SVCD vs DivX

[iluvJLO]

Some say SVCD is better, some say DivX. I say if 2-5 CD's and downloading forever is no issue, then SVCD is better. As far as quality is concerned, DivX easily beats SVCD in a bytes per bytes sense. A DivX movie under 700mb looks just as good as a 3-4 disc SVCD. Only 2 beef I have about DivX is, most of their audio is real low. You gotta blast the volume up to hear something. Usually with VCD and SVCD, you get excellent loud and clear sound. Also, sometimes the a/v goes out of sync, so u gotta set the divX picture quality all the way to 0 for it to sync well.
oh yeah, the other plus to SVCD is that u can play it on the dvd and if u got a dvd changer, those 2-5 discs wont b a factor!
I dunno tho, its a convenience thing for me. I dont like to have so many discs of one movie, and spend so much time downloading just one flick. I figure, if u want the best quality bootleg available, might as well just spend the 17 bucks and get the best quality DVD all in 1 disc.

what do u guys think

[adam]

That is a common misconception about svcds. A svcd should never even be 4 cds unless its insanely long. All svcds should easily fit on 3 cds even when encoded at the highest quality settings and many movies will fit on 2 cds. Any movie that required 4 cds in svcd format would require 3 cds in divx.

Also not everyone downloads their movies, so the better compression of divx becomes less important to these people.

[pacmania_2001]

Also a 3 cd even 12 cd SVCD will look the same as a less than 1 cd Divx if it is encoded from the Divx file. For the advantages in picture quality to come out in a SVCD the source needs to be really qood quality.

[jeex]

when dvd-r/w becomes like cd-r/w, wont people just be converting there divx movies to mpeg2 and then burn them to dvd-r/w discs so they cant watch them on there *drum roll for main argument* STANDALONE PLAYER?

then i guess we'll see what a mistake converting all your stuff to vcd, xvcd, and svcd... because the quality is crappy, and you had to waste all those extra cd-r's on svcd's...

think long term.

ahwell, i guess we'll wind up reripping the dvd, lowering the bitrate, so it'll fit on our SinglE layer dvd-r disc, and burn'em. i guess the quality wont be so bad. it should beat the bejesus out of svcd & divx, combined!


i'm rantinggggggggg, so i'll stop..

[adam]

Divx converted to mpeg2 even at very high bitrates looks absoutely terrible. Svcd converts much better. I for one will definitely switch to dvd-r/w when its feasible but I will not throw out my current collection of svcds nor curse the amount of cdrs they use. My svcds stand up quite well to a dvd and my friends and family cant even tell a difference and they welcome a 5 min food/pee break every
50-60 mins. Now if I had been converting to vcd all these years then yes I would regret even bothering with that format.

If I waited for dvd-r/w to come out before "wasting" any cdrs then I would have only a handful of dvds. I'm very glad I wasted all those cdrs at 2 cents a piece.

Oh and there are already dvd-rw burners that burn dual layer, not sure if the media is out yet though.

[Baldrick]

adam: DVD-RAM is the only format that supports dual layer, the dvd-rw and dvd+rw tecnology will NOT support dual layer.

[Jeomite]

DivX sucks because it can't be played on a standalone player (...yet.). SVCDs of course play on standalone players (not all, sucks if doesn't work on yours. =| )

If DivX support is added on standalone players, then things will get interesting. =)

[Betamax]

DivX only plays on computers, possible it never will on DVD-players, reason is possible because the codec used for the video and the mp3 used for the audio.
You've got to like the poos audio, so SVCD will remain my target (and about 1-2 years the DVD).
Thank you Baldrick, for the advise to better invest in a DVD-RAM for the dual-layer.
For a complete move (1½ to 2 hours) + diverse clips + other things, I think dual layer would be required. Does there already exist DVD's (with dual layer) that also has 2 writable sides?

[lhorwinkle]

What do you do to get DVD-ish quality from SVCD?

My SVCDs are rather poor. Lots of boxiness, motion artifacts, and much less detailed than the original VHS source.

I use a Matrox G400 TV card to capture composite video. I use TMPGEnc to encode MPEG-2. And I burn with Nero 5.

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On 2001-10-02 11:21:22, adam wrote:
I will not throw out my current collection of svcds ... My vcds stand up quite well to a dvd and my friends and family cant even tell a difference
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[Baldrick]

betamax: but dvd-ram is NOT compatible with any dvd player or dvd-rom.

[thxkid]

why even spend hours upon hours ripping a DVD when you can buy it for $17 for new, $10 used, at much better quality.
I get fantasic results with my VCD's(2520 bitrate) and SVCD's(2520 bitrate) But I use my time editing family video's onto VCD's or SVCD's for easy access and ease of use over tape format. I find VCD's and SVCD's a Godsend over crappy VHS and SVHS.
I also capture music video's from dishnet as MPEG2, demux with TMPGE, burn them as SVCD and look very very close what came off the satellite.
I have before made a backup SVCD of my Laser Discs, like Disneys Beauty and the Beast or Song of the South with using happuage PVR MPEG encoder card and they look a heck of a lot better than VHS and just as bit as good as SVHS.

[Jeomite]

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why even spend hours upon hours ripping a DVD when you can buy it for $17 for new, $10 used, at much better quality.
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If you want just the movie, you can say that $20 and rip it for $5 rental (or even download the DVDRip off the net from a reputable SVCD Releasing group). If you want those extra/bonus features, go with the DVD. I don't see a *BIG* difference between my SVCD Rips vs DVD; yes, THERE IS a difference between SVCD vs DVD, but for me, it isn't significant enough to spend on buying the DVD for what I probably will not watch more than 5 times.

[pacmania_2001]

I put downloaded movies or ripped movies on to SVCD because either they are not available where i live yet or they are worth purchasing for any of the special features.

Also it is common here in Australia for us to get the same movie on DVD but authored by a different company who does a shittier job of the film transfer, menu making and they lack special features so why should I pay the same amount for a lower quality job than the Region 1/2 disc so instead I download them from the net with a higher quality picture.

[adam]

<TABLE BORDER=0 ALIGN=CENTER WIDTH=85%><TR><TD><font size=-1>Quote:</font><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR><TR><TD><FONT SIZE=-1><BLOCKQUOTE>
On 2001-10-02 12:54:22, lhorwinkle wrote:
What do you do to get DVD-ish quality from SVCD?

My SVCDs are rather poor. Lots of boxiness, motion artifacts, and much less detailed than the original VHS source.

I use a Matrox G400 TV card to capture composite video. I use TMPGEnc to encode MPEG-2. And I burn with Nero 5.

</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

Your not going to get high quality svcds if you are using a captured source. Its simply not high quality enough to begin with. It seems obvious that if you start out with vhs quality video the svcd will at best be vhs quality. If you rip a dvd and properly convert it to svcd then to the untrained eye it will rival dvd.

@Baldrick: I could have sworn I read somewhere that there was a dvd-rw drive that supported dual layer burning. I must have been looking at the read capabilities instead of the write capabilities. My mistake.


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: adam on 2001-10-04 08:35:13 ]</font>