Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with VLC

Firefox 3.5.5 + VLC 1.0.3 + Embedded .MOV + Windows 7= $#@%!!!

Alvy Ampersand — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 15:52:23 -0800

Firefox 3.5.5 + VLC 1.0.3 + Embedded .MOV + Windows 7= $#@%!!! A synopsis:

i) I get a new laptop which runs Windows 7. Yay!

ii) I install VLC on it - ideally, it will be my primary media player. I do not install the Mozilla plug-in.

iii) I install FF.

iv) I bookmark several .ASX files in Firefox. When I click a bookmark, FF's Download options box appears, asking if I want to save the .asx file, or open it. I opt to open it, using VLC, and it works exactly the way I want it to. Yay!

v) I mosey over to Apple Trailers, and am chagrined but unsurprised to find 'Please install QuickTime' messages, rather than embedded .mov files. When I try bookmarking and clicking the .MOV file (The same strategy as the .MOV files), Firefox automatically opens a new tab which is all black save for white text which reads 'Waiting for video', not even giving me the option to save the file or open it with the application of my choice.

vi) After some research, I realize that I declined VLC's Mozilla plug-in. So, I uninstall and reinstall VLC, including the plug-in this time.

vii) The QuickTime/MOV problem persists, and now clicking my bookmarked .ASX files automatically opens a black background 'Waiting for video' tab as well. Fiddling with file type/default application settings in both Win7 and FF has not changed anything

Ultimately, I want to be able to listen to streaming audio on VLC using the Firefox bookmark method I originally had, while being able to watch embedded QuickTime videos in my browser without having to install any other media players (WinAmp, MPC, and especially not QuickTime or iTunes). Can I achieve my dream?

I realize the Windows 7 angle is probably irrelevant (I had similar issues on my WinXP-running PC, but had a buttload of largely redundant media players that allowed me to get around the issue), but better to err on the side of thoroughness. Apologies for any lack of clarity.

AniPod?

Oktober — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 12:29:15 -0800

I have a substantial amount of anime that I'd like to watch, but a less-than-perfect system for doing it. Pretty much all of it is in .mkv files (h.264 video and AAC audio) with subtitles, and I'd like to transcode them to a format that's playable on either my iPhone or my PS3 with subtitles intact. I've tried both handbrake and VLC, and I either get 1) no subtitles in handbrake or 2) encoder errors in VLC. So, hive mind, what am I doing wrong here?

PC Remote?

rossination — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 23:39:17 -0800

What is the cheapest remote control option for our pcs? We've been watching a lot of downloaded TV lately on a VLC on a Dell laptop, connected to our TV via HDMI cable. It's a great low-cost option for watching torrented episodes of The Wire, but it's a pain to get up to pause, rewind, etc.

What is the cheapest, easiest remote control option? I'm thinking something like the Apple remote, but for a PC. It looks like my options are:

>> wireless (USB or bluetooth) presenter remote. These look good but are about $50 (a little more than I'd like to spend) and I want to be sure that I can map the powerpoint-specific buttons to VLC functions (or just map them to space bar, alt-left/right, etc).

>> iPhone or Windows Mobile app to control VLC from a fancy phone or iPod touch. I don't have one of these, so it isn't an option.

>> PS3 bluetooth remote? This looks the most promising, but I don't see anything about whether or not it can be used on a PC, and I don't know how the keymapping would go.

>> expensive Logitech universal remote like the Harmony -- way too expensive.

At the very least, I want to be able to pause, rewind, and fast-forward. I know we could get better results by switching to a media center application, but at this point it's not worth setting up, so I'm only interested in a means to play files through VLC.

It seems like this would have come up before, but I'm Googling around and can't find anything.

Is there a VLC Plugin to play RV40?

leafxor — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 17:29:36 -0800

Where can I find a plugin for VLC to play RV40? RV40 is the Real Media Video 4.0 codec. VLC can't play it - I'm wondering if there is a plugin available for VLC to let it play it without having to download realplayer.

A better way to pause

aerotive — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 11:03:24 -0800

I'm looking for a way to pause/unpause VLC using the middle mouse button even if VLC doesn't have focus. Any ideas? I often use VLC to play one-off audio files, podcasts and such. The system is a media PC hooked up to a big-screen TV in my living room. I'll frequently start playing a file remotely from my den using a screen-sharing app, then listen to it in the living room. I like to avoid having to constantly turn the TV off and on solely to press pause.

