Basic Video conversion question I need help with.

[Cheddarhead]

I've searched the site for an answer to this question and have come up empty, so I thought I'd ask it directly.

The background is this. I converted all my TV DVD's to video files about two years ago. I've now got nearly 13 TB's of video data saved.

For good, quality video I find that I need to rip a DVD into my computer at about 6,000 kbs and a half hour sitcom winds up being about 1 GB per episode.

Recently a friend gave me a few copies of Big Bang Theory that he got off Pirate Bay and I was shocked to find that even though those files are only 200 - 250 MB per episode they look every bit as good as the 1 GB file sized episodes I've been ripping and saving. A little more searching online and I realized that video I buy from Amazon or Apple's iTunes also is high quality yet at greatly reduced file sizes.

How can that be? Is there something simple I'm missing?

All my stuff was ripped in with H.264 M4V or MP4 at 6000 kbs. I've TRIED just cutting the kbs to 1500 but the loss of quality is noticeable, whereas like I said, it seems stuff I'm finding online is still high quality even at the smaller size.

I know the answer is probably quite complicated and has a lot of factors to be taken into account, but is there a basic starting point I can begin at? I'm really confused as to why no matter how many variations I try on several different converters I just can't come close to that quality at such a small files size.

Thanks in advance for any help you might be able to offer.

[Baldrick]

What do you convert with? Handbrake?

[Cheddarhead]

I've been using mostly a media converter from iSkysoft

Though I've spent about four hours today playing with Handbrake, trying to see if I could convert any of the files I have to a smaller copy. I've only so far managed to reduced the file size with greatly reduced video quality.

[Cornucopia]

Depends alot on:
1. The encoder (x.264 is consider by many here as the BEST h.264-type encoder, whether using CLI or GUIs)
2. The settings (and by extension, the gui that allows for certain possibilities OR NOT, and in your correct understanding of them)
3. The source/lineage (are you using your "rips" as source? HD cable footage? Rips that are actually already converted at least once?)

edit: from what I can tell in your OP, your "rips" really are ripped + converted, so you're already starting from a compromised position.

Scott

[Cheddarhead]

Scott-

Yes, everything I'm trying to convert to a smaller file size is in fact something that was already ripped from a DVD.

I guess I'll just have to keep playing around with the ripping process and try to get it down to a more reasonable file size. I'm not very knowledgable in all the tech specs involved. I managed to figure out when doing the original conversion how the bit rate would affect the quality, and which file types seemed to work best for me. I was fairly happy with the collection I converted, but when I realized that it was possible to have basically the same quality at 1/4th the storage space it shocked me. I'm sitting here with three 3 TB drives and four 1 TB drives full of video and would have loved to compressed that down to just a drive or two.

It sounds like that's not a realistic expectation though since these have already been ripped in from DVD. So I'll just leave them as they are and try to learn a better way of ripping in DVD's I get in the future.

Thanks for your input on this.

[Cornucopia]

Again, those were not "ripped", but "ripped AND converted". There's the rub. And why it doesn't look as good (you're starting 1 generation down, not from the "original", it probably wasn't optimal itself). Lots of new people get that confused to their detriment.

Scott