Encoding HD content

[Ryland]

I have been recording HD (1920x1080) tv and using videoredo to trim it. The input format was:

Transport Stream
Mime: video/mp2t

whereas Videoredo ends up with:
DVD "Vob" format
MPEG-2 Program Stream
Sys Rate 40000 kb/s

The problem I am having that these files are slightly out of spec for streaming to my media extender. Is there a way to change the output from VRD?

 

[phd]

What are the output specs you are attempting to create?

 

[Ryland]

I am not exactly sure. What I need is to cut the bitrate down a bit so that my media extender stops artifacting due to too much data being transmitted. Linksys Tech support said that the outputted media is close to working fine but not quite.

 

[bits]

Are you streaming over a wired or wireless connection? Sounds like it is wireless. My suggestion is that instead of reducing your PQ even further to accommodate wireless you should bite the bullet and find a way to use a wired connection. You will not have to re-encode and you will be able to enjoy the HD picture quality.

 

[Ryland]

The artifacts occur over both wired and wireless. I have run the full gambit of tests before going to Linksys and they analyzed the files output by videoredo and stated that they are encoded to too high of a bitrate for the mpeg chip to fully handle, thus I end up with artifacts.

 

[bits]

The artifacts occur over both wired and wireless. I have run the full gambit of tests before going to Linksys and they analyzed the files output by videoredo and stated that they are encoded to too high of a bitrate for the mpeg chip to fully handle, thus I end up with artifacts.

Ah I see, I think...you are streaming mpeg2 DVD compliant video to a Linsys network media player and the player can not handle the bitrate according to Linksys. Which Linksys model do you have? Unless this is a very old Linksys I would be very surprised if it could not easily handle mepg2 DVD compliant video.

What does MediaInfo (freeware) say is the bitrate of the file put out by VRD?

Are you creating a DVD with VRD or are you telling VRD to output a vob?

 

[Ryland]

I have a DMA2100 extender which is their newest one. It was Linksys engineers who stated that it was a codec/bitrate issue. I have VRD saving to a disk which is then used as the source for the extender. The video is also not necessarily "DVD compliant" because the resolution is 1920x1080.

Mediainfo:
General section
Overall bit rate : 16.6 Mbps

Video section
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 15.0 Mbps
Nominal bit rate : 38.7 Mbps

 

[bits]

I have a DMA2100 extender which is their newest one. It was Linksys engineers who stated that it was a codec/bitrate issue. I have VRD saving to a disk which is then used as the source for the extender. The video is also not necessarily "DVD compliant" because the resolution is 1920x1080.

Mediainfo:
General section
Overall bit rate : 16.6 Mbps

Video section
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 15.0 Mbps
Nominal bit rate : 38.7 Mbps

So you load your video file into VRD and then tell it to change the bitrate and give it a vob file extension, is that correct?

If that is what you are doing then you are not doing anything to the file other than changing the file extension and some information in the header. To get VRD to actually re-encode your HD file to some lower bitrate you would need to create a DVD in VRD. However, VRD would re-encode it to SD and at a substantially lower bitrate. It would no longer be HD. It would be mpeg2 DVD compliant.

I think what you ultimately want is to keep your file HD but just lower the bitrate enough so that your 2100 can play it smoothly, is that correct? If so, VRD is of no use to you. The selection in VRD to change bitrate is misleading in that it only changes information in a header and does not actually change the bitrate. The vob extension is also misleading in that it is really not a DVD vob file it is just your file with a .vob extension.

The bitrate is on the high side and would give many network media players trouble but there are a few that can probably play the files smoothly.

Off hand I can not recommend any software that can take HD mpeg2 and output HD mpeg2 at some lower bitrate. I am sure they exist but I have no experience with them.

What many folks do is re-encode to wmv HD or h264 HD or DivX HD. I personally try to avoid re-encoding so I have a network media player that has NFS capability as well as an internal HDD. I can smoothly play HD ts mepg files with bitrates up to 20Mb/sec. Fortunately at the moment I rarely record OTA HD files with bitrates >18Mb/sec.

If I did re-encode I would choose WMV HD and use TMPGEnc Movie Style. Most of my network media players can play h264 but WMV HD is still more universal and I can play them on all of my players. IMO, after many many tests, feel that the PQ for a given bitrate/file size WMV is as good or better than h264. Keep in mind that I have software encoding and I am not comparing hardware encodings.

 

[Ryland]

I haven't actually changed any settings in VRD from whatever the default is. The resultant file has an mpeg extension, not a VOB extension. I was pretty sure that VRD wouldn't be able to do what I wanted but figured it was worth checking. I have been converting the files to DIVX then changing the header to think its an XVID file. I haven't found a better way to do this since all of the free converters that I have found are limited to the resolution they will convert to and 1920x1080 is way above their highest ones. I was hoping to not have to continue reencoding but it is not looking hopeful. The really annoying part is that the specs for the DMA2100 show that what I am doing SHOULD work.

 

[bits]

I haven't actually changed any settings in VRD from whatever the default is. The resultant file has an mpeg extension, not a VOB extension. I was pretty sure that VRD wouldn't be able to do what I wanted but figured it was worth checking. I have been converting the files to DIVX then changing the header to think its an XVID file. I haven't found a better way to do this since all of the free converters that I have found are limited to the resolution they will convert to and 1920x1080 is way above their highest ones. I was hoping to not have to continue reencoding but it is not looking hopeful. The really annoying part is that the specs for the DMA2100 show that what I am doing SHOULD work.

Sure wish I had some magic to suggest. Before I got my CS615 I would take my OTA HD files run them through HDTVtoDVD (freeware). It does a great job and it displays in full widescreen 16:9 and looks like a high quality commercial widescreen DVD. You may have to run your m2ts file through vrd and output it as a ts file and then drop it into HDTVtoDVD.

 

[Ryland]

I just found the authors site. I will have to take a look at it. I guess I need to look into the various settings of VRD a bit more to figure out how to change the resulting filetype.

 

[bits]

I just found the authors site. I will have to take a look at it. I guess I need to look into the various settings of VRD a bit more to figure out how to change the resulting filetype.

After loading the file into VRD select Save As...then click on the pull down for Save as type: then choose Transport Stream (*.ts)

It may work to just change the file extension from m2ts to ts.

Many folks are going the route of the HD PVR but unfortunately there is no software to edit h264. I think the media industry has us right where they want us!

 

[Ryland]

Cool, thanks. The media industry does have us hurting for some simple way to handle things that shouldn't be complex.

 

[Ryland]

Well it looks like the DVR-MS format works perfectly fine with my extender. I need to check a few more videos but the testing I ran last night worked fine.