Request Amazon/Primevideo CBR video quality? [Is Essential]

I can't speak to how it works with these download streams. You're the man, there.

My only experience is with my PVR when offloading content from my (full) DVR to .ts files on the computer.

Maybe that's a whole different ball of wax, and in fact it probably is, but with the PVR, CBR is definitely better than VBR at the same bit rate.

VBR tends toward the kind of jerky motion that gives me seasickness. LOL!



BTW, I see none of that in AS downloads (at high rez). At all!!

Motion is excellent.

Not sure why it was requested either.



T

 

I think some of you guys are thinking of Variable Frame Rate (VFR). We're talking about Variable Bit Rate (VBR) vs. Constant Bit Rate (CBR), which is the actual quality of the image in the video stream and has nothing to do with framerate, smoothness, or jerkiness.

VBR vs. CBR streams have already been compared thousands of times by people who have been downloading these streams for years now, the quality difference is extremely well established in those communities.

 

On this PVR, you can only control the bit rate (up to 14 Mbps) and whether it's Variable or Constant.

My observations were from comparing recordings made with different combinations of these settings.

Maybe it's also changing Frame rate in the background -- I don't know.

Only explaining what I saw.


T

 

Please just make CBR optional in case you add it. In my experience it really depends on the content if the VBR or CBR version is better. For shows with grain (like live action movies) the CBR is superior while on shows like anime with barely action the VBR seems better in my experience. Replacing it would make the tool for other people (like me) not usable.There is no overall "is better".

 

In the main message it was said: """ option to select video quality """

 

This is exactly what I said before.

 

i found that amazon prime have different bitrate of video in different regions/servers , even in same video and same profile......

for example:
The Boys_S02E01
Region--> (JAPAN / HONG KONG)
Format profile : High@L4.0
Bit rate : 4 058 Kbps
The Boys_S02E01
Region--> (USA)
Format profile : High@L4.0
Bit rate : 7 069 Kbps

 

Yep it depends on the CDNs they are using.

Sometimes they are even different fps.

"Star Trek: Picard" CBS All Access Amazon Version has 24.000 but the international Verison (e.g.: Europe as an example) has 23.976 fps. Its very interesting sometimes.

 

Really cool feature would be to mix video from CBR and audio from VBR, as CBR has only 192kbps audio (comparing to 640kbps VBR).
I think implementation would be tricky but it would be great feature for many users.

Maybe a feature for the future, step by step

 

It is not complicated at all because you can download the audio of one manifest and the video of others, that is very simple. It only remains to hope that they give us the possibility to download the video of the CBR manifest, which in more than 90% of cases is already the best

 

But isn't it because the CBR streams are at a higher bit rate overall, or maybe because they bodge the VBR by not properly doing 2 passes when encoding VBR?

 

It's complicated, but the short version is that Amazon changed the encoding options for VBR a year or two ago, resulting in lower quality despite still often having a high bitrate. They've actually tweaked the VBR encoding method several times over the years, never for the better, but the current one is the worst. The lucky part of this is that the CBR version has so far has remained good, even on rare occasions surpassing the bluray release in image quality.

There are some movies and shows on Amazon that were encoded with the much better VBR profile years ago and haven't been re-encoded since, but there's not very many, and they're not immediately obvious, and require downloading both and comparing them against each other as there's no way to know before you download them.

 

Do you know if we will soon enjoy this possibility?

 

Bitrate isn't everything and the overall encoding settings matter as well. Sadly Amazon hides them after the first rips came out (with the first public Widevine exploit years ago). No way to see if they actually tweak settings. There was a downgrade a few years ago (noticable by the file size), but no one knows what they actually changed. In all comparisons I did it really depends on the content if CBR or VBR source is better. All I can say for sure is that "cbr" has worse results than "2pass" for the same bitrate target. The VBR version most likely uses crf - but the crf value they use is unknown. The last known settings had crf=18, so my guess is they raised it to 19 or 20 together with some other settings.

I still prefer the VBR version for most anime on Amazon, because in my comparisons they look better. Not for all of them tho. For everything else the CBR version is probably the choice to go with. It's really sad that there still isn't an option to choose between VBR/CBR and maybe h265.

I've also heard that AnyStream is grabbing the worse Netflix streams as well. Netflix offers 2pass (old) and crf (new) encodes, but the new crf encodes are in most cases worse. An option to choose from 2pass/crf or an option to "download highest bitrate" would help a lot.

Anyway, it's making the tool unusable for everyone that wants to store the best quality possible. Adding this changes isn't that hard. That's why I'm not ready to pay for it (yet).

 

More of a quality guy myself would love to see this feature at anystream. Thought I purchased the licensed version looking towards the development of the app

 

This problem is not technical. It is more like what do we do and how we behave in order not to attract redundant attention from content providers.

 

I am getting your point, you could keep this for subscribers only - (Just a suggestion.)
Either way, the content providers have their hands full irrespectively with the content that floats around the internet. Having high-quality content is always a plus on your hard-drive.

 

I honestly don't think that offering content with same protection level as the content that is already offered by AnyStream now will atract any additional attention from content providers.

 

that anystream offers VBR, CBR or ABR amazon will fight in the same way against pirating of their content