Netflix and Streaming

I was a skeptic about a Netflix account. I was sure that it could not be as described. You just get movies that are at the bottom of the queue. The movies available for streaming must be ones you have never heard of. there is no way that $9 bucks a month get’s you more than a couple movies a month you actually want to see.

I own two blu ray players that can stream Netflix, and an Xbox 360, and have access to an iPad. A friend emailed me a link to sign up for a free month, so I decided to see what it was all about. At least I would watch a couple of movies for free.

I was unprepared for the selection; not just hundreds of movies, but hundreds of pages of movies to select from. Quite a few are available for streaming with pretty good video quality. I was able to link in my devices very easily. The iPad can both manage the queue and stream movies.

I started watching the Voltron series with my son. He loves it. (He did ask why the picture didn’t fill the whole screen of my HDTV.) We have also enjoyed several cartoon classics, as well as more recent movies. The selection of documentaries is pretty good, too. I loved “Lord, Save Us from Your Followers“, which I had heard about when they were filming it.

The dvds that are shipped have come quickly, a by product of having a Netflix shipping center in Orlando. And every movie they have sent has been the one on the top of the queue. I know that won’t always be the case, but so far it has been great.

Even the rating/recommendation settings have been pretty accurate. I got a couple of movies they said I would not really like, and they were right. I didn’t like them. I provided Netflix with answers to a quiz on my movie preferences, and rated a few films I had seen. Now, when I browse movies, they rate them according to what I said I liked or disliked.

So far, I have been very pleased.

Handbrake and the iPad: The Settings

Handbrake 0.95 is out with an iPad preset pre-loaded. See the review here.

[See an updated post about handbrake settings and how the new iPod Touch and Apple TV effect which preset you can use for multi device video.]

Avatar came out yesterday so I decided to test a few settings and see how they play on the iPad.These are not scientific, just trial and error. I had already discovered that my general cross-platform settings worked pretty good. I start with an iPod preset, raise the resolution to 720 width in picture settings, raise the constant quality to 65%, select iPod 5G support. Those settings result in a decent sized file with a good image that plays on all Apple video capable devices (iPod, iPhone, Apple TV, and iPad)

But both the iPad and Apple TV can do higher resolution. So I tried tried three different larger resolution settings. I ripped about 6 minutes 43 seconds in three different higher resolution settings: My base iPod preset settings with loose anamorphic and with strict anamorphic, as well as the straight Apple TV base setting (with minor changes)

All three worked on the iPad. Not surprisingly, the higher resolution settings I tested looked better, sharper, on the iPad.

Both the loose and strict anamorphic ended up with a resolution of 853×480 (as opposed to a 704×400 on my cross platform setting) and were 211MB in size. I could tell no difference in video quality between these, and both were sharper than the cross platform setting I use.

The Apple TV setting (base one with no changes except I deselected large file size and added iPod 5G support) was also 853×480 size, but only 150MB. It looked almost as good as the larger file sizes on the iPad.

The clips on my Apple TV (hooked to 26″ HDTV) loaded just fine. The larger files were just a hair sharper. On my small screen I had to pause the clip to see it. When playing there was virtually no difference. I don’t think there is any visual difference between the loose or strict anamorphic settings I used and they are just a hair better than the basic Apple TV settings.

If size is a factor, I would use the base Apple TV settings with the slight changes I made. They will look great on the iPad (and iPhone 3GS or 4. See update below). These will not work on the older iPhone or iPods, because they can’t do wider than 720 pixels

Below are some screen shots. I tried to capture the same frame, but hopefully it’s close enough to see the differences. In all images, the quality was very similar.

Apple TV on the left, iPod Preset Anamorphic loose on the right. The color seems deeper on the Anamorphic

Similar capture. Same.

More of an action shot. iPod preset on top, Apple TV on bottom. Again the colors appear deeper in the ipod preset. The iPod preset is a bit sharper.

All three settings. Although smaller, the basic iPod preset looks similar to the Apple TV.

Bit more of an action shot. In this one the cross-platform iPod preset looks more like the larger version.

I wonder if it is the 5% extra in the “constant quality” setting that allows for the deeper colors.

At any rate, unless you are pausing the video, there is virtually no difference to my eye. If you want your videos to play on all Apple devices, stay with my iPod preset. If you only need them on the iPad or Apple TV (and newer iPhones and iPod Touch 4th Gen), I would use the slightly modified Apple TV preset.

Update: After some further testing, a file ripped from the basic Apple TV setting, with “iPod 5G Support” checked will give great performance on an iPad, Apple TV, and iPhone 3GS. I will load it on my new iPod Touch 4 Gen when it arrives and test it through the new Apple TV when it ships, but it should be compatible with those as well. It will not play on an older iPod or iPhone model.

Handbrake Settings for iPad

[Update: Check the link at the bottom for a more in depth look at handbrake settings for the iPad.]

Since I did quite a bit of testing between handbrake’s 0.93 and 0.94 builds, I wanted to report my experience with movies I ripped and the iPad I’ve been using. Later, I may try to see how high a resolution file you can rip for the iPad…

I have watched a few videos on the iPad. Anything from iTunes looked better than the handbrake rips. I don’t know what they use for compression, but digital copies of movies look very nice, even on the larger iPad screen. I have heard that the iPad can handle higher resolution video like the Apple TV. For me, I like my video to be cross platform, so I still rip for the highest quality of the lowest capability device: the iPod.

Movies ripped on the iPod settings I described in previous posts (iPod/iPhone preset, raise resolution to 720 width in picture settings, 65% constant quality, 5g support.) work just fine on the iPad. I did notice that films ripped in 0.93 settings showed more artifacts than those in 0.94. I actually re-ripped a couple in the later release to help them look better for later viewing.

A more in depth look can be found here.

Link to handbrake.