#313537 - 03/09/2008 21:08
The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
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Except this is WinXP, which I'd been led to believe didn't have the "missing codec" problem that people (incorrectly) associate with Linux systems.
So.. how do I get it to play an mpeg4 video ??
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#313538 - 03/09/2008 21:09
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 24/12/2001
Posts: 5528
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#313539 - 03/09/2008 21:14
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: tman]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
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No change. I think perhaps something better than wimpy11 is needed. What do people use to view their media on this wretched platform? Thanks
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#313540 - 03/09/2008 21:16
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 24/12/2001
Posts: 5528
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It an AVI? If so then WMP should be enough. Any idea what the FourCC is for it?
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#313541 - 03/09/2008 21:17
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: tman]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 24/12/2001
Posts: 5528
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If all else fails then just install VLC. That usually plays pretty much everything and doesn't need codecs installed since it has its own.
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#313542 - 03/09/2008 21:20
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: tman]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
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If all else fails then just install VLC. That usually plays pretty much everything and doesn't need codecs installed since it has its own. Ahh.. good suggestion. I think that's what I'll try next. Hopefully my earlier attempts at adding codecs and the like didn't install too much spyware. (it's in .avi format, output from mencoder). Thanks
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#313543 - 03/09/2008 21:20
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
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I wanted to try RealPlayer as an alternative, but the installer dies with a scripting error. 
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#313544 - 03/09/2008 21:22
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: tman]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
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It an AVI? If so then WMP should be enough. Any idea what the FourCC is for it? It's in a .avi container, and file reports: 2041_20080824180000.avi: RIFF (little-endian) data, AVI, 720 x 400, ~30 fps, video: FFMpeg MPEG-4, audio: Dolby AC3 (stereo, 48000 Hz)Thanks
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#313546 - 03/09/2008 21:28
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
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Mmm.. no joy. Black video from VLC. Here's a simple cut of the first 5MB of the file: can you play it there? (works fine on Linux) http://rtr.ca/sample.aviThanks
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#313547 - 03/09/2008 21:34
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
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Mmm.. no joy. Black video from VLC. Heh.. vlc on Linux plays the file just fine, of course.
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#313548 - 03/09/2008 21:38
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
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Easiest thing to do is install a codec pack. I've had good luck in the past with the K-Lite Codec Pack. And, for what it's worth, GSpot is a good tool for divining information about video files.
Edited by wfaulk (03/09/2008 21:40)
Edit Reason: GSpot
_________________________
Bitt Faulk
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#313549 - 03/09/2008 21:39
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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old hand
Registered: 14/02/2002
Posts: 804
Loc: Salt Lake City, UT
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I always use ffdshow as the only codec I install anymore. It will decode and encode everything I need. If you still need a player I really like Media Player Classic. Edit: and your file played back perfectly for me.
Edited by Waterman981 (03/09/2008 21:48)
Edit Reason: feedback
_________________________
-Michael
#040103696 on a shelf
Mk2a - 90 GB - Red - Illuminated buttons
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#313550 - 03/09/2008 21:40
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
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Mmm.. no joy. Black video from VLC. Heh.. vlc on Linux plays the file just fine, of course. Okay, I've gotten vlc to work, by cranking down the " hardware acceleration" setting for the Radeon driver to midway instead of full acceleration. Ugh. See, the trick is, I'm mailing these videos cross-country to the most technically illiterate family imaginable. -ml
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#313551 - 03/09/2008 21:45
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 24/12/2001
Posts: 5528
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Your best bet would be to transcode it into something else. Sending video is a massive PITA. Got to make sure the audio and video codecs match on both ends etc...
The specific FourCC that it wants is for ffdshow. I've tried changing the FourCC to XVID or DIVX but it just doesn't like it but that might be because the file has been truncated.
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#313552 - 03/09/2008 21:46
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 24/12/2001
Posts: 5528
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Ugh. See, the trick is, I'm mailing these videos cross-country to the most technically illiterate family imaginable. Transcode to an oldish WMV or make a DVD video maybe?
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#313553 - 03/09/2008 21:46
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
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Easiest way to be sure would be to reencode it into a format for which all Windows PCs will have support. I'm sure there are some reasonable AVI codecs, but WMV is basically guaranteed.
Also, do they have a DVD player? Burn a video DVD and send them that.
Edited by wfaulk (03/09/2008 21:47)
_________________________
Bitt Faulk
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#313555 - 03/09/2008 22:13
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 08/03/2000
Posts: 12338
Loc: Sterling, VA
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You could also try encoding to flash video. Then you wouldn't have to send video anywhere, they could just view it online. You can get some pretty good quality from Youtube, and that other one I'm forgetting at the moment...
As for codec hell in Windows, like others have said, just use VLC. I'm sorry, Bitt, but codec packs are awful. They're just a mess, and there's really no way to uninstall what they put on. I definitely say install VLC and never worry about codecs ever again.
And I second the suggestion for Media Player Classic. VLC is lighter than most playback software, but MPC is the lightest I've seen that can play as many types of files. That, and MPlayer, which has some nice GUIs for Windows now.
