Considering WMV HD

[Nyghtfall]

A few years ago, I tried switching to DVD-quality MPEG-2. That didn't work. Last year, I tried switching to 720 HD MP4 using h.264 encoding. That didn't work, either. In both cases, large file sizes drove me back to WMV. Since January, 2013, I've been using 720 x 480 WMV. It's the same resolution as DVD, but with a slightly lower data rate resulting in less-than-DVD-quality video.

Well, damnit, I want to offer better, and storage is stupid cheap now. So, I want to try HD again. This time, I'm sticking with WMV to continue minimizing file sizes. My video editor has a preset for 1280 x 720 WMV using VC-1 encoding. Below are two clips of the same scene comparing what I use now with what I want to try. This scene is part of a future update:

http://www.cinemasphyxia.com/stuff/Deat ... nshine.wmv - 20 MB WMV
http://www.cinemasphyxia.com/stuff/Deat ... ine_HD.wmv - 45 MB WMV HD

Let me know what you think.

[xj900uk]

To be honest I can't see that much different Nyghtfall, but then I am on a small PC playing via Media Classic Cinema s/w

[Nyghtfall]

Yup. I agree. Too little difference in video quality, and someone on Fetnoir also pointed out that h.264 is actually a more efficient encoder than WMV HD in terms of compression.

I'm just gonna stick with what I'm using and not try to fix what ain't broke.

To anyone reading this, I've deleted the samples.