Does anybody care anymore?

[Thargok]

I am only asking because ~2-3 years ago Divx was all the rave in the Mac community. ffmpeg hacks in OS X and Stux/3ivX solutions were all the rave. Encoding was crap, and although ffmpeg M$-MPEG4 was decent, it wasn't that great compared to PeeCee encodes.

However, now that 3ivX and DivX(tm) are in full swing with effective encoders/decoders in QT; it seems after all the morons complaining everyday, that MPEG-4 encoding is gone for DVD copying.

[tgpo]

Do I care about divx? No

Do I care about MPEG-4? Yes, Almost all of the videos on my website are MPEG-4. You can't beat the quality for the file size.

[galactica]

since gettnig a dvd burner, i say if its not dvd why bother!

[bilestyle]

i personally never cared for anything divx oriented. b4 or after my dvd burner.

[AntnyMD]

I don't have any real use for DivX or MPEG-4 until a standard is developed for burning the content onto CD/DVD and settop players designed to read that format are manufactured.

Until then, long-live DVD and SVCD.

[MikieV]

If I wasn't downloading fan-subbed Japanese TV-shows, I wouldn't care - since that is the only media I have in that format.

Divx-capable players are here now (or shortly available) - there is at least one person on this forum who has a much better idea of availability than I do. :P

If I get one of them, it might change my outlook on "Divx" (et al) - but I doubt it is something I would encode with, just use for playback.

Mike

[terryj]

Mikie V,
where are you going to download the fan subbed Japanese shows?
Curious to expand my horizons...

[MikieV]

Mikie V,
where are you going to download the fan subbed Japanese shows?
Curious to expand my horizons...

Usenet

I have an Easynews account, and a Comcast cable-modem account.

Anime newsgroups:
alt.binaries.multimedia.anime
alt.binaries.multimedia.anime.repost
alt.binaries.anime
alt.binaries.multimedia.anime.raw (not subtitled, yet)

Non-Anime Japanese TV-show newsgroups:
alt.binaries.multimedia.japanese
alt.binaries.multimedia.japanese.reposts

Mike

[ZeroSix]

DivX DVD players work very nicely... As for encoding, i agree. I rarely encode to DivX, but it is nice to have hardware that will play it if i choose that option.

Long live the SVCD!

[MikieV]

The only way I might be interested in encoding in Divx, is if it would let me get more playing-time stuffed into one DVD - with acceptable quality.

With DVDSP, I basically have three default options for MPEG2 encoding of my camcorder footage: 60-minutes, 90-minutes, and 120-minutes. There are some other variations, but I am looking at distributing (inflicting) home-movies on relatives out-of-state. I want great quality, and compatability with the most number of standalone players.

For my own use, with good-quality DVD-R/+R discs still over a buck-a-throw, getting -significantly- more than 2-hours of footage on a single disc is something I am interested in.

But, I am leaning more toward getting a standalone DVD-recorder/HD/tuner (to finally replace a VCR, for what little TV-recording I do) - and hope the price of DVD+R/+RW discs comes down, if these recorders reach "critical mass"?

If the price of the blanks comes down, Divx only makes sense as a bandwidth/time saver for internet transfers. Big surprise => that is why it came about, isn't it??

But it will probably be a -long- time before I am sending home-movies over the internet. :P

Mike

[Gazorgan]

If you can backup a DVD to a DVDR, then there's no point in making a 2 CDR version of the same movie.

6 months ago I never saw a DVD-ISO on the Internet, now I see dozens. We are talking 4 GB files now, whereas last year people were in the 1.0-1.4 GB range for a movie. I'm not condoning piracy, I'm telling you what I see when I put on the grey hat and see what the un-washed masses are doing....

[galactica]

If you can backup a DVD to a DVDR, then there's no point in making a 2 CDR version of the same movie.

I feel the same way

6 months ago I never saw a DVD-ISO on the Internet, now I see dozens. We are talking 4 GB files now, whereas last year people were in the 1.0-1.4 GB range for a movie. I'm not condoning piracy, I'm telling you what I see when I put on the grey hat and see what the un-washed masses are doing....

true, and just think how bad it will get as our net accesses increase to 10MB lines with 2MB uploads......

[Dunnyman]

When it takes them so bloody long to come up with mac stuff, no, why should I care about DivX? I truly get tired of everyone regarding Mac users as second class citizens, we get the last version of stuff, poorly ported crap, etc, etc, etc.. if a company isn't going to make a top-flight Mac version of their product, screw 'em.

[AntnyMD]

If you can backup a DVD to a DVDR, then there's no point in making a 2 CDR version of the same movie.

I feel the same way

I don't. Not everything is DVD-worthy, even at $1 per disc for a blank DVD. Well, lemme restate that ... even at $2 a disc (I still buy pricey media).

[MikieV]

6 months ago I never saw a DVD-ISO on the Internet, now I see dozens. We are talking 4 GB files now, whereas last year people were in the 1.0-1.4 GB range for a movie. I'm not condoning piracy, I'm telling you what I see when I put on the grey hat and see what the un-washed masses are doing....

Yeah, I've looked at some of the Usenet groups - and it is amazing how much is out there. Since I have an Easynews account (and via Comcast, an unused Giganews account), it is also amazing to see those posts archived for 25-28 days - giving people plenty of time to get all the files (let alone, the constant requests for reposts!).

