Compression Ratio & Commercial Deletion?

JJenson · **18th June 2007, 05:31 AM**

I just got this set up my HTPC here are my specs:

Sony Wega 55"
Vista Home Premium
2 gb ram
Intel Core 2 Duo 1.86 ghz
Nvidia GeForce 6800 GS 256 mb

I am unsure how to do a couple of things on this as I just set this up yesterday and cannot seem to find my exact answer.

Fixed - VMC records at best quality by default moving to fair still showed analog cable jsut as good and records a whole show around 200-300 mb. 1st question - I recoreded a 30 minute tv show and it was 1.85 gb this is way to big for my media center. How do I get this down to around 500 mb?

Sorry if this has been covered elsewhere also but I came across a couple more questions.

How do I archive and keep all the info for the show? Basically I am recoreding live tv on c:/ drive and want to move it after a while to d:/ without loosing the data like the title of the show and all of that?

2nd question - Is there anyway to automate commercial deletion while it records?

3rd question - I have a Sony Wega 55" tv and I cannot get the media guide and administrator section gets cut off if the video play back is set to the correct size. But if I set the administrator section then the tv playback has black edges and doesn't show the correct size? Is there anyway to fix this?

Thanks everyone for you suggestions.

Jeff

KingHilary · **18th June 2007, 10:44 PM**

Hi Jjenson,

I don't compress, I just burn the stuff I want to DVD, but this guy ARkay seems really helpful. Look down at the bottom of the main forum page and you will see a whole raft of topics related to a compressing functiopn called "Crunchie". Look here http://www.xpmediacentre.com.au/community/crunchie/

Second, I cannot imagine a program that removes commercials as you tape being successful. You would always run the risk of losing some of the actual program. I am old, so I still remember an old comic strip called "our boarding house". In this strip an old windbag called the Major invented a device to cut the comercials out of the big football game, but he talked so loud and long that the device failed to record any of his program.

Better to record the program and use VideoRedo or similar, to automatically detect the commercials, making them very easy to remove.

Can't help you with the third question.

Cheers,

King Hilary.

JJenson · **19th June 2007, 01:22 AM**

Thanks Hilary;

I saw that crunchie thing I ended up just switching everything to fair quality and everything seems good.

As far as the commercial deletion I will look into a couple of things I have seen on these forums.

My main concern for now is archiving and keeping all the info

Thanks

Jeff

MSurge · **19th June 2007, 10:29 AM**

I run Cruchie (see download section for this great little prgram by Arkay) but it does only process SD material and won't do HD. Not an issue for me since I find so little actually is true HD I can't be bothered. Arkay is said to be working on a new version but since this is his "hobby" then it's a matter of waiting to see when. You seem to be recording analogue TV signal since with the digital recording there is no option for recording quality as it records the broadcast MPEG stream direct to the HDD (approx 3GB per hour).

VideoRedo (search google and download a trial) is the most popular editing program but it doesn't process AVI files. I've used it to edit the DVR-MS files and then leave crunchie to compress it to an AVI file which then appears under "My Video". VideoRedo does have an advert detection function which will scan and mark the timeline but you will see that since all these advert-detection functions pickup on a black-frame to mark the start and finish then there are many false and missed points as well so you still need to tweak things before having it do the final edit. When you see how hit-and-miss this is then you'll see that it's not something that can be done automagically - at least not reliably anyway.

I can guess but I've really got no idea what you are talking about in Question 3 so you might want to rephrase this problem you are having. You talk about the guide and screen/display. Are you talking EPG (Guide) or screen resolution or something else?

JJenson · **19th June 2007, 12:37 PM**

The third question is basically a resolution problem with a 55 inch tv which from what I can tell is kind of not a normal size. Nividia hasn't worked out resolution resizing for this yet so I will live with what I have for now.

A real question I guess which is my last one that remains is about archiving. I would really like to move the recordings to another HD on my system and keep all the info like it does on the recordings. Does anyone know how this information is kept? Database XML file SQL DB I am just trying to figure out how to do this manually.

THanks
Jeff

MSurge · **19th June 2007, 08:04 PM**

The extra information is meta-data similar to the information embedded with mp3 files.

To keep this data I expect that you'll have to keep the original DVR-MS file intact. I've noticed that editing these files with VideoRedo and saving as DVR-MS still loses this information for some of the files, but it doesn't bother me since anything I keep end up being converted to an AVI via crunchie anyway.

