What's new
By:
Filters

Measuring picture quality

R

RapidDevil

Member
Hey Guys,

I looked into picture quality a while back for streaming things such as netflix, torrenting etc. I remember during this research I learned that pixels is not an indicator of picture quality (by all means correct me if I'm wrong) but what we should really be looking for is the bitrate of the connection, be it a file played through USB or a stream.

Firstly, have I understood that correctly and secondly, if there any kind of plugin/software on enigma 2 that allows you to measure this accurately? i.e. be able to see the bitrate of a stream as you're playing it?

TIA.
 
I never understood why everyone wants 1080p or higher for.
The way I always think of it is. If your in a traffic do you want to be on a bike or a lorry.
One takes up less space than the other.
Why have a 1080p or higher stream that looks bad, to a 720p stream that will take up less space and would look better
 
Guys, with all due respect I didn't say anything about wanting 1080P. This thread doesn't warrant the 'pay for the real thing comments'. I have a long term sub and I'm very happy with it.

It's purely out of curiosity, which I can explain further if need be.
 
That's fine mate, but maybe you should have put why you wanted to know in your opener.
It reads like you are trying to get a better picture.
People seem to need to know the ins and outs of how this works and how that works when it comes to IPTV, cable etc.
You get people asking what's the blue dot on the Amiko box for? and they seem more bothered about the blue dot than whether there box is working and it turns into a 4 page thread.
All they should be bothered about is can they watch their sub relatively stress free and in decent quality. if they can leave it at that and enjoy it and think of the money they are saving.
Like I said, Life's too short.
 
Mate i don't want to fall out with you on this, I'm sure being a vet you've helped countless people on here but we're on completely different pages on this thread.

There's plenty of detail about the background to what I'm asking about, I didn't realise I have to justify why I'm asking. It wasn't a one liner. I'm just trying to better my understanding of a certain area of tech, isn't that what technology is all about?

gravehead said:
People seem to need to know the ins and outs of how this works and how that works when it comes to IPTV, cable etc.
Click to expand...

What's wrong with wanting to know how it works? What's the point in going to school or reading a book? Isn't it human nature to try to improve our knowledge and understanding?

As you want to know the rationale to asking, I'll explain a bit further:

There was a thread recently where a reseller (I think he was) claimed 99% of his streams were 4k when talking about picture quality. My understanding (as detailed in my OP) was that pixels doesn't necessarily = picture quality and that it's more to do with bit rate. So therefore his '4k' streams aren't necessarily better than a 1080 (or even 720!). Ironically this is exactly what @silver 's analogy was referring to if I've understood correctly. I've got loads of old media files and I thought it would be interesting to compare the two, if I had a means of doing so with a plugin. There's no means to an end here, I just thought it would improve my understanding and in a geeky way, be fun to mess about with.

Even though it's not what I'm talking about on this thread, I don't understand this jumping on people that ask about picture quality. In fact, why wouldn't someone want to improve picture quality? I see countless posts of people being belittled each time they venture anywhere near picture quality, why? Not everyone that's discussing this is 'stressing' about their sub, being ungrateful or disrespecting the technology (or their providers).

I think 99% of people that use IPTV know all about it's limitations and it's a very very small minority of people that have some kind of self entitlement complex to thinking their sub should be perfect 4k sly q quality. I'm just interested in how it works, that's all.

I apologise in advance if any of this comes across as brash, it's not my intention to be disrespectful in any way, I just don't understand some of the taboo around this subject as I've tried to articulate above.
 
Why didn't you put your reasons down in your opening thread?
That way people know the reason why you're asking and not jump to conclusions and start giving answers that mean nothing in relation to what your actually asking for
 
gravehead said:
Why didn't you put your reasons down in your opening thread?
Click to expand...

A few reasons:

1. I didn't realise I needed to give a precise reason, I did put the background to it.
2. Through experience of using many forums over the years I've learned that being concise is key to getting responses. If I had put all that detail in my OP how many people would really have read it? It's better to be short so long as it's not vague (which it wasn't).
3. It took me ages to write that lol. I didn't think it was relevant and would have been a waste of time.

Genuinely interested in any of your thoughts on my post #7.

Thanks for your time.
 
I have liked your post #7 when I read it once I realized what you are on about. Way over my head I'm afraid, don't let the vet status fool you.
There is nothing wrong with learning but with it being in the IPTV section I thought your sub had a bad picture
There are people on here who are so knowledgeable it's scary.
Maybe try reposting in the general section instead of the IPTV section
 
I've put it in IPTV as it was IPTV I was wanting to compare to all the different media types. Nothing to do with my sub.

Reposting in a different section is against the forum rules ;-)

I'm sure a mod will move it if need be.

dsayers2014 said:
Bitrate plugin but I think it has issues with certain IPTV types and serviceapp
Click to expand...