All that said, I'm sorry Mark but are you sure that file is encoded properly? VLC definitely gave me an error when opening it, but it still played afterwards. That says to me: "encoding issue."
_________________________
Matt
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#313556 - 03/09/2008 22:17
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: Dignan]
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old hand
Registered: 14/02/2002
Posts: 804
Loc: Salt Lake City, UT
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It did play fine for me with ffdshow... in both MPC and WMP.
_________________________
-Michael
#040103696 on a shelf
Mk2a - 90 GB - Red - Illuminated buttons
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#313558 - 03/09/2008 23:23
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: Waterman981]
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old hand
Registered: 01/10/2002
Posts: 1039
Loc: Fullerton, Calif.
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Plays fine on win2K and VLC with the Nemo codec pack. MP won't play it, claiming it's opened by another app. Stupid.
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#313559 - 03/09/2008 23:33
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: Dignan]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
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All that said, I'm sorry Mark but are you sure that file is encoded properly? VLC definitely gave me an error when opening it, but it still played afterwards. That says to me: "encoding issue." Yeah, the real file is fine -- the sample.avi I provided is just a raw chop of the first 5MB of the real file, missing the index from the tail end etc.. which is why vlc complains (but plays it fine regardless). Cheers
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#313560 - 03/09/2008 23:35
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: Waterman981]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
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It did play fine for me with ffdshow... in both MPC and WMP. Ah.. so ffdshow is just a (good) codec package, for general use by wimp11 and others ? Thanks
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#313561 - 03/09/2008 23:48
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 17/12/2000
Posts: 2665
Loc: Manteca, California
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Gspot says
FILE_NAME sample.avi
FILE_NAME_WITH_PATH C:\Documents and Settings\Glenn\Desktop\sample.avi
FILE_SIZE 5,242,880
CONT_AUDIO_STREAM_COUNT 1
CONT_BASETYPE AVI(.AVI)
CONT_BYTES_MISSING 1068497458
CONT_INTERLEAVE_ALIGN Split
CONT_INTERLEAVE_PRELOAD 512
CONT_INTERLEAVE_TIME 500
CONT_SUBTYPE OpenDML (AVI v2.0),
CONT_TOTAL_BITRATE 0
VIDEO_ASPECT_CONVERT_AVI1
VIDEO_ASPECT_CONVERT_AVI2
VIDEO_ASPECT_CONVERT_CVD1
VIDEO_ASPECT_CONVERT_CVD2
VIDEO_ASPECT_CONVERT_DVD1
VIDEO_ASPECT_CONVERT_DVD2
VIDEO_ASPECT_CONVERT_SVCD1
VIDEO_ASPECT_CONVERT_SVCD2
VIDEO_ASPECT_CONVERT_VCD1
VIDEO_ASPECT_CONVERT_VCD2
VIDEO_ASPECT_SOURCE_MATCH
VIDEO_ASPECT_TYPE_NTSC
VIDEO_ASPECT_TYPE_PAL
VIDEO_BITRATE 844
VIDEO_CODEC_NAME FFmpeg/ffdshow ISO MPEG-4
VIDEO_CODEC_STATUS Codec(s) are NOT Installed
VIDEO_CODEC_TYPE FMP4
VIDEO_DAR 1.800
VIDEO_DURATION 0:33.868
VIDEO_FIELDS_PER_SEC
VIDEO_FRAME_COUNT 1015
VIDEO_FRAMES_PER_SEC 29.970
VIDEO_H264
VIDEO_MPEG2
VIDEO_MPEG2_3X2
VIDEO_MPEG2_BFF
VIDEO_MPEG2_I_L
VIDEO_MPEG2_PPF
VIDEO_MPEG2_PROG
VIDEO_MPEG2_TFF
VIDEO_MPEG4 MPEG-4
VIDEO_MPEG4_BVOP
VIDEO_MPEG4_GMC
VIDEO_MPEG4_NVOP
VIDEO_MPEG4_QPEL
VIDEO_PAR 1.000
VIDEO_PICS_PER_SEC 29.970
VIDEO_QF 0.098
VIDEO_SAR 1.800
VIDEO_SIZE_X 720
VIDEO_SIZE_Y 400
AUDIO_BITRATE 384
AUDIO_BITRATE_TYPE CBR
AUDIO_CHANNEL_COUNT 6
AUDIO_CODEC 0x2000 (Dolby AC3) AC3
AUDIO_CODEC_STATUS Codec(s) are Installed
AUDIO_MPEG_STREAM_ID
AUDIO_MPEG_SUBSTREAM_ID
AUDIO_SAMPLE_RATE 48000
_________________________
Glenn
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#313567 - 04/09/2008 00:33
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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addict
Registered: 01/03/2002
Posts: 599
Loc: Florida
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I use DefilerPak and Zoomplayer and have it download the codecs. You can also try CoreAVC. I've heard it is very good. Edit: Your sample file plays perfectly for me.