If you want some help with your Q3 then post the resolution of your TV, how you've got it connected and the graphics card you are using.

JJenson · **20th June 2007, 12:53 AM**

Thats strange on the dvr-ms keeping the info within itself cause when I keep the file but move it to another location it loses all the data stored with it. That was why I figured it had to be so sort of a local DB keeping the data.

Any ideas on why it wouldn't keep the info if store within the file when its moved to a new directory. Or is it that the video library just doesn't show those details period?

When I switch if over it goes to the actual file name like full_house06082007_278435.dvr-ms and I would like it to display just the title of the show like it does in the recordings area.

Full House - Stephanies New School. Not sure how to get this info across. Also the picture changes when I move the file across as well.

Thanks so much for the replies the resolution thing is a vista and nvidia thing for now. Apparently they are working on it. For now that question is good.

KingHilary · **20th June 2007, 07:33 AM**

Hello Jjenson,

You should find that Media Centre will play a regular MPEG2 file just fine. Why don't you just save the ms-dvr file as an mpeg, and name it as you like. Most programs that will pick up an ms-dvr file will be able to export it as an mpeg.

Again, VideoRedo will take an ms-dvr file, allow you to cut out the commercials, and then save the edited file as an MPEG. When you save it you give it the name that you want.

King Hilary

MSurge · **20th June 2007, 08:32 AM**

JJenson,

When you are looking at the recorded program files under My TV you aren't seeing a list of the file names in the directory. This view is the same as looking at MP3's under My Music in that windows uses the metadata in the file to compile a database of the files, and it is this database that you are actually viewing in the menu.

If you open up Windows Media Player and (using the menu bar or the little drop-down arrow next to the minimise button) select

Tools > View > GoTo > Library

you should see how it looks. This is the reason things can get a bit strange if you move the file and it may not reappear even if you copy it back.

JJenson · **20th June 2007, 09:10 AM**

Sorry all mainly I want to be able to do this cause I had been using GBPVR for the last 6 months. I had all my recordings renamed on the fly so I knew the title. I don't want to spend an hour or two everyday renaming files to the title. I keep about 20 shows a day.

As far as the title and info I will check it but a little dissapointed there is no way to have files archive with all the info. But thats ok I can live with that one I guess.

Maybe you know then if I have 3 drives and the first one fills up with recordings will it automatically switch to the next and so on? Basically then I can just view in the title mode inthe recorded tv section and get all the shows for each title that way?

Thanks again sorry so many questions This program is just new to me

Jeff

JJenson · **20th June 2007, 11:09 AM**

I got what you are saying after checking it all out.

This is my question then is there a way to have the video library pick up the metadata from the file?

MSurge · **20th June 2007, 12:00 PM**

I don't play around too much with my DVR-MS files but I expect that you can add "watched folders" to include the location where you are moving the files to so once these files have been moved over then MCE 'should' update these files in to the database. I've found it a bit unreliable with MP3's though and tend to use WMP to force a rebuild of the database whenever I do some significant changes to the music side of things.

Now that you've got your head around the "how it works" you are probably best to try things and see what works for you.

JJenson · **20th June 2007, 12:17 PM**

Yeah I just talked with my wifes Uncle about making a plugin that will actually keep the structure look but combine int he recorded tv info. He is going to take a look at it and lt me know if he can write it.

I will give some things a shot and see what I can do. I have added those to the watched folders but still no luck with the data but maybe I will do a rescan or whatever you want to call it to see if it will work.

Thanks Again

MSurge · **20th June 2007, 12:26 PM**

I think it can take some time to update the database as it does this in the background functions but with the MP3's I've found it unreliable but since I only need to do this very occasionally I just delete the entries in the WMP database and force it to create it new from scratch. If you doing this regularly with DVR-MS files then it's not something you want to do manually to often.

If you are moving the DVR-MS files to a second HDD because of space restrictions why not just set it to record everything to this other HDD instead of the default location on C drive?

JJenson · **20th June 2007, 12:51 PM**

Actually I am on the same page as you here. I think if I set it up I can have it record on all 3 HD's I have set up. I think when one filles up it will goto the next one and so forth and it will all show up in the recorded tv area. I think this should work will get back to you.

Jeff