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Handbrake alternative with VA-API support (gehirneimer.de)
submitted 2 months ago by BentiGorlich@gehirneimer.de to c/linux@lemmy.world
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I recently switched to an AMD GPU and VA-API is the only option for hardware acceleration on linux that is viable. But Handbrake does not support it and it doesn't seem like it will in the foreseeable future, so I am looking for an alternative. Ideally it is just an ffmpeg GUI, but I did not find any that are:

  • actually compatible with linux
  • updated in the last 5 years
  • have an option vor h264_vaapi or hevc_vaapi video codecs

Another workflow I thought about that is not working is transcoding the video, but copy all audio and subtitles and let handbrake handle that, however Handbrake has no option to just copy the video stream...

So far I have tried:

  • ffmpeg_batch: wouldn't use my local version of ffmpeg, because of some path error, only works through wine
  • qwinff: got it building, but no VA-API codec, and no mkv output support (over 10 years old)
  • Shutter Encoder: only works through wine, font problems, no va-api support
  • Avidemux: takes forever to open a video clip, more of a video editor, no va-api support
  • Hybrid: know it from my windows days, clunky UI, no va-api support, but best candidate for me right now as I could use it to just copy video and handle audio and subtitles in here
  • StaxRip: the .7z file could not be extracted, I just got an error

Any ideas or suggestions?

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[-] JASN_DE@feddit.org 4 points 2 months ago

Do you actually need the GUI or is it simply a preference? Because investing 15 minutes in a proper ffmpeg script might be worth looking into.

Apart from that, what would that hybrid "ffmpeg-then-Handbrake" approach look like? What would be the goal here?

[-] cyborganism@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 months ago

Just an anecdote, I would LOVE for ffmpeg to have a GUI.

[-] who@feddit.org 2 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Are you aware that HandBrake supports AMD VCN hardware video encoding, but doesn't show the option in the GUI unless support is detected on your system? Perhaps you could get it working by installing the AMD's proprietary driver.

https://handbrake.fr/docs/en/1.9.0/technical/video-vcn.html

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/AMDGPU_PRO

You haven't said what kind of source media you're encoding, so we don't know if there's a feature of Handbrake that would be hard to replace using another tool.

VA-API is the only option for hardware acceleration on linux that is viable.

I guess that depends on what you mean by viable. Are you aware of Vulkan Video?

https://www.phoronix.com/news/Vulkan-Video-VCN2-VCN3-Default

https://www.phoronix.com/news/RADV-Vulkan-Video-Low-Latency

FFMPEG apparently merged support for it last year. If you can't get HandBrake to do what you want, you might consider investing some time in learning ffmpeg commands.

https://www.phoronix.com/news/FFmpeg-AV1-Vulkan-Encoder

[-] bishoponarope@lemmy.world 1 points 2 months ago

Tdarr supports AMD GPUs I think? it may be through a plugin, but it shouldn't be a problem. And now you've asked that question, I'm going to go test that and see if I can confirm I'm right.

this post was submitted on 05 Jun 2025
8 points (100.0% liked)

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