Recording Quality Modes

[mike1961]

Hello - I'm curious as to what recording quality most use when recording movies. I suppose most would easily get away with a basic quality for recording the news and stuff but what do most feel is good when recording movies?

Thanks,
Mike

[Opus4]

That usually comes down to whatever you think is good enough for your eyes. For me, the best one for default use is "Best", which is about 3GB/hour. I can't tell much difference between it & 'live tv' w/the cable connected directly to the TV. Then, for some favs that don't need high quality, I set those to use some lower recordnig rate.

- Andy

[flavius]

Anything that looks good and burns quickly (does not need reencoding).

[mike1961]

I guess what I'm thinking is that 2gb / hour is nice in that you can fit at least a 2 hour movie on a standard dvd where you can't with 3 gb / hour. How noticeable is the difference between the two? Also, how do they look for regular vs. high definition?

Finally, I was thinking that at 2 gb / hour, one could only fit around 100 movies on a 400 gb hard drive....not a whole lot but certainly nicer than the inconvenience of having to find DVD's.

Mike

[dvd_maniac]

Finally, I was thinking that at 2 gb / hour, one could only fit around 100 movies on a 400 gb hard drive....not a whole lot but certainly nicer than the inconvenience of having to find DVD's.

I encoded my entire DVD collection into Mpeg-4 AVC files. They average out at about 450MB per 2hr movie and the quality is great. I have over 1000 movies from DVD and recorded TV movies and I just passed the 400GB barrier (416 to be exact).
I use Max Mpeg-2 setting 12mbit/s which comes out to be about 5.5GB/hr.

If you plan on burning to DVD then stick with 2GB/hr but f you want t leave them on pc you might want to give encoding them a try.

[mike1961]

How do I get that mpeg4 quality mode at 450mb per movie - is there a download somewhere?

Thanks,
Mike

[mike1961]

A few questions:

1. I guess I'm a little confused. You said you record at the max 5.5 gb/hour setting and then I guess you encode them at Mpeg-4 AVC files? If so, how long does it take to encode a movie?

2. Also, is it possible to just record directly in the mpeg 4 setting?

3. Once in the mpeg 4 avc mode, does one decode it to burn to a dvd if they want to and if so how long does it take and what software is used?

4. Where do I get to software to encode into mpeg 4 avc and is this similar to the divx format? A while back I tried encoding something in DivX and it seemed to take forever.

Thanks,
Mike

[mike1961]

Any responses to the above...I'm wondering about how to get it in this quality.

Thanks,
Mike

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by mike1961

A few questions:

1. I guess I'm a little confused. You said you record at the max 5.5 gb/hour setting and then I guess you encode them at Mpeg-4 AVC files? If so, how long does it take to encode a movie?

Couple hours probably, depending on the speed of your machine.

2. Also, is it possible to just record directly in the mpeg 4 setting?

The only thing that can do that is the Plextor ConvertX 402U. And responses to it didn't seem too glowing.

3. Once in the mpeg 4 avc mode, does one decode it to burn to a dvd if they want to and if so how long does it take and what software is used?

I think dvd_maniac is just burning the files on as data (or not burning them). If you want to make DVD-Video disks, stick with one of the DVD qualities in Sage

4. Where do I get to software to encode into mpeg 4 avc and is this similar to the divx format? A while back I tried encoding something in DivX and it seemed to take forever.

Similar, but different. AVC is basically an extension of the MPEG-4 DivX and the like are based on. DivX and the like are based off MPEG-4 part 2, aka MPEG-4 ASP (Advanced Simple Profile). AVC is the extension of that, MPEG-4 part 10, AVC (Advanced Video Coding), resulting in better PQ/higher efficiency. Also called H.264.

Common software for encoding H.264 would be:
Nero Recode/Nero Digital
Quicktime 7 (apparently really crappy on the PC/Windows)
x264 (free) - requires something like Virtualdub.

H.264 will be slower to encode than DivX.

[mike1961]

Do you know if the Nero Recode/Encode will also take DVD's that I have bought and encode them into this format (so that I don't have to constantly insert DVD's and I can just have them all on a hard drive)?

Also - is it the Nero Suite or something I have to buy or will the Nero that comes bundled with a CD drive do it?

Thanks again,
Mike

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by mike1961

Do you know if the Nero Recode/Encode will also take DVD's that I have bought and encode them into this format (so that I don't have to constantly insert DVD's and I can just have them all on a hard drive)?

Not copy protected DVDs

Also - is it the Nero Suite or something I have to buy or will the Nero that comes bundled with a CD drive do it?

It's part of Nero Ultra, but bundled Nero doesn't always come with everything.