5 ms·

I don't really know what people "generally" think of Netflix encoding, but my experience is that it's Very Bad. It's a combination of factors: - Netflix will o

I don't really know what people "generally" think of Netflix encoding, but my experience is that it's Very Bad. It's a combination of factors: - Netflix will only send you "high quality" (over 720p) streams on certain browsers (IE on windows, Safari on OSX, ???? on Linux) that support Encrypted Media Extensions. - Netflix also auto-scales the quality they are sending based on their understanding of your connection. - Also apparently they do per-title re-encoding passes. This all combines, in my experience, to on average the worst streaming quality overall and also the most opaque. There are debug modes you can enable to see some of this, but generally it's very hard to tell what quality you are looking at and what is preventing you from getting a nicer quality. I also find that Netflix's "low profile" content (i.e. not max quality) looks bad - i.e. the 720p stream looks quite bad in addition to being low resolution.

vosper 2y ago
> Netflix also auto-scales the quality they are sending based on their understanding of your connection. Netflix dropping to potato quality after a few minutes is infuriating. Refresh the browser and quality goes back up for a few minutes before it drops again. My wife often doesn’t notice it; it drives me nuts. My theory is that they try to save bandwidth by dropping quality after some time and hoping you don’t notice.
- charlie0 2y ago
  Probably because there's a significant number of people who just stream stuff constantly as background noise. The tyranny of the minority.
LegitShady 2y ago
100% agree with all of your points
Retr0id 2y ago
> Netflix will only send you "high quality" streams on certain browsers [...] that support Encrypted Media Extensions. They won't send you anything at all unless you have EME, coupled to a supported DRM engine. Getting >1080p requires a "more secure" DRM engine (e.g. Widevine L1, PlayReady SL3000)
MaxBarraclough 2y ago
It's similar with YouTube's premium content, i.e. DRM-protected films or series available for rent or purchase on YouTube. It plays at a maximum of 480P on most desktop browsers, including Google's own Chrome for Windows. (Disclaimer: I haven't checked this recently, I'm assuming the situation hasn't improved.) * https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/3306741 https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/3306741 * https://support.google.com/youtube/thread/89050028/my-movie-i-purchased-in-hd-1080p-isn-t-in-1080p-anymore-it-s-in-480p-not-what-i-paid-15-for https://support.google.com/youtube/thread/89050028/my-movie-...
jamesponddotco 2y ago
Because of this quality issue, I always wondered how people who rip Netflix content handle this, since they often offer 2160p Dolby Atmos versions of movies or even TV show episodes for download. How do they maintain the quality long enough to rip the content? When I used Netflix years ago, I could barely keep a constant 1080p stream at times.
- gruez 2y ago
  They use HDCP strippers, devices which can strip protections from the hdmi signal, at which point they can feed it into an capture card to reencode.
  - AltF4me 2y ago
    I think the OP's question was maintaining the higher quality stream, not the act of ripping.
    - gruez 2y ago
      That doesn't seem hard to pull off. Just record the stream multiple times and splice/replace the low quality bits.
      - kmeisthax 2y ago
        The FTP topsite scene is extremely competitive and anyone doing multiple rips to splice together would lose the race to leak the show.
        Cyph0n 2y ago
        The best WEB-DL groups are internal P2P - FLUX (HDB) and NTb (BTN). They both (afaik) do hybrid releases by taking e.g. audio or DV metadata from one service and merging it with another source. Funnily enough, even for UHD remuxes, P2P groups are top-tier (like Wildcat and Framestor).
  - 2y ago
mock-possum 2y ago
For whatever it’s worth, I’ve never had any problem with it. I’ve got a bookshelf computer hooked up to a 52” 1080p screen in my living room, nothing fancy, and I’ve never noticed any issues at all with quality, or buffering times. I just open the video through the website in chrome, and play it, and it’s fine.
- aeturnum 2y ago
  I think you will probably see a noticeable increase in quality if you install one of the "netflix 1080p" extensions[1]. [1] https://chromewebstore.google.com/search/netflix%20higher%20quality?hl=en https://chromewebstore.google.com/search/netflix%20higher%20...
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
serallak 2y ago
You are talking about PC browsers, but I do not think they are the main target of Netflix nowadays. They would be much more concerned about the quality on their app on smartphones, tablets and smart TVs.
- eythian 2y ago
  I thought the same, but it turns out I have quite a number of friends (especially younger, who are sharing apartments with flatmates etc.) who don't have a TV or tablet, and who will just sit on their bed or couch with a laptop for netflix and such. This is totally anecdotal of course, but I do feel like it might be the device stats are quite different from what we might expect.
  - Mindwipe 2y ago
    They are, but only in that you would be surprised at how tiny the PC usage is to most online video streamers, it's even smaller than anyone would expect.
hulitu 2y ago
> Netflix also auto-scales the quality they are sending based on their understanding of your connection. This is the future. You can multiply a pixel as many times as you want. They really managed to squeeze the sound quality to a minimum.
- entropicdrifter 2y ago
  I have a friend who genuinely thinks Dolby Digital Plus ripped from streaming services is higher quality than lossy DTS ripped from a DVD or Blu-ray. Insanity.
presentation 2y ago
They should just have a setting the user can set to decide how much buffering vs quality they’re willing to tolerate
bwat49 2y ago
> - Netflix will only send you "high quality" (over 720p) streams on certain browsers (IE on windows, Safari on OSX, ???? on Linux) that support Encrypted Media Extensions. It's not only netflix that does this, all of the streaming services do (though some of them limit to 1080p instead of 720p). Such an utterly pointless anti-piracy measure... every show ends up on torrents in 4k regardless, only serves to punish those actually paying for the service.
- aeturnum 2y ago
  I believe it's rooted in agreements that content producers (including Netflix I am sure) insist on for distributing media. My impression is that all anti-piracy measures are intended to "just" extend the exclusivity period for official sources for that media. So almost anything you can do to delay high quality rips appearing will be worthwhile for the company financially.
  - baobabKoodaa 2y ago
    Torrents for popular movies and tv shows tend to appear within hours (in good quality even) so not sure how successful that attempt at delaying is
    - Mindwipe 2y ago
      Netflix 4k titles certainly don't. It's often weeks at this point for web-dls.

