Quality Thread

[Jon Read]

Perhaps we can use this thread to discuss different movies, quality, and the compression used (slider from 1 to 100).

I am doing my first DVD now so will report back later. Is there any way to find out what the file size will be before starting the encode ? Or is it pot luck ?

[jef195]

Originally Posted by Jon Read

Perhaps we can use this thread to discuss different movies, quality, and the compression used (slider from 1 to 100).

I am doing my first DVD now so will report back later. Is there any way to find out what the file size will be before starting the encode ? Or is it pot luck ?

From what i understand there is no way to predict file size

[OCedHrt]

Tried the default 95 one a short promo dvd (one music video). 459MB -> 50MB. Resulting quality sucks. Noise, lots of it. Trying max quality of 150 now.

[RetroActive]

i tried at 125 than at 150. the matrix was the dvd, retail 8.2 gigs. 125 took it down to 1.6 gigs, quality sucked. 150 took it down to 1.9 gigs and quality still sucked.
by way of the slider i would need atleast 300 to 450 or even as high as 500 till im happy with the quality. i was overly happy with the compression, but think less compression and more quality if you want people to use this program. i understand its new and thats why im saying this.
i love the idea and even like the program, but more quality less compression please.

[OCedHrt]

Same, just finished with the 150 setting and while it was a lot better (no more easily visible random noise), the deinterlacing (i think?) is still horrible. Suffers from the same problem as most deinterlacers that operate on the frame level? Not quite sure since I'm no expert :P But basically, my MPEG2 decoders deinterlaces with no problem, if I try to use deinterlacing filters, any combination of settings will never get it right 100%.

[bardelot]

Converted a ripped DVD (The Italian Job) (7 GB) I used default settings (95) and the quality is very good. It took 8 hours until it was finished. Size is now (1.9 GB)

[Lenco]

Hello to all,

I think ratDVD has a lot of potential.
Some people over at the FTD forum did some test en concluded that de videoquality can be improved.
I don't have sufficient knowledge how to achieve this but I can imagine VBR, multi-passes etc.
After all this is only the first release of ratDVD
Greetz,

Nemesh

[danpos]

My first trying with ratDVD:

Movie : Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Original DVD size : 7.49GB
RatDVD file size (with 5.1 -> 2.0) : 1.44GB
Transcoded DVD size : 6.05GB

Quality : Default 95%

I just don't get to play with .ratDVD, using neither MPC and VLC (my WMP is old and don't want to upgrade it to WMP10, because of I already used it before and I didn't like it).

I've tried re-registering the .ax inside XEB folder and reboot my machine. I still only get to play the audio from .ratDVD file, but video didn't.

Some advice are greatly appreciated.

TIA,

[Pluri]

This is really odd. Some are saying that using 95 is great, others say quality sucks?

[DeadMan]

Some need better eyesight. It's suprising how some folks think DiVX/XViD is the greatest thing since sliced bread. But anyone with a decent setup and correct levels of brightness/contrast/gamma/hue/color/sharpness knows it does not look anywhere near as good as the original DVD. TV's can hide a multitude of sins however.

[myktek]

everyone's perception is different, personally as long as i don't see pixelation then it's good... i'm not as picky as others....

[OCedHrt]

Originally Posted by myktek

everyone's perception is different, personally as long as i don't see pixelation then it's good... i'm not as picky as others....

Well, the pixelation is horrible. I'd say the quality is equivalent to trying to fit a 2 hour movie on one cd using xvid or divx. Not sure if the all-in-one is really worth the extra space. With some (maybe more like a lot of) effort you could make your own menus in mp4.

[fozzieb]

Originally Posted by OCedHrt

Well, the pixelation is horrible. I'd say the quality is equivalent to trying to fit a 2 hour movie on one cd using xvid or divx. Not sure if the all-in-one is really worth the extra space. With some (maybe more like a lot of) effort you could make your own menus in mp4.

you missing the point, I would put up with the small loss in quality if it means downloading a 1Gb file to convert back rather than a full 4Gb image.

If we are that bothered about quality we would by the originals, i mean lets face it this is not all about backing up our dvd collection, if that was the case we would all be buying dual layer discs and doing 1:1 backup.

[Jazza]

I had a 4.7gb disc with 8 episodes of friends done originally using dvd decrypter(RIP) and dvd shrink.

I ratted it with the default(95) and got a 1.5gb file - played it in WMP10 with zero loss in quality.

[NScythe]

In general, what's the visual quality of RatDVD like versus Nero Recode, DVD Shrink, DVD Rebuilder, DVD Fab, CloneDVD, etc...? I understand that beauty is in the eyes of the beholder. I just need general opinions. Thanks.

[fozzieb]

Originally Posted by NScythe

In general, what's the visual quality of RatDVD like versus Nero Recode, DVD Shrink, DVD Rebuilder, DVD Fab, CloneDVD, etc...? I understand that beauty is in the eyes of the beholder. I just need general opinions. Thanks.

It's like creating a high quality Xvid Avi then converting it back to a Dvd, never going to look as good as just using Nero Recode, but it still looks great.

