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View Full Version : CBR or VBR?

wopster
13th July 2006, 15:16
Do you recommend constant or variable bitrates for converting my AVI captures to M2V? Which one is better in terms of quality and time?
Awatef
13th July 2006, 17:33
You definitely should use 2-pass VBR, since this increases quality significantly (at the expense of the double encoding time).
You could try CCE by the way, it is very fast and achieves the best quality among all MPEG-2 encoders.
wopster
13th July 2006, 17:37
You definitely should use 2-pass VBR, since this increases quality significantly (at the expense of the double encoding time).
You could try CCE by the way, it is very fast and achieves the best quality among all MPEG-2 encoders.


Thanks Awatef! I actually just downloaded CCE SP 2.7 for use with DVD Rebuilder (A DVD I created was a bit too large).

Thanks
Blue_MiSfit
28th July 2006, 01:07
90% of the time VBR is the way to go. However, some devices only play nice with CBR. For example, streaming video is generally CBR, given the limited data rates of most internet connections.

Some specialized playback devices, like the Focus Mantis, which is a box that runs over ethernet or an internal hard drive and can drive up to 16 NTSC/PAL monitors, or DVI/VGA monitors in up to 1080p on each monitor!! It's a badass box, but it doesn't like VBR very much, especially with HD. We get best results piping it 25Mbps CBR MPEG-2 for SD and 60Mbps CBR MPEG-2 for HD.

Anyway, its unlikely that you are using such a device. I just thought I'd mention that VBR is not the be all end all solution. If you're just archiving stuff for personal viewing on your PC it's for sure the only way to go. CBR is just so wasteful... :)