Convert WMV2 / WMV8 to another format. Any recommendations please?

[NotHarry]

Please would somebody advise me on the best way to convert WMV2 (also known as WMV8) to another format, with the minumum loss of quality, but without greatly increasing the file size?

What format do you recommend I convert to?

The reason that I do not want WMV2 / WMV8 is because this format is not supported by my stand-alone media player.

Can the conversion be done in batch mode on multiple files?

I also have some FLV filed downloaded from YouTube, and I have the same question about converting these files too.

Thanks,

Harold.

[zoobie]

I guess the first question would be...what formats does your media player support? You may wish to get another media player that supports formats like avi, wmv, flv thusly avoiding any loss from conversion

[NotHarry]

Thanks zoobie,

Codecs:
MPEG 1 / 2 / 4
AVI
XVID
WMV9(MP@HL)
H.264(BP@L3, MP@4.0 and HP@4.0)
AVC(HD)
VC-1(MP@HL, AP@L3)

Formats:
avi
wmv
mpg
iso
vob
ifo
mp4
asf
tp
trp
ts
m2ts
mov(H.264)

How do you recommend I convert these WMV2 = WMV8 files ?

[jman98]

Are you sure that your WMV files won't play? Have you actually tried this or are you just assuming they won't work? I am not a WMV expert, but surely WMV9 is downwardly compatible with WMV8.

If you must convert, conversion to H.264 might be good as it offers an excellent balance of high quality and small file size compared to other codecs.
My PC is too slow to make H.264 encoding practical, so I'll leave it to others to suggest tools for that.

[NotHarry]

Definitely.

There are very very few media players that can cope with WMV1=WMV7 and WMV2=WMV8.

I got a media player from China that can play, but the remote control and the on-screen menu are so rubbish, I'd rather convert the files if there's an easy way.