Best way to reduce .mkv file size.

[Fordiesel69]

I plan to rip my DVD collection as I prefer to use plex on my TV's as to not be stuck using an optical drive.

MakeMKV does a fine job but the filesize is high.

Any recommendations?

 

[gogydm]

MakeMKV is outputting the native MPEG-2 format. After MakeMKV, I'd suggest encoding to something else like x264 or x265 using HandBrake. It's a great free, open-source tool.

 

[Rand]

h.265 is tremendous.. provided your device can decode it. (most can nowadays)
otherwise your plex will be doing alot of transcoding.

also its not that simple. is this dvd, blu-ray 4k? hdr?

h.264 is the most compatible also faster to encode.
h.265 has some extra features esp. for newer formats and takes signficantly longer to process/encode.

IMO: if you are using plex it is essential to set it up correctly
and utilize direct play when possible to avoid unnecessary trans coding
due to settings if you are hardware constrained.

What is your plex hardware? h.264 is a huge step from mpeg-2 but h.265 is also a decent leap up from that.

 

[jhellwig]

Some DVDs in the later years were double layer up to quad layer so there is much more data than a regular single layer 4.7Gb disk. I would see if it is possible to just copy that main title that you want and ditch the other versions/languages or whatever else they cram on the disk.

 

[Fordiesel69]

I am very fine with dvd quality. I do not need blue ray quality as that will be reserved for at home as only on TV is 4k. All the rest of mine are 1080p. I will be backing up only dvds not blue ray

 

[Fordiesel69]

Thank you for the suggestion to use handbrake. Knowing nothing about how to use it, I used the default H264 encoder settings and it was fine. My ancient Xeon E3-1245 V3 hit a thermal event so I switched to using my spare Xeon E-2136 sever. The old haswell took 17 to 20 min to encode, the E2136 takes 4-7 min.

When is it smart to use x265 encoding?

 

[OVERKILL]

If you want smaller files, use x265. That's what most of my Plex library is at this juncture.

 

[Fordiesel69]

Do we know of any players that **can't** play x265?

And are you using 10 bit or 12 bit.

 

[OVERKILL]

Do we know of any players that **can't** play x265?

And are you using 10 bit or 12 bit.

Most of the stuff is 12-bit IIRC, but I will double check when I'm home.

 

[Fordiesel69]

It seems 10 bit and 12 bit look the same on a 55" 1080p TV.

Takes 25 minutes but only hits the CPU 55 ~ 68 % load.

 

[OVERKILL]

It seems 10 bit and 12 bit look the same on a 55" 1080p TV.

Takes 25 minutes but only hits the CPU 55 ~ 68 % load.

I checked, most of mine are actually 10-bit.

 

[Rand]

arent dvds 720 × 480 pixels you could encode to a smaller size no need for 1080p(1920x1080)

 

[Fordiesel69]

Im not an expert but I think it upscales.