When I burn video to DVD the quality is not so hot. The video seems a bit pixelated and there are many jagged lines like I need to use some anti-aliasing.

A few notes:

- I transfer the files to a PC and burn them with Adobe Encore using automatic transcode settings.

- I tried increasing the bitrate on mythtv and there was no improvement.

- I captured the same source with a Canopus ADVC-100 into my PC and burned a DVD. The quality was much better so I know the video source is not the problem.

- When I simply play the files back on the computer monitor they look much better than the DVD, but they still don't look great.

Any suggestions? I've looked through the forums and have not seen anything that looks promising.

Thank you.

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MSI K7N2GM2-LSR (Integrated Video)
Athlon XP 2800+
512M RAM
160GB WD
Hauppauge PVR-150

One more thing I should have mentioned, I'm using R5A30.1 with the ivtv-0.4.0 drivers.

_________________
MSI K7N2GM2-LSR (Integrated Video)
Athlon XP 2800+
512M RAM
160GB WD
Hauppauge PVR-150

What rate & resolution are you recording at on Myth? And more importantly, what is Adobe Encore doing to it with 'automatic' transcoding....

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HP VL400 (PIII 866), Skystar2 2.6D, PVR350, Nvidia FX5200, 384MB, 200GB, KnoppMyth R5.5

I'm capturing at 720x480 resolution. I tried the default rate of 4500/6000 max and ramped it up from there to the maximum of 16000.

Adobe "automatic" is an algorithim that sets the bit rate to try to maximize quality and fit the video on a DVD. I've used Encore for quite a while and the automatic setting seems to do a reasonable job. Also, I used the same Adobe settings when I burned the video I captured using the Canopus ADVC-100. I don't think Encore is the problem.

I have also tried the PVR-150 in a Windows box using Hauppauge software and the quality of the capture after it's burned to DVD is still pretty bad.

Could it be that the PVR-150 is just not up to the job?

_________________
MSI K7N2GM2-LSR (Integrated Video)
Athlon XP 2800+
512M RAM
160GB WD
Hauppauge PVR-150

Personally I'd capture at 720x480 (assuming NTSC) and 8Mbit/s and not transcode at all. This is standard DVD quality, and the 150 captures DVD-ready MPEG2 format. Transcoding MPEG2 is not a good plan if you don't have to. My 2 cents.

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HP VL400 (PIII 866), Skystar2 2.6D, PVR350, Nvidia FX5200, 384MB, 200GB, KnoppMyth R5.5

Agreed, but when the video is to lengthy it must be transcoded to fit on one DVD.

So resolution and bitrate are the only adjustments that can be made on the PVR-150? Is anyone else burning PVR-150 captured video? Are you getting good quality results?

Thank you.

_________________
MSI K7N2GM2-LSR (Integrated Video)
Athlon XP 2800+
512M RAM
160GB WD
Hauppauge PVR-150

Or, if its too big, & since you are tranferring it to a Windows box anyway can you "Shrink" it to 4.7GB using another piece of software *hint hint* ?

I capture on my PVR150 using 720x480 at 9Mbit/s. I transfer them to my Windows box and cut the clips with TMPGEnc DVD Source Creator. It's not a full-blown editor, but it's good for removing commercials and making the videos fit on a DVD. Using two-pass encoding and variable bit rate on the video helps also.

This is an update for anyone who is interested.

As nickread suggested, burning the nuv file without any further processing yields really good results.

When the file is too big to burn directly I did what WantPvr suggested and used DVDShrink. To do this I did the following:

I transferred the nuv file to my Windows box and pulled it into Adobe Encore. I created my menus and chapter points and then tell Encore to create the DVD files on my hard drive. Encore warns me that the files will be too big to burn to DVD but I simply ignore that warning. I then used DVDShrink to reduce the files to a size that will fit on a single layer DVD. I then burned the DVD with NERO. The quality is fine.

It looks like Adobe Encore does not handle transcoding MPEG-2 files very well. I like Encore because it allows me to create menus and chapters easily. I've used it for years but I've only used it with DV-AVI files. It does a great job of transcoding AVI files.

I believe I've got everything working well now. Thank you for the advice and suggestions.

_________________
MSI K7N2GM2-LSR (Integrated Video)
Athlon XP 2800+
512M RAM
160GB WD
Hauppauge PVR-150

I vaguely remember reading that the Adobe video editing programs didn't officially support mpeg-2 files. I think they are geared more towards importing DV files. It was last year that I tried the demo versions of their apps, so that may have changed since then.