Software encoding quality

[Reddwarf]

Since my beloved PVR150 card died I only have an encoderless analogue capturecard as a "last resort" recording device. However, it is almost useless since the encoding bitrate of soft-pvr is so low. Sub; can you make a fix to increase the bitrate for software encoding to something near DVD quality?

[ShiningDragon]

Surely i could be wrong, but afaik all analog cards will be handled with an softencoder (SoftPVR components from hauppauge!). And you should be able to select the bitrate while planning a recording (default, better, good, best). As far as i can see, these settings works fine with my 2 hvr-2200.

[mvallevand]

No SoftPVR isn't needed for cards that have hardware encoding. Maybe you are confusing this with the mpeg-ts muxing piece.

Martin

[ShiningDragon]

Ah, yes! This could be. It's just the name of the "codecbundle" hauppauge! calls it (where the hcw_????.ax mux is included).

But i am right, that sub doesn't implemented the ability of hardwareencoding on analog cards, or am i wrong?

[Reddwarf]

Ah, yes! This could be. It's just the name of the "codecbundle" hauppauge! calls it (where the hcw_????.ax mux is included).

But i am right, that sub doesn't implemented the ability of hardwareencoding on analog cards, or am i wrong?

Only analog cards needs an encoder, and npvr will use the HW encoder if it is present on the card. But unlike gbpvr npvr can use cards without hardware encoder and encode analog video on-the-fly using the Soft PVR package. The ability to select encoding quality is not yet implemented, therfore my humble request.

[ShiningDragon]

My hvr-2200 are used as analog cards and i need to install the hauppauge! SoftPVR components (to be more precise: only the mux) to get the analog part showed (otherwise i had only the unused DVB-T part of these cards in the device list).
Is it really true, that nPVR uses already the hardware encoder of those analog cards? I was sure to read, that nPVR wouldn't support this. But as i wrote above: I am not very sure.

[pBS]

if it has a hardware encoder on board, it *will* be used...however if it doesn't then it can use software encoding...
all analog [hardware encoder or not] needs the software mux..
on software encoding cards, the framesize/bitrate are not selectable...hence his request...
[and mine too!]
my problem is frame size...my card defaults to 320x240 which would suck at any bitrate..so we need pic size settting too!
[it does have 720x480 as a option,just isn't the default]

all my hw encoding cards have 720x480 set as only resolution in driver...
[software encodes could also benefit from framesize adj. as smaller frames require less encoding power]

[Reddwarf]

if it has a hardware encoder on board, it *will* be used...however if it doesn't then it can use software encoding...
all analog [hardware encoder or not] needs the software mux..
on software encoding cards, the framesize/bitrate are not selectable...hence his request...
[and mine too!]
my problem is frame size...my card defaults to 320x240 which would suck at any bitrate..so we need pic size settting too!
[it does have 720x480 as a option,just isn't the default]

all my hw encoding cards have 720x480 set as only resolution in driver...
[software encodes could also benefit from framesize adj. as smaller frames require less encoding power]

That is correct, that particular MUX is needed to wrap the data in a TS container (which is why it has extension .ts)

[Reddwarf]

((bump...))

[sub]

My hvr-2200 are used as analog cards and i need to install the hauppauge! SoftPVR components (to be more precise: only the mux) to get the analog part showed (otherwise i had only the unused DVB-T part of these cards in the device list).
Is it really true, that nPVR uses already the hardware encoder of those analog cards? I was sure to read, that nPVR wouldn't support this. But as i wrote above: I am not very sure.

Has pBS said above, your hardware encoder is definitely used. It does use a mux filter from SoftPVR for making a .ts stream though (this is not soft encoding though).