Database Users

Encoding video for the Epic

How should I encode HD videos for my Epic? I'm starting with 1080p ultra-high bitrate.
Should I encode the video to match the Epic's resolution 800x480, or stick with some even fraction of 1920x1080, like 960x540 and let the Epic scale it to the screen?
What's the maximum bitrate the Epic is able to handle? What's a good codec to use?

Bump 10char

did you ever get an answer to this, I need to find this out too.

Assuming you are wanting to encode from bluray I follow this method. should work with most video files I would think.
http://www.knowyourcell.com/samsung/samsung-epic-4g/epic-4g-guides/526581/how_to_convert_videos_and_transfer_them_to_the_samsung_epic_4g.html
I have made high quality full length movies from both bluray and dvd around 1gb in size. and they play and look great.
Edit: I normally "rip" the movie only files to hd and mount em as an iso rather than from disk.. Not sure if I can name the "sly" software I use to do so as it sits in the grey area between legal and not

I use handbrake and encode to 800x400. The advantage is most films can be reduced to 1 to 2 GB depending on source. Sometimes I crop sides a bit if original is 2.35. I playback on epic with mvideoplayer. For some reason, sometimes mvideoplayer sometimes does not do mkv embedded subtitles well but there is an mkv subtitle extractor android app.

Ok 2 things to note...
1) if you keep your SD card as Fat you gotta break up the video if its too large filesize. I think 4gb is it..
2) Realistically speaking our phones have the processing power to play 1080p but its locked ...so you'll have to re-encode them to less until someone figures it out...I would keep the aspect ratio the same though..so if your dealing with 16:9 1080p..make it 16:9 720p...if you change the aspect ratio it will make the video stretch...

I think you mean Transcode, not encode. Typically most recording devices encode at the source, because storing raw video in HD has a high capacity and performance requirement.
These are the formats I've played with:
DivX, XviD, MPEG4, WMV, MKV
I've liked MKV in general.

And what about Movies?

Hi,
just wanne know wich formats the device play surely?
I know that it will play .mkv with h.264 anf 1080p .....
but and thats a very very big but....
Whats about watching full movies?
The Tab only supports FAT32 and files over 2GB are not supportet, how does this fit together ? Doesnt make any sense to me.
What about you?

Tried a little and as you say, large files can´t be added.
But 720p mkv works flawlessly.

For one thing its 4gb, not 2. And this still leaves you with a lot a hd files to watch. If something doesnt work, try vplayer alpha.

Played everything I threw at it so far. I use vplayer and the video app (the video app can play most filetypes and I use it whenever possible, its quite nice).
I tried mkv, divx, mp4 (h264 / h263), wmv and flv. So you are pretty set with these two apps when it comes to videos. vplayer had sync problems with 720p but the samsung app played it flawless.

shaggles said:
Played everything I threw at it so far. I use vplayer and the video app (the video app can play most filetypes and I use it whenever possible, its quite nice).
I tried mkv, divx, mp4 (h264 / h263), wmv and flv. So you are pretty set with these two apps when it comes to videos. vplayer had sync problems with 720p but the samsung app played it flawless.
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Its not about the player but about the filesystem wich cant handle murch more than 4 gig files

NightFire123 said:
Its not about the player but about the filesystem wich cant handle murch more than 4 gig files
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Click to collapse
The standard user-accessible filesystem pretty much ANY device will be formatted as FAT32 which has a 4GB filesize limit. This is not a limitation of the Tab, but of virtually ALL devices that support external memory.
The expectation of being able to play almost blu-ray quality movies on a 7" screen is a bit unrealistic. It's only 1024x600 so anything beyond 720p is a complete waste of time, as is bitrates much beyond 1000kbps if you're using H.264 compression, as the difference is hardly going to be noticable on such a small display. The average movie encoded to a circa 1GB H.264'd MKV file will likely be virtually indistinguishable from its source when played on the GT, unless you've got visions of playing it back through an HDMI dock.
Besides, why have 4 4GB movies, when you can have 16 1GB movies to watch?
VPlayer will happily play pretty much anything at up to 2000kbps that I've told it to which is higher than I'd usually encode at unless it's for archival purposes. It does have audio sync issues with some high bitrate sources. You could also try Rockplayer.
The standard video player will handle pretty much any MPEG4 derived file that you can throw at it. (Divx, XVid, etc) and has no issue with 720p (1280x720) sources. Beyond that, you'll want to try VPlayer, MPlayer or Rockplayer etc.
Don't expect it to handle high-bitrate 1080p H264 videos very well, it's only a 1Ghz CPU after all and H.264 takes a lot of processing power to decode. You might get away with it if encoding with Xvid, but again, 1080p over 720p is going to be a waste of space on the 1024x600 display. If you want to output to a TV then you might get benefit from it, but it's a bit convoluted. If it's fairly low bitrate and/or a lesser codec than H.264, then you might have better success.

