Should I keep mov files after converting to mp4?

[zBernie]

I have hundreds of videos I've taken over the years which are in .mov format. I just recently found out that I cannot stream the 1080p .mov videos from my Mac to my Apple TV 3. Well, you can, but the time it takes to buffer is ridiculous. So, I tried converting several videos using the HandbrakeCLI command line utility like this:

HandbrakeCLI -i movie.mov -o movie.mp4 --preset="Normal"

This command creates a 1920x1080 mp4 file, which is on average about 1/3 the size of the original mov. The video quality looks very good, and plays back on the Apple TV 3 just fine. I understand that both mov and mp4 are container files, so I'm assuming the video and audio are transferred from the mov to mp4 in a lossless manner.

Assuming that is true, is there any reason to keep the original mov files after converting?

I was planning on retroactively converting all of my mov files to mp4, since mp4 is an industry standard.

-Thanks

[johns0]

Handbrake is re-encoding your files so you are losing some quality,best to keep the mov files for archiving unless they are not that important.

[Island_Dweller]

If your mov files contain h.264 video and aac audio, Quicktime Pro will allow you to export it losslessly to mp4.

[Baldrick]

Or the free ffmpeg,
ffmpeg -i video.mov -acodec copy -vcodec copy video.mp4.
No shrinking though.

[rumplestiltskin]

Use Videospec to determine the contents (codecs and bitrate) of the original .mov file.

If no further editing is required and the converted files look and sound fine (double-check A/V sync), you can toss the originals.

[johns0]

I believe the op wants to reduce the file size to prevent buffering when streaming the video so just remuxing them isn't what he/she needs to do.