[mythtv-users] Transcoding ripped DVDs

[David Brodbeck]

On Wed, February 18, 2009 7:00 am, Jon Bishop wrote:
> you're going to have to transcode something and see if it's
> good enough, or not. Only you are going to be able to decide where to
> go from there. More bitrate=bigger files.

Yup.

You can save some time by finding something short that's representative of
the stuff you watch -- say, a trailer with similar quality, action,
lighting, etc. Transcode it with various settings and then watch the
results.  This lets you "audition" different settings without waiting for
a whole movie to finish.

The settings you come up with may not work for *everything* you transcode
but they'll give you a good starting point.

When transcoding DVDs to watch on my standard-definition TV I usually use
mpeg4 video compression at about 1800 kbps.  I do two-pass average bitrate
compression.  I copy the audio from the DVD as-is instead of transcoding
it; this leaves all the surround-sound stuff intact, and transcoding the
audio doesn't save much space anyway -- the audio on DVDs is already
compressed.