The GPS takes care of hi-def video playback, and while 1080p is pretty useless on the device. If you already have the video in 1080p format, it's pretty nice to be able to play it without converting it. And when the HDMI dock arrives, 1080p playback on tv is useful.

dhanjel said:
The GPS takes care of hi-def video playback
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the what with the what what?

If I got say a 32GB sdcard. Could I format that as ext3 and store files bigger than 4GB on there? Would I be able to easily access the files from the various apps?

Like others have said 720p MKV/MP4 will play fine with H.264/x.264 video tucked inside. To use the allshare app easily, use MP4 files as Windows Media Sharing will see those and stream them out via DLNA.
My reasoning is as follows:
1 - Screen is only 1024x600 so 720p is all you need (1080p content is just overkill here). Even regular old DVD rips look great.
2 - Only has two speakers, repack your MKV into an MP4 with the audio converted to 2ch AAC LC with your H.264 video. This is the same format used for the XBox 360 as well. Basically if you can watch it on your 360 (no hacks) then you can stream it with allshare.
I follow these "rules" and stream everything from my sabnzb homeserver no problem.

[Q] Xoom HD playback capability

There are a lot of MP4 video clips that I cannot get to play on Xoom smoothly but they play back really well on my HTC Desire.
On Xoom the video is laggy while the audio is audible. This happened to both 720p and 480p videos. I used both the default player and Moboplayer to ensure I am using the hardware acceleration.
Strangely on my Xoom the Moboplayer can soft-decode 480p MP4 with ffmpeg and playback without any problem. 720 is smoother but the decoding was too slow which resulted in A-V async.
Again, all those clips play really well on my HTC Desire. Tegra 2 should be able to handle them.
Anyone knows anything?

Please search the forum before asking questions. This has been asnswered.
The problem you're having is to do with the clips using high profile encoding.

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=968640&highlight=video
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=968308&highlight=video
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=972812&highlight=video
There's lots more. All I can say is, learn to love Handbrake and be prepared to have your computer running all night every night if you ever want to watch HD movies on this thing.

I dont agree; I have transcoded 2 blue rays, hellboy and start trek 2009 in about an hour each, using my imac and handbreak
Oh, and download Vitalplayer from the market for the best hd video playback..

wase4711 said:
I dont agree; I have transcoded 2 blue rays, hellboy and start trek 2009 in about an hour each, using my imac and handbreak
Oh, and download Vitalplayer from the market for the best hd video playback..
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Yeah, well, I don't agree.
I converted 2 720p mkv 90 minute movies and a 40 minute 720p mkv TV show last night and it took 6 hours. This was done on an Intel Core 2 duo P750 2.26GHz
Not everyone has the same hardware. I suppose I could run out and buy an i5 or i7 for the sole purpose of encoding video for the XOOM.
Maybe Motorola can partner with a PC company. How about 20% off a new laptop when you buy a XOOM that way you will be able to take advantage of its HD video capability in 2 hours instead of six.

Digital Man said:
Yeah, well, I don't agree.
I converted 2 720p mkv 90 minute movies and a 40 minute 720p mkv TV show last night and it took 6 hours. This was done on an Intel Core 2 duo P750 2.26GHz
Not everyone has the same hardware. I suppose I could run out and buy an i5 or i7 for the sole purpose of encoding video for the XOOM.
Maybe Motorola can partner with a PC company. How about 20% off a new laptop when you buy a XOOM that way you will be able to take advantage of its HD video capability in 2 hours instead of six.
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It all depends on your settings, and keep in mind that the imac is going to have similar hardware to your machine. The recommendation is to set max width to 1280, set B Frames to 0, turn off CABAC, 8x8 Transform, and Weighted P frames. If you do that, you'll find fairly consistent encoding times even with older hardware. Also, keep in mind that encoding is entirely processor bound and will do better the more cores you can throw at it.

