I have a client that wants me to produce 30 to 40 second video for clips the web with the following requirements: 

• 640x480 (or thereabouts)
• Less than 1.5 MB
• Highest quality possible

I'm using Squeeze and producing half way decent WMV files that meet their requirements, but was wondering if anyone has any advice on something better.

On another related issue, the client wants the same size and data rate on clips of 30 minutes to one hour.  I have found that producing WMV files with Squeeze takes about 5 times longer than the length of the video clip itself.  A one-hour clips (QT ref) takes about 5 hours to convert.  I have been dealing with Squeeze customer support on this and they confirm that that is way too long.  However, they haven't come up with an answer yet.

 I'd do QT MPEG-2 Part 10 (ie H264) with a Flash wrapper. 

Well the compression you'd require is going to depend on a few variables:

1.) Framerate
2.) Embedded Audio Track
3.) Is the file to be streamed or made available as a download? (Would affect the options based on the assumption the viewer has the capability to playback the desired file.)

I just ran the DivX bitrate calculator (MPEG4-based compression which is frame-resolution independent) and for a targeted 1.5MB filesize with a single 64Kb/s audio stream, the maximum constant bit rate you'd be able to achieve would be approx 345Kb/s.

I did a quick test using a 30-second clip featuring a spinning RGB cube using a 345Kb/s bitrate setting and the end result (in my opinion) was 'decent'. Though I'd say it would probably be verging on the borderline of needing just a bit more bitrate allocation (closer to around 500Kb/s I'd say).

My personal preference for compression is DivX or XviD (it's open-source counterpart)... though I imagine you may also get some really good results using an H264 or MPEG4: Part-10/AVC codec such as Apple's H264/MPEG4. (Or x264 for open-source).

I avoid WMV files like the plague as they produce awful image softening in most instances. Compression technology has come a long way, and WMV is at the very bottom of my export options. But that's just a subjective and personal preference based on encoding low-res and high-def material with WMV codecs.

I do a lot of testing just out of curiosity on my machine, experimenting with codecs, formats, open-source, "de-facto (Quicktime/MS WMV)" and so forth and here's my list of favourites:

1.) DivX
2.) FFmpeg's MPEG4 implementation (for speed)
3.) FFmpeg's x264 implementation (for speed)
4.) Apple's MPEG4
5.) Apple's H264
6.) MS WMV 9 Professional (reserved for HD material only)

Naturally I'm a fan of DNxHD, but I don't count that as a format capable of streaming.

Thank you so much.  This is all excellent information.

The Flash video (FLV) Bitrate Calculator by Flash Bible author Robert Reinhardt is a helpful tool to determine proper bit-rate settings based on content of the source material. It will even spit out a Squeeze project file.

What version of Squeeze?