Movie Sounds Better When Played In Full Mode

[ejoy]

I spent quite some time A/Bing a divx movie re-encoded to 320 using mencoder. Although the movie plays quite smoothly in Save mode, it sounds slightly compressed, just like you are listening to a CD ripped to 64k bps. When played in Full mode, the movie sounds richer, more extended and has better sound stage, albeit consuming more horse power: I need 4 AA 2000mah to watch a full-length movie.

Has anyone observed this before? It seems to me the gp2x decodes audio in software whereas video in hardware, hence the difference I heard.

 

[sam fisher]

I spent quite some time A/Bing a divx movie re-encoded to 320 using mencoder. Although the movie plays quite smoothly in Save mode, it sounds slightly compressed, just like you are listening to a CD ripped to 64k bps. When played in Full mode, the movie sounds richer, more extended and has better sound stage, albeit consuming more horse power: I need 4 AA 2000mah to watch a full-length movie.

Has anyone observed this before? It seems to me the gp2x decodes audio in software whereas video in hardware, hence the difference I heard.

I believe that the GP2x has hardware that augments the software in decoding video. its probably the fact that save mode is for really low quality videos. Or that your video bitrate is just too high and consuming too much CPU resources to leave enough for hte audio. It would sound choppy though and not a compressed CD. Sounds to me like some sort of weird media player bug thingey.

 

[ejoy]

I believe that the GP2x has hardware that augments the software in decoding video. its probably the fact that save mode is for really low quality videos. Or that your video bitrate is just too high and consuming too much CPU resources to leave enough for hte audio. It would sound choppy though and not a compressed CD. Sounds to me like some sort of weird media player bug thingey.

No, the sound under Save mode is quite good, just not as good as I expected. Otherwise I won't bother trying Full mode. The difference between Save and Full mode is subtle but definitely perceivable. IMO some detail is lost in Save mode. Although the audio bitrate is 128 vbr, it does not sound as good as on my PC. Well, it's just a handheld.

 

[sam fisher]

I believe that the GP2x has hardware that augments the software in decoding video. its probably the fact that save mode is for really low quality videos. Or that your video bitrate is just too high and consuming too much CPU resources to leave enough for hte audio. It would sound choppy though and not a compressed CD. Sounds to me like some sort of weird media player bug thingey.

No, the sound under Save mode is quite good, just not as good as I expected. Otherwise I won't bother trying Full mode. The difference between Save and Full mode is subtle but definitely perceivable. IMO some detail is lost in Save mode. Although the audio bitrate is 128 vbr, it does not sound as good as on my PC. Well, it's just a handheld.

1) low quality speakers in the GP2x

2) Save mode doesn't do anything but lower the clockspeed. So basically it would end up skippijng the audio and maybe crackling a lot. Not sounding compressed and lossy.

 

[reallynotnick]

So why don't you just use normal mode? o.0

 

[Blades]

Do any of you experience A/V sync errors when you watch movies useing TV-OUT?

I can't seem to get the GP2X speakers to shut up so I can watch my movie useing the TV-OUT cables. So you hear this small delay when the GP2X speakers are on and the TV-OUT is playing.

Any tricks you can recommend to shut them speakers up. I tried using the Headphone out instead, but it won't go as loud and the A/V sync probs are still there. But the sync problems would go away when I would just use the TV-out mode(I would cover up the GP2X speakers).

Any sugestions, and hopefully they fix this in the next firmware update.


Blades

 

[Blades]

Also, is it a limitation of the GP2x to show all true colors. When I watch a movie, sometimes it seems that it will only show X amount of colors and darks kind of look grainy and washed out etc..., yet when I watch it on my computer full 16 million colors are availble. Just wondering if that is also a limitation of the GP2x. Thanks in advance..


Blades

 

[emumanx]

The Gp2x LCD is only 16bit color. so no it wont show all the colors. It trys to group colors in a range then display them. Hence the gray and black mix. (i know not technical at all, but iam trying not to be over complex) to see this on your PC just turn the video card to 16bit color and play the same movie. You should come out with a close (if your video card dosnt compensate for it) picture to that of the GP2X.

 

[Lobo]

Just wanted to chip in that I too have noticed a difference in sound quality if the video is played with Save instead of Normal.

 

[Vimacs]

The gp2x tft is actualy 24bit.
The blockyness probably comes from to much b frames, turn them off or lower the max amount to 1.
The sound is decoded in software while the video is decoded in hardware, that could be a reson, however i hevent noticed bad quality at save yet, mabye lowering the sample rate a bit and/or encodeing in mono could help.

 

[bumholesniffer]

Have not really noticed but will check the next time I watch a divx which should be in 5 mins. Gonna watch Hard Candy (any good ??) if its crap pls let me know I hate crap films.