mcnutty said:
It all depends on your settings, and keep in mind that the imac is going to have similar hardware to your machine. The recommendation is to set max width to 1280, set B Frames to 0, turn off CABAC, 8x8 Transform, and Weighted P frames. If you do that, you'll find fairly consistent encoding times even with older hardware. Also, keep in mind that encoding is entirely processor bound and will do better the more cores you can throw at it.
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Been there done that. There are no shortcuts. Good quality takes time or more cores. Or harness the GPU ie CUDA but that causes horrendous macroblocking in bright scenes.
No matter how you sugar coat it, re-encoding video is a time consuming pain in the ass for most people.
I also seem to remember there are multiple versions of the imac, with variable hardware specs, from dual core up to quad core 3.6GHz - so your claim of similar hardware seems unlikely.

..........

e.mote said:
>I converted 2 720p mkv 90 minute movies and a 40 minute 720p mkv TV show last night and it took 6 hours.
Suggest using 800 max width for substantially faster encode speed and smaller size. Quality diff is negligible on a 10".
If using 2-pass, switch to 1-pass for both faster encode time AND better quality.
Unfortunately, HB doesn't provide x264's speed presets. You can gain additional speed (at cost of some nominal size increase) with the faster presets. Hmm, I should update my HB script to allow "downloadables" as input.
>The recommendation is to set max width to 1280, set B Frames to 0, turn off CABAC, 8x8 Transform, and Weighted P frames. If you do that, you'll find fairly consistent encoding times even with older hardware.
Encoding to baseline profile (what the above basically means) gains speed by disabling more advanced "compression" features. The trade-off is significant size increase, about +30% vs high profile.
Using a lower res allows more efficient settings. At 800 width, you can use main profile. Speed diff between main & baseline is insignificant. Speed gain for the lower res is substantial.
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I appreciate that your trying to help, but those are the settings that I have been using already: 1280, set B Frames to 0, turn off CABAC, turn off 8x8 Transform, and turn off Weighted P frames....
and it is still taking well over 3 hours to re-encode a 1:30 movie.
I understand that lowering the resolution will decrease the encoding time, but I consider that a last resort compromise. In fact I would consider that basically a failure of the XOOM.
I have considered buying an i5 or i7, but I feel stupid buying a new laptop for the sole purpose of encoding for the XOOM, when I could just pick up my Galaxy Tab and just play these videos immediately. No encoding. Just copy them over and play.

I am quite sure those videos are not high profile. Their bitrates were around 2M, way below 20M.
And, as I said, I can even do soft-decode to play the 480ps which does not play well with hard-decoding.
480ps, man. 480ps. Stunning.

e.mote said:
Last edited by e.mote; Today at 10:19 PM. Reason: reply removed, as recipient can't read
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Your sarcasm needs work. It lacks creativity. And removing the original post is just immature.

Digital Man said:
Your sarcasm needs work. It lacks creativity. And removing the original post is just immature.
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I don't really care about the encoding stage, I have an i7-950 which encodes a blu-ray in handbreak in well under an hour.
What I'd like to know, is are the codecs really this lacking, and will we see a solution?
I, like the OP have a HTC Desire and I could be devastated to find the XOOM can't handle the videos my Desire can.
Does it natively support mkv? I like to watch TV episodes in mkv like the 86MB Big Bang Theory episodes.
All my non-TV stuff I rip myself so I'm not concerned. Other than the DRM wmv I buy. Which play back fine on my galaxy tab.

alias_neo said:
I don't really care about the encoding stage, I have an i7-950 which encodes a blu-ray in handbreak in well under an hour.
What I'd like to know, is are the codecs really this lacking, and will we see a solution?
I, like the OP have a HTC Desire and I could be devastated to find the XOOM can't handle the videos my Desire can.
Does it natively support mkv? I like to watch TV episodes in mkv like the 86MB Big Bang Theory episodes.
All my non-TV stuff I rip myself so I'm not concerned. Other than the DRM wmv I buy. Which play back fine on my galaxy tab.
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Most TV shows that are 720p mkv, and are privately enoded, and downloaded, average about 1.2 GB and will and not play. Support for MKV as a container isn't a problem, its the profile of the h264 video in the container that is the problem.
If the Video that you like to watch is only 86MB, that doesn't sound like high profile 720p. So it might play, only way to know is to try or download mediaInfo and check its properties.
Good to hear that the i7 that you have can do a blu-ray in an hour. That sounds like what I should do eventually. Wonder if an i5 will do as well. I've heard that the i7, though it has 4 physical cores, is seen as 8 due to multithreading, wheras the i5 is limited to 4.
I watched two re-encoded episodes of fringe last night, and the Video on the XOOM is really amazing. It actually is almost worth the wait.