vosper 2y ago

> Netflix also auto-scales the quality they are sending based on their understanding of your connection. Netflix dropping to potato quality after a few minutes is infuriating. Refresh the browser and quality goes back up for a few minutes before it drops again. My wife often doesn’t notice it; it drives me nuts. My theory is that they try to save bandwidth by dropping quality after some time and hoping you don’t notice.

charlie0 2y ago
Probably because there's a significant number of people who just stream stuff constantly as background noise. The tyranny of the minority.

LegitShady 2y ago

100% agree with all of your points

Retr0id 2y ago

> Netflix will only send you "high quality" streams on certain browsers [...] that support Encrypted Media Extensions. They won't send you anything at all unless you have EME, coupled to a supported DRM engine. Getting >1080p requires a "more secure" DRM engine (e.g. Widevine L1, PlayReady SL3000)

MaxBarraclough 2y ago

It's similar with YouTube's premium content, i.e. DRM-protected films or series available for rent or purchase on YouTube. It plays at a maximum of 480P on most desktop browsers, including Google's own Chrome for Windows. (Disclaimer: I haven't checked this recently, I'm assuming the situation hasn't improved.) * https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/3306741 https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/3306741 * https://support.google.com/youtube/thread/89050028/my-movie-i-purchased-in-hd-1080p-isn-t-in-1080p-anymore-it-s-in-480p-not-what-i-paid-15-for https://support.google.com/youtube/thread/89050028/my-movie-...

