So a DIVX movie converted to SVCD instead of VCD will give m

[buzzinhornets]

If I encode a divx movie to svcd instead of vcd, will the picture quality produced on my tv, be MUCH better than if vcd? It says svcds are better picture than vhs... is this true? Cause vcds are much poorer than vhs movies... so will svcd give NOTICEABLE results? Is it worth it?

[Macros746]

You are jumping into a bees nest here my friend. My opinion is this: Unless you are capturing directly to MPEG2 (which can look very good) no it isn't worth it. You just need to fiddle with your filters in TMPGenc and Virtualdub until you come up with a product that looks good to you. I advise just encoding things a minute at a time. This will give you a good idea what each filter does and what your video need. VCD from a TV can look VERY good. But remember, the higher quality of SVCD is largely dependent on having a perfect source. TV reception, even under the best conditions with the best capture card, isn't perfect. It isn't like a DVD rip. My experience is that the noise and blockiness of SVCDs looks worse on TV capture than VCD unless you hike up the bitrate. But you'll have to experiment on your own to find out what YOU like. Some people will tell you that SVCD is hands down the winner. Others will come in and defend VCD, and still others will say that Divx is the clear winner. You really have to try them all for yourself. I just want to tell you to try some filters before you judge and experiment with ALL the formats.


Mark

[w00kiee]

basically if the source divx is at a decent bitrate and resolution then i vote svcd. i am big in the camp of higher resolution. just in doing my own tests upping the resolution and bitrate (svcd will be a higher resolution and usually a higher bitrate than vcd) produces a closer representation of the source. even if the source is so-so.. you lose less going svcd. i havent seen a filter make a 352x240 flic look like 480x480 or 704x480 but maybe i havent seen the right one.

[salvius]

The resolution is exactly as important as the goodness of your TV. Now, see, my one TV is quite the crap, and the other one is good stuff. Now...
When watching movieson the crap, resolution doesn't make a difference. Both looks pretty good. On the other one, it's clear that SVCD is better.

NOTE: do not encode VCD. Whatever anyone says, it's an old format, it's not bad, but mpeg2 is better than mpeg1, encode to SVCD if you can or xSVCD.

[Macros746]

Chances are that the source (if it is Divx...particularly if it is downloaded Divx) isn't all that good. So encoding it to a higher resolution ain't gonna help a thing. I'm not gonna get into the whole MPEG2 versus MPEG1 arguement but again I say that one is NOT clearly better.

Mark

[salvius]

Subtitles? Max bitrate? Etc. etc. etc. I don't know how someone can still argue mpeg1 is as good or better, but whatever floats your boat.

[Sefy]

It all depends on your source, having a higher resolution when the original one was as low as VCD, then making it "look" like a SVCD won't make it SVCD, it will just be VCD with bigger blocks.

[salvius]

Good point Sefy. But remember, there's always xSVCD if you can support it. Use if you can.

[thxkid]

If its 352x240 stay with VCD but experiment with different bitrates I always use 2520 bitrate for my VCD's with perfect results.
But if its a 480x480 then I would go with SVCD but it depends on your imput source, I have noticed that my DVD's from my APEX look so much better than the programs I capture using my Dishnet receiver.

[homerpez]

I agree: if a Divx starts out as a DVD-resolution rip (better than 480 in any direction), make it an SVCD. I go ahead and have great luck turning widescreen movies (either off DVD or Divx) into low-AVG bitrate SVCD's! Believe it or not, you can fit a whole 90-min movie on ONE CD, 480x480, 128k audio, VBR, and have it look very nice on an analog TV! (I do believe this remains a "Standard" SVCD format, but maybe I'm wrong)

Of course, this is encoding with CCE, which probably accounts for that...

Really, source is what matters most. I noticed a lot fo stuff found on Divx, is unacceptably bad source video. Usually blocks are everywhere, and it just isn't as good as a DVD source, or capturing it yourself from a TV show... so really it's up to you to judge just how good the source is.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: homerpez on 2001-12-12 19:49:50 ]</font>

[vancouverite]

MPEG-1 is better than MPEG-2 if encode with bitrare lower than 3000 kbps! So XVCD is better than SVCD if use the same resolution of course.