About data rate

With some video codecs, you can specify the data rate, which controls the amount of video -information that must be processed each second during playback. Specifying a data rate in Premiere sets the maximum data rate, because the actual data rate varies depending on the visual content of each frame.

The data rate you specify depends on the purpose of the video. The following list describes data rate guidelines for some uses:

Videotape production The data rate should fall within the capabilities of the computer and hard disk that will play the Timeline or clip during videotape recording.

Hard-disk playback If your final video will be played back from a hard disk, determine the typical data transfer rate of your audience's hard disks and set the data rate accordingly. If you are exporting video to be used in another editing system, or to be imported into a compositing application such as Adobe After Effects, you'll want to export at the maximum quality. Use a lossless codec or the codec supported by your video capture card, and specify the data rate that the editing system supports for video capture and editing.

CD-ROM playback The data rate for video played from a CD-ROM depends on the speed of the CD-ROM drive. For example, if you are preparing a final video file for a double-speed CD-ROM drive (300K per second) you might specify between 150 to 200K per second to account for both the data rate of the drive and for the system overhead required to move the data.

Intranet playback The data rate can be 100K per second or faster, depending on the speed of your intranet. An intranet is an in-house or private network that uses Internet network protocols. Because they are limited in scope, intranets generally use higher-quality communications lines than standard telephone lines, so they are usually much faster than the Internet.

Streaming video over the World Wide Web The data rate should account for real-world performance at the target data rate. For example, the data rate for streaming video designed for a 28,800 bps (bits per second) connection is often set to 20,000 bps. That's because factors such as data volume and line quality often prevent telephone-based Internet connections from consistently achieving their stated data rate.

Downloading a video file over the World Wide Web The data rate is less important than the size of the video file on disk, because the main concern is how long it takes to download the file. However, it still may be desirable to reduce the data rate for downloaded video because doing so reduces the size of the video file, making it download faster.

Use the Get Properties For command to analyze the data rate of files you export. See Analyzing clip properties and data rate.

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