Digital Man said:
Most TV shows that are 720p mkv, and are privately enoded, and downloaded, average about 1.2 GB and will and not play. Support for MKV as a container isn't a problem, its the profile of the h264 video in the container that is the problem.
If the Video that you like to watch is only 86MB, that doesn't sound like high profile 720p. So it might play, only way to know is to try or download mediaInfo and check its properties.
Good to hear that the i7 that you have can do a blu-ray in an hour. That sounds like what I should do eventually. Wonder if an i5 will do as well. I've heard that the i7, though it has 4 physical cores, is seen as 8 due to multithreading, wheras the i5 is limited to 4.
I watched two re-encoded episodes of fringe last night, and the Video on the XOOM is really amazing. It actually is almost worth the wait.
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That's correct, it's an 8 threaded processor, running on an Asus ROG III Gene.
As for the videos I'm watching:
Video
ID/String : 1
Format : AVC
Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec
Format_Profile : [email protected]
Format_Settings_CABAC/String : Yes
Format_Settings_RefFrames/String : 4 frames
Format_Settings_GOP : M=4, N=48
CodecID : V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC
Duration/String : 20mn 24s
BitRate/String : 465 Kbps
Width/String : 624 pixels
Height/String : 352 pixels
DisplayAspectRatio/String : 16:9
FrameRate/String : 23.976 fps
Standard : NTSC
ColorSpace : YUV
ChromaSubsampling : 4:2:0
BitDepth/String : 8 bits
ScanType/String : Progressive
Bits-(Pixel*Frame) : 0.088
StreamSize/String : 67.8 MiB (77%)
They're not 720, but they're nice enough on my Galaxy Tab. They are High Profile @ L4.0 though which I'v heard a lot of bad-mouthing about on the forum lately. I'm no expert on media codecs and frankly couldn't care as long as theyre watchable. I'd love to know I could rip my Blu-Rays at 720p and watch them on the XOOM comfortably though.

What you are posting is interesting. Its high profile, but low bit rate. Some of the early claims for the Tegra 2, which is used in the XOOM, said it actually could play high profile but only at a low bit rate, but I haven't heard it confirmed. I suspect this video will not play, but later on I will try encoding a video in a simliar manner to yours and see what happens.

Digital Man said:
What you are posting is interesting. Its high profile, but low bit rate. Some of the early claims for the Tegra 2, which is used in the XOOM, said it actually could play high profile but only at a low bit rate, but I haven't heard it confirmed. I suspect this video will not play, but later on I will try encoding a video in a simliar manner to yours and see what happens.
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Great, if you like I can dropbox the file I have and PM you the link for testing. These files playback flawlessly using the Galaxy Tab with every single player software I have tried, whether hardware or software decoding. FOr them not to play on the XOOM would be a killer.

Got your file. Sorry, it plays but with no sound. I tried RockPlayer and Moboplayer and the System Player and all play the same - silent.
The Video is actually pretty good. Smooth and very acceptable. So I guess it can technically play high profile, very low bitrate files - just not with sound. Have to Play around some more and see if I can learn anything else that might get this to play correctly or figure out what the problem is.
Edit: Actually, this is a Divx encoded file, not h264, so that is why it plays. So I am a little surprised about the lack of audio. And its only mp3 audio!!! This is really amazing. I can't believe the XOOM isn't playing this correctly. Has to be a way.
Update: Ok, success! It does play correctly in Rockplayer in software decoding mode. With sound. So it looks like you will have no problem.

