MPEG2 vs. Xvid

[mcsj]

Okay... This is not scientific at all, and I should mentioned that I have no intention to make illegal copies of copyrighted material...

I tooked a "Friends" DVD, ripped an episode (28:39, or 1719 seconds @ 480i) off the disc, and now I have a 1.17GB of VOB file, that is, about 5.8Mbps (including 640Kbps of audio)

Then I encoded it with Xvid 1.0.1 at 1800Kbps (640Kbps audio unmodified + 1160Kbps of video @ 640x480), resulting a roughly 387MB avi file.

That's a 68% reduction of file size! And viewing it using a digital video projector (@ 640 x 480, projected on a screen with diagonal image width of about 7 feet), those 2 videos look almost exactly the same to me.

Makes me wonder, if D* or E* ever switch to MPEG4, how much more channels can they put in without adding any satellite bandwidth...

 

[Wayd Wolf]

MPEG-4 is more intense to process than MPEG-2 so it hasn't been until around oh, now, that chipsets to handle it have started becoming really availible in a meaningful way and they still aren't inexpensive enough to stuff digital cable and satellite boxes with them.

Not that they don't exist and aren't on the horizon, but it isn't going to happen tomorrow with MPEG-2 with its proven specs and characteristics and firm entrenchment.

BTW, did I forget to mention MPEG-4 is a very cranky codec when it comes to bit errors? Ever have a very slightly corrupted DiVX AVI file? You should get the picture right there. MPEG-2 on the other hand is more robust. And people whose dishes are looking through a few branches, or not pinpoint aimed, or wired with bad coax who are just keeping service intact now don't need an MPEG-4 feed that will fail without perfect conditions.

 

[Neutron]

What do you think of WM9?

 

[Wayd Wolf]

What do you think of WM9?

To answer with another question, what do you think the world would think of using a Microsoft codec for streaming DBS and cable video?

It's self-answering, really.

Technically, WM9 is even less understood by less people than MPEG-4 is compared to MPEG-2. Need we make it worse?

I know there's those who would like it based on it offering somewhat better compression, and the content fee free charge(encoder/decoder charges are something like ten cents or better LESS than those for MPEG-4), but Microsoft can't even keep Windows Media working on my XP box so like I'm going to think this would a good thing. Uh-huh. Sure.

When Microsoft can write a version of Windows Media Player that doesn't require ten dozen codecs from two dozen web sites like VideoLan VLC, doesn't seem to randomly reconfigure itself to not be compatible with its own core media(I haven't been able to view ASF/WMV files for almost a year now in WMP, but can with VLC), and doesn't intrude on my privacy every chance it gets, then Microsoft should take up writing a codec. But right now, they can't even make it work with their own player consistantly.