MiniCoder

MiniCoder is a small-sized and portable application that enables you to encode media files to other formats, as well as to edit their properties before doing so.

Since installation is not required, you can drop the program files in any location on the disk and just click the executable to launch MiniCoder. Otherwise, you can save it to a pen drive or other removable storage unit to directly run it on any PC with minimum effort. Unlike most installers, it doesn't modify the Windows registry configuration.

The user-friendly GUI consists of a common window with a simple structure split into five panes dedicated to configuring settings and viewing log details. You can begin by adding media files to the task list.

Batch processing is possible, which means that you can encode multiple files at the same time by applying the same settings. On task completion, the PC can be scheduled to immediately shut down, hibernate or enter standby mode.

As far as audio and video parameters are concerned, you can change the bit rate, file size, quality, codec, container, video size and field, as well as apply post-processing effects (denoise, sharpen, subtitle). You can load AviSynth filters.

The application can be asked to disable the video title. You can indicate the output priority, set the process priority level, ignore audio, subtitles, chapters and attachments (if any), show a video preview dialog, or ask MiniCoder to continue with the encoding process even when encountering errors. Plugins are supported, such as ColorMatrix, Decomb, Deen or FluxSmooth.

We haven't come across any problems in our tests, thanks to the fact that MiniCoder didn't hang, crash or display error messages. It carried out encoding jobs swiftly while remaining light on system resources. This tool comes loaded with some advanced features for encoding media files, and it's mainly geared toward skilled users.