[Q] Best video settings (balance of quality and size) - Barnes & Noble Nook Tablet

I've been trying to find information about this but I have been unable to yet (likely due to how new it is). I'm trying to find the best settings to re-encode my videos for a balance of quality and size.

Test the NT's video capability here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1348488
As for encoding specs, it's simple: conform to MP4 specs (H.264, AAC stereo) if you want to use built-in player and hardware accel.
Newbies tend to obsess with encoding parameters, and there've been reams of how-to's for Handbrake encoding. You don't have to bother with any of that. The 4430 should handle anything in 720p, and the majority of 1080p. I would use the default settings of whatever encoder you prefer.
For quickie conversion to MP4 (from common formats), see my VidsOpt script conversion in the above link.

Thank you for the information. And it's not so much worrying about all the settings but trying to maximize how many shows/movies I can hold on the NT at once. I travel a lot for work and some of the flights are LONG so having as many options as possible is what I'm really looking for since it wouldn't be as simple as just loading other videos onto the NT at the time.

Cozila said:
Thank you for the information. And it's not so much worrying about all the settings but trying to maximize how many shows/movies I can hold on the NT at once. I travel a lot for work and some of the flights are LONG so having as many options as possible is what I'm really looking for since it wouldn't be as simple as just loading other videos onto the NT at the time.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Get a 32 GB uSD card. I can hold 20+ hours of video on mine.

>to maximize how many shows/movies I can hold on the NT
There are two ways to lower a movie's size, reduce the resolution, or reduce the quality. Both are a personal preference.
A 90min movie averages 800MB-1GB, encoded at 480p and standard quality. Then, you can fit 32 such movies onto a 32GB uSD. With a larger res, you can fit fewer. You can also of course have more than one uSD card.

Getting ready for the Thanksgiving drive and saw this question, so did a test re-encode of Green Lantern. Original file is a 720p mkv
Video Bitrate: 720p (1280x536 @ 4811kbps)
Audio Bitrate: DTS @ 1509 kbps
Using Handbrake Normal as the baseline.
1) Container MP4, left extension as .m4v
2) Picture: changed Anamorphic to Loose, Width to 1024 (assumed native width was a good idea to reduce size)
3) Video: Video Codec x264 which means encode took about 50 minutes. Constant Quality 22
4) Audio: AAC Mixdown to Stereo, Samplerate Auto, Bitrate 160
5) Subtitles: need to play around with this later
Original mkv filesize was 5.7GB
.m4v file was 913MB
To me, it looked absolutely great. Could not complain and actions scenes didn't show any sign of stutter. Didn't watch the whole thing through, but didn't seem to come across any problems either.
I'm sticking with these settings and will see if there are any changes required.
I'm not a video encoding expert or a Handbrake expert - but I think I know enough and need at least 3-4 movies for the drive.
Hope that helps.

Thank you very much, I'm going to give those settings a try when I get home.

The settings are working great. So much that I actually put the setting into a preset file for anyone else that wants it in http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1361819. Thank you very much for your help iron_c

