We were using FFmpeg which is free. And when a bug occurred that broke the system, a previous developer installed PandaStream.
My question is, what do you recommend for quality video encoders?
Is it best to stick with ffmpeg and keep it free, or does a small website really need a heavy duty service like Panda?
FFmpeg and MEncoder are both good quality FOSS encoders.
If you've got problems with the encoding (re: your bug) at might be worth having a look at their configuration, perhaps even the output codec and working it through that way. It might help if you have a local mirror of your remote system so you can test various configurations quicker than if you were running it on the remote server.
I would be quite surprised if Panda weren't using a tool like mencoder or ffmpeg to do their encodes.
The obvious advantage of a third service (especially for something like video encoding) is it takes a whole load of the heat off your server. Encoding video is a seriously heavy task.
That said, with the prices Panda charge, you could easily build a little render farm using a couple of VPS machines
Edit: Panda even post their ffmpeg config so it might be an idea to just nab one of theirs.
Personally, I've used Aunsoft Video Converter for Mac and found it very professional in encoding and decoding various video formats.
The reason I choose Aunsoft Video Converter for Mac is as follows: First: Convert HD 1080p, 1080i, 720p videos for viewing on portable devices or editing in other software. Second: TiVo, HDTV shows, recorded camcorder videos can be easily enjoyed on your media players. Thrid: Extract TrueHD, DTS, FLAC, DTS-HD audio from M2TS, VOB, MKV, etc video to AAC, AC3 and keep 5.1 channels. Fourth: Support VFW codec encoding and 5.1 channel audio output. Fifth: Comprehensive list of output profile with best settings for different media devices. Sixth: Enable you to remove black borders of the movie and watch it in full screen with Crop function. Last: Perfect and guaranteed video/audio synchronization.