For years I have already been doing most of the work involved; I have been intensely researching, following the latest developments, and sharing the information with interested people close to me. Now I have a good way to store and categorize the information I collect, and it’s easier to share.

I spent the last year adding articles and videos, populating the pages on the website, and getting feedback from friends and family.

So far I’ve written about magnesium, air quality, paint, Blueprint hair products, and every month I do a summary of the most interesting health and longevity research I saw in the last month.

In addition to the website and YouTube channel, I post updates on Instagram, Facebook, Bluesky and X, and you can get email or RSS updates by subscribing on the blog. I would love any feedback and engagement.

I will continue to share software-related things here on Spirton.

Links are below:
Website: https://klaustownsend.com
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@KlausTownsend
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/klaustownsendofficial/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61579636887479
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/klaustownsend.bsky.social
X: https://x.com/klaus_townsend

Changes since SB49:

• Synchronised with r35910, which
  • Silences meaningless errors
• Added support for XAnim codecs
• Added support for dynamic loading (dlfcn-win32-r19)
• Added RTMPDump Streaming Media library (r481)
• Updated libpng to 1.5.14

Changes since 2.2.5:

• General:
  
  • Some renderers (like Philips HTS) can connect more quickly with the server
  • Improved support for Sony Bravia HX series TVs
  • Improved design on OS X
  • Fixed FFmpeg video transcoding on Xbox
  • Fixed file permissions on Linux
  • Plugins can use custom icons for files (thanks, skeptical!)
• Languages:
  
  • Updated Korean translation (thanks, sunghyuk!)
• External Components:
  
  • Updated MPlayer/MEncoder for Windows to SB49, which:
    
    • Improves MP3 encoding speed
    • Improves MKV support
    • Improves threading
    • Fixes memory leaks

Changelog:

• Synchronised with r35801
• Updated FFmpeg to r49065 (64b7e7d), which
  • Improves Matroska (MKV) support
  • Improves threading
• Updated fontconfig to 2.10.91, which
  • Fixes memory leaks
  • Makes it threadsafe
• Updated jpeg to 9
• Added mpg123 1.14.4

Changes since 2.4.0 Beta 1:

• Fixed the presets Weak and Faster when not using GPU (thanks, Motenai Yoda!)
• Fixed the Animation tuning (thanks, HolyWu!)

Changes since 2.3.0:

• The “Medium” preset is back to what it was in 2.2.0
• The “Fast” preset is the same as “Medium” was in 2.3.0
• The new “Faster” preset is the same as “Fast” was in 2.3.0
• The “Animation” tuning has been changed a lot based on SVP recommendations
• The “Weak” tuning has been changed a lot based on widezu69’s recommendations
• The “Smooth” tuning is smoother

Changelog:

• Synchronised with r35203, which:
  • Enables more CPU optimisations
  • Improves audio sync
  • Tried to fix very occasional freezing issue
• Updated FFmpeg to r44583 (8d07742), which:
  • Improves audio/video sync
• Updated GCC to 4.7.0
• Updated x264 to r2216

Changelog:

• General:
  
  • Made videos adhere more exactly to the maximum bandwidth limit
  • Updated MPlayer/MEncoder to SB37, changelog: https://www.spirton.com/mplayer-mencoder-sb37-released/
  • Updated MediaInfo to 0.7.60, changelog: http://mediainfo.sourceforge.net/Log
  • Files are now sorted alphanuerically by default, e.g. Episode 2 before Episode 10
  • #–TRANSCODE–# folder name is localized
  • Cleaned up FFmpeg and MEncoder commands
  • Use automatic enabling of multithreading with FFmpeg and FFmpeg/AviSynth engines
  • Many improvements to UMS.conf and how it responds to updates, it is recommended to delete your old one
  • Only use tsMuxeR to compensate for MEncoder ignoring audio delay when A/V sync alternative method is enabled (which it is by default)
  • Fixed bugs in plugin installer
  • Automatic encoding detection of non UTF-8 external subtitles for Russian, Greek, Hebrew, Chinese, Korean and Japanese languages (leave "Subtitles codepage" option blank)
  • Improved handling of UTF-8 external subtitles
  • Prevented image distortion on some DLNA clients with "Keep AC-3 track" option enabled
  • Don’t show entries for disabled engines in #–TRANSCODE–# folder
  • Allow Traces tab panel to auto-scroll (thanks, LordQuackstar!)
  • Replaced ImageMagick with Thumbnailator for thumbnail generation
  • Fixed FFmpeg engine’s handling of unsupported custom options (thanks, ajamess)
  • Fixed FFmpeg command line arguments used by tsMuxeR video
  • Fixed DNLA 2114 errors when scanning non-readable subfolders with "hide empty folders" enabled
  • Linux tarball: fix "cannot find tsMuxeR" error
  • Fixed numerous small bugs