Digital Man said:
Got your file. Sorry, it plays but with no sound. I tried RockPlayer and Moboplayer and the System Player and all play the same - silent.
The Video is actually pretty good. Smooth and very acceptable. So I guess it can technically play high profile, very low bitrate files - just not with sound. Have to Play around some more and see if I can learn anything else that might get this to play correctly or figure out what the problem is.
Edit: Actually, this is a Divx encoded file, not h264, so that is why it plays. So I am a little surprised about the lack of audio. And its only mp3 audio!!! This is really amazing. I can't believe the XOOM isn't playing this correctly. Has to be a way.
Update: Ok, success! It does play correctly in Rockplayer in software decoding mode. With sound. So it looks like you will have no problem.
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Interesting, if somewhat concerning that it won't play this in the standard players or with hard-decoding even though it uses mp3 audio.
How about VPlayer Advanced? I find this plays most of my videos nicely on the Tab.

Probably just lack of Divx support in hardware. Thats not a big deal, even a single core CPU of lower power can easily decode low res, low bitrate Divx. I don't consider that a flaw at all. Software decoding video like this with the XOOM's dual core A9's is trivial. Results are fine. Just need an app like RockPlayer that does it. XVID files will probably not work in hardware either.
From Motorolas website:
PLAYABLE FORMATS
AAC, H.263, H.264, MP3, MPEG-4, ACC+ Enhanced, OGG, MIDI, AMR NB, AAC+

Digital Man said:
Probably just lack of Divx support in hardware. Thats not a big deal, even a single core CPU of lower power can easily decode low res, low bitrate Divx. I don't consider that a flaw at all. Software decoding video like this with the XOOM's dual core A9's is trivial. Results are fine. Just need an app like RockPlayer that does it. XVID files will probably not work in hardware either.
From Motorolas website:
PLAYABLE FORMATS
AAC, H.263, H.264, MP3, MPEG-4, ACC+ Enhanced, OGG, MIDI, AMR NB, AAC+
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeh that's pretty fair I guess. How do you think it would manage if converted to MP4? I can do it on my 950 when I get home and send you it if you like? I'd not mind converting the whole lot if it played in the stock player.

[Q] CM7/Gingerbread Video Playback

Hi everybody. I am running Phiremod 6.2. What I really want is to be able to drop a standard definition video on the sd card, such as a divx or xvid file on the and have it play back smoothly on the nook. It seems that hardware video decryption doesn't work and that is the reason we are stuck using software decryption. What is the best video player? Even with the best video player, do you still need to re-encode the videos to lower resolution for proper playback? What format do you re-encode video to? Do we expect hardware video decryption to be accomplished by the amazing xda hackers?
Thanks!

I use Mobo player for playback. Have encoded several standard def videos from a TV series using Handbrake with the nookcolor preferences created by someone else on this forum, in H.264 format. They look and sound very good this way, except it does not fill the screen which is expected as it is standard def. Have not tried any HD content yet.

waldes said:
Hi everybody. I am running Phiremod 6.2. What I really want is to be able to drop a standard definition video on the sd card, such as a divx or xvid file on the and have it play back smoothly on the nook. It seems that hardware video decryption doesn't work and that is the reason we are stuck using software decryption. What is the best video player? Even with the best video player, do you still need to re-encode the videos to lower resolution for proper playback? What format do you re-encode video to? Do we expect hardware video decryption to be accomplished by the amazing xda hackers?
Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Isn't Phiremod just a modded CM7? CM7 suppports hardware decoding, for up to 480p files (max 854x480). Anything beyond that will be soft decoded. Anything that isn't expressly supported by Nook's "supported" video/audio formats are, afaik, also software decoded (the base player will not do this, need something like vitalplayer or rockplayer, etc.)
- If a video is just not a supported format but is 480p and under, it runs very smoothly for me in CM7 as software decoded -- you wouldn't be able to tell that it wasn't hardware accelerated.
- If a video is higher than 480p (720p, etc) or the bitrate is too high, even if it is the supported format, it will also attempt to be software decoded. My experience with this is that it's poor quality (stutters, audio desync a lot of times, etc.)
MP4 container, H.264 baseline codec for video conversion. Anamorphic loose, 854x480. AAC / MP3 (I forget what else is supported) codecs for audio, choose 44.1 khz sampling rate instead of 48khz to avoid problems. Bitrate for video and audio are up to you, but I wouldn't use the lossless setting for H.264 because you'll have issues with it playing (and will be an enormous file). You also really don't need to use it for a 7" screen. For me, video bitrate of 800 kbps (avg) is low but acceptable, 1100 for medium, 1500 is (non-HD) dvd quality. 128-160 kbps audio, your choice.
There's a lot of players out on the market, many free. I like Vital Player Neon a lot but the paid app version failed on me because of their self-copy protection. I use Moboplayer and also installed the Neon codec from the dev's website, it improved my performance noticeably on some more system-intensive videos.
As always, YMMV.

