HandBrake query

[slick rick73 10]

I have a movie on my desktop which was a .mkv file and was 2gb. I've then converted it on handBrake to .m4v format so I can put it in iTunes to stream to apple tv and the file is now 4gb.

Why is that?

[the_bloke 17]

At a guess, you've converted the file with a bitrate twice as high as the MKV.

 

You can download MediaInfo for free, get the video and audio bitrates of the MKV and use similar rates when using Handbrake to covert (unless Handbrake has an option to keep the same rates as the source; I can't remember).

 

Most HD movies downloaded from the 'net are in MKV format so it sounds like a process you'll have to get used to.

[slick rick73 10]

Thanks. I use the presets for Apple tv 3. I'm not very technically minded when it comes to computers but what you say kind of makes sense! I had wondered why my hard drive was getting so full so quickly and this explains it. I'll will have a mess around with the bit rate settings to see if I can improve things. Otherwise it's going to have to be a new hard drive..

[Guest]

You probably don't need to convert the video at all. You can probably remux it instead. It'll save lots of time as it won't need to reencode the video and possibly the audio too. Apple TV will be happy with h264 video and aac audio in an mp4 container.

 

If you search for remuxing mkv for apple tv you'll probably find something