I would never use this as a way of copying Dvd's as the other app's are designed for that, But this backs up a WHOLE Dvd to a smallish file that can be downloaded and the converted back to a Dvd.

The whole point is DOWNLOADING not copying

[NScythe]

Originally Posted by fozzieb

It's like creating a high quality Xvid Avi then converting it back to a Dvd, never going to look as good as just using Nero Recode, but it still looks great.

I would never use this as a way of copying Dvd's as the other app's are designed for that, But this backs up a WHOLE Dvd to a smallish file that can be downloaded and the converted back to a Dvd.

The whole point is DOWNLOADING not copying

Thanks for the opinion! So far this app does emphasize more about downloading than transcoding dvds.

[fozzieb]

It looks like it will be a while before we better the Shrink/RE-Code app's

[heternova]

Hi,
I will thanks the devs of ratDVD. I tried the soft and I found that, as transcoder, it's not bad. But the function to recreate the original DVD it's not a good stuff.
I tried to compress a DVD-5 with ac3 5.1 audio: the compression is incredible, from 4,37 GB to 1 GB. Than I tried to decompress the .ratdvd, and the DVD's size was 3,31 GB. Between the compression and decompression phase, ratDVD has lost 1 GB material!!!!!
That's too much. So I think that this function is useless untill ratDVD will remain a transcoder and not a compressor like WinZIP, WinRAR or WinRK (with CABAC or CALVC, like H.264).
Thanks
Heter

[Karohh]

I ran a short video quality test with xvid and ratdvd. This is what I did and found out. You can download the files at from the following location and judge yourself:

StarWars.VIDEO_TS.original.zip
StarWars.ratDVD
StarWars.xvid.avi
StarWars.VTS_01_1.from.ratdvd.VOB
StarWars_from.xvid.m2v

I don’t know if there is any traffic limit for these files. Maybe it would be good if someone could put them on some mirror.

Here is what I did:

1. Used DVDShrink to create a short 20 sec. DVD without audio and subtitles from Star Wars V of 18,5 MB (File: StarWars.VIDEO_TS.original)
2. Fed this DVD into ratDVD and got out a 3,9MB ratDVD file (File: StarWars.ratDVD)
3. Fed this into xvid (the Gordian knot way) and got out an 3,9MB XVID file (File: StarWars.xvid.avi)

Since we all know that players may play the files differently depending on a multitude of parameters I now converted both files back to MPEG-2 where playback shouldn’t do any smoothing, etc.

4. Used the standard ratDVD program to rebuild the DVD and got out a DVD structure with this VOB of 14,3 MB (File: StarWars.VTS_01_1.from.ratdvd.VOB)
5. Used TMPGEnc (using constant quality) to convert the Xvid file to M2v of the same size (14,4 MB) than the ratDVD vob file (File: StarWars_from.xvid.m2v)

Before anyone complains, here is what I think is a little bit unfair but I don’t think that these details really matter:

• When I created the xvid files I used n-path because otherwise it wouldn’t hit the desired size. RatDVD defined the size and had only one run.
• The ratDVD was is size almost equivalent to the xvid although it had to carry the additional dvd information (navigation, etc. – no idea what size this would be)
• The final file size of the “unratted” MPEG-2 was identical in size with the M2V that came out of the xvid file although M2V does not include all the muxing, DVD navigation, etc. I don’t know how much this is but I’m guessing only very few percent, if at all

So, what do we see? When I looked at it I like the ratDVD file a little better although or maybe because it was a little smoother. When my roommate looked at it he liked the xvid one a bit better – interestingly because it was less smooth. So at the end, this quality comparison ended as so many of these “what is better” comparisons that I have seen – it is really in the eye of the observer and what every individual likes more.

The one thing that can be derived from this is that if you need only a bare title from a DVD, it is fine to stay with xvid. If you want the complete DVD, ratDVD is the way to go.

[matt_the_rippa]

I wouldnt be downloading Star Wars rips from anywhere at the moment >if you want the chace of being slaped witha lawsuit go ahead.

[warforpeace]

Oh well... I tried a different approach. I put together two 17" TFT Monitors (LG 1730S) connected to two different computers. I compressed "Cold Mountain" with ratDVD for seven whole hours then fed it to WMP9 (yes it plays flawlessly). That happened on computer number 1. computer number 2 featured the original DVD fed to WinDVD 6 Platinum. Started playback of both the movies at once and compared quality using my very eyes, tne monitors being very close one to another. And here's what I noticed.
Procentually, the quality difference is somewhere at 2%, the original DVD being the winner. The difference increased to about 5-7% when PAUSING both players. Indeed, there were tiny artefacts on the ratDVD still image. But I could see absolutely NO difference when playing some fast scenes.
Overall, I guess it's pretty impressive. Oh, and to shut the foul words that might come, I used two IDENTICAL computers (I work in a computer hardware store and am able to build identical computers). Just to be sure, I switched the computers (played ratDVD file on computer 2 and original DVD on computer 1) and gost same results. Awesome!