Thanks for that. When you say is has issues with IPTV and SA, does this just mean it wouldn't run properly or be inaccurate? Or could there any end being some compatibility error that forces a reflash?

I'm quite happy to give it a try even if it doesn't work but I don't fancy it if it may end up causing me a whole host of other problems!

Thanks again.
 
RapidDevil said:
Thanks for that. When you say is has issues with IPTV and SA, does this just mean it wouldn't run properly or be inaccurate? Or could there any end being some compatibility error that forces a reflash?

I'm quite happy to give it a try even if it doesn't work but I don't fancy it if it may end up causing me a whole host of other problems!

Thanks again.
Click to expand...
I think it only works with service type 1: it won't do any harm installing it though
 
Last edited:
I think picture quality is more to do with FPS (frames per second) a good frame rate is around 30 FPS for 1080p . Don't take this as gospeel it is just my understanding of it.
 
mike123 said:
I think picture quality is more to do with FPS (frames per second) a good frame rate is around 30 FPS for 1080p . Don't take this as gospeel it is just my understanding of it.
Click to expand...

That's an age old debate I think. FPS i.e. crudely put - how smooth something moves across a screen to the naked eye vs the amount of pixels.

When it comes to streaming I think I'm right in saying it's the bitrate - i.e. how much information is packed into those pixels that determines the overall quality. That's why physical blu-rays are better than Netflix when they're both presenting 4k images. Very happy to be corrected though!

FPS vs resolution is largely subjective. Interestingly on the test line I had a week or so ago there were 2 versions of ifollow. One had a higher resolution with poor FPS and the other visa versa. On that occasion the higher res was the better stream to watch but that's purely because the one with lower resolution was too low to be considered a good watch.

What you're watching makes a difference too. Movies are better with higher resolution and lower FPS for sure, FPS works better in sports (so the ball isn't ghosting on a 50 yard pass etc). But I digress! As was suggested earlier, when it comes to IPTV as long as it works and it's decent, everyone should be happy. It's an interesting point of discussion though.

Going back to my OP, having a plugin that could determine bitrate would take a lot of the subjectivity out of how your eye perceives a picture's quality. As I said, interesting to me in a geekish way!
 
I am in the camp i can tell the difference between good and bad picture quality as long as it is good i don't really care. I have a sheild with AI upscailing and that certinaly improves picture quality however, it certinaly dose not take HD to 4K
 
mike123 said:
I am in the camp i can tell the difference between good and bad picture quality as long as it is good i don't really care. I have a sheild with AI upscailing and that certinaly improves picture quality however, it certinaly dose not take HD to 4K
Click to expand...

AI upscaling is a very interesting topic to me. I have a 2019 Panasonic 4k that won a lot of plaudits for it's upscaling but I've read that very little compares to the shield. From my limited understanding it's all in the processing power of the CPU but definitely something I'd like to learn about.

Should I put a disclaimer.....? I'd better: I'm also in Mike's camp of being happy with a 'good picture', the above is purely for an interest in the subject and understanding of how it works.....because I'm a bit of a geek sometimes!
 
I found the upscailing on the tv is crap. but with the sheild it is excellent. When watching the fotball i put the TV into sports mode thats the best settings for me. When watching a film i put the settings into cinema mode.
 
RapidDevil said:
That's an age old debate I think. FPS i.e. crudely put - how smooth something moves across a screen to the naked eye vs the amount of pixels.

When it comes to streaming I think I'm right in saying it's the bitrate - i.e. how much information is packed into those pixels that determines the overall quality. That's why physical blu-rays are better than Netflix when they're both presenting 4k images. Very happy to be corrected though!

FPS vs resolution is largely subjective. Interestingly on the test line I had a week or so ago there were 2 versions of ifollow. One had a higher resolution with poor FPS and the other visa versa. On that occasion the higher res was the better stream to watch but that's purely because the one with lower resolution was too low to be considered a good watch.

What you're watching makes a difference too. Movies are better with higher resolution and lower FPS for sure, FPS works better in sports (so the ball isn't ghosting on a 50 yard pass etc). But I digress! As was suggested earlier, when it comes to IPTV as long as it works and it's decent, everyone should be happy. It's an interesting point of discussion though.

Going back to my OP, having a plugin that could determine bitrate would take a lot of the subjectivity out of how your eye perceives a picture's quality. As I said, interesting to me in a geekish way!
Click to expand...
fps is very important if its incorrect the picture will be jerky it should be around 25fps minimum i , bit rate affects sound and vision. 4k and 1080 always seems louder on my box. its subjective once you get to 4k . i dont think i could tell the difference above .
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top