"Quality" vs. "Encoder Preset"

[hanness]

Description of problem or question:

On the "Video" tab of Handbrake, what really is the difference between adjusting the "Quality" slider and the "Encoder Preset" slider?

When I make adjustments to the quality, I can see huge differences in the resulting output quality and this makes a big difference in the resulting file size, but it does not seem to make a huge difference in the amount of processing time.

However, when I adjust the Encoder Preset, it makes a huge difference in how how it takes to process the video, but only minor difference to the output size and I'm also not really seeing a noticable difference in quality.

So, I'm wondering, can I bump up the speed by setting the Encoder Preset slider to a faster speed, and make up for any potential quality loss by setting the Quality slider to slightly better quality or is this misguided thinking?

HandBrake version (e.g., 1.0.0):

1.3.3 for Windows


Operating system and version (e.g., Ubuntu 16.04 LTS, macOS 10.13 High Sierra, Windows 10 Creators Update):

Windows 10, version 2004, x64


HandBrake Activity Log ***required*** (see How-to get an activity log)

NOTE: I have no activity log because this is a general question about what settings to use prior to performing any encoding so there is no activity!

[rollin_eng]

Obviously you have done an encode as you know settings change speed.

Speed, quality, size. The rule is you can have 2.