OK, after doing searches, looking at faqs, and getting thoroughly 
perplexed, I must finally ask the list (apologies; seems like the sort 
of problem that's been addressed before).

I'm using mencoder with a Hauppage WinTV board on an Athlon 1400 (or so) 
with 768MB ram.  The quality of my recordings varies; almost all of them 
have two vertical visible wiggly lines down the middle of the screen... 
and while some channels are fairly clear (Food Network, of all things, 
comes through with about the same quality as a VHS VCR), some are 
execrable (Comedy Central is EXTREMELY blocky to the point where 
on-screen text is difficult if not impossible to read).

Additionally, and this is less important (because we use an external 
tuner for live TV), watching TV via the freevo gets choppier and 
choppier as time goes on.

Here's my VCR command line from local_conf.py (the aumix bit is in there 
because I was having difficulty with setting record levels; now that 
I've switched motherboards to ALSA, it's probably no longer needed):

Any help anyone could offer would be greatly appreciated.  I'm OK with 
320x240 (not sure the hauppage can actually record at better--any 
ideas?), but the blockiness is really unacceptable.

VCR_CMD = ('aumix -L -f /home/freevo/recording_aumixrc; ' +
           '/usr/bin/mencoder ' +    # Change. Absolute path to the 
runtime
           '-tv driver=v4l:input=0' +   # Input 0 = Comp. V. in
           ':norm=NTSC' +                  # Change
#           ':channel=%(channel)s' +        # Filled in by Freevo
           ':chanlist=us-cable' +          # Change
           ':width=320:height=240' +       # Change if needed
           ':outfmt=yv12' +                # Prob. ok, yuy2 might be 
faster
           ':device=/dev/video0' +         # CHANGE!
           ':adevice=/dev/dsp' +          # CHANGE!
           ':audiorate=32000' +            # 44100 for better sound
           ':forceaudio:forcechan=1:' +    # Forced mono for bug in my 
driver
           'buffersize=64' +               # 64 Megabyte capture buffer, 
change?
           ' tv://%(channel)s'+
           ' -ovc lavc -lavcopts ' +       # Mencoder lavcodec video 
codec
           'vcodec=mpeg4' +                # lavcodec mpeg-4
           ':vbitrate=1200:' +             # Change lower/higher, 
bitrate
           'keyint=30 ' +                  # Keyframe every 10 secs, 
change?
           '-oac mp3lame -lameopts ' +     # Use Lame for MP3 encoding
           'br=128:cbr:mode=3 ' +          # MP3 const. bitrate, 128 
kbit/s
           '-ffourcc divx ' +              # Force 'divx' ident, better 
compat.
           '-endpos %(seconds)s ' +        # only mencoder uses this so 
do it here
.
           '-o %(filename)s.avi ')                   # Filled in by 
Freevo

-->VPutz

Attachment: signature.asc
Description: Digital signature

Reply via email to