ATI MMC is giving me better quality than 3 pass CCE @ 8k avg

[Zeus3k]

ATI All-in-Wonder MMC @ 8k Bits/Sec is giving me better quality than a three pass CCE VBP 8k bits/sec. Being a frequent reader of this board, this baffles me... It should be the opposite.

I just bought my DVD writer and I want to convert all of my Hi-8 recordings to DVD. I first did the following tests:

ATI All-in-wonder MMC 7.7 Settings:

MPEG Format
720x480
Motion Estimation: 0%
Sound - mono 48k - 16bit
Inverse Telecine not checked.

I did repeated captures using bitrates of 3k, 4k, 6k, and 8k VPR with deinterlaced checked.
I then repeated the process with deinterlaced unchecked.

This gave me 8 mpg files with various settings. Now I wanted to compare MMCs quality to CCE.

Virtual Dub Settings:

Huffy (used recommeded settings)
Sound - mono 48k - 16bit
720x480
Used no filters

I then captured the same 2 min 30 second section as before with 0 dropped frames.

Next, I encoded with CCE using various methods:

I changed the following defaults:

Checked box for DVD compliant.
GOP sequence changed N/m from 5 to 4.

Using the AVI file from virtualdub, I encoded 5 different rates with CCE

3k bitrate CBR
4k bitrate VBR (3k low, 8k high) 3 passes
6k bitrate VBR (3k low, 8k high) 3 passes
8k bitrate VBR (3k low, 9.8k high) 3 passes
8k bitrate CBR

For each VBR encode I deleted the old .VAF from the previous encode. I wasn't sure if they were unique to the bitrate set. (guess I can do a file comparison to find that out).

------------------------------

Now I have 13 different files, I loaded them into Ulead Workshop and authored a DVD with each file being a new chapter and a description of what it was. Workshop skipped it's own encoding process since they were already DVD compliant. I next burnt the 1.5 gig DVD.

Viewing and judging the DVD on a 36 inch TV with others, this is our results.

3K bitrate:
CCE: interlaced CBR - Low quality but best of the 3k bitrates
MMC: deinterlaced - low quality. blocky in several places
MMC: interlaced - Unacceptable. VERY bad blocks. Worst

4k bitrate:
MMC: deinterlaced - still low quality - minor blocks here and there, but best of the 4k bitrates
MMC: interlaced - Same as above, but slight less quality
CCE: interlaced VBR - hardly any blocks, but motion is jerky compared to fluidness of motion in MMC

6k bitrate:
MMC: deinterlaced - high quality. Blocks not visible unless I pause and examine video. Fluid motion [Best of the 6k bitrate]
MMC: interlaced - Same as above, but a tad bit less quality. Also fluid motion
CCE: interlaced VBR - Beautiful video, but movement of objects is jerky (flickers like, makes me dizzy)

8k bitrate:
MMC: deinterlaced - high quality. hardly distinguishable from 6k bitrate. [Best of all 13 segments]
MMC: interlaced - Again, tad bit less quality than deinterlaced version
CCE: interlaced CBR - Still has that damn jerkyness
CCE: interlaced VBR - Motion jerkyness. Not much different than one above.

So the 8k MMC deinterlaced was the best. Double shock! I figured viewing it on a TV that interlaced would look better. Guess I was wrong. Their was a point on the MMC interlaced that when I paused the video, I could see the comb interlace lines.

So anybody have an ideas what I am doing wrong? Any ideas on improving quality. I heard of inverse telecine improving quality. But then I would have to do a pulldown on the avi (to get framerate back to 29.970), and the one time I tried that a while back I got audio sync problems. Anyone have a good link for a guide with virtualdub and IVTC

[fingernailX]

http://www.doom9.org/mpg/cce-advanced.htm