[ExtractStream] Editing MPEG2 streams

[Roger Merchberger]

--- Rick Weldon <rick@n...> wrote:

> Over the last couple of days I've gone deep into getting a Sade
> concert
> offa my TiVo and getting it into at least system MPEG 2 format that
> I'd
> like to burn to SVCD. I tried really hard to follow Merch's web
> page, but
> well, it just twernt workin' (Sorry Merch. I'm not knocking ya
> buddy. If
> anything I owe you much thanks for your information. Its taught me
> loads :)

Hey - different things work for different people... It's all a
learning process, too! Always something new to tinker with!

I'm glad that what I have "out there" has helped, and I've learned
stuff from you, too! [see below]

[[snippety]]

> All the tools are running on WinXP Pro, Athalon XP 1600-Raid blah
> blah

Ooooh... Aaaahhh... Mr. Athlon - My Hero! (Duallie 1600+ MP's here!)

> Notes on this step for those of you using the Sony using this
> version of
> TiVo OS and TiVoApp....

Sony just does *love* to do things their own way, tho... don't
they???

> Whenever I try to get down the split streams into m2a and m2v files
> I
> sometimes get loads of errors. Especially on shows longer than an
> hour.
> They seem to freak about half way through or ExtractStream gives up
> the
> ghost trying to deal with all of the errors.

2 things: 1) Maybe Sony did something slightly different to their
stream encoding to make it "more efficient?" -- and 2) Was the stream
you snagged an NBC stream? NBC owns a goodly chunk of Tivo, and those
persnickety little "thumbs up to record this show" icons during the
NBC commercials can cause Extractstream some serious heartburn...

[[ but it is nice for me to snag a "Crossing Jordan" that might look
interesting -- the writing & plotlines are a little "off" for me, but
dang is Jill Hennessy cute... ;-) ]]

> Thennnnnnnn I came across TyConvert Wheeeeee!!! Yippeeeee. Whata
> guy!
> Charlie Payne as he removed lots of "Payne" from my life :)

Glad to hear something works well for you!

> 3. Now, here's where things change from Merch's procedure. I'm
> guessing
> that the need for converting to AVI and Wave is to get TMPGenc to
> load the
> resultant m2a and m2v files that come out of that. I'm not sure why
> as
> Merch doesn't say.

Yes... but there's more...

AFAIK, Nandub only knows AVI, so those folks that are encoding to
DivX with Nandub need to do the DVD2AVI thing... and yes, the default
behavior with TMPGenc is you need WAV files for audio, but it's also
for those who have DVD/SVCD players that cannot handle 32KHz audio
need to convert to WAV to then "upconvert" to 44.1KHz before
re-encoding to MPEG[2].

During my trials and tribulations over the last
> couple
> of days, I came across the m2v_vfp-0.46 plugin for TMPGenc. Simply
> unzip
> and drop the m2v.vfp and m2vconf files into the same dir as TMPGenc
> and
> voila. The m2a and m2v streams load right into TMPGenc without the
> need
> for converting them as they come out of TyConvert.

Hrmmm... always looking for shortcuts, I snagged m2v_vfp for myself,
and slid it into the freshly released TMPGenc 2.50 -- and methinks
that this plugin will only handle *video* - Running Win2K, I could
get TMPGenc to load the video fine, but the .m2a wouldn't load for
me. Depending on your OS or other software you've tried/installed,
you might have an Audio codec that I don't have on my box.

> 4. Then I setup TMPGenc for SVCD pretty much as Merch's
> instructions show
> to get rid of the green stripe and encode for SVCD then set it on
> its way
> and go to bed for the night :). 2 hours of concert takes about 6
> hours on
> my machine :)

You might wanna try the DVD2AVI on the same show (if you still have
the tystream...) I just did a "test clip" of 17830 frames of "High"
quality Tivo recordings encoded to 1750kbit/sec - one with the .d2v
file from DVD2AVI, and one straight from the .m2v - and I found a
serious speed difference on my computer.

All other things being equal, the .m2v file would have taken an
estimated 1 hour, 4 minutes to encode (I encoded about 1/3 of the
clip, and extrapolated, so this isn't a "perfect" benchmark, but it
would be close) and the .d2v file encoded in 23 minutes 11 seconds. I
haven't tried it on a single processor yet, but I should have better
results in a few days...

> General Notes:
> Splitstream gave me hell. Having to iterate over the Sade concert
> into 5
> different files. TyConvert does it on the first pass. It is really
> shweet.

If send/split/stream wasn't working so well for me, I'd give that a
shot... as it is, as part of my C/C++ learning project, I want see if
I can modify splitstream to make it easier for my uses -- things like
autmatic log creation instead of stderr output, a single parameter
input, and have the proggie assume/build the rest (issue the command
"sendstream stargate1" and it would run like you typed in "sendstream
stargate1.ty stargate1.m2a stargate1.m2v bad-stargate1.ty" - I've hit
over 100wpm typing speed - but why not save some typing anyway???)
;-)

> It'd be great if someone else could try some of this and let me
> know what
> you learn.

I hope this helps with some of your tinkering!

Gotsta roll... Laterz!
Roger "Merch" Merchberger

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Great stuff seeking new owners in Yahoo! Auctions! 
http://auctions.yahoo.com