Not really a Mac problem but you guys are a little more serious.

[Fishtalk]

What sort of European standard DVD player do I need to Play my .AVI CD's on my TV.... DIVIX? MPG4? DIVIX DVD? or what ever ????
thanks in advance.

 

[Makosuke]

The answer is "Depends on the .avi." You can easily find other threads here or pages elsewhere that explain this in detail, but AVI is a container format. It's an empty box into which you can put audio and video tracks in any of a wide variety of formats (aka codecs). It's the same as .mov or .mkv--you can put almost anything in them.

So what you really want to know is whether a given DVD player supports both the AVI container (which any one that supports additional video files almost certainly does), AND whether it supports the codecs used in your specific AVI files, which the manufacturers rarely explain in any detail.

If you're lucky, your AVIs are relatively vanilla "DivX" files, meaning they use DivX video and probably MP3 audio. Those should be played back by almost any DVD player that has a little "DivX" logo or somesuch on it.

If you're unlucky they've got some sort of crazy combination of codecs (I have seen some truly insane junk in AVIs before), or are just plain broken such that a forgiving application will play them but a set-top DVD player will choke. Then of course there are the .mkv files that somebody stuck an .avi extension on because that made it open in the right app. These, of course, will only play in a player that can handle .mkvs, and I don't know if such players even exist (the PS3 certainly doesn't like them).

Open one up in QT player, do a get info on it and see what the codecs reported are. Cross your fingers and hope you see "DivX" and "MP3" listed.

 

[Fishtalk]

Quote/


Open one up in QT player, do a get info on it and see what the codecs reported are. Cross your fingers and hope you see "DivX" and "MP3" listed.[/QUOTE]

Many Thanks for your Info... did what you suggested and came up with DivX
but did'nt see any thing about MP3....

 

[Dan73]

What sort of European standard DVD player do I need to Play my .AVI CD's on my TV.... DIVIX? MPG4? DIVIX DVD? or what ever ????
thanks in advance.

Best bet would be to built a HTPC, then you can play all formats, including bluray if you get the drive and if you can play movies right off other computers and network storage and such.

They're easy/fun to built too.

 

[Makosuke]

...came up with DivX
but did'nt see any thing about MP3....

What did it say immediately after "DivX, 320x240, Millions" or whatever? The next thing there should be the audio track.

They're easy/fun to built too.

For certain definitions of "easy" and "fun", which don't, frankly, match up at all with non-geek definitions of either term. The Windows license alone, before any hardware, is also going to cost you more than most set-top DVD players.

Personally, I'd just get anything that says DivX on it somewhere and hope it works. If not, nothing short of an HTPC will anyway

 

[rowsdower]

For certain definitions of "easy" and "fun", which don't, frankly, match up at all with non-geek definitions of either term. The Windows license alone, before any hardware, is also going to cost you more than most set-top DVD players.

Completely agreed on how easy or fun this would be for the OP. If anyone is interested though, MythTV is free. However, hardware adequate to handle HTPC duties will definitely cost more than most set-top DVD players.

 

[Fishtalk]

Completely agreed on how easy or fun this would be for the OP. If anyone is interested though, MythTV is free. However, hardware adequate to handle HTPC duties will definitely cost more than most set-top DVD players.

Yeah Right..my idea of 'Fun' is not building electronic stuff.... couldn't if i try'd
I found a DVD player with DivX and Digital TV built in for 38€.


Finally to answer Makosuke's question. In the majority of my.AVI CD's
I get Video// Generic MPEG-4 and Sound// MPEG-3
Then underneath I get Annotation Valeur // DivX.
But sometimes I get Video// DivX //sound MPEG 3
and sometimes on Sound i get "ms' which dont work on QT..have to use VLC to get a sound track... I assume a DivX DVD player would work.... thanks for your answer's

 

[Makosuke]

The ones that say "Video// DivX //sound MPEG 3" will most likely play on a set-top box. The ones that say "Generic MPEG-4 and Sound// MPEG-3" probably will as well, though it'll depend on the specifics of the file and the player.

As for those ones with "MS" sound (they're using one of the sound codecs common in WMV files), there's a chance those will play on a set-top box if it also claims to support .wmv files, but even if it does I wouldn't get my hopes up.

I honestly wonder what possesses people to encode files like that, but if it makes you feel any better Windows users often have just as much trouble getting them to work as Mac users (can't tell you how many "this file won't play for me!" threads I've seen regardless of the platform).

Anyway, good luck!

 

[Fishtalk]

Thanks Makosuke..... I'll tell you if it worked once I've bought the player.

Yeah it works.....

 

[Dan73]

Yeah Right..my idea of 'Fun' is not building electronic stuff.... couldn't if i try'd
I found a DVD player with DivX and Digital TV built in for 38€.

Couldn't if you tried? Extremely doubtful unless you can't turn a screw driver or plug in wires were they belong and you can ONLY plug them in where they belong because you can't plug a USB plug into a DVI port can you? Its the same on the inside.

 

[Makosuke]

Thanks Makosuke..... I'll tell you if it worked once I've bought the player.

Yeah it works.....

Glad to hear that.

Couldn't if you tried? Extremely doubtful unless you can't turn a screw driver or plug in wires were they belong and you can ONLY plug them in where they belong because you can't plug a USB plug into a DVI port can you? Its the same on the inside.

I mean this in no way as an insult to the OP or others without much technical aptitude, but actually, yes, you'd be quite surprised at how much trouble people can have with "simple" things like putting together the components of a computer.

Yes, given an exact parts list and detailed instructions, almost anybody could manage to assemble a DIY computer. The same could also be said of an average four cylinder engine, and most people outside a supervised high school shop class don't try that, either.

In reality, even with the Internet to help, understanding enough to compile said parts list (rather than having somebody hand it to you) is a substantial undertaking if you're not starting from a technical background (I've tried to teach people myself). And even if you bypass that and somebody just hands you a stack of compatible motherboard-processor-RAM-HD-case-power supply-video card, putting it all together without breaking anything is going to be a major, stressful undertaking for a lot of people.

Just because YOU think it's easy and fun (and hey, I fall in that category myself!) doesn't mean everybody does--could do it isn't the same as either want to do it or would find it easy if you tried.


Oh, and "you can't plug a USB plug into a DVI port can you" is spoken like someone who's never done much tech support. I've seen people stuff USB plugs into an Ethernet port (they're about the same width), then call me when their printer wasn't working, and competent people have been known to plug firewire cables in backwards, shorting the power pins to the data lines and frying devices or the PHY on the motherboard. They're not stupid, just not fully understanding what they're doing. Hell, I've broken SATA ports off brand-new motherboards on account of the cables they came with being overly tight, and I do this stuff for a living.