  Renderers:

  • Added Sony SMP-N100
  • Added Yamaha RX-A1010 (thanks, merelin)
  • Deprecated misnamed TranscodeVideo profile MPEGAC3: use MPEGPSAC3 instead
  • Documented and cleaned up TranscodeVideo and TranscodeAudio profiles

  FFmpeg:

  • Updated FFmpeg to a366bea (20120827)
  • Follow the maximum bandwidth setting
  • Mux AC3 instead of transcoding it
  • Use better commands

  MEncoder:

  • Disabled AC-3 remux if audio track has delay, which improves audio sync
  • Disabled DTS and LPCM remuxing if tsMuxeR engine is unavailable

  Languages:

  • Updated Bulgarian translation (thanks, JORDITO)
  • Updated Dutch translation (thanks, leroy)
  • Updated Russian
  • Updated English settings labels

Changelog:

• Synchronised with r35130, which:
  • Improves SubRip handling
  • Supports more formats
  • Fixed streaming delay in some situations
• Updated FFmpeg to r44030 (438b86fed47d766b5af30cd1c379d15aa4cf4e57), which:
  • Improves audio/video sync
  • Better support for double-PAL and double-NTSC framerates
  • Fixed memory leaks/corruption
  • Improved subtitle timing when seeking
  • Fixes AC3 bug
  • Improved support for bitmap subtitles
• Updated x264 to r2208
• Updated fontconfig to 2.10.1, which:
  • Fixes a font type
  • Respects user’s previous configurations more
  • Fixes memory leaks
  • Supports older versions of Windows
  • Fixes cache aging

Changelog:

• General:
  
  • Many improvements to FFmpeg, from audio sync to file-support to stability
  • Updated MPlayer and MEncoder for Windows to SB36, which:
    
    • Supports a lot more file formats and colour-spaces
    • Improves audio/video sync, especially with PAL (25FPS) videos
  • Added FFmpeg multithreading option
  • Updated FFmpeg for OS X to 57d5a224
  • Added a GUI config editor for those who like to edit manually
  • Improved audio/video sync when using MEncoder
  • Improved audio channel detection
  • Fixed support for some plugins
  • Added support for TX3G (MPEG-4 Timed Text) subtitles
  • Added support for WebM videos downloaded from YouTube
  • Fixed DV video detection
  • Fixed "Definitely disable subtitles" option with ASS/SSA subtitles
  • Fixed default audio/subtitle priority options
  • Fixed running on headless servers
  • Windows 7 and Vista users are reminded to run as administrator before attempting to automatically update
  • Fixed multithreading bug with MEncoder on Linux
  • Made layout more consistent
• Plugin Installer:
  
  • Added Plugin Installer which lets you automatically browse plugins and install them, see this page for details: viewtopic.php?f=8&t=152
• Web:
  
  • Added new default web video engine: FFMpeg Web Video
  • Updated WEB.conf with working default video streams
  • Added support for new web protocols: mmsh:// and mmst://
  • Added The Onion to the default video feeds
• Languages:
  
  • Updated Simplified Chinese (thanks, lovenemesis!)
  • Updated Czech (thanks, valib!)
  • Updated English
  • Added image for Hebrew subtitle choosing