moved here a few years ago (despite the preponderance of Fry’s stores).

  Now this location is gone. I wonder how much of the “we couldn’t come to favorable terms on a lease” was true (vs. an excuse to close a retail store at a time when more business is moving online, particularly in the heart of Silicon Valley). But that’s not what I wanted to discuss. I came here to discuss…

  The Micro Center Window Logos

  The craziest part about shopping the Santa Clara Micro Center location was the logos they displayed on the window outside. Every time I saw it, it made me sentimental for a time when some of these logos were current, or when some of these companies were still in business. Some of the logos on their front window were for companies I’ve never heard of. It reminds me of the nearby 7-11 convenience stores when I was growing up– their walls were decorated with people sporting embarrassingly 1970s styles long after the 1970s had transpired.

  I thought I would record what those front window logos were and try to pinpoint when the store launched exactly (assuming the logos have been their since the initial opening and never changed).

  
  
  Click for larger image
  

  Here we have Lotus, Hewlett Packard/HP, Corel, Fuji, Power Macintosh, NEC, and Fujitsu. Lotus was purchased by IBM in 1995 and still seems to be maintained as a separate brand. The Power Macintosh was introduced as a brand in 1994. Corel’s logo has seen a few mutations over the years but I don’t know when this one fell out of favor.

  Fuji (vs. Fujitsu) appears to refer to Fujifilm, though this logo is also obsolete.

  
  
  Click for larger image
  

  Hayes– I specifically remember reading the Slashdot post accouncing that Hayes is dead (followed by many comments reminiscing about the Hayes command set). Here is the post, from early 1999.

  From Googling, it doesn’t appear IBM still has a presence in the consumer computing space (though they do have something pertaining to software for consumer products). Then there’s the good old rainbow Apple logo, something that went away in 1997. I suspect 1997 was also the last hurrah of the name ‘Macintosh’ (though I remember mistakenly referring to Apple computer products as Macintoshes well into the mid-2000s and inadvertently angering some Apple enthusiasts).

  
  
  Click for larger image
  

  As for the next segment, obviously, both Sony and Toshiba are still very much alive. Iomega was acquired by EMC in 2008 but is still maintained as a separate brand. USRobotics is still around and making — what else ? — 56K modems (and their current logo is slightly different than the one seen here).

  Targus seems to be a case maker (“Leading Provider of Cases, Bags and Accessories for Laptops and Tablets”). I wonder if that’s just their current business or if they had more areas long ago ? It seems strange that they would get brand billing like this.

  Finally, searching for information about Practical Peripherals only produces sites about how they’re long dead (like this history lesson). It’s unclear when they died.

  The interior of this store was also decorated with more technology company logos near the ceiling (I didn’t really register that fact until I had visited many times). Regrettably, I now won’t be able to see how up to date those logos were.

  Based on the data points above, it’s safe to conclude that the store opened between 1995 or 1996 (again, assuming the logos were placed at opening and never changed).

  Epilogue

  Here’s one more curious item still visible from the outside :

  
  
  

  “See the world’s fastest PC !” Featuring an Intel Core 2 Extreme ? That CPU dates back to 2007 and was succeeded by Nehalem in late 2008. So even that sign, which is presumably easier and cleaner to replace than the window logos, was absurdly out of date.

• ffmpeg error while converting to mp4 Error while opening encoder for output stream #0.0

  20 mars 2016, par Josh

  I am trying to convert various file types to mp4 to be displayed using ffmpeg, but i keep getting the error :

  Error while opening encoder for output stream #0.0 - maybe incorrect parameters such as bit_rate, rate, width or height

  Another piece that looks important is :

  [libx264 @ 0x93caef0] broken ffmpeg default settings detected

  [libx264 @ 0x93caef0] use an encoding preset (e.g. -vpre medium)

  [libx264 @ 0x93caef0] preset usage : -vpre -vpre

  [libx264 @ 0x93caef0] speed presets are listed in x264 —help

  [libx264 @ 0x93caef0] profile is optional ; x264 defaults to high

  The latest code I am running is :

  ffmpeg -i source -s 320x240 -r 30000/1001 -b 200k -bt 240k -vcodec libx264 -coder 0 -bf 0 -refs 1 -flags2 -wpred-dct8x8 -level 30 -maxrate 10M -bufsize 10M -acodec libfaac -ac 2 -ar 48000 -ab 192k destination

  I have seen a few other people with this issue, but their fixes didn’t work for some reason.

