Is .mkv becoming more popular?

[vieo]

Is .mkv becoming more popular? What do you think about the format? Do you see a lot more people adding support(to hardware/software) for it in the future?

BTW, what are some other formats that are similar to .mkv? When I say similar, I mean they allow for multiple sub-title streams, menus, etc.

[teegee420]

OGM is similar. Both MKV and OGM are great for anime. I don't rip any anime so I always use either mp4 or avi. The vast majority of the stuff I come across is still avi, so I don't know how much more popular MKV is getting.

[celtic_druid]

I see it becoming more popular in certain areas. Like for Anime or anything else hybrid. Previously, when avi was used the video had to be converted to CFR leading to various problems. Ok, other containers support VFR, but it isn't so easy to do. Like creating a VFR mkv to re-encode to wmv because you can't do it directly.

Also AVC is becoming more popular and mkv can store it natively. Sure you could use mp4, but then you are limited in your choice of audio streams. Also Nero's chapter implimentation doesn't support unicode.

If menu playback became more standard, then I am sure that would also help. With mkv you have DvdMenuXtractor for reproducing DVD menus. No such tool that I know of for DivX.

As for other containers that allow multiple subs and menus; you basically have DivX and mp4 with DivX sharing most of the limitations of avi upon which it is based.

I don't really see mkv replacing avi for the standard 1/2 CD XviD avi rip despite the fact that it offers lower overhead and can properly handle VBR audio and store MPEG-4 natively. The benifits just don't outweigh the current lack of hardware support.

edit:
ogm has far more in common with avi than it does with mkv. Basically ogg + VfW/ACM (avi).

[paulw]

I hope not. As far as I'm concerned it's the most dogy format for posting TV programs around. Too hard to convert to something that you can play on a TV. DivX and Xvid rulzes..

I once downloaded an old movie that was in MKV format. Took about a month of searching to find how to change it to DVD then after that all my other codecs were screwed so I had to restore my hgost backuo to decade the next Xvid that I downloaded..

[celtic_druid]

No reason why you can't put DivX or XviD in an mkv container. People need to remember that XviD is just a video codec. XviD doesn't mean avi. So saying that you don't like mkv, but do like XviD makes no sense.

As I said, where I see mkv's growth is where its advanced features are useful rather than just using it where avi would be adequate.

A lot of the problems converting come from going from an advanced container like mkv to something like avi. Also the limitations of VfW. So it isn't mkv that is the problem.

[lovelove]

If menu playback became more standard, then I am sure that would also help. With mkv you have DvdMenuXtractor for reproducing DVD menus.

ok, but what is this good for, if there is no single piece of software which can play them? Or is there?

[dragonkeeper]

The MKV container is far superior to the avi container in every way and I do see MKV becoming more popular. I see a lot of tv shows on the net are done in the format.

As hard as it is to believe the U.S is not the only place on the planet which produces great movies and T.V shows, needless to say I watch a lot foreign content. I prefer to watch foreign film in it's native language with subtitles, but i also have the English audio track where available so when watching the movies with family and friends they don't have to read the subtitles.

Most of the people who are dogging mkv have not bothered to do their homework. I keep hearing how MKV is so hard to convert and that's their primary reason for disliking it. MKV is a container for video/audio, a container that you can pretty much put any video/audio format , unlike AVI in which your very limited in what you can put in it. You can put xvid or Divix video into a MKV container just as easily as you can h264\AVC, H264\AVC video just happens to be the format chosen by most people. And if one would bother to actually learn about the codecs you would understand why.

When one is trying to convert mkv to avi in actuality you're attempting to convert the video and audio to a format suitable for the avi container. Hence when there is an issues in the conversion process is this a problem with the MKV (which works perfectly fine), or a problem with the process weather it be the tool or lack of knowledge. I'm leaning toward the process used, but for some reason a lot of people want to blame the mkv container.

If your having trouble converting MKV it is most often link to a lack of knowledge, a PC that is not up to spec to convert the video or audio within the mkv container or someone trying to use a poorly designed "1 Click" tool to convert the mkv to a lesser container i.e. avi. None of these problems are the fault of the mkv container, and for all those who continue to complain buy the damn movie and rip\convert it yourself. I'm only assuming you're downloading the content, because i can't imagine anyone ripping a movie or T.V show to MKV when they hate MKV.

As far as hardware support I could give a rats ass, the industry has always been slow about meeting the needs of the public. Look how many years it took before the avi format had hardware support. I didn't complain about lack of support and chose not to wait on the industry to provide support. I took maters into my own hands I built a hex core media PC with 7 TB of hard drive space for my theater room. And added dual core media PCs to other rooms of the house with the theater room media PC streaming content to those units. So as far as I'm concerned the industry has lost the chance to wow me with new features of addition support for other formats and networking/streaming capabilities I've already had it for years and see no need to indulge in their often inferior product..

So i pose a question to those who hate mkv.
Why do you have MKV when it does everything avi does and so much more?
And what are your reasons, i mean legitimate reasons not what u have heard from other people.

[cal_tony]

I read the above post by dragonkeeper and I find that I agree with him completely.


Additionally, It does seem that the support for this format is slow in coming. Most of the programs now in use appear to all use MKVToolNix and produce prepackaged outputs that in my opinion are just not that useful. They always seem to produce an output missing something. The audio is wrong The chapters are not to my liking. Or the subtitles are not in my preferred format SRT. It's taken me awhile to find the single purpose programs work for me to fix these problems.

In the end, I find that without much effort, and using the MKV container I can produce a movie from my BR collection that has just the things I want and will play without failure on my Media players.

The only drawback I see is the unavailability of menu support.

Tony

[AlanHK]

Notice that the early posts in his thread were made in 2006... movng on.

The main drawback of MKV is that it takes more processing power to decode.

My PC is several years old now and while it can play most MKVs, high definition ones grind along and may not be able to play at real time speed. And any reencoding of MKV is about 50% slower than an equivalent quality DivX source.

But it is higher quality in a smaller file and with a recent machine it's a good choice.

[jman98]

lovelove - You've got nothing better to do today than graverob a thread almost 5 years old? As a member since March you're supposed to know better.