Related

Movies On XDA

Hi,
Could someone tell me what the correct settings are to encode video to my XDA. I need screen resolution and FPS also Kbps.
Video Encoding for Pocket PC
The simplest method of encoding for the pocket pc is to encode using windows media encoder. Simply download the encoder from
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/download/default.asp.
Once you have it is very easy. There are templates for pocket PC.
Voila!
I have noted however that mpegs encoded for the pocket PC look and play better. I have not compared with the new encoder though. To play mpeg files you need mpegtv.
http://www.mpegtv.com/
BeDammit
Beos isn't dead...
http://www.yellowtab.com
Also, with WME9 you can tweak quite a few settings to customise it for your needs, although it's far from intuitive. I use it myself to encode movies for viewing on the train, quite acceptable quality, full-screen, stereo, 20fps, at about 1MB per minute.
I've been asked to share some instructions for Windows Media encoding, as the existing how-to guides only cover divx and mpeg: so here goes...
1) Get the software - Windows media encoder 9 - from Microsoft here
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/9series/encoder/default.aspx
2) You can use the wizards to covert for pocketPC, but as this is about tweaking for optimum performance, select the custom setting to create a blank project and bring up the session properties window. I'll now go through the tabs on the session properties:
Sources) WME is very flexible, and allows you to use multiple sources, but in the case of simple file conversion, just alter the default source. Select the File radio butto on the source from section, and browse for your file.
Output) Select the Archive to File checbox, and then browse for or enter the output filename. Note WME will helpfully set the extension to wmv automatically. Make sure the push and pull checkboxes are cleared.
Compression) Here's the fiddly bit. Why they don't allow you to create and save off a complete custom destination is beyond me, but select a destination of PocketPC and click edit. We'll now go through the compression settings dialogue:
- General) For pocket PC you want to use Audio: CBR: Windows Media Audio 9, Video: Windows Media Video V8. You now need to set up your target bit rate. Windows media allows a single file to have more than one bit rate, so that if it's viewed over the internet, a different stream can be sent depending upon the bandwindth. As we're going to be creating a single file, we'll only want a single bit rate. Remove all the target bit rates and add a new one. Give it a bit rate of 120K - note this pop-up window is a bit superfluous, it just alters the caption on the second tab, from where the real bit rate can be set:
- 120 Kbs) OK here is the main tweak page for the compression. Here are my suggested values for a very higly compressed, but watchable file:
Audio format: 20kbps 22KHz stereo CBR. You can up this if the sound quality is very important, but don't go too high otherwise the PocketPC won't have enough power to process the file.
Video Size: use a calculator to work out the correct dimensions to produce a full screen on the pocketPC, given your original video size. So if the original video was 352x240, we want a width of 320 to fit the screen. 240*320/352=218ish, so the size you would want is 320x218.
Frame Rate: High frame rates can require too much performance than the pocketPC can provide, but it's worth playing around with this one. I tend to go for 20fps for movies, 15fps for animation (such as Southpark )
Key Frame Interval: If the PocketPC video stalls because of peformance, this is effectively how long you'll have to wait before it recovers. Lower values produce bigger files, but higher values make stalls more irritating. I tend to use 4s
Video Bit Rate: One of the best things about Windows Media is the bit rate is totally flexible. You'll definitely want to play around with this one. The higher the bit rate, the bigger the file and the better the qaulity, but the more power required to play it. 100K bps gives a not-crystal clear, but perfectly watchable result.
Buffer size: I tend to leave this at about 5s - it affects the total memory required when watching the movie, but doesn't make tht much difference.
Video Smoothness: This setting is a little fiddly. It determies whether you want a smooth but slightly blurry video, or a sharp but jerky video. It depends on what you're encoding. It's a percentage value. I generally use 5 for action movies, 15 for southpark. Keep it low, otherwise you'll get a slideshow on the PocketPC.
Once you've set up your values, you'll probably want to use the export button on the General Tab to save this off to use again.
Back on the compression tab) Initially leave two-pass encoding unchecked, so that you can encode just a bit of the file first to check things are OK. Once you're happy with the results, you can select two pass encoding to produce slightly better quality results.
Video Size) As we set up the correct video size on the compression settings, this is a bit superfluous. However it can be used to crop borders off letter-box content, which saves a bit of space.
Attributes) Set up how you want
Processing) If the source is a poorly encoded video, you can de-interlace, or if it's a movie that has been recorded directly, you can inverse telecine (telecine is where they change the frame rate from film at 24fps to video at 25fps). I tend to leave it as None.
Plug-ins) OK this isn't really important, unless you have a DVD rip that has very quiet sound. There's no simple way of amplifying the sound in WME, so you need to use an audio plug-in. I've used Scrollworks Peak Slammer with good results, but it's quite costly for a simple audio amplifier. I'd be interested to know if there's a simple freeware audio amplifier plug-in out there. http://www.scrollworks.com/products/slammer
Security) Leave blank
Advanced) Leave the defaults
Now click apply!
Ok don't go the whole hog just yet - click start encoding and let the first 30 seconds or so get encoded, then stop the encoding. This doesn't delete the partially encoded file, so you can check the output to make sure it's OK. Click the properties button to bring up the properties window again, and alter any settingas you feel need changing here, such as volume, size, compression, smoothness etc. Keep doing this partial encode/tweak settings cycle until you're happy with the results.
Once you have good session settings, go back to the compression tab and select two-pass encoding and click the apply button. Now press encode and wait for your file to be produced.
Hope this helps
having played with encoding quite a bit, i have to say that when disk space is a problem, nothing but divx is worthwhile.
Get the DIVX codecs from www.doom9.net
Get the application virtuadub from the same site
Now you can open any avi,mpeg file in virtuadub, and encode it using the divx codec. Apply a resize filter if you want to make the screen size smaller. Use some audio codec settings to reduce sound quality, and you will have a movie, not DVD quality, but watchable, and doesnt take hundreds of Mbs.
Use pocketdivx http://www.projectmayo.com/projects/detail.php?projectId=9
to play the movie.
Also found a great audio tool to decrease the size of mp3 or WMA files.
DbpowerAMP from http://www.dbpoweramp.com/ allows you to covert audio formats, and to reduce quality.
Managed to get a 5Mb mp3 file, to 900k WMA file, and it sounded good on the xda
I've noticed that video playback on the XDA will be a lot smoother if you turn off the phone while viewing. Probably something to do with the phone being a realtime application with high priority.