LBN1 said:
I use Mobo player for playback. Have encoded several standard def videos from a TV series using Handbrake with the nookcolor preferences created by someone else on this forum, in H.264 format. They look and sound very good this way, except it does not fill the screen which is expected as it is standard def. Have not tried any HD content yet.
Click to expand...
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Is the <-> (vs >-<, etc options) not working for you to expand it to full screen? I have not had any issues getting 480p content to edge-to-edge (provided it's 16:9 aspect ratio, which many shows and movies are. While Nook's resolution isn't true 16:9 it's close enough that you won't notice any real edge). The only videos that display with bars for me are the wider aspect ratio ones.

(On stock rooted firmware, with 1.1Ghz OC)
I also use handbrake... encoding to 1024x576 xvid seems to do the trick with mobo player. (Altough so far I tried only one video file.)
edit: tried an other one, plays almost perfectly in sync. It is about 1 frame out-of-sync that can only be noticed with hard, fast sounds like slapping.
Encoding to h264 with the said resolution results in video being played back slower and of course audio being out of sync.
480p h264 baseline / aac mp4 files can be hardware decoded and play nice, but I'm all for the bigger resolution.

angomy said:
Is the <-> (vs >-<, etc options) not working for you to expand it to full screen? I have not had any issues getting 480p content to edge-to-edge (provided it's 16:9 aspect ratio, which many shows and movies are. While Nook's resolution isn't true 16:9 it's close enough that you won't notice any real edge). The only videos that display with bars for me are the wider aspect ratio ones.
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The ones I did were not in 16:9 aspect ratio, they were 4:3 which is why I believe I could not expand them to full screen. I haven't yet tried a 16:9 video like a movie but will soon.

in addition to the formats/resoluton mentioned try using Vital Player Neon - works with a lot of formats - plays really smooth on my NC (CM7 7.02+1.3GHzOC)

Thanks a bunch!

Video formats

Can we discuss what video formats you use for dvd rips and settings . What works what doesnt. App you use and on what os.
Me personally i make 720p mp4 videos using mpeg streamclip on my mac. I always hear ppl talking about making 1080p mkv files or whatever does the quality even matter on our none hd screens ?? Arnt dvds only 480 or 720p any how. Anyone here rip bluerays .
Sent from my GT-N8013 using Tapatalk 2

Resolution:
DVDs are 480p max. If you encode to higher res, all you're doing is stretching the video for no purpose.
Stretching the res just makes the end product bigger with no quality gain, and your player or device
will stretch the video anyway.
Blurays are 1080p. The scale (e.g. 720p size reduction) and quality you use are dependent on what you
intend to play the videos on. 720p is perfect for the Galaxy Note 10.1 with its 800p screen
Suggested format:
The best video codec: h264
The best audio codec: aac
The best container: mkv (for multiple audio and subs) or mp4 (subs as well as more than two audio streams a bit troublesome)
My preference (h264 video +aac audio) in mkv.
As a rough guide:
A practical DVD rip = ~1.3-1.7 GB (~1500 kbps @480p)
A decent BluRay rip would be ~2.7 GB (~2500 kbps @720p)
A fairly transparent BluRay rip ~5 GB (~4000 kbps @720p)
Free or Commercial:
Depending on how much control you want over quality, as well as ease of use, I'd say go with a commercial solution (WinAVI is quite good).
Otherwise free solutions are quite good (e.g. RipBot264, StaxRip, Handbrake) but you will need to decrypt your purchased discs to your hard drives.