  In case it matters : ultimately this will be used in php, though I am trying to get it working first via putty

  EDIT: : Here is the full thing as requested(using a wmv, have tested wmv and flv) :

       ~ >> ffmpeg -i path.wmv -s 320x240 -r 30000/1001 -b 200k -r 29.97 -bt 240k -vcodec libx264 -coder 0 -bf 0 -refs 1 -flags2 -wpred-dct8x8 -level 30 -maxrate 10M -bufsize 10M -acodec libfaac -ac 2 -ar 48000 -ab 192k path.mp4
  
  FFmpeg version SVN-r26076, Copyright (c) 2000-2011 the FFmpeg developers
  
    built on Aug 28 2012 17:55:47 with gcc 4.1.2 20080704 (Red Hat 4.1.2-52)
  
    configuration: --enable-version3 --enable-gpl --enable-nonfree --enable-shared --enable-postproc --enable-avfilter --enable-libopencore-amrnb --enable-libopencore-amrwb --enable-libvpx --enable-libfaac --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libtheora --enable-libvorbis --enable-libx264 --enable-libxvid --disable-ffplay --disable-indevs --disable-outdevs --disable-demuxer=v4l --disable-demuxer=v4l2 --disable-mmx
  
    libavutil     50.36. 0 / 50.36. 0
  
    libavcore      0.16. 1 /  0.16. 1
  
    libavcodec    52.108. 0 / 52.108. 0
  
    libavformat   52.93. 0 / 52.93. 0
  
    libavdevice   52. 2. 3 / 52. 2. 3
  
    libavfilter    1.74. 0 /  1.74. 0
  
    libswscale     0.12. 0 /  0.12. 0
  
    libpostproc   51. 2. 0 / 51. 2. 0
  
  
  
  Seems stream 1 codec frame rate differs from container frame rate: 1000.00 (1000/1) -> 29.97 (30000/1001)
  
  Input #0, asf, from 'path.wmv':
  
    Metadata:
  
      SfOriginalFPS   : 299
  
      WMFSDKVersion   : 11.0.6001.7000
  
      WMFSDKNeeded    : 0.0.0.0000
  
      IsVBR           : 0
  
      title           : Wildlife in HD
  
      artist          :
  
      copyright       : © 2008 Microsoft Corporation
  
      comment         : Footage: Small World Productions, Inc; Tourism New Zealand | Producer: Gary F. Spradling | Music: Steve Ball
  
    Duration: 00:00:30.09, start: 8.000000, bitrate: 6977 kb/s
  
      Stream #0.0(eng): Audio: wmav2, 44100 Hz, 2 channels, s16, 192 kb/s
  
      Stream #0.1(eng): Video: vc1, yuv420p, 1280x720, 5942 kb/s, 29.97 tbr, 1k tbn, 1k tbc
  
  File 'path.mp4' already exists. Overwrite ? [y/N] y
  
  [buffer @ 0x9ce9eb0] w:1280 h:720 pixfmt:yuv420p
  
  [scale @ 0x9ce8f70] w:1280 h:720 fmt:yuv420p -> w:320 h:240 fmt:yuv420p flags:0x4
  
  [libx264 @ 0x9ce9ef0] broken ffmpeg default settings detected
  
  [libx264 @ 0x9ce9ef0] use an encoding preset (e.g. -vpre medium)
  
  [libx264 @ 0x9ce9ef0] preset usage: -vpre <speed> -vpre <profile>
  
  [libx264 @ 0x9ce9ef0] speed presets are listed in x264 --help
  
  [libx264 @ 0x9ce9ef0] profile is optional; x264 defaults to high
  
  Output #0, mp4, to 'path.mp4':
  
      Stream #0.0(eng): Video: libx264, yuv420p, 320x240, q=2-31, 200 kb/s, 90k tbn, 29.97 tbc
  
      Stream #0.1(eng): Audio: libfaac, 48000 Hz, 2 channels, s16, 192 kb/s
  
  Stream mapping:
  
    Stream #0.1 -> #0.0
  
    Stream #0.0 -> #0.1
  
  Error while opening encoder for output stream #0.0 - maybe incorrect parameters such as bit_rate, rate, width or height
  
  </profile></speed>

  Thanks for any help

• Why does FFMPEG report the wrong duration ?

  27 avril 2013, par Adrian Lynch

  I have an oldish build of FFMPEG that I can't easily change.

  We use FFMPEG to find the duration of video and sound files. So far it has been working wonderfully.

  Recently on an uploaded file, FFMPEG has reported a 30 second file as being 5 minutes 30 seconds in length.

  Could it be something wrong with the file rather than FFMPEG ?

  If I use FFMPEG to convert to another file, the duration is restored.

  In case it matters, ffmpeg -i 'path to the file' produces :

      FFmpeg version Sherpya-r15618, Copyright (c) 2000-2008 Fabrice Bellard, et al.
        libavutil     49.11. 0 / 49.11. 0
        libavcodec    52. 0. 0 / 52. 0. 0
        libavformat   52.22. 1 / 52.22. 1
        libavdevice   52. 1. 0 / 52. 1. 0
        libswscale     0. 6. 1 /  0. 6. 1
        libpostproc   51. 2. 0 / 51. 2. 0
        built on Oct 14 2008 23:43:47, gcc : 4.2.5 20080919 (prerelease) [Sherpya]
      Input #0, mov,mp4,m4a,3gp,3g2,mj2, from 'H :\path\to\file.mov' :
        Duration : 00:05:35.00, start : 0.000000, bitrate : 1223 kb/s
          Stream #0.0(eng) : Audio : aac, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16
          Stream #0.1(eng) : Video : h264, yuv420p, 720x576, 25.00 tb(r)
      Must supply at least one output file
  

  It's that very command I use to then extract the duration with RegEx.

  Does anyone have a nice application that can do what I'm trying above but get it right 100% of the time ?