Encoding MKV Files for Playback

Hello Everyone,
After much testing/researching, I have finally found the best solution to encode .MKV files to .MP4 for flawless playback on the HD2 using MediaCoder. I have tried many of the other methods and settings provided by others on this forum and many of them were good, but simply took too long or sometimes caused choppy playback on the HD2.
UPDATE 9/6/10
Thanks to everyone who has helped out with new settings and testing out encoding methods in this thread and the entire forum. I have recently had major issues with encoding certain videos in H.264 resulting in audio sync issues, frames, and artifacts. Doing some more testing and help from forum members, I will be updating the settings to what I have been using recently and having absolutely no issues with even on 1080P files. Just remember to use Windows Media Player, it provides the best playback for these encodes!
MediaCoder Settings:
Format: H.264 ( If Possible use CUDA Encoder, much faster!)
Mode: Average bitrate @ 1500Kbps
Audio encoder: FAAC
Audio Format: LC-AAC
Audio container: AAC
Audio mode: Average bitrate @128Kbps
Container: MP4
Resize: 800x480
Effects: Filter by Encoder
Aspect ratio: Keep Display AR
With these settings I have tested 12 different files ranging from 500MB-1.8GB in size(720p quality) and the largest took 34 minutes on my dual core CPU (intel i5). First tried playing the files with HTC Album player and CorePlayer and the results weren't very good and they included a lot of choppiness. After reading some others success with WMP, I decided to give it a shot and I was pleasantly surprised to find that it played the .MP4 files beautifully and without a single hiccup.
Some of you may already have solutions for encoding videos for playback on the HD2, but I have found these settings to be perfect for anyone who wants to encode HD .MKV files.
I want to thank everyone who has contributed to finding the best method of converting/encoding files for playback, but I can honestly say these settings will give you amazing quality and smooth playback, even in the most intense action scenes. Give it a try!
Smack it up, flip it, rub it down,
Sticky this to be seen all around
Very nice find!
Wow, tried many of different settings and this one has worked the best for me so far! Sticky this!
Great find. This is now stuck
Great find. One question though, I have been using XenonMKV to package my MKV files to MP4 and it never takes longer than 10 minutes to do and the videos work flawlessly on my XBOX 360. Haven't tried it on an HD2 since I haven't got one yet. Do the MKV files have to be re-encoded to work on the HD2 or can they simply be repackaged into an MP4 as XenonMKV does?
htpw16 said:
Great find. One question though, I have been using XenonMKV to package my MKV files to MP4 and it never takes longer than 10 minutes to do and the videos work flawlessly on my XBOX 360. Haven't tried it on an HD2 since I haven't got one yet. Do the MKV files have to be re-encoded to work on the HD2 or can they simply be repackaged into an MP4 as XenonMKV does?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
one reason ud wana change them up is to lower the resolution and bitrate since you dont need it so high on the smaller screen and it uses less battery
I will try it but I don't even convert mkv I just hit up coreplayer but I will keep this in mind
i dont have the option for 800x450 does that just depend on the original aspect of the video? its lost so should be 16x9
domineus said:
I will try it but I don't even convert mkv I just hit up coreplayer but I will keep this in mind
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
same here I dont see the use of it (at least for me)
lbhocky19 said:
i dont have the option for 800x450 does that just depend on the original aspect of the video? its lost so should be 16x9
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You probably meant to say "16:9" which is the aspect ratio. Also, check for 800x400, it should be there.
Depending on your encoder, you might want to see about removing the black bars that are so prevalent on TV shows crammed onto DVDs. The black bars not only take up precious screen space, but they cause the decoder to render them, which is CPU-intensive. Also they cost you in battery life since black is the most expensive color rendering for our screens.
I've tried these settings 3 times on .avi and .mkv amd I either get an unreadable file or sound but no video. the HD2 WILL NOT play ANy of my .avi files and it lso doesn't play some .mp4.
I have tried .mkv files and yes, some of them fail when I try to play them. I kept the same settings from the first post and only changed: Aspect Ratio = Keep Pixel AR.
Which MediaCoder version do you use?
Thank you,
Mike
medrison said:
Which MediaCoder version do you use?
Thank you,
Mike
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I use MediaCoder 0.7.3.4625 x64. For some of you having trouble playing .MP4 files, what player are you using to open them with? I have found WMP to give me no trouble playing any .MP4 file I threw at it.
htpw16 said:
Great find. One question though, I have been using XenonMKV to package my MKV files to MP4 and it never takes longer than 10 minutes to do and the videos work flawlessly on my XBOX 360. Haven't tried it on an HD2 since I haven't got one yet. Do the MKV files have to be re-encoded to work on the HD2 or can they simply be repackaged into an MP4 as XenonMKV does?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Re-encoding the MKV files seems to be the better choice for size and smoothness of playback. At the native bitrate of 3000+Kbps playback is choppy for me even when using WMP. Not only will lowering the bitrate provide smoother playback, but it will lower the file size. The videos I encode are around 500MB average, and when encoding is finished they are no larger than 250MB, which helps a lot since I only have a 16GB memory card.
Using MediaCoder 0.7.3.4625 x64. On my PC I have no problems playing the .MP4. The only issue I get is when I transfer the file to the phone, and try playing it on the phone. I hear audio but no video, but after changing the Aspect Ratio that seem to have fixed my issue.
N1M1TZ said:
Using MediaCoder 0.7.3.4625 x64. On my PC I have no problems playing the .MP4. The only issue I get is when I transfer the file to the phone, and try playing it on the phone. I hear audio but no video, but after changing the Aspect Ratio that seem to have fixed my issue.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Glad to hear things are working fine for you. If you don't mind me asking, how's the playback, and what player are you using?
Gentlemen, let me introduce to you AnyVideoConverter - this little baby is free and does the job just fine!
Tried it out w/ some anime. Select file, and hit convert to mp4 - perfect sync!
http://www.any-video-converter.com/products/for_video_free/
godsafk said:
Re-encoding the MKV files seems to be the better choice for size and smoothness of playback. At the native bitrate of 3000+Kbps playback is choppy for me even when using WMP. Not only will lowering the bitrate provide smoother playback, but it will lower the file size. The videos I encode are around 500MB average, and when encoding is finished they are no larger than 250MB, which helps a lot since I only have a 16GB memory card.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wait....250MB...I end up with 1Gb/movie with your settings.
May I ask if you are sure you wanted 800/450 px and not 800/480?
Thank you,
Mike