I almost exclusively watch 1080p MKV files on my Note 10.1. At first the audio had trouble staying synced with hardware decoding on every player I tried. Luckily VLC recently fixed that somehow with their Android app. I think MKV is good if you have multiple audio or subtitle tracks. Logically I know I shouldn't see a difference in quality between 720p & 1080p on this tablet, but I do. Think it has something to do with how it's scaled.

thas5 said:
I almost exclusively watch 1080p MKV files on my Note 10.1. At first the audio had trouble staying synced with hardware decoding on every player I tried. Luckily VLC recently fixed that somehow with their Android app. I think MKV is good if you have multiple audio or subtitle tracks. Logically I know I shouldn't see a difference in quality between 720p & 1080p on this tablet, but I do. Think it has something to do with how it's scaled.
Click to expand...
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The 1080p could probably show better. Though the difference should be negligible.
If the video has black bars, these may be cropped in encoding. Which means the 1080p video is closer to 900p.
Encoding a cropped video to 720p may actually be closer to 544p (i.e. 1280x544p) to maintain the aspect ratio (so the video doesn't look "tall").
If the audio stream is 5.1 DTS audio, you're gonna probably have stuttering due to processing the larger audio file.
2 Channel (stereo) audio is all you need for the Note 10.1

Thanks guys so making my dvd rips 720p isnt doing anything but making a bigger file eh. Dont think mpeg streamclip has mkv which is why i use mp4 so far with no issues. My settings are h.264 aac 3000kbps bitrate limit and files are around 2 gb...
Sent from my GT-N8013 using Tapatalk 2

Think im gunna look into an external blueray ripper for my mac. Any good programs for mac?
Tried handbrake but it doesnt take dvd rips, ie vob files.
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I usually rip my DVD's and convert them to .avi or mp4 at 480p or lower and purchase fullHD movies and re-encode them to 480p or 720p when i want to load them in my tablet. As long as the audio is good (i tend to favor conversion to stereo for tablet playback), i'm willing to sacrifice a little in image quality since having movies in fullHD can eat up a lot of space pretty quickly.

Thanks im trying some 480p conversion . Saving about 1/2 to 1 gb going down to 480p...
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DJsCrIBbLe said:
Thanks im trying some 480p conversion . Saving about 1/2 to 1 gb going down to 480p...
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The difference of 480p against 720p isn't very noticeable if you watch movies with your tablet at arm's length.

720p is HD, and 1080p is Full HD so we do have an HD display. And I enjoy a good MKV Bluray rip on this device using BS Player.
And watching 480p isnt as bad due to the resolution.

Very nice app to convert videos on the fly...
...is Video Converter Android, an app for the Note 10.1.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/...wsMSwxLDEsInJvbWFuMTAubWVkaWEuY29udmVydGVyIl0.
I have many videos in different formats, which sometimes cannot be played on the note 10.1. So I loaded them on my extSD, search in this app for video files, and all are found (3Gp, MPG, everything). Then I just tap on "convert" and the app changes format so that the movie can be played with stock video player.
I do not like to wait hours for video conversion at home til my pc is done with the task. The Note works on even with display switched off, and conversion is really fast.

ensure you rip them as summed to stereo if you are using large bitrates, BS player can deal with 5.1 audio but struggles with higher bitrates as it can only decode 5.1 in software. Stock player can play 5.1 AC3

REWORDED: On this tablet, is there a way to watch a wider-than-16:9 movie so the view size is enlarged/zoomed proportionally to fill the screen vertically? Instead of stretching and distorting a wide-screen movie vertically to fill the screen to get rid of the black bars (top and bottom), is it possible to enlarge the movie proportionally for fill the screen vertically while cropping the sides? That way, the sides are cropped-off, but there's no distortion. Maybe there's other movie viewing apps that can achieve this? I'm referring to only when watching, not encoding. Thanks.

What frame height & frame width do people recommend ?

blud7 said:
Resolution:
DVDs are 480p max. If you encode to higher res, all you're doing is stretching the video for no purpose.
Stretching the res just makes the end product bigger with no quality gain, and your player or device
will stretch the video anyway.
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To be accurate NTSC DVDs are 480 horizontal lines max. PAL are (up to) 576.
But back to the OPs question, I use makemkv to RIP the DVD and then Freemake to recode to generic Android supported codecs - which also decreases the file size by a factor of 3.
Freemake allows you to set a "up to" resolution so one setting of 720p will do for all DVDs and BluRay/HD-DVDs ...

With this tablet, is there a way to watch a wider-than-16:9 movie so the view size is enlarged/zoomed proportionally to fill the screen vertically? Instead of stretching and distorting a wide-screen movie vertically to fill the screen to get rid of the black bars (top and bottom), is it possible to enlarge the movie proportionally for fill the screen vertically while cropping the sides? That way, the sides are cropped-off, but there's no distortion. Maybe there's other movie viewing apps that can achieve this? I'm referring to only when watching, not encoding.
Anyone? Thanks.