Verbatim 8x dvd+r dl a buck ea

[MilesAhead]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817130040&cm_re=verbatim_dvd%2br_dl-_-17-130-040-_-Product

$30 for a 30 pack of 8x dvd+r dl

[sajman99]

Thanks for telling. That's a good deal for quality dl I suppose.

Though I have to say, I'm such a cheapskate that if I produced a coaster I'd still really be depressed. 

[Deozaan]

I bought a 3-pack of DVD+R DL a few years ago for $15. They were so expensive that I've never used them for fear of making a coaster.

Now I can get 10 times as many DVD+R DLs for 2 times as much money. Really good deal!

Except these days I don't know what I'd use a DL DVD for.

[MilesAhead]

I bought a 3-pack of DVD+R DL a few years ago for $15. They were so expensive that I've never used them for fear of making a coaster.

Now I can get 10 times as many DVD+R DLs for 2 times as much money. Really good deal!

Except these days I don't know what I'd use a DL DVD for.

Yeah, x264 kinda' changes the game. A month or so ago I would probably have purchased at least 2 of those packs at that price.  I didn't even buy one.

[Deozaan]

What is x264?

[MilesAhead]

What is x264?

That's an encoder that produces better quality than divx/xvid or dvd with a lower bit rate. Even the company that does divx is giving up on divx format.  Their new "divx plus" is .mkv using 264 encoding. Here's a link to the encoder these programs are using:

http://www.videohelp.com/tools/x264_Encoder

[Deozaan]

I'd heard of h264, but not x264. Thanks for letting me know.

[MilesAhead]

I'd heard of h264, but not x264. Thanks for letting me know.

I guess one is the standard and the other is the encoder program itself. I'm no video expert.  Reading what "pull-down" is makes me dizzy. 

[Deozaan]

Yeah, x264 kinda' changes the game.

Hmm. . . You make it seem like x264 is really good quality with good compression/small file size. But I'm using one of the x264 programs to convert a 650MB AVI to MP4 and the program says it will be 1.4GB.

[cthorpe]

Can get Memorex DL off of NewEgg for $30 for 50 discs: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817501023

[MilesAhead]

Yeah, x264 kinda' changes the game.

Hmm. . . You make it seem like x264 is really good quality with good compression/small file size. But I'm using one of the x264 programs to convert a 650MB AVI to MP4 and the program says it will be 1.4GB.

I'm no expert on x264. I use programs that use it.  But is perhaps the .avi standard def while the .mp4 is 1080P or 720P? Are you sizing up? If so, you're going to use more bits.

[MilesAhead]

Can get Memorex DL off of NewEgg for $30 for 50 discs: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817501023

Have you used Memorex DL?  I haven't. I don't know a cheap way to try them. If I buy a 5 pack in brick & mortar store it will prolly cost me $19 to find out if they work in my burners.

[Deozaan]

Yeah, x264 kinda' changes the game.

Hmm. . . You make it seem like x264 is really good quality with good compression/small file size. But I'm using one of the x264 programs to convert a 650MB AVI to MP4 and the program says it will be 1.4GB.

I'm no expert on x264. I use programs that use it.  But is perhaps the .avi standard def while the .mp4 is 1080P or 720P? Are you sizing up? If so, you're going to use more bits.

Turns out it was actually 2.34GB when it finished converting, but you bring up a good point I hadn't thought about.

But I just checked and the AVI was 720x480 and so is the MP4. So no, it didn't upscale. I didn't customize any settings, I just picked the preset to convert to play on the PS3. What's worse is that I spent all those hours converting the video and the PS3 doesn't even seem to recognize the file. . .

[MilesAhead]

Yeah, x264 kinda' changes the game.

Hmm. . . You make it seem like x264 is really good quality with good compression/small file size. But I'm using one of the x264 programs to convert a 650MB AVI to MP4 and the program says it will be 1.4GB.

I'm no expert on x264. I use programs that use it.  But is perhaps the .avi standard def while the .mp4 is 1080P or 720P? Are you sizing up? If so, you're going to use more bits.

Turns out it was actually 2.34GB when it finished converting, but you bring up a good point I hadn't thought about.

But I just checked and the AVI was 720x480 and so is the MP4. So no, it didn't upscale. I didn't customize any settings, I just picked the preset to convert to play on the PS3. What's worse is that I spent all those hours converting the video and the PS3 doesn't even seem to recognize the file. . .

Don't know what to tell you. I don't have ps3.  I have WD HDTV for USB.  I use BD Rebuilder mostly.  Sometimes I use Quick AVI Creator as it does both xvid and x264. For more control a bit rate calculator comes in handy.  For tools like bit rate calculators I look first on videohelp.com

since it has great search tools for video, audio, subtitle and other tools:

http://www.videohelp.com/tools

Also the biggest determining factor I've found is the quality of the source.  If you have a BluRay video with rich colors you can get a great quality DVD9 using HC encode, or a great quality .m2ts file using BD Rebuilder.  HC enc takes longer as you really need to use 2 pass "best" profile, but it has the advantage you can play it on an upscaling DVD player and get output very close to the original.  BD Rebuilder you need a compatible set top box or BluRay player.

