Abstract: A method for transcoding a plurality of media items by allocation of processing power and storage through a combination of pre-processing the media item and processing in real time to provide transcoding of the plurality of media items. The method includes receiving information that relates to the computational and storage capabilities available for transcoding. The information received includes available power, available storage, variants to which to transcode and at least one of the respective probability and importance of the variants. The method also includes determining how to pre-process the plurality of media items in response to the received information, such that the transcoding is optimized.