Hey, I just started ripping and converting my Blu rays so I can watch them on the TV and keep them organized in iTunes. I wanted to keep full quality so they look perfect in 1080p so I've just been doing a pass-through on the resulting MKV to convert it to M4V so I can put them all in iTunes with correct metadata attached etc.. Obviously due to the fact that I'm trying to keep them the highest quality I can get, the resulting files are quite large with a very high bit rate. So I assume with this high bit rate that these files would not stream to the apple TV (I know you can only get 720 currently) and thus, I will have to just go HDMI from my Mac to TV to play these large files? Thanks for any feedback or suggestions.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple TV 2 question
- Thread starter o0jelly0o
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
How high are your 1080p bit rates? I have some short videos in 1080p at about 6 to 7 Mbps that stream to the aTV just fine. If there are dropped frames, I don't really notice them. For the record, I have the videos on a WinXP laptop connected to my router using 100BaseT ethernet and streaming to my aTV using 11n.
You can use any Blue Ray player to RIP the DISC using MakeMKV but you cannot play the DISC directly on the MAC only the resultant ripped file.
I am in a similar situation.
I just learned that you can stream the 1080p video to the apple tv (which outputs at 720p).
What I am not clear on is the Mbps I can have on the 1080p video. I tested Season of the witch at 15Mbps for 1080p and it streamed to my TV just fine.
I also know that you can pla higher than 5Mbps on a 720p video but I have not tested the limits.
Does anyone know the REAL limits of each? Also would you recommend i stay with 720p and just up the Mbps or go with 1080p aroung 15Mbps (or higher if someone can recommend a limit).
1080p @15Mbps ~12GB
720p @ 5Mbps ~ 4.5GB
or even
720p @ 8Mbps???
What makes more sense?
I just learned that you can stream the 1080p video to the apple tv (which outputs at 720p).
What I am not clear on is the Mbps I can have on the 1080p video. I tested Season of the witch at 15Mbps for 1080p and it streamed to my TV just fine.
I also know that you can pla higher than 5Mbps on a 720p video but I have not tested the limits.
Does anyone know the REAL limits of each? Also would you recommend i stay with 720p and just up the Mbps or go with 1080p aroung 15Mbps (or higher if someone can recommend a limit).
1080p @15Mbps ~12GB
720p @ 5Mbps ~ 4.5GB
or even
720p @ 8Mbps???
What makes more sense?
Well, hard drive space is cheap. I'd say keep your high bit rate 1080p files if your home network is up to it. Also, be prepared to reconvert a few files here and there if you're pushing the limits of the aTV2 and some of your files don't work.
so are you saying that some movies will play at 15Mbps and some won't?
I want a high limit so I can just use a standard 15-20Mbps for ALL movies so I don't have to worry. Like you said HD's are cheap so I want the TOP QUALITY for this appletv and future versions...
I want a high limit so I can just use a standard 15-20Mbps for ALL movies so I don't have to worry. Like you said HD's are cheap so I want the TOP QUALITY for this appletv and future versions...
I'm just saying that no one really knows what the bit rate limits are. Apple keeps the specs low, partly to ensure that all files will play.
What I want to convey is that if you intend to encode your 1080p videos at a very high bit rate, you may be on the ragged edge of what will and what won't play.
And I do remember some threads for Apple devices (not necessarily aTV2) where some videos would play and some wouldn't, even though they had identical bit rates and resolutions. Not sure if anyone could ever figure out the reason, but the solutions tended to be re-encoding at a lower bit-rate.
Gotcha
So in your opinion is 15Mbps VERY high for a 1080p?
Can I assume that 12Mbps 1080p would ALL play? Or is that still too high?
I'm trying to find that sweetspot so I can encode all videos (action & comedy) at the highest possible settings for use on the current TV2.
Can anyone suggest a good program to just get the specs of a .mkv file (i.e. bit rate, track info, other details)
I have re-encoded all of my files once (going from the days of 2ch only to the AC3 passthrough) and don't want to be disappointed in my choice from here on out (until a true 1080p solutions comes along).
So in your opinion is 15Mbps VERY high for a 1080p?
Can I assume that 12Mbps 1080p would ALL play? Or is that still too high?
I'm trying to find that sweetspot so I can encode all videos (action & comedy) at the highest possible settings for use on the current TV2.
Can anyone suggest a good program to just get the specs of a .mkv file (i.e. bit rate, track info, other details)
I have re-encoded all of my files once (going from the days of 2ch only to the AC3 passthrough) and don't want to be disappointed in my choice from here on out (until a true 1080p solutions comes along).
Yeah, I'd say that 15 Mbps is pretty high.
Really, who knows. You might try searching some of the threads here to see if anyone has a reliable bit rate for 1080p. Try searching some of Caveman's posts. He's one of the guys around here that has lots of experience.
Yeah, I know what you mean ... who wants to keep re-encoding stuff over and over. Not sure what app you use to convert your BluRays, but perhaps you have a way to convert a few minutes of a movie and not the whole thing. Then just test it out.
