How big are the recorded shows on Directv

[theFOoL]

Hi guys,

Just curious... How big are the recorded shows on Directv? We have a 55" TV @1080p though I assume the HDD is a 2-4TB I'm guessing

 

[newtekie1]

It is going to vary a lot, so that question is almost impossible to answer. What TV you have doesn't matter. What does matter is the resolution of the actual video signal the DirectTV box is receiving from the TV station you are recording. A show broadcast at 1080p is going to take up a lot more space than a show broadcast at 720p or 480p. Though, I think DirectTV might only broadcast at a maximum of 720p?

Edit: Some research shows that DirectTV broadcasts in either 720p or 1080i, depending on what DirectTV receives from the content provider. So the size will depend on the resolution, with 1080i recording taking up a little more space than 720p. Though if the box uses the same bitrate to encode both(which is plausible), they they will both take up the same amount of space.

 

[theFOoL]

Well I'd assume so. Most shows I see look 720p so. I was just wondering

Definitely NBC Records at the res of the TV which is 1080p. It's a Roku TV

 

[newtekie1]

Definitely NBC Records at the res of the TV which is 1080p. It's a Roku TV

NBC broadcasts at 1080i, not 1080p, so the recording would be at 1080i. The resolution of the TV makes absolutely no difference, the DirectTV box doesn't care what resolution your TV uses.

 

[mtcn77]

You should search for lossless compression codecs. Later, you can further compress into final storage offline.

 

[newtekie1]

You should search for lossless compression codecs. Later, you can further compress into final storage offline.

No one uses lossless video compression. Not even the video on Blu-Rays is lossless.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

Some research shows that DirectTV broadcasts in either 720p or 1080i, depending on what DirectTV receives from the content provider.

ATSC... 720p and 1080i end up being about the same file size.

If DirecTV is still broadcasting MPEG2 and their DVRs record it as MPEG2, it is ~6 GB/hr...but I think that is wrong. I'm going to run a test off of my Hauppauge QuadHD tuner... I'll have a definitive answer in two hours...

At bare minimum, the number I provide will give you the worst-case-scenario for file size.


FYI, Roku can't generally handle MPEG2 unless it has a codec to decode it on the GPU.


Edit: Judging by 20 minutes of a 60 minute recording, looks like my ~6 GiB/hr was spot on.

For the record: MPEG4 h.264 heavy is ~4 GiB/hr and mobile is ~1 GiB/hr.


Edit:
4.73 GB (5,088,392,772 bytes)
59:56
1280x720
59.94 fps
24,000 kbps video
384 kbps audio (6 ch, 48 kHz)

It was "The View" so not much action/movement which improves compression. ~6 GB/s is a good rough estimate for MPEG2 per hour.