DC2000 anyone?

[miker]

The reason I questioned the GOP is because the pinnacle manual suggests a GOP of 15 with video datarate at 8Mbps for a DVD compliant stream (the rest of the stream being audio to make it 9Mbps).

But using a GOP of 12 should give a better idea when doing side-by-side comparison with other encoders.

Anyways, I will do you an interlaced MPEG2 (default for DC1000 is upper first), GOP=12, MAX datarate=8Mbps

Expect a big file in your email in a couple of days...

[miker]

BTW, the timing above was for encoding to 5Mbps MAXIMUM. Lots of nasties in the pool scene!!

[Jkun]

Lots of nasties in the pool? Remind me not to go swimming there

If you would have a look at all the other encoders, you'd notice that none of them handle the pool scene perfectly! Even the expensive Futuretel and the much praised Tmpeg have some blockiness in there. Only the Cinemacraft does without blocking but still has a grainy look to it.

J-kun

[KuroNeko]

Mike, thanks very much for the demo file! You put a lot of effort in this, and I'll be sending this file to the owner of the MPEG2 test site, to have him add this to the list.

It looks pretty good qualitywise, not too much blocking in the pool scene.

However, it's VBR is very poor indeed, making this file a full 5 MB (20MB instead of 15 average) larger than other encoders. The bitrate graph is nearly flat. The Futuretel encoder (also C-Cube) proves that this isn't an issue of the chip but the drivers.

Guess I won't be buying that cheap DC2000 after all I wonder, if implementing good VBR is that difficult, as only the most expensive cards do it well. Not good for C-Cube if that's the case.

Encoders left to test : OmniDVD ($2000), ProVideo (who now have a second card with added tuner, like the WinTV PVR), Gainward VidoeXpert, Pentamedia Navis.

The latter 3 are relatively cheap but also only accept one parameter for VBR, so probably same results.

Does anyone happen to have (accessto) one or more of these?

Neko