[Deozaan]

The only BluRay player I have is a PS3. I'm trying to find something that will convert videos to play on it. I don't care so much about HD (since I can't rip BluRay videos from my PS3) but I do have a number of miscellaneous videos (not movies) on my PC that I would like to be able to copy over and play on my PS3 on the TV.

Thanks for your help. I'll keep looking.

Back on topic: That sure is a nice price for DL DVDs

[MilesAhead]

@Deozaan on the ps3 you might try
http://forum.digital-digest.com/

and flag your question attn: Admin and/or Blutach.  Those guys have been doing video stuff for years before I got into it. If I don't have the particular hw to mess with I can't do trial and error(er, I mean scientific experimentation) to figure it out.

[sajman99]

@Deozaan:

I also don't have PS3 so I can't give a personal recommendation on what works well in that regard.

However, I will say that recently I've read favorable comments on iWisoft Free Video Converter and Hamster Free Video Converter. Both of these video converters support a wide range of formats and devices.

Regards

[Deozaan]

@Deozaan on the ps3 you might try
http://forum.digital-digest.com/

and flag your question attn: Admin and/or Blutach.  Those guys have been doing video stuff for years before I got into it. If I don't have the particular hw to mess with I can't do trial and error(er, I mean scientific experimentation) to figure it out.

I found this guide while navigating to the proper area of the forum to ask the question: PS3 H.264 Conversion Guide.

Important: There are actually three methods to get H.264 playback going on the PS3. One is to use MP4, but this means its limited to AAC audio and that unless you have an AAC decoding receiver, you will not get 5.1 audio. The second method first makes a MKV (instead of MP4) file with AC3 (instead of AAC) 5.1 audio, and then using the mkv2vob utility to convert that to a VOB/MPG file. This strange VOB/MPG file (normally they have MPEG-2 video, not H.264 video) will actually play on the PS3, and the advantage is that it can have AC3 or even DTS 5.1 audio and so you get to enjoy 5.1 audio easily. Unfortunately, this type of video file will not allowing seeking. The third method uses newly available tools to create a M2TS transport stream, which will allow AC3 5.1 audio and seeking (but only forward seeking, apparently). The instructions are common for all 3 methods until a certain point the guide (which will contain more information on the 3 methods), where you will then have to choose one of the methods.

I'll give it a try and report back (but it might be a day or two for the conversion process to complete). I think I'll stick with MP4 because it sounds like a lot of extra work (and time!) converting to mkv and then vob and besides all that I don't have a receiver. I just have my TV's speakers.

I also don't have PS3 so I can't give a personal recommendation on what works well in that regard.

However, I will say that recently I've read favorable comments on iWisoft Free Video Converter and Hamster Free Video Converter. Both of these video converters support a wide range of formats and devices.

I appreciate the help, but I'm just so tired of spending hours and sometimes days converting a video before I know it works. I think I'll stick with the guide mentioned above for now and if I get really desperate maybe I'll give these a try.

Thanks again, to both of you.

[MilesAhead]

btw looks like this deal ran out.  It's back up to $39.99.

[4wd]

I found this guide while navigating to the proper area of the forum to ask the question: PS3 H.264 Conversion Guide.

You might like to give HandBrake a try with the following two presets for AAC stereo or 6 channel - I made the presets using info from the forum from users who reported what worked.

Copy the user_presets.xml to %appdata%\HandBrake - when you run HandBrake it will have two presets called PS3 AAC 6Chan and PS3 Stereo.

NOTE: Choose the preset before loading a video file and make sure that Create Chapter Markers under the Chapters tab is unticked.



I was actually quite amazed at the speed at which the H.264 encoding went, on my Phenom II 945: 349MB MP4ASP+MP3 stereo AVI -> 227MB MP4AVC+AAC Stereo MP4 in ~10 minutes.

[Deozaan]

Thanks for the info and presets, 4wd.

So I found out that I made a mistake. Apparently for the PS3 to recognize video files on an external USB drive, it has to be in a specific folder. So I spent all those hours converting a video using XviD4PSP and then deleted the file when I couldn't get it to work. And it probably would have if I had just put it in the right directory on the USB drive.

Also, I recently used DVD Ripper Platinum to rip a DVD to the PS3 using a preset. It worked on that over the course of 3 days (but probably took less than 48 hours, if that makes sense) and split the movie into 3 different files (maxing out at 4GB due to PS3's fat32 limitation). Turns out it thought it was a good idea to change the resolution to 1080p when ripping from a DVD (which is 480p IIRC).

I'm just having all sorts of bad luck with this stuff.   Too bad it seems to be a result of user error.

[MilesAhead]

If you want to give another try using x264 I would do a run with Quick AVI Creator. It has the virtue that it does not try to resize the frame unless you explicity put a resize filter in the script.  If the input is 720x480 that will be the size of the output. Only tricky parts with x264 is it tends to use a very low bit rate.  I just substituted 4000 and then made adjustments as I experimented with various inputs.  For .avi input to .mkv output it should work fine.

As you can see by the page, it's pretty versatile afa input formats accepted:

http://download.videohelp.com/QuickAVICreator/index.html

Plus the author is good about answering questions:

http://forum.videohelp.com/threads/289721-Quick-AVI-Creator?p=1989965