Alternative to Handbrake - DVD Catalyst

Seeing some of the threads/questions re: Handbrake settings for the Nook, if you're having issues or just want something completely automated I found that DVD Catalyst ($10) has three presets for Nook Color (normal, fast, high quality) that work very well -- essentially just load the file or folder, select the preset and hit go. You can enable "advanced" user if you want to tweak the options but I've tested it with a couple of dvd video_ts folders and videos of different codecs (both audio and video) and they've all come out in good quality, and all playable without software decoding.
The file sizes that come out are comparable to the ones produced by presets for Handbrake people have produced here. a 1 hr 55 min video encoded for me at 1.39GB at the highest quality Nook setting.
I know it's not free like Handbrake but it might save someone headaches especially if they're wrestling with, for example, widescreen anamorphic content that isn't 16:9 or 4:3. Or if they just don't want to deal with tweaking presets
Does batch jobs as well, and has presets for a slew of other android devices if you're also converting for other formats/resolutions for your phone, etc.
is it faster then handbrake when converting the video?
Somewhat; I tested it last night for you with a 5-minute video. It took Handbrake 3 mins and 45 seconds to encode, it took DVD Catalyst 3 mins 15 seconds -- I can't (or haven't found) the command line interface to see what DVD Catalyst is writing out for its encode jobs, but I've tried to match w/e specs as closely as possible for the test (audio/video bitrate, etc.) How that will scale to larger files, I'm not entirely sure -- I batch encode all my videos before I go to bed at night.
I'd like to use AMD Video Converter as it uses the GPU to convert and is about twice as fast as Handbrake even on my Quad Core but I'm having trouble finding a way to manually control the settings for the output to match the NC needs. Anybody have any tips there?
Edit- Trying out MediaEspresso - Media Converter. So far, problems with output, will keep trying and report back. MediaEspresso settings not working with NC. It is a pretty nice encoder that has support for GPU encoding and is faster by about 50% than Handbrake, but not flexible enough to get the output that the NC needs. Working great to encode for my EVO however.
Just wanted to point out that with the speed of the NC (OC) and the range of codecs recognized by various players you hardly need to recode videos anymore.
britoso said:
Just wanted to point out that with the speed of the NC (OC) and the range of codecs recognized by various players you hardly need to recode videos anymore.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you gotten 720p videos to work smoothly with software decoding? I am only oc'ed to 1.1 Ghz and they still stutter. That's what I'm normally encoding.
*** Edit:*** Just to clarify, I mean encoding from 720p -> 480p so I can use Nook's hardware acceleration.
Both nookie froyo and the newer cm7 builds have hardware decoding
I didn't think the Nook's DSP (TI OMAP 3621) allowed native 720p decoding, only the OMAP 3630+ -- there was a thread here somewhere that said something about that. The 854x480 maximum resolution was, I thought, a hardware, not software limitation for the Nook.
From my own (meager) experience, anything higher than 480p insists on being played via software decoding regardless of what player I've used.
Some sites say 720p, others mention what you said... I just leave hd content for my bigger,hd screen
britoso said:
Just wanted to point out that with the speed of the NC (OC) and the range of codecs recognized by various players you hardly need to recode videos anymore.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have moboplayer and CM7 OC to 1.3 and 720p video is still sub par via software decoding. Best results are still to handbrake recode to mp4 at 854x840.
The hardware decoding only handle mp4 files.
I tried this software to re-encode hd file to lower res mp4 and it does it lot faster than handbrake (on old P4 w/o gpu decoding GPU) : format factory : http://format-factory.softonic.fr/