jamesponddotco 2y ago

Because of this quality issue, I always wondered how people who rip Netflix content handle this, since they often offer 2160p Dolby Atmos versions of movies or even TV show episodes for download. How do they maintain the quality long enough to rip the content? When I used Netflix years ago, I could barely keep a constant 1080p stream at times.

gruez 2y ago
They use HDCP strippers, devices which can strip protections from the hdmi signal, at which point they can feed it into an capture card to reencode.
- AltF4me 2y ago
  I think the OP's question was maintaining the higher quality stream, not the act of ripping.
  - gruez 2y ago
    That doesn't seem hard to pull off. Just record the stream multiple times and splice/replace the low quality bits.
    - kmeisthax 2y ago
      The FTP topsite scene is extremely competitive and anyone doing multiple rips to splice together would lose the race to leak the show.
      - Cyph0n 2y ago
        The best WEB-DL groups are internal P2P - FLUX (HDB) and NTb (BTN). They both (afaik) do hybrid releases by taking e.g. audio or DV metadata from one service and merging it with another source. Funnily enough, even for UHD remuxes, P2P groups are top-tier (like Wildcat and Framestor).
- 2y ago

mock-possum 2y ago

For whatever it’s worth, I’ve never had any problem with it. I’ve got a bookshelf computer hooked up to a 52” 1080p screen in my living room, nothing fancy, and I’ve never noticed any issues at all with quality, or buffering times. I just open the video through the website in chrome, and play it, and it’s fine.

aeturnum 2y ago
I think you will probably see a noticeable increase in quality if you install one of the "netflix 1080p" extensions[1]. [1] https://chromewebstore.google.com/search/netflix%20higher%20quality?hl=en https://chromewebstore.google.com/search/netflix%20higher%20...

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

serallak 2y ago

You are talking about PC browsers, but I do not think they are the main target of Netflix nowadays. They would be much more concerned about the quality on their app on smartphones, tablets and smart TVs.

eythian 2y ago
I thought the same, but it turns out I have quite a number of friends (especially younger, who are sharing apartments with flatmates etc.) who don't have a TV or tablet, and who will just sit on their bed or couch with a laptop for netflix and such. This is totally anecdotal of course, but I do feel like it might be the device stats are quite different from what we might expect.
- Mindwipe 2y ago
  They are, but only in that you would be surprised at how tiny the PC usage is to most online video streamers, it's even smaller than anyone would expect.

hulitu 2y ago

> Netflix also auto-scales the quality they are sending based on their understanding of your connection. This is the future. You can multiply a pixel as many times as you want. They really managed to squeeze the sound quality to a minimum.

entropicdrifter 2y ago
I have a friend who genuinely thinks Dolby Digital Plus ripped from streaming services is higher quality than lossy DTS ripped from a DVD or Blu-ray. Insanity.

presentation 2y ago

They should just have a setting the user can set to decide how much buffering vs quality they’re willing to tolerate

bwat49 2y ago

> - Netflix will only send you "high quality" (over 720p) streams on certain browsers (IE on windows, Safari on OSX, ???? on Linux) that support Encrypted Media Extensions. It's not only netflix that does this, all of the streaming services do (though some of them limit to 1080p instead of 720p). Such an utterly pointless anti-piracy measure... every show ends up on torrents in 4k regardless, only serves to punish those actually paying for the service.

aeturnum 2y ago
I believe it's rooted in agreements that content producers (including Netflix I am sure) insist on for distributing media. My impression is that all anti-piracy measures are intended to "just" extend the exclusivity period for official sources for that media. So almost anything you can do to delay high quality rips appearing will be worthwhile for the company financially.
- baobabKoodaa 2y ago
  Torrents for popular movies and tv shows tend to appear within hours (in good quality even) so not sure how successful that attempt at delaying is
  - Mindwipe 2y ago
    Netflix 4k titles certainly don't. It's often weeks at this point for web-dls.