As much as I dislike all the copy-protection being implemented - I can understand why they feel the need to do -something-.

Mike

[MikieV]

DivX DVD players work very nicely...

That is very tempting to me. I have three DVD-Rs, each containing a season of a subbed, Japanese-language, Anime TV show (Ghost in the Shell, RahXephon, Noir) in ".avi" format. The GITS and Noir discs have 26-episodes, each. The RX has 24.

If I re-encoded to mpeg2, to play on my standalone DVD player - it would fill a few discs.

It would be nice to be able to put these discs in, and select an episode from a menu.

Mike

[Thargok]

When it takes them so bloody long to come up with mac stuff, no, why should I care about DivX? I truly get tired of everyone regarding Mac users as second class citizens, we get the last version of stuff, poorly ported crap, etc, etc, etc.. if a company isn't going to make a top-flight Mac version of their product, screw 'em.

One guy did it by himself. Not only did he hack the decoder by himself, but he made the hack into an actual QT plugin. And he wrote an encoder. The result is a version that is faster than the PeeCee counterpart and more usable (as nobody I know has even come close to encoding with DivX from any source on Winthell; as it is a pain in the arse)

[tgpo]

One guy did it by himself. Not only did he hack the decoder by himself, but he made the hack into an actual QT plugin. And he wrote an encoder. The result is a version that is faster than the PeeCee counterpart and more usable (as nobody I know has even come close to encoding with DivX from any source on Winthell; as it is a pain in the arse)

I think I have an idea of who you are speaking of, or at least I think I know who you are speaking of.

I simply have no use for Divx right now. I'm very much into DVD burning now. I havn't even made a VCD is a long time.

[qshartle]

My friend was isanely smart, and took an old peice-o-shit mac, that he got at a garage sale, put in a 10 gig hd, OS X 10.3, Quicktime Pro, and a tv tuner card. And now he makes his MP4 movies on his G5, and then burns them o a cd, and watches them on his bigscreen. Altho XBOX and PS2 have similar programs, his only cost him 100$ to make.

Q

[galactica]

A MAC IN A GARAGE SALE!
you never see that!
what kind was it - do you know?!?!?

[qshartle]

damn, umm, its one of the older settop types, ummm, damn, i dunno the name, bu its perfect for a DVD player type thing. I was just at his hosue, and he painted the body black, and added neon lights around the skirt of it, inside, so it has this cool green glow coming ou the bottom.



Q

[ps2daddy]

My friend was isanely smart, and took an old peice-o-shit mac, that he got at a garage sale, put in a 10 gig hd, OS X 10.3, Quicktime Pro, and a tv tuner card. And now he makes his MP4 movies on his G5, and then burns them o a cd, and watches them on his bigscreen. Altho XBOX and PS2 have similar programs, his only cost him 100$ to make.

Q

If you have a PS2 with a modchip or boot disk you can use a divx playing PS2 mediaplayer program and its is absolutely free

The Q-cast/Gameshark Media player streams the files from your computer and it costs $50 while the PS2 mediaplayer program will allow you to play a Divx disk directly

[qshartle]

ive seen that, but hes an XBOX freak, i dont think he will want a ps2 just for that.


Q

[BernieR]

My friend was isanely smart, and took an old peice-o-shit mac, that he got at a garage sale, put in a 10 gig hd, OS X 10.3, Quicktime Pro, and a tv tuner card. And now he makes his MP4 movies on his G5, and then burns them o a cd, and watches them on his bigscreen. Altho XBOX and PS2 have similar programs, his only cost him 100$ to make.

Q

How does the mp4 look on a "bigscreen" ????

thanks

Bernie

[ps2daddy]

ive seen that, but hes an XBOX freak, i dont think he will want a ps2 just for that.


Q

xbox can do the same thing also if I am not mistaken (if he already has one of those)

[movie freak]

i used to download lots of divx/xvid movies, i put them all onto cd-r, since i have bought a dvd-rewriter i see no point in downloading them anymore, i do download the occasional movie which is already in an mpeg form ready-to-burn, but other than that i don't. i have downloaded full dvd-r movies. i do still have all my old xvid/divx movies on cd-r in my cupboard, they are good if i want to watch something when i'm out on my laptop say, easy to lend to friends without worrying about being scratched.

[qshartle]

it looks fabulous on a bigscreen.

XBMP does not play mp4 in mp4 format(only avi)

Q

[KaiCherry]

My 2 cents

I like the avis, because they work fantastic with my AV playback solution.

Xbox Media Center is the best bang/buck playback solution for pretty much anything mplayer can handle. High bitrate mpeg4-a-fied avis look *fantastic* at 720p

Integrated IMDB lookup, desktop connectivity...its a cool system that works well.

-K

[WiseWeasel]

Ahhhhhhhhhhh! It's a ghost! Run for the hills! Seriously, though, that's all the XBox is good for, cuz (insert all-knowing entity here) knows it's not the games...

[KaiCherry]

I disagree. But then again, I have gamecube, ps2 and xbox, so I can pretty much say with 100% certainty that the PS2 is the "PC" or the trio...which is odd...since the xbox is more or less a pc

Annnd the Gamecube is Better than the PS2...



-K