how to view mp4 on mac

[obelisk282]

my firend have a mac pc and i gave him some anime on mp4 format and he said he cant watch it, is there any program out there that he can use?

[Cornucopia]

You ought to know, "MP4=MP4" isn't the way to think about this. Just like MPEG2 has "Profiles" and "Levels", so MP4 has "Profiles" and "Levels" and "Versions".

The Most common ones are:
Simple Profile (@ Main Level) (from MPEG4 v1), Advanced Simple Profile (from MPEG4 v2), and AVC/h.264 (aka MPEG4 v10)

Macs use Quicktime mainly. Quicktime understands SP and h.264, but not ASP.
DivX/Xvid/3ivX MP4's can be either SP or ASP. That's likely the problem right there.

Your best bet is something like ffmpegX or VLC. Or have your PC friend convert it to something your Mac can understand. Or watch it on a PC (sorry Mac fans).

You may have similar problems with Audio, re: M4A/AAC LC vs. M4A/AAC HE. There are other codecs that might give you trouble too.

Scott

[Case]

What Mac and what OS version? Too old might be problematic.
Usually, folks are happy with the play-just-about-anything player VLC.

[rumplestiltskin]

Yes, VLC is great. Also MPEG Streamclip will play (and convert if you wish) many formats.