recording quality settings in 2.1

[Stobor]

I was supprised to see the data on recording quality was culled off the menu on 2.1. The data rate on the recording quality (like: DVD extra long play - 1.8 GB/hour) allowed me to easily see which quality was higher and plan out my hard drive usage for my selected rates. Is there any way to renamed the quality options to replace this data?

[kny3twalker]

just make your own custom quality and call it what you want
the directions are in the FAQs and some examples I made that are farily generic

[mls]

You can just edit in the extra piece of info in the lines for the ones already in the properties file, however SageTV sees these as new ones and assumes its original ones are missing and puts them back also.

In other words you'd end up with 2 of each of the basic default ones showing up when you want to pick a recording quality something like this:

DVD Extra Long Play
DVD Extra Long Play ~ 1.8GB per Hour

If you don't mind the duplication, I can tell you how I changed mine to show the GB per hour values that were shown back in v2.0. Otherwise, as kny3twalker said you could look up the instructions for making custon quality settings of your own.

[Cayars]

I think Jeff removed the x.xGB per Hour because it's unknown now exactly how much space will be used per hour since the profiles changed from constant to variable bit rates.

[teedublu]

What?
I can understand ADDING VBR profiles etc..
But not removing existing ones that your current settings (default, fav-set, record-set) are pointing to.
so 2.1.10 is an upgrade? It's more like "trick or treat"!

TW

[mls]

Although I am not positive, I doubt if anything really has changed other than the addition of extra DVIX settings. In v2.0 the python2 lines for the "stock" qualities were not in the properties file, they were internal to SageTV. With v2.1 they are listed in the properties file.

Since nobody could see them before, I'm quessing that's why everyone thinks there is something different going on (which I kind of doubt). I know the original DVD qualities in v2.0 were VBR before (not sure why everyone thinks the weren't). I don't know if or how many of the others might have been though, so some of those could have changed now in v2.1.

As for the GB per Hour, those were only estimates and were not actually accurate anyway (since they were based only on the video bitrate and didn't include the audio as part of the calculation as they should have).

I haven't bothered actually sitting down and re-calculating the values in v2.1 simply because I don't think it's any big deal (or any major change). However, if you don't like what you see in the properties file for the "stock" settings you can of course add your own custom quality settings.

I quess Jeff would be the only one that could tell us if he used the same python2 settings that were internal for v2.0 now in v2.1. It would be nice to verify what (if anything) has been changed though.

[Opus4]

I have no idea why the G/hr text was removed, but they did not all change to VBR -- simply look at the mmc/python2_encoding lines in your properties file to see that very few of them are VBR. Beyond that, as was mentioned right above, it would be hard to say what exactly might have changed in the settings since the default settings were not visible in 2.0.

- Andy

[Cayars]

I'd say it's more like half of what was there is now VBR and I'd say that probably 90% of users are now using VBR when they would have used CBR.

Here are the recording profiles that are now VBR by default:
CVD
DVD Extra Long Play
DVD Long Play
DVD Standard Play
SVCD Extra Long\ Play
SVCD Long Play
SVCD Standard Play

I'm sure that 90% if not more of the users will use a SVCD or DVD based profile and these are now VBR.

[Opus4]

The point was that from past info on the forum, those same quality settings that you just mentioned seemed to have been VBR previously, so I don't think that changed. You just couldn't easily see that was the setting because those lines weren't in the properties file.

However, I do think that one thing that changed (from another thread discussion) was that some rates were made DVD compliant that were not that that way before -- I saw outputstreamtype\=10 change from outputstreamtype\=0 between early 2.1 betas to later ones.

- Andy

[Cayars]

Yea, I agree with the outputstreamtype.

I really think the DVD settings were constant and not VBR. With that said HOWEVER, I'm glad Jeff switched it (if he did) since most people here use a PVR-250 or like board and these do a great job using the onboard compression. Only on very high rate motion does it become a problem for some people. There really is no point in using extra disk space when it's not needed.

For example on Sunday's my computer only uses the BEST setting for NFL games. DVD quality just doesn't cut it for me for football.

[Opus4]

I wonder if things ever changed after Jeff wrote this post a LONG time ago:

Originally Posted by Narflex

These are the default qualities in SageTV.

Quality  VBR AvgVideoRate Resolution AudioBitrate
Best     No  6Mbps        720x480    384kbps
Great    No  3.8Mbps      720x480    384kbps
Good     No  2.8Mbps      480x480    256kbps
Fair     No  1.7Mbps      480x480    256kbps
CVD      Yes 2.5Mbps      352x480    224kbps
SVCD ELP Yes 1.152Mbps    480x480    224kbps
SVCD LP  Yes 1.6Mbps      480x480    224kbps
SVCD SP  Yes 2Mbps        480x480    224kbps
DVD ELP  Yes 3Mbps        720x480    384kbps
DVD LP   Yes 4.8Mbps      720x480    384kbps
DVD SP   Yes 6.4Mbps      720x480    384kbps
MPEG2Max No  12Mbps       720x480    384kbps

NOTE1: For Creative VBDVCR, 640x480 is used instead of 720x480 and 320x480 insted of 352x480
NOTE2: AudioSampling of 48kHz is used for all of these

I use Best for just about everything except kid's shows. But, I used kny3twalker's examples & the custom quality settings document to make a VBR version of the Best recording rate. I figure hd space is fairly cheap.

- Andy

[kny3twalker]

max variable rate, I found to be really good for sports
best variable rate is really good for cartoons/animation
highest quality I tend to use for most things
I really like the extra bit rate, especially for analogue cable

[zz5]

I know that Best and Great are CBR and that all the DVD profiles are VBR. They've been this way ever since I started using Sage last year. All you have to do to check whether a recording is cbr or vbr is open it up in something like Womble Video Wizard and it will tell you. Best, Great, and the DVD profiles are all DVD-compliant - no re-encoding is necessary when making a DVD. It's just that Best and Great use CBR, whereas the DVD profiles use VBR. CBR and VBR are both acceptable for DVD.

[Pumpkinhead]

I've been using DVD SP mode which is definitely VBR. It drops down to around 3800 kbs and peaks up around 7300 kbs in a couple recordings I have analyzed with other tools, averaging about 6100 kbs.

This setting works well for everything, and it saves space compared to a 7300kbs CBR type of recording by allocating the extra bits to the more difficult areas (such as high motion) while not wasting them on the "easy" areas as the CBR modes do. This improves playback quality compared to a 6100 kbs CBR mode while making most efficient use of storage.

If drive space is'nt an issue or you're going to watch and delete it right away, then it doesn't really matter much. You can throw maximum bits at it.

[Cayars]

I stand corrected. I do remember seeing this and I have looked at them in Womble and other editors. What I was thinking of is the introduction of similar profiles for SnapStream's BTV since they had profiles that were real bad. I spent so much time on them/BTV that it was cemented on the brain.

PS I'm a total convert (as you could probably guess) and don't use BTV at all anymore!

Sorry for any confusion I might have added to this thread.

Carlo