Problem with ffmegx

[jadewolf]

I've been looking for a video converter like this for ages, without success. I thought I'd finally found a good one now, so downloaded ffmegx. But no I discover it hardly works.

My first conversion, an avi to 3gp, worked. But I found it too low quality, after upping the quality I tried again. ffmegx informed me that the conversion was instant, and it created a not working file. So I twiddled around with the video kb/s box, and after 20 or so tries, I got my .3gp high quality video.

But now I'm trying to convert .mp4 to.avi, and also .wmv to .avi .
Neither work. Both attempts (I've tried inverting the audio thing like specified in other topics here) give an instant conversion, and yield no file at all at the other end, not even a nonfunctional one. Please, can anyon help a newbie to video converting?

JW

[Case]

Please post the Process Information log (accessible by clicking the blue "i" in the ffmpegX Progress window). It may hold clues and error messages that may help overcoming your conversion issues.

[jadewolf]

Fri Oct 16 07:16:23 CEST 2009

It seems to be empty. Sorry for my delay replying. ^^

[Case]

It seems to be empty.

This log is only in memory, not on disk. Therefore, try accessing it right after a conversion attempt (when it says 'Finished' or 'Failed').
If you have the required binaries (mplayer, mencoder, mpeg2enc) installed, then the log should contain something more than just the date.

[jadewolf]

Aha, I think I don't have them installed. Will edit when the dl has finished.

[jadewolf]

/bin/sh: /Library/Application Support/ffmpegX/mencoder: cannot execute binary file
Encoding started on Fri Oct 16 21:54:13 CEST 2009

[Case]

mencoder: cannot execute binary file

It appears mencoder wasn't installed correctly. Did you follow the guide at http://www.ffmpegx.com/download.html ?
Did you unzip fmpegXbinaries20060307.zip ? (There are some posts on this forum that suggest unzipping wasn't obvious to everyone.)

[jadewolf]

I downloaded them from
http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/mplayerosx/ffmpegXbinaries20060307.zip
and for mencoder
http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/mplayerosx/ffmpegXbinaries20060307.zip

like it indicated on the "ffmegx components self installer" window which comes up.
I tried unzipping them just now, both come up with folders containing mencoder and mplayer files, just when I select them in the self installer window, the installation fails.

I'm downloading from that new link now.

EDIT: Tried the same after unzipping the new file, "installation not successful". And it doesn't let me chose the folder. The self-installer window does however say mpeg2enc has installed, and the other two haven't.

[Case]

The link for mplayer and mencoder is the same, because the .zip archive contains both binaries. You only need to download it once. Leave the binaries in their default download location (the installer will copy them). Point the installer to the respective binary files (select the file, not the folder) (screengrab). Install.

[jadewolf]

Sorry about my long delay answering, internet problems. I live in the middle of nowhere, see.

Here's my new log:

FIXME:Hardenabling SSE and SSE2 without detection
Wed Oct 28 19:16:17 CET 2009
MEncoder dev-CVS-060307-04:23-4.0.1 (C) 2000-2006 MPlayer Team
Mac OSX static build for ffmpegX
CPU: Intel Pentium III Katmai/Pentium III Xeon Tanner (Family: 6, Stepping: 6)
CPUflags: Type: 6 MMX: 1 MMX2: 1 3DNow: 0 3DNow2: 0 SSE: 1 SSE2: 1
Compiled for x86 CPU with extensions: MMX MMX2 SSE SSE2
success: format: 0 data: 0x0 - 0x295508aa
ASF file format detected.
Too many video packets in the buffer: (4096 in 7075222 bytes).
Maybe you are playing a non-interleaved stream/file or the codec failed?
For AVI files, try to force non-interleaved mode with the -ni option.
ASF: No audio stream found -> no sound.
VIDEO: [WMV3] 320x240 24bpp 1000.000 fps 0.0 kbps ( 0.0 kbyte/s)
[V] filefmt:6 fourcc:0x33564D57 size:320x240 fps:1000.00 ftime:=0.0010
Requested video codec family [wmv9dmo] (vfm=dmo) not available.
Enable it at compilation.
Requested video codec family [wmvdmo] (vfm=dmo) not available.
Enable it at compilation.
Cannot find codec matching selected -vo and video format 0x33564D57.
Opening video filter: [expand osd=1]
Expand: -1 x -1, -1 ; -1, osd: 1, aspect: 0.000000, round: 1
Opening video filter: [scale w=640 h=272]
================================================== ========================
Read DOCS/HTML/en/codecs.html!
================================================== ========================
Exiting...

[Case]

VIDEO: [WMV3] 320x240 24bpp 1000.000 fps 0.0 kbps ( 0.0 kbyte/s)
[V] filefmt:6 fourcc:0x33564D57 size:320x240 fps:1000.00 ftime:=0.0010
Cannot find codec matching selected -vo and video format 0x33564D57.

It seems WMV3 video is not supported by mplayer/mencoder.
Try using a different preset (e.g. ffmpeg) and activate 'Decode with QT', while having the free Flip4Mac WMV playback component installed. That should work for most WMV files.

[jadewolf]

Right; that seems to work OK. Thanks a lot!