Thinking of using H.264 MP4 rips for the season pack. Thoughts?

Thinking of using H.264 MP4 rips for the season pack. Thoughts?

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Viper007Bond

Viper007Bond

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Once this season of Top Gear is over, we'll be releasing our regular season pack. However instead of releasing Scene rips, we're considering releasing rips off iPlayer. They're better quality than the AVI rips we currently release as they're encoded with H.264. They're about the same filesize though.

Thoughts?

https://pic.armedcats.net/q/qu/quiky/2009/07/12/vlcsnap-782008.png
 
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Dunno, really. Some of us only play TG and other stuff on PCs or laptops, me as an example, so I wouldn't mind switching to x264 (all the F1 2009 rips I've downloaded so far are x264). Can't speak for others, though.
 
I'll have some side-by-side comparisons in a bit.
 
Don't mind either way, as I don't really plan on downloading them again :)
 
Sorry if this is redundant, but can you post the gory details between the two in this thread?

360s / PS3s don't have problems with most h/x264s mp4s
 
Is this how you plan on offering the regular downloads later on? How will this affect people with Divx DVD players, portable players, etc...I'm unfamiliar with the format, and I'm too lazy to look into it.
 
Regular downloads will still be xvid for this season. The pack we release at the end will probably have the much higher quality x264 versions.
 
The BBC use x264 :O ,maybe you mean H.264, x264 is a h.264 encoder.. I doubt the bbc would use that.. they probably use their own encoders or something..

Wouldn't x264 encodes from the original .ts look better than iplayer?

Transparent x264 encodes are about 800MB

Is the screen in ops post full size/real?

if so then iplayer isn't good enough.

iplayer: http://img9.imageshack.**/img9/5140/ipkayer.png

.ts : http://img21.imageshack.**/img21/5056/snapshot20090712225820.png
 
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killer101 said:
The BBC use x264 :O ,maybe you mean H.264, x264 is a h.264 encoder.. I doubt the bbc would use that.. they probably use their own encoders or something..

Wouldn't x264 encodes from the original .ts look better than iplayer?

Transparent x264 encodes are about 800MB
Click to expand...
We transcode to x264. Dunno what the BBC uses.

And iPlayer is potentially better than broadcast. Quiky will know for sure.
 
Release a sample of 13x04 in x264 and see if people complain about compatibility/quality. If not, go for it.
 
Embarrassingly I'll have to click "huh?" If you say it'll work on my standard installation VLC in Windows than it's fine with me. If it requires much more then I doubt I'm smart enough to sort it out so no.
 
Since I'm all for quality, I voted for x264.
 
Since I play TG on the TV through a PVR that I don't believe handles x264, my preference would be to stick with Xvid, that said if it's only the season packs the change won't really affect me as I wouldn't be downloading the episodes again.
 
killer101 said:
The BBC use x264 :O ,maybe you mean H.264, x264 is a h.264 encoder.. I doubt the bbc would use that.. they probably use their own encoders or something..

Wouldn't x264 encodes from the original .ts look better than iplayer?

Transparent x264 encodes are about 800MB

Is the screen in ops post full size/real?

if so then iplayer isn't good enough.

iplayer: http://img9.imageshack.**/img9/5140/ipkayer.png

.ts : http://img21.imageshack.**/img21/5056/snapshot20090712225820.png
Click to expand...

The iPlayer screenshot is indeed the full size (ie. representative of the x264 iPlayer source).

As for why it is different, probably due to the fact that the broadcast version of top gear airs in a 1:85:1 aspect ratio, and the BBC resize it to a 16:9 aspect ratio for the iPlayer version. Not a groundbreaking difference, certainly not one that bothers me when you consider that the quality is much better than the scene rips at the same file size.

I'd like to know where people post these .ts sources. Nothing better than having TG in it's best form, but so far the only places I know of that have them are private torrent sites for which you need invites :mad:
 
I think better quality rips off iPlayer are nice, but the scene-rips you are using now should also be made to a package.
So let's say 2 packages. 1 XviD for the masses, and 1 with x264 as a bonus for people desperate for higher quality.
 
killer101 said:
The BBC use x264 :O ,maybe you mean H.264, x264 is a h.264 encoder.. I doubt the bbc would use that.. they probably use their own encoders or something..

Wouldn't x264 encodes from the original .ts look better than iplayer?

Transparent x264 encodes are about 800MB

Is the screen in ops post full size/real?

if so then iplayer isn't good enough.

iplayer: http://img9.imageshack.**/img9/5140/ipkayer.png

.ts : http://img21.imageshack.**/img21/5056/snapshot20090712225820.png
Click to expand...
The iPlayer version looks just slightly more unclear then the .ts version. Look at the grill of Renault and Clarkson's face. However, in theory the overall quality "should" be better in the iPlayer version



namX said:
I think better quality rips off iPlayer are nice, but the scene-rips you are using now should also be made to a package.
So let's say 2 packages. 1 XviD for the masses, and 1 with x264 as a bonus for people desperate for higher quality.
Click to expand...
It is harder to support and keep two torrents alive then it is to just have one.


Also, in case people don't know, the PS3 and Xbox 360 handle MP4/h.264 better then they handle Avi/XviD :)
 
You'd probably get some complaints from people who have older divx compatible players. I have one of these and am happy with the scene releases. People with HD or plasma, or LCD tvs would probably like them.
I have no plans to buy such a tv until the price comes down more.
If the scene releases remain available on the ftps and other torrent trackers, I don't see why not.
I have re-encoded mkv/ MP4 h.264 files to something that will play on my divx dvd players, but that is a bit silly.
 
Scene releases will always be available on the day of airing. We're strickly talking about the end-of-season pack that's used for long term downloading.
 
Go for h.264/MPEG-4.
Not only am i all for good picture quality, it will be a first step in the HD conversion, as we'll all need to be able to play MPEG-4 for HD Top Gear. (but as i said, HD will need much bigger files...).
 
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