Edited by Attack (04/09/2008 00:37)
_________________________
Chad
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#313570 - 04/09/2008 00:46
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: Dignan]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
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As for codec hell in Windows, like others have said, just use VLC. I'm sorry, Bitt, but codec packs are awful. They're just a mess, and there's really no way to uninstall what they put on. I definitely say install VLC and never worry about codecs ever again. Many are awful. I linked to one I've had success with. All it does is install some codecs and a few pieces of software, like GSpot and MPC. Installing individual codecs always left me in a bigger mess if I had to install more than one or two. And I second the suggestion for Media Player Classic. VLC is lighter than most playback software, but MPC is the lightest I've seen that can play as many types of files. MPC uses the Windows codec system. If he can't play it with WMP, he can't play it with MPC. Period. It's merely a different UI for the exact same playback software built into Windows.
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Bitt Faulk
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#313572 - 04/09/2008 01:18
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
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All that said, I'm sorry Mark but are you sure that file is encoded properly? VLC definitely gave me an error when opening it, but it still played afterwards. That says to me: "encoding issue." Yeah, the real file is fine -- the sample.avi I provided is just a raw chop of the first 5MB of the real file, missing the index from the tail end etc.. which is why vlc complains (but plays it fine regardless). I've since replaced the sample.avi file with a full/complete sample (same codecs), and vlc no longer complains about it on startup. Otherwise no difference (still need to crank down the h/w accel on my P4 Radeon box). Recoding as WMV (both version 1 and version 2) didn't work, neither did ordinary mpeg-2. I like the format I've already coded to, as it also keeps the audio perfectly in sync.. something that other encoding options seem to bugger up. I've sent a link for the sample.avi to the intended recipient, along with a link for the vlc installer, and asked her to try those and report back. If all goes well, I'll burn the videos to DVD-ROM and mail them across the country. Thanks folks!
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#313575 - 04/09/2008 03:37
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 08/06/1999
Posts: 7868
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Sadly video playback is pretty much a mess on any OS. Too many formats, too many companies with their own attempts to control the market, and no clear leader. Video never has had quite the killer format like audio did with MP3.
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#313576 - 04/09/2008 06:00
Re: The usual: no codec found when trying to play a video
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 18/01/2000
Posts: 5683
Loc: London, UK
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Otherwise no difference (still need to crank down the h/w accel on my P4 Radeon box). Video driver or codec bug. I had a similar problem with WMP on a Radeon card -- things that were too bright came out black. VLC obviously does something different (probably not exercising the acceleration quite so much), because that worked OK. That card's since gone bang, so I can't check your file for you...
_________________________
-- roger
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#313624 - 04/09/2008 19:09
Will it never end? WinXP UDF support?
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
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So, I'm burning these 3-GByte files to DVD-R now, to mail out west. Burned first disc, and popped it into the WinXP box here just to ensure things are alright, and... It comes up with an empty root directory on the DVD. "Properties" shows that XP knows it is a "UDF" filesystem, but it refuses to show the contents. Again, this works fine on Linux, even on the exact same machine. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/321640Q: Does Vista also suffer this M-bare-ass-ment? Q: Is there a spyware-free UDF driver available for XP? Thanks guys.
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#313626 - 04/09/2008 19:24
Re: Will it never end? WinXP UDF support?
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 24/12/2001
Posts: 5528
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Have you closed the session?
Use a different UDF variant? XP can do UDF but not whatever one you're using it seems.
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#313628 - 04/09/2008 19:46
Re: Will it never end? WinXP UDF support?
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
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Q: Does Vista also suffer this M-bare-ass-ment? Mmm.. judging from Google results, I'd say that both XP and Vista lack full UDF support. Bummer. I think I'll just mail a USB hard drive to her, instead of trying to fiddle further with this lack of basic functionality. Thanks
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#313632 - 04/09/2008 21:24
Re: Will it never end? WinXP UDF support?
[Re: mlord]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
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Just burn it as UDF 1.5. Easy-peasy.
_________________________
Bitt Faulk
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#313672 - 06/09/2008 01:17
Re: Will it never end? WinXP UDF support?
[Re: wfaulk]
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pooh-bah
Registered: 12/01/2002
Posts: 2009
Loc: Brisbane, Australia
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Why the need to burn UDF at all?
_________________________
Christian
#40104192 120Gb (no longer in my E36 M3, won't fit the E46 M3)
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#313678 - 06/09/2008 10:45
Re: Will it never end? WinXP UDF support?
[Re: Shonky]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
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Why the need to burn UDF at all? Another Microsoft limitation -- without UDF, it cannot handle LARGE files at all (> 2GB, I think). Which is why DVD-Video discs always have the main feature split up into a bunch of small VOBs. EDIT: the video files I'm dealing with here, began life as 40GB recordings (6hrs each of HDTV at 1080i), and have been squished down to 720x400 resolution, resulting in 3.something GB files. Again, Linux doesn't care. Cheers
Edited by mlord (06/09/2008 10:47)
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