In Your Opinion, Which is the Best HD Encode/Rip Group?

[pokekevin]

i'm pretty sure 95% of those who posted don't even see the difference between releases with the naked eye..

Very true. But if you know what to look for then its somewhat/quite easy!

The way i see it. Most people will support the groups that they first downloaded from lol

[iLOVENZB]

So, iLOVENZB, you think internal groups are better than scene groups, right?

Ehh I respect the scene and some p2p groups but p2p groups tend to not know why the scene do certain standards

eg. Split rars etc.

P.S.: There are scene groups that don't care about size restrictions (e.g. 8GB for a 1080p movie), at least for some of their releases. Those are usually of pretty decent quality, too.

Depends on the running time of the feature

[btgaoke]

no wiki?

[shipwreck]

Depends on the running time of the feature

Not necessarily. Quick example: REFiNED rip of Quantum of Solace. 106min, 8.74GB.

[iLOVENZB]

Depends on the running time of the feature

Not necessarily. Quick example: REFiNED rip of Quantum of Solace. 106min, 8.74GB.

I assume that's a 720p rip?

"We have gotten together and discussed file sizing. DVD9 causes a much too high
bitrate for releases around the 2 hour long mark."

"[ Total Sizes ]

2.1) Final file size must be DVD5, 1.5 x DVD5, or DVD9 size
2.2) A size of 0.5 x DVD5 is acceptable for animated movies ONLY.
2.3) A max undersize of 40 MiB can be tolerated
2.4) DVD9 should be used only in cases of long movies, or high action movies.
2.5) Propering a release that could have been a bigger size is not valid,
unless below minimum bitrate.
2.6) 2x DVD5 is NOT allowed.
2.7) For very long movies like LOTR, you may deviate from rules. Please use a
multiple of 0.5xDVD5 (2240 MiB)."

Source: high.def.x264.movie.standards.rev2.nfo (Yes, I know there is a later revision)



EDIT: Revision 3.1 doesn't change much but 3.0 has significantly changed since revision 2

[shipwreck]

It's a 1080p rip (Quantum.of.Solace.1080p.BluRay.x264-REFiNED). Would have been an even more drastic example if it was a 720p rip, since 106min are anything but a "very long" movie (less than two hours), and 8.74GB for a relatively short 720p rip would have been rather overkill.

Another example: The.Boondock.Saints.1999.1080p.BluRay.x264-CiNEFiLE

108min, 8.74GB

[shipwreck]

Now that we have a poll about the best HD groups, what about the worst?

My vote goes to BDFLiX, or INFAMOUS. Nah, BDFLiX wins hands down. Not only do they rip ('rape' rather) every movie to the ~7.5GB max 'BD9' format, no matter how long they are, resulting in often pretty pixelated (read: crappy) rips. They also do some unbelievable school boy mistakes, unforgivable for classic movies like Kill Bill Vol.1, for example. They ruined that one by choosing a vertical resolution of 1280 pixels (instead of 1080 pixels max., obviously). Still don't get how that could have been 'overseen', if they even check their own rips that is.

[TheAllusionist]

I think that's the point of sticking with a certain group, that way you're assured quality rather than there being a possibility of failure. I prefer p2p groups like ESiR, CtrlHD, DON, PerfectionHD, etc.

The scene may have rules, but if you know anything about encoding, you should see that the rules are just a minimum guideline. The groups tend to see those as optimum settings and believe that they will have perfect releases. There is also an element of racing with the scene, whereas p2p try to get their uploads out quickly, but without errors.

Another thing is that when people say a p2p group, it just means that they are non-scene and use a peer-to-peer method. Most of the these groups are on private HD torrent sites or members of usenet groups. Both of these are dedicated to quality and that is why I see their rips as an extra seal of assurance.

If you mean p2p as in grabbing something from thepiratebay or mininova, there certainly wouldn't be the same commitment to quality.

/rant

[shipwreck]

Recent example of a scene rip that simply does not make sense. If it wasn't a good movie, I wouldn't even care. But seriously...

The.Curious.Case.of.Benjamin.Button.1080p.BD9.x264-Chakra

166min movie 'forced' into the 7.5GB BD9 format, resulting in an average video bitrate of around 5500Kbps, which really isn't enough for 1080p. In addition to that, they chose a 768Kbps DTS audio stream, likely re-encoded from the original lossless source.

If you want to have DTS sound, choose the 1536Kbps DTS core (no re-encoding needed), provided the Blu-Ray source has DTS audio streams, of course. If you need to save space, choose 640Kbps AC3 instead, and not 768Kbps DTS - the latter was DVD standard, just like 448Kbps AC3 was. At 640Kbps (introduced with HD), being the more efficient codec, AC3 usually sounds better than DTS at 768Kbps. DTS at 1536Kbps is king, of course, transparent, dynamic, precise -> if DTS, then 1536Kbps, please.

[BlackKnight]

WiKi do a pretty good job, too. No problem with colours and such, but I haven't seen that many of their releases yet. DON and PerfectionHD are other groups that release pretty good stuff.

if you want to see more releases from WiKi, you should join HDChina. It's where that group comes from and that's why WiKi isn't so popular.