[Q] What video codecs for hardware acceleration?

I have a bunch of 1080p MKV movies that I want to convert into mobile versions for the Galaxy S II, but does anyone know what codecs I should use in order to take advantage of better battery life?
I play to shrink these down to 800x480 res. Any recommendations on bitrate too?
Also, any software or guides recommended to convert MKV to whatever codec has hardware acceleration for this phone?
All the video formats that the phone can play natively are hardware accelerated. So u can choose from MP4, avi, FLV and so on.....
I don't have much knowledge regarding the subject. But here's what I gathered:
According to Wikipedia:
The Exynos 4210, unlike Tegra 2, features support for ARM's SIMD engine (Media Processing Engine, a.k.a NEON instructions) and this may have a significant performance advantage in some cases over Tegra 2 in critical performance situations such as accelerated decoding for multiple multimedia codecs and formats (e.g., On2's VP6/7/8 or Real formats).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Now, to take advantage of that hardware there also needs to be software that supports it.
MoboPlayer is one such software, that I know of, which has "ARM V7_NEON" playback codec and so it will fully utilize Galaxy S2 resources.
As to regards to which format you should convert...
On the MoboPlayer website is said that: "Almost all video formats(need to choose "software decoding" mode inmost cases)."
So I suppose what you need to do, is to disable "software decoding" mode and see what video formats will be supported in hardware mode.
stra said:
I don't have much knowledge regarding the subject. But here's what I gathered:
According to Wikipedia:
Now, to take advantage of that hardware there also needs to be software that supports it.
MoboPlayer is one such software, that I know of, which has "ARM V7_NEON" playback codec and so it will fully utilize Galaxy S2 resources.
As to regards to which format you should convert...
On the MoboPlayer website is said that: "Almost all video formats(need to choose "software decoding" mode inmost cases)."
So I suppose what you need to do, is to disable "software decoding" mode and see what video formats will be supported in hardware mode.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I live in the US and we don't have the SGS2 released here yet. Can anyone who has the phone already, please test this out and let us know which codecs are hardware accelerated with MoboPlayer?
I found this guide for transcoding:
http://forum.videohelp.com/threads/211070-How-to-convert-MKV-to-AVI-or-OGM-to-AVI-using-mencoder
I don't think there is an "optimum" bitrate because that is going to vary depending on content, ie, number of fast motion scenes. Maybe encode it in VBR and set the top limit fairly high.
I know this phone will handle 1080p MKV, but some of my mkv files are like 12gb!
Hi, dont bother with anything else, handbrake should be your tool of choice. There are various templates included but I usually just set it to MP4 high profile and choose the file size I want, handbrake then does the rest and bloody well too.
Do a search on here for handbrake, there may already be threads about it, note though you should only really have to re-encode if you movies are over 4 gig (fat 32 limit) as I haven't found a file this phone wont play yet with one player or another. My players of choice are always stock first, then mobo, then DICE.
stoolzo said:
Hi, dont bother with anything else, handbrake should be your tool of choice. There are various templates included but I usually just set it to MP4 high profile and choose the file size I want, handbrake then does the rest and bloody well too.