The bit rates on the movies I've been doing are very high, at least 15-20+Mbps. I'm not sure if they would stream on an apple tv as I don't have one currently, but I think I'm just going to have to either have an HDMI from my Mac straight to the TV or convert them to lower bit rates I guess.
thanks for all the info!
I am trying out the CQ feature (normally I did two-pass 5Mbps for 720p) with 17.5 - it is creating a file a little bigger than the 15Mbps file. So I assume that 17.5 is too high, maybe 18.5 or 19? Can you/anyone comment whether a two pass at 15Mbps is better than a CQ of 18.5 (Assuming they both produce the same SIZE file). Can I assume there will be no difference between the two?
I have always been under the impression that two pass is always the best quality option...maybe not though...
I am trying out the CQ feature (normally I did two-pass 5Mbps for 720p) with 17.5 - it is creating a file a little bigger than the 15Mbps file. So I assume that 17.5 is too high, maybe 18.5 or 19? Can you/anyone comment whether a two pass at 15Mbps is better than a CQ of 18.5 (Assuming they both produce the same SIZE file). Can I assume there will be no difference between the two?
I have always been under the impression that two pass is always the best quality option...maybe not though...
No, two-pass is the best option for getting the most quality out of a given bitrate, but CQ is the best option if you just care about quality no matter what the bitrate.
There should be no difference between CQ and two-pass at the same file size (which means the same average bitrate), but the point is that you can never predict what the file size/ABR of a CQ encode is going to be. One movie's bitrate may be two or three times as high as another's at the same CQ value.
That said, 17.5 is almost certainly too high an RF for Blu-ray encodes. These are relatively clean sources and so compress much better than DVD, for example. I leave my encodes at the Handbrake default of 20 and even back off to 20.5 or so with great results. I haven't tried any 1080p encodes though. As suggested, you should try a minute at a range of CQ settings and see what the bitrate variation is and whether you're happy with the quality.
I was Planning
On testing this out myself....I will have a go today or tomorrow and let you know what the limits are.
Have not bothered playing around with the ATV for that kind of thing yet because I have a Blu-ray system on a shelf underneath it
Just been using it for rented stuff and Youtube etc.
On testing this out myself....I will have a go today or tomorrow and let you know what the limits are.
Have not bothered playing around with the ATV for that kind of thing yet because I have a Blu-ray system on a shelf underneath it
Just been using it for rented stuff and Youtube etc.
Update On Test So Far:
I have successfully played both a 2-pass 15Mbps 1080p video and a 18CQ (17.4Mbps) 1080p with no noticeable stutter or loss of frames (etc.) - It was streamed wirelessly (N-Band)
So it is possible that 20+Mbps videos will play if a 17.4Mbps will...
What I don't really get is that there is really no public information the AppleTV can do this. Being able to down convert a 17.4Mbps 1080p seems pretty intense...
Now if only there was a way to save the DTS track in the .m4v for later use when the TV can do more than Dolby Digital.
I have successfully played both a 2-pass 15Mbps 1080p video and a 18CQ (17.4Mbps) 1080p with no noticeable stutter or loss of frames (etc.) - It was streamed wirelessly (N-Band)
So it is possible that 20+Mbps videos will play if a 17.4Mbps will...
What I don't really get is that there is really no public information the AppleTV can do this. Being able to down convert a 17.4Mbps 1080p seems pretty intense...
Now if only there was a way to save the DTS track in the .m4v for later use when the TV can do more than Dolby Digital.
I've been using Pavtube Bytecopy to produce the MKVs because I have a newer drive and currently MakeMKV won't work with it (although I think the problem I'm having with it is going to be fixed soon in an update to MakeMKV). Anyway, after I have the MKV I use iVI (which can be found on the Mac app store or their official website), and I set it to pass-through so I can get the best quality m4v. Doing pass-through is considerably faster than re-encoding the entire movie, but obviously it doesn't really compress it much so you're left with a pretty big file usually. I've just started ripping Blu rays, but from the 10 or so I've done using iVI pass-through the resulting .m4v is usually 3-8Gb smaller than the mkv.
Can't you just leave it in there? Use MP4Tools to extract it and then Subler to re-attach it once you'ver transcoded the audio to AC3?
So .m4v will hold and play DTS?
Again this is all for my TV - If I can future proof the audio by just leaving the DTS in that would be great...I can't just pass through in handbrake right?
ALSO - I know this isn't really the right place to ask but if you guys have knowledge of handrbrake...I want to know should I use anamorphic? most of the movies go to 1920x1072 or something close to that if I have it off...turning it to strict make it go to full 1080 most of the time...I used the "loose" so I could downsize to 720p before I knew I could encode in full 1080p. So should I use "off" or "Strict" when doing blu-ray encodes?
Again this is all for my TV - If I can future proof the audio by just leaving the DTS in that would be great...I can't just pass through in handbrake right?
ALSO - I know this isn't really the right place to ask but if you guys have knowledge of handrbrake...I want to know should I use anamorphic? most of the movies go to 1920x1072 or something close to that if I have it off...turning it to strict make it go to full 1080 most of the time...I used the "loose" so I could downsize to 720p before I knew I could encode in full 1080p. So should I use "off" or "Strict" when doing blu-ray encodes?
Last edited: