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Ripping Settings
- Thread starter xJus10x
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My Tutorial On How To Best Rip Video For iPod & AppleTV
Have you read my tutorial on how best to rip videos with Handbrake? Same applies for AppleTV unless you want to waste disc space by over sampling.
Have you read my tutorial on how best to rip videos with Handbrake? Same applies for AppleTV unless you want to waste disc space by over sampling.
This tutorial is something I tried out and it works brilliantly.
The upsampling does cause it to take quite some time... It took about 25 hours or so on my 933MHz G4 tower, but the result was flawless.
He's using 2250Kbps for a standard definition anamorphic widescreen DVD on Mediafork. I used the same settings he recommended and the color, clarity and contrast were excellent. The file size for 1h 50m was about 1.86 gigabytes.
It's a bit extra work with the 2nd step but that takes only a few seconds to set up and maybe a minute to transcode into the appropriate container.
So far it's the absolute best results I've seen with SD over AppleTV. Additionally, the AAC 160Kbps is pretty sufficient for the 2 channel downmix. When demuxed back into 5.1 channel Dolby Surround analog, the matrix decode produced pretty decent channel separation in my receiver. I'm using a Sony STR-DA1000ES receiver with dual 32-bit DAC's so results with Dolby Surround might vary but there's no reason 160Kbps AAC can't be sufficient for Dolby Surround playback... and you're limited by the fact that 160Kbps appears to be the max bitrate for the AAC component of MPEG-4 AVC that AppleTV will support. That may change with later software updates.
I think you offer a lot of great info. However, I think you need a separate tutorial for Apple TV since some users don't use video iPods at all and don't need those settings. I also think the anamorphic settings issue also needs to addressed. As I am still tinkering with my settings I wouldn't say that I am yet qualified to write an Apple TV tutorial but will definitely put in my 2 cents when I get a clearer idea of the optimal settings. I can support that too many people are using 2000-3000 avg. bitrate settings and from what I have seen somewhere in the 1200-1500 range is going to be the sweet spot.
If you have a 40"+ HDTV, you may want to use Average bitrates 2500-3500, H.264. I've tested various settings using both Handbrake and MediaFork, etc... and I am very fussy about IQ.
I've finally settled on Average Bitrates 3500 H.264 (2 passes encoding), which seem to be the closest to DVD quality. The image is sharp and brighter than lower bitrates encoded at 2000-2500.
I've finally settled on Average Bitrates 3500 H.264 (2 passes encoding), which seem to be the closest to DVD quality. The image is sharp and brighter than lower bitrates encoded at 2000-2500.
I've been fairly happy with 2500 kbit setting (2-pass) on my 42" panny plasma.
I also set the option in handbrake to "auto-crop" to help reduce size.
I also set the option in handbrake to "auto-crop" to help reduce size.
I have had much more luck with VisualHub for these Apple TV encodes; the application has been feature-expanded for Apple TV specifically, and offers a lot of features that I didnt feel were quite as well implemented in Handbrake...
Link: http://www.techspansion.com/visualhub/
Why upsample? All that is going to do is waste your time and drive space. The Apple TV has demonstrated a very good upsampling capability built into the hardware (best Ive ever seen even). You should simply use settings that allow for resolution passthrough; anything else is a waste.
I tried that and I wasn't impressed with the result. However, there are many considerations in encoding and upsampling so I'm willing to try it again and see if there's something I missed.
My initial encode parameters were passthrough resolution using MPEG-4 at an average 1Kbps bitrate. I find this to be too low a bitrate with straight MPEG-4 encoding. At 2250-2300Kbps in MPEG-4 AVC with the H.264 compression schema, the results were much better. I haven't yet ascertained whether the root cause of the difference was only the H.264 compression, or the bitrate, or the upsampled resolution, or any combination of the three.
I'm pretty well versed in video encoding at least directly for NTSC/ATSC purposes, but I'm not entirely sure how the upsampling operates in the AppleTV... whether it's simply a linear expansion ratio or actual frame-by-frame resampling with something like bicubic interpolation or a better method.
I wasn't certain that the guy needed to include all the steps that he did but I know it works... I just haven't taken the time to dissect his process and identify redundant/unnecessary steps. He seems to operate on the assumption that AppleTV's graphics card only outputs square pixels whereas HDTV and SDTV use nonsquare pixels. As to whether or not the AppleTV only outputs square pixels I do not know... but if it were the case, I'd be more confident of a hardcoded upsample versus a hardware upsample... the accuracy of the latter being dependent on the sample & hold times in the upsampling D/D (HDMI) or D/A (Component) buffer.
Also, do you know if this upsampling via AppleTV only works via HDMI, or both HDMI and Component? Currently I'm running component video because my HDMI port is used up by an upsampling DVD player which doesn't upsample out the component interface.
FYI in your response just be aware that I'm not concerned about drivespace... I have about 750GB of combined storage across my LAN. I'm more concerned about using the most efficient process that will still preserve color, contrast and clarity in a manner that is more or less perceptually transparent relative to the output from an upsamplling DVD player.