Commerical VCDs

[Guiboche]

I was just wondering if anyone knows what type of MPEG encoder(s) are used when companies create commerical VCDs. I haven't actually seen the picture quality of commerical VCDs. How is the quality and how does it stand up to TMPGEnc and Panasonic?

[vitualis]

Commercial VCDs are usually made with a hardware MPEG encoder. IMHO, TMPGEnc and Panasonic are as good if not better. Of course, how good a VCD looks also depends on your source material...

Regard.

[Xitanium]

i must say, alot of it has to do with the player... my friend has a vcd player (not a dvd player) and when i pop a vcd in it looks great, better than apex660 and pioneer 343.

[rickmccl]

You know, I'm seeing that the [s]vcd's I convert look quite a bit better with WinDVD than in my Samsung. Very disappointing.

[vitualis]

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On 2001-07-14 20:41:20, Xitanium wrote:
i must say, alot of it has to do with the player... my friend has a vcd player (not a dvd player) and when i pop a vcd in it looks great, better than apex660 and pioneer 343.
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Yep, I agree.

Although someone passionately argued against me on this before, if playing VCDs is more important to you than playing DVDs, you should consider buying a S/VCD player rather than a low end DVD player.

Regards.

[next]

Oh OK, never realized it was that simple.

Should I get a cheap one or an expensive one?

[homerpez]

I'm just curious about this, hopefully someone knows the answer... it's kind of related to this topic...

I notice when you look at info of a DVD, the AVG and MAX bitrates really are not that high, only 1000-1500 AVG depending on the movie!

What bothers me is this... how did they do it?!?! This is MPEG-2 video at a high resolution, detail... yet only VCD bitrates!

My guess is that you need to do multiple passes of the source video using VBR (like 3 or 4 pass vs. just 2-pass). I know that when I make VCD's at only 352x240 res, I use up to 1300 AVG bitrate and still doesn't look perfect using 2-pass.

Does using 3,4 or even 5 passes (like in CCE) make a much better VBR movie than just 2-pass (like TMPGEnc)? The CCE method is a lot more invlved for me, but if I can get perfection, It's worth it!

[vitualis]

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On 2001-07-15 07:47:30, next wrote:
Should I get a cheap one or an expensive one?
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Are you sure you want to get into this?

Regards.

[SatStorm]

@ homerprez
This is VBR all about..
If you monitor VBR mpeg 2 transmissions (DVD, SVCD, DVB/S, DVB/T) you will see that bitrate goes from 1000kb/s to 6.000kb/s and again to 3.000 then 1000 etc...
On 2 pass VBR, the first pass marks the no motion scenes of every frame and the second on marks the compress
On 3 pass VBR first marks the no motion scenes of every frame, the second marks the fast and slow motions and the third one marks the compress
On 4 pass VBR, the first marks the no motion scenes of every frame, the second marks the fast scenes, the third the normal motion scenes the third the slow motions scenes and the last one marks the compress
And that goes and goes...

@all
There are 3 kinds of DVD standalones. HighEnd DVDs, Low End DVDs and DVDs based on DVD roms...
The last ones are the best, because you can program them like a computer. Even if they don't have a good picture, you can always change that hardware part and make it better (if you are a tech freak)
Just see those cyber-home DVDs (www.cyberhome-help.de)
You change 3 registors, and you get 25% better picture quality!

Also, buying a standalone VCD is not a good idea: Those machines plays only standard VCDs, not (x)vcd...
Napa for example: Plays only those awfull CBRs.....

[vitualis]

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On 2001-07-17 06:38:32, SatStorm wrote:
Also, buying a standalone VCD is not a good idea: Those machines plays only standard VCDs, not (x)vcd...
Napa for example: Plays only those awfull CBRs.....
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Yes, VCD players only play standard VCDs. However, "out-of-the-box" (not everyone wants to do surgery on their equipment ) they tend to play VCDs better than low end DVD players (the NAPA has it's own idiosyncratic problems that are not normal on most stand-alone VCD players).

Regards.

[aldus4]

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On 2001-07-17 06:38:32, SatStorm wrote:

Also, buying a standalone VCD is not a good idea: Those machines plays only standard VCDs, not (x)vcd...
Napa for example: Plays only those awfull CBRs.....

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The NAPA range of players is foremost a CD-Audio/MP3 player with the added bonus of playing VCD's. You shouldn't put NAPA in the same category as standalone VCD players.

[SatStorm]

Napa it is a standalone!
It has also a remote control...
You can say that it is a portable vcd player...
But it is standalone!
For chineezzzz at least...

[homerpez]

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On 2001-07-17 06:38:32, SatStorm wrote:
If you monitor VBR mpeg 2 transmissions (DVD, SVCD, DVB/S, DVB/T) you will see that bitrate goes from 1000kb/s to 6.000kb/s and again to 3.000 then 1000 etc...</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

I gathered that, but still amazing that some AVG at 1000-1500k (you can view info with programs like Smartripper), of course I know it dips way higher and lower, but to AVG that is still amazing!

<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 2 pass VBR, the first pass marks the no motion scenes of every frame and the second on marks the compress
On 3 pass VBR first marks the no motion scenes of every frame, the second marks the fast and slow motions and the third one marks the compress
On 4 pass VBR, the first marks the no motion scenes of every frame, the second marks the fast scenes, the third the normal motion scenes the third the slow motions scenes and the last one marks the compress
And that goes and goes...</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

So I guess the more, the better! I have a 5-pass running with CCE right now, it'll be interesting to see what that does...

Thanks for the response/explanation!