Do a search on here for handbrake, there may already be threads about it, note though you should only really have to re-encode if you movies are over 4 gig (fat 32 limit) as I haven't found a file this phone wont play yet with one player or another. My players of choice are always stock first, then mobo, then DICE.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks mate! Actually, I'm getting this phone for my GF for our anniversary and she's a big Harry Potter geek, she has all the books and blu-ray. I've already converted her blu-rays to MKV so she can have them all on the XPS 15, but I was hoping to convert the MKV down to a mobile friendly format.
All the HP movies add up to 80gb so I can't just copy the MKV's on there, that's why I was thinking of transcoding again.
I did find this bit of info on the Exynos:
http://www.samsung.com/us/business/oem-solutions/pdfs/Exynos_v11.pdf
1080p Video Encode/Decode
- H.264 30fps
- MPEG-4 30fps
- VC-1 30fps
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It doesn't say what container it supports but from what you say, it sounds like MP4 is the way to go. Thanks for the Handbrake tip!
one thing you should aware of is that if you intend to get the MHL>HDMI adapter at some point you may want to transcode at a resolution a little higher as it wont look great on the TV. If you are just playing on the phone then you can get them down to a fraction of the size. I found the best thing to do was to find a smaller film clip that was encoded as 1080 MKV and run off some tests, then save off the template and batch convert the log. I converted all my start trek films from 8 gig to 2 gig a piece, I left them at 1080p but set the file size down to 2 gig. The all look great on my Phone and still really good on my TV through the HDMI, best of both worlds.
stoolzo said:
one thing you should aware of is that if you intend to get the MHL>HDMI adapter at some point you may want to transcode at a resolution a little higher as it wont look great on the TV. If you are just playing on the phone then you can get them down to a fraction of the size. I found the best thing to do was to find a smaller film clip that was encoded as 1080 MKV and run off some tests, then save off the template and batch convert the log. I converted all my start trek films from 8 gig to 2 gig a piece, I left them at 1080p but set the file size down to 2 gig. The all look great on my Phone and still really good on my TV through the HDMI, best of both worlds.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wow, that's crazy! I doubt my gf will ever output these to a TV. I'm still playing with Handbrake's settings.
One thing I don't get about it is that HP is 1920x800'ish, so when I set it to 800, the height drops down to 336'ish.
I think I'd rather have it fullscreen and sacrifice cropping some of the sides, so I clicked ASPECT RATIO and set the height to 480.
Handbrake set the width to 1152, so I set a crop of 176 on left and right, to try to bring the final size back down to 800x480.
But Handbrake has some weird algorithm that doesn't seem to give the desired result? It changed the output size of the video on its own after I changed the cropping values.
So, I'm not quite sure how cropping is handling in Handbrake, is it done before or after the resolution is resized?
Mobo can't use HW video decoder. SW decoder use SIMD(NEON) instructions.
Exynos HW video decoder can decode 1080p.
Try diceplayer. it use HW video decoder in Exynos ( Multi Function Codec )
juami said:
Mobo can't use HW video decoder. SW decoder use SIMD(NEON) instructions.
Exynos HW video decoder can decode 1080p.
Try diceplayer. it use HW video decoder in Exynos ( Multi Function Codec )
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks but does it also depend on which container or codec the video is in?
I'm assuming that h.264 video in a MP4 container should be hardware accelerated right?
H264 in any container up to High Profile level 5.0

[Q] Best settings to convert Blu-ray for watching on Transformer Prime TF201?

