.mkv splitter & h.264 decoder

[johnsonx42]

any advice on best .mkv splitter and h.264 decoder? I know, it's one of those questions with no single best answer, but I'm looking for input on what works for you guys...

I've been trying to pick a "final" format for dvd-rips that works with more-or-less everything. So far using handbrake to encode to h.264 in an .mkv container seems to work best... the files play great through Plex Media Center on the HTPC, and also through the Plex app on my samsung bluray; they also play on the bluray fed directly from a DLNA server with no problems. h.264 in .mkv seems closest to making every device happy.

However, I also want to be able play the files directly on the HTPC via NPVR's video library, but the results haven't been so perfect.

So far I've tried the Haali and LAV splitters, and the Microsoft DTV-DVD and LAV Video decoders.

Haali + MS: high CPU use, npvr becomes sluggish, hard to skip. aspect ratio is wrong - anamorphic video stretched vertically to 16:9
LAV Splitter + MS: same as Haali + MS, which is no real surprise
Haali + MS: didn't try, had to remove Haali to get LAV splitter to work
LAV Splitter + LAV Video: low cpu use, skipping is fine. aspect ratio is wrong - anamorphic video stretched vertically to 16:9

So it LAV is the better decoder, but the aspect ratio is always wrong (which drives me insane). I could obviously add a custom aspect ratio to NPVR and select it manually, but it shouldn't be necessary - when I play the same movie from the ripped VIDEO_TS folder, NPVR's Auto mode gets it right.

First thing I'm trying to figure out is who's fault is it that the aspect ratio isn't coming out right? Is this the splitter's fault, decoder's fault, NPVR's fault, or handbrake's fault? All the other methods of playing the file get the aspect ratio correct.

[mvallevand]

Which aspect ratio? When you make your files is DAR=OAR?

Martin

[ga_mueller]

I also use Handbrake to compress my movies. using high profile with an mkv container. Nowdays I use XBMC for playback, but when I used npvr I used Haali + MS DTV-DVD without any issues like high CPU or whatever. I don't remember having any aspect ratio issues.

[johnsonx42]

DVD's of recent releases are all 1.85:1 or 2.39:1, so they're letterboxed even on a 16:9 TV. In handbrake I'm using the automatic size and cropping settings, which crop out the black bars so as to use the full frame size for actual video (why bother wasting 20% of the frame on black pixels?). Then it sets a flag somewhere that tells the player what aspect ratio to use. This makes every player happy except for NPVR.
Here's a screenshot of HandBrake's Picture tab after having it open the VIDEO_TS folder of A Few Good Men:
[ATTACHMENT NOT FOUND]

edit: I'm using the Normal preset, but just changing the container to .mkv

[johnsonx42]

I imagine if I set Anamorphic to "None" and then clicked the resulting "Keep Aspect Ratio" flag, then the file would play with the correct aspect ratio in NPVR too... but from what I understand that's really not the right way to do it.

[Lao Pan]

A couple of years ago I was having the same problems - in the end I gave up and converted all my DVD's to 1280 x whatever mkv's (720p HD) Took some work with the calculator, but at least NPVR can't get confused by square pixels :confused:

I used MEGUI for the conversion and also slowed my 25fps PAL down to 23.976fps while I was about it, to get the original butch voices back - and I was surprised how HD they looked.

I have been using LAV splitter with PDVD codec (SAF Unlocked - need to tweak merits) for excellent picture quality with DXVA acceleration, but have recently switched to the LAV Video codec with copy back acceleration (AMD GPU) so that I could use the xy-vsfilter for forced subtitles on Blu-Ray's & Blu-Ray Rips and still get low CPU usage.

[imilne]

I just left the black bars in (they can't add too much* to the file size can they?) and had anamorphic set to strict I think. It's been a while since I did my DVDs though.

Iain

* and I won't be doing them again if it does

[johnsonx42]

thanks for the input guys. I'm going to revisit my handbrake settings and see what I can figure out. There are some inconsistencies in the gui, things seem to change depending on in what order I click the options. For example if load a preset which sets the various picture size options, make some changes to the settings and then save a new preset, not all of the settings come up the same if I load the preset again later. Also the screen width defaults to 720 when I first start the program and open a media folder, but if I then select a different preset the screen width will switch to 710... even going back to the default preset doesn't change it back to 720. So I'm finding I can't really be sure what settings were actually used to create the videos I'm testing with. I figured I could sort things out with the GUI, and then transition to using HandBrakeCLI, but I may have to go right to the CLI to make sure things are consistent.

What I'm ultimately trying to do is encode the DVD's to a theoretically universal and permanent format so that I can get rid of the huge VIDEO_TS folders. I've done a few before with Nero 7, encoding to "nero video" (.mp4) format, but those don't seem as universally compatible as I'd hoped and I'd rather use free software (though I've been tempted to upgrade Nero to the latest and give it another shot).

[ga_mueller]

Just curious what the final file size is with the normal setting. With high profile it's usually between 1-1.5G and I can't discern any quality difference compared to the original files (on our smallish 32" panel).