h.264 mp4 to avi or divx to play on stanalone

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bertybath
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Post by bertybath » Fri Jan 09, 2009 11:59 pm

sorry i see what you mean that if i was encoding a 4.3 picture it would look all wrong on the screen if i fill it up - so im guessing that 4.3 would look better with borders - the reason im trying to fill it on widescreen is when put original xvid files into player it auto seems to fill to full screen but when ive encoded the h.264 it always played in the letterbox ?

by the way thanks for your time and patience

kind regards

bertybath
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Location: united kingdom

Post by bertybath » Sat Jan 10, 2009 12:19 am

last question lol

is there a preferred audio type to use as i know in-built speakers on lcd tvs are not the best but my encodes always sound very tinny - what method gives the best sound ?

thanks

ladycoder
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Post by ladycoder » Sat Jan 10, 2009 9:02 am

I suppose if the H264 files have an AR larger than the screen, the player would shrink the image to fit more of the picture, and that could seem to be letterboxed.


I am really not sure what the problem is if the files play and the people look in proportion.

Where do these original Xvids come from. Can you post the stats of one?

I use mp3 and ac3 audio; do not change the sampling rate as this can lead to distortion.

Try VBR, ABR and CBR mp3s and see if one sounds better. Also, there are more than one type of mp3 encoder - see poll.

fwupow
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Re: h.264 mp4 to avi or divx to play on stanalone

Post by fwupow » Fri Oct 16, 2009 2:50 pm

I also use Philips stand-alone DVD players. One is video system component and one is portable. Both have USB input so any FAT32 formatted drive can be hooked to them.

My portable unit has a 10.2" diagonal, 800x480 native resolution screen. I encode my videos to 720x480 using DivX Home Theater profile.

800x480 native resolution is 800 divided by 480 or 1.67 horizontal pixels for every 1 vertical pixel. So this DVD player is not exactly 16:9 by resolution but the physical dimensions are what matters and the actual size of the display is about 8.7" x 5.3" or 1.64:1. OK, so my portable DVD player is a fraud and not 16:9 at all. The pixels are apparently square or very close to it.

If the movie is an extra-wide (1.85:1 or 2.39:1), I leave the black bars/letterboxing on top and bottom. Cropping them would stretch the video vertically and make people and objects look abnormal. For instance a Stargate would look like a vertically stretched oval instead of the round circle that it actually is.

16:9 is 1.78 horizontal pixels for every 1 vertical pixel or 1.78:1.

Standard Definition DVDs are encoded with 720x480 resolution. This is 1.5 horizontal pixels for every 1 vertical pixel or 1.5:1 or 3:2, but your DVD player or TV will squish the video back down to 16:9.

16:9 is actually 720x404 or 854x480.

A 720p HD LCD TV has a resolution of 1280x720. 1280/720 = 1.78, which is 16:9 or 1.78:1
A 1080i/p HD TV should have a native resolution of, at least, 1920x1080 which is also 16:9 or 1.78:1, although some advertised 1080 HD TVs are fraudulent and actually have a lower native resolution to which the incoming 1080p signal is down-converted to.

Many movies have a 1.85:1 or 2.39:1 aspect ratio and so may be letter-boxed on the DVD, which totally sucks for playing on the standard 16:9 widescreen TV.

If the source file is 4:3 aspect ratio/"Full-Screen", I size the video to 540x480 and letterbox it out to 720x480. 540x480/1.125 doesn't sound right (not 4:3/1.33), but remember, my portable DVD player is 800x480 so it'll get stretched out horizontally enough to look pretty normal, and when fed to my my 720p HD TV, it'll get upconverted/resized to a 16:9 aspect on that as well.

Ideally, you want your video resolution to match the native resolution of your display for best quality.

I've gotta take some aspirin now.

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