Hi everyone,
This is my first post on this forum. I am not sure if it is proper to ask my question here. It seems this's a forum for developers? I am not a developer at all. If I posted on the wrong thread I am sorry.
I just bought my Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime TF201 about a month ago. You see, I am completely a newbie about the tablet things. I have a large collection of Blu-ray discs which I want to put onto my TF201 for watching while traveling around. I found a Blu-ray ripping program (It is called Aunsoft Blu-ray Ripper if it matters) that can convert Blu-ray movies to the MP4 format videos for watching on Android tablets.
My question is: I don't know what are the best output settings I should use with the Blu-ray program There are too many technical terms I can hardly understand. Does anyone here have any video conversion experience for Transformer Prime? Any advice or instruction is highly appreciated!
Detailed info about the settings in Aunsoft Blu-ray Ripper software:
Format: H.264 Video(*.mp4)
Video settings available are:
Codec - h264
Size(pix) - original; 1280*720; 1440*1080; 1920*1080.
Bitrate(kbps) - original; 4000; 6000; 8000, 10000; 12000.
Frame Rate(fps) - original; 12; 15; 20; 23.976; 24; 25; 29.97; 30.
Audio settings available are:
Codec - aac; ac3.
Sample Rate(hz) - 22050; 32000; 44100; 48000.
Bitrate(bps) - 64000; 96000; 128000; 160000; 256000; 320000; 640000.
Channels - Mono; Stereo; 5.1 channels.
So I haven't done any converting myself, but I think I can help. Ill just go through those settings you listed and give you what i think would be the best choice.
video-
size- 1920*1080 should work since the prime can handle hd
Bitrate - not sure on this one I would imagine that you could go pretty high like 8000-1000
frame rate- 30
Audio-
codec - aac
sampe rate - 44100
bitrate - (idk on this I think anything is fine) 256000
channels- doesn't really matter the prime will only play mono from its own speaker, but if you hook it up it might be able to do more so maybe 5.1 or else stereo
Hope this helps
If you have a large collection of blu-rays that you want on the Prime, then storage space may become an issue, even if you get a micro-SD card. You could try the suggestions made by cmat1120 and see how many GB a single movie takes up. That will help you determine how many movies you'll be able to store on your Prime.
If you plan on watching movies with headphones, I'd recommend going with a stereo audio output. I don't know if 5.1 will do you any good because I don't think that surround sound gets passed through the HDMI port (I haven't been able to get it to work, anyway), and the extra audio channels won't improve headphone quality.
I also recommend going with original frame rate. I don't see a need to change it, and I especially don't see any reason to increase it above the original. That won't magically give you extra frames that don't exist in the first place.
If you're aiming for 1080p HD, then it is 1920 x 1080 with 24 fps. That's where I would start, and I'd adjust the bitrate depending on how much storage space I want to use per movie; a higher bitrate will take up more storage space but will have better quality.
After thinking about it some more, I am changing a recommendation - go with 1280 x 720 resolution. The Prime's display is 1280 x 800, and some of those 800 pixels are dedicated to the bar at the bottom of the screen. The Prime cannot display 1080p on its own screen. If you rip your movies at 1920 x 1080, the Prime will scale it down to 1280 x 720 when it displays it. I don't even think it can display 1080 through HDMI; only 720. Shrinking the movies down to 720 when you decode them will spare you a chunk of storage.
jkvato said:
After thinking about it some more, I am changing a recommendation - go with 1280 x 720 resolution. The Prime's display is 1280 x 800, and some of those 800 pixels are dedicated to the bar at the bottom of the screen. The Prime cannot display 1080p on its own screen. If you rip your movies at 1920 x 1080, the Prime will scale it down to 1280 x 720 when it displays it. I don't even think it can display 1080 through HDMI; only 720. Shrinking the movies down to 720 when you decode them will spare you a chunk of storage.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It can display 1080 via HDMI, assuming your content is 1080 of course. I'd still go with 720 though.. Personally I can barely tell the difference between 1080 vs 720 up-close.. I have trouble distinguishing the two from 8-10 feet away, and the TFP will only display 720 if you're watching on the tablet.
.mkv 720p
although 1080p isn't a problem either, with dice player you just resize it to fill your screen
and bitrate above 160 if you hear the difference on this device I want your ears
Thank you all very much for your inputs here! Really appreciate.
I've tested with the 1080P settings that cmat1120 suggested to convert my Transformers BD of 2hrs 23min. Guess what? The generated MP4 file is 10.28GB! Although the file played flawlessly with surprisingly good quality on my big computer screen, the huge file size made my Transformers Prime tablet a little it bit hard to cope with.
The 1080P settings generates too huge file. In this way my tablet will only be able to store 2 or 3 movies.
I've also tried to use ac3 5.1 audio settings, but the converted file played without sound on TF201. I think ac3 5.1 makes no sense for Transformer Prime as it will only to be able to produce stereo sound.
I then tried with the 1280*720 settings and the generated file is more acceptable with good quality on TF201. The final file is only 4.14GB. This way my tablet will be able to hold about 6 or 7 movies.
The detailed settings I used as below:
Format: H.264 HD Video(*.mp4)
Video settings:
Codec - h264
Size(pix) - 1280*720
Bitrate(kbps) - 4000
Frame Rate(fps) - 24
Audio settings:
Codec - aac
Sample Rate(hz) - 44100
Bitrate(bps) - 128000
Channels - stereo
The 720P settings also converts faster in the Aunsoft Blu-ray Ripper. So I think I will use the above settings for my future conversion.
But if there's any way to make the final size decreases to 2GB around while still keeping the good quality...
Thanks again cmat1120, jkvato, namebrandon and Hawkysoft !
I use DVD Catalyst. It is the best ripping software I've found. It has a bunch of pre-sets for many devices including the Prime. These pre-sets are also set-up for whatever resolution you are looking for from SD to Blue-Ray. This program also has the capability to remove the black bars from certin aspect ratio's. I personaly have not ripped any Blue-Rays but there is a pre-set for HD.
The people who make DVD Catalyst are great at answering e-mail for any problem or question you have. They usually answer within a few hours.
Highly recommended
http://www.tools4movies.com/
I use DVD Catalyst as well, and it's a pretty good program. The downside is that in order to rip blu-rays you also need to buy additional software to decrypt the blu-ray, such as Any DVD HD or DVDfab Passkey for Bluray.
I used DVD Fab HD Decrypter to rip the Bluray to hdd then Handbrake to encode to .mp4 (use the ipad preset). Resulting file size has been fairly small. Puss In Boots.mp4 was < 1G. Other movies have been approx 2G or less.
It's not a one-step solution but both apps are free and both apps work on Linux as well as Windows.
THANK YOU FOR MORE INPUTS HERE!
I find Handbrake is very useful to reduce the file size while keeping relatively good quality.
The generated MP4 file from Aunsoft Blu-ray Ripper using the 1080P settings is around 10GB. After using Handbrake to convert again to the iPad format it is now reduced to 1.3GB. Great
The 1.3GB file is now in the .m4v format with resolution 1024*464. It played fairly well on my Transformer Prime and much better on my sister's iPad 2
Also I find if you reduce in Aunsoft Blu-ray Ripper the video bitrate(kbps) value to 2000 the generated H264 MP4 file can be even smaller! At 4000kbps it is 4.14GB, but with 2000kbps it is only 2.14GB and the video quality is still quite good. Surprise
So it seems the video bit rate is the main factor deciding the final file's size.
captain0403 said:
THANK YOU FOR MORE INPUTS HERE!
I find Handbrake is very useful to reduce the file size while keeping relatively good quality.
The generated MP4 file from Aunsoft Blu-ray Ripper using the 1080P settings is around 10GB. After using Handbrake to convert again to the iPad format it is now reduced to 1.3GB. Great
The 1.3GB file is now in the .m4v format with resolution 1024*464. It played fairly well on my Transformer Prime and much better on my sister's iPad 2
Also I find if you reduce in Aunsoft Blu-ray Ripper the video bitrate(kbps) value to 2000 the generated H264 MP4 file can be even smaller! At 4000kbps it is 4.14GB, but with 2000kbps it is only 2.14GB and the video quality is still quite good. Surprise
So it seems the video bit rate is the main factor deciding the final file's size.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
now try to compress it to mpv, 720p and tell me the output ;-p
720p is better than 1080p for the prime, also reduces size, although 1080p isn't a problem either for me.
p.s. the movies i watch are roughly between 4 and 7GB
Series at the otherhand are mostly between 1.5 and 2.5GB makes sense cuz of the time huh?
p.s. i checked the program you use, and it should support mpv compression as well
"now try to compress it to mpv, 720p and tell me the output ;-p"
Thank you Hawkysoft!
Did you mean the MKV format?
I could not find the MPV output format in Aunsoft Blu-ray Ripper
captain0403 said:
"now try to compress it to mpv, 720p and tell me the output ;-p"
Thank you Hawkysoft!
Did you mean the MKV format?
I could not find the MPV output format in Aunsoft Blu-ray Ripper
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ah yes sorry... thats what i ment yea
I just tested with the MKV 720P settings from Aunsoft Blu-ray Ripper and the generated MKV is only 1.52GB! Fairly good size and quality for my Transformer Prime. But my sister's iPad 2 did not even accept the MKV file. You see, my Transformer tablet is better than iPad
The Blu-ray movie I converted with is Toy Story 3 of 1hr 43min long. With the program's CUDA acceleration the conversion only took 56 minutes. Very good!
The detailed settings I used are:
Format: MKV HD Video(*.mkv)
Video settings:
Codec - h264
Size(pix) - 1280*720
Bitrate(kbps) - 2000
Frame Rate(fps) - 24
Audio settings:
Codec - aac
Sample Rate(hz) - 44100
Bitrate(bps) - 128000
Channels - stereo

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