So using a utility called X-Mouse Utility Control I've configured all middle-button clicks to be converted into a Enter key click, and I've configured VLC to recognize Enter as pause/unpause.

Problem is this all breaks down when VLC doesn't have focus. Is there any way to make this work when some other app has focus? Or another utility or program that would work better?

This is on Windows Vista.

Minimum PC specs for playing HD video files?

wastelands — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 08:08:07 -0800

What are the minimum specs for a PC to play HD video files smoothly? I need to replace my ancient P4 2.8 GHz (w/onboard video) for several reasons, including that it chokes on some 720p videos during high action/movement scenes. Would your basic ~$480 Dell handle smooth playback of high def video files (.mkv, .avi) on VLC media player? Could I run other apps in the background (browser, IM, etc.) without input or video stutters and lag?

For example something like this:

Intel Core 2 Duo E7400 (3MB L2, 2.8GHz, 1066FSB)
Genuine Windows Vista Home Premium Edition SP1
2GB Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 800MHz- 2DIMMs
500GB Serial ATA Hard Drive (7200RPM) w/DataBurst Cache
Integrated Intel® GMA X4500HD Graphics

Or do I need more power?

Why can't I get DVDs to play properly?

ODiV — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 18:08:48 -0800

How can I get DVDs to play smoothly on my computer? Whether from a disc or an ISO file on the hard drive I cannot get a DVD to play without it skipping on my computer. As far as I can tell it's just audio skipping. The video might be skipping as well, though. It feels like it could be, but I might just be reacting to the audio.

I've rewound and rewatched sections when they skip and they don't skip in the same place or at all the second time around.

I'm using VLC. I'm running an AMD X2 3800 (dual core 2ghz) with 2 gigs of RAM on XP. I'm not overclocking. My DVD drive is PATA and the hard drive I'm currently using is SATA over USB.

I've recently replaced my RAM with no improvement (memtest gives me no errors). I upgraded my sound card from the onboard to a Creative X-Fi to fix video game sound issues, but that hasn't fixed it. I reinstalled XP recently partly because of this and I'm all patched up.

I've tried shutting else everything down. I shouldn't have to do that though, really. My CPU is usually around 4%. Every once and awhile it'll spike to 11 or 15%, but the spikes don't seem to correspond with the skipping.

Any suggestions would be great. I'm getting really annoyed.

legal video conversion

roue — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 21:32:10 -0800

I'd like to legally automate the conversion of quicktime .mov files videos to .flv, providing a drop box service, preferably under linux, but I'm getting tripped up on the first and last parts My users are requesting a simple video ingestion/conversion service and they don't want to use YouTube in an attempt to maintain control of their content.

There are plenty of tools that will take video file format x, y, and z and convert them to H.263/Sorensen Spark/H.264 .flv files. The obvious choices are ffmpeg / mencoder / vlc project libs. Unfortunately, to accomplish the conversion they have reverse engineered U.S. patent restricted commercial codecs (please correct me if I'm wrong). Since I'll be doing this in a professional capacity, I'd like it to be completely in compliance with the law.

So I guess my question is three fold:

1. What's the cheapest way I can legally do quicktime to flv conversion?

2. If I've got a choice, what's the best codec to use for web distribution?

3. What automatable software would you recommend?

We can probably afford to spend some money, but not, for instance, the $3000 On2 wants for it's conversion tools. Also, we have Adobe CS3 Flash and Flash Video Encoder, but I was unable to find a way to script them (on Mac) to do a conversion. Last, if at all possible I'd like to avoid really hacky solutions like "this cool app that records mouse movments and lets you play them back..."

Thanks.

Need Video Card for...Video!?

Oktober — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 13:37:28 -0800

What's the best video card to get for xvid/divx and h.264 decoding? Long story short: I've given up on Cable TV, most of what I watch now is either streamed from hulu and netflix or downloaded from the internets. Getting a faster connection has improved my streaming performance, but watching ostensibly "HD" h.264 videos has been somewhat less than satisfying. There's still a lot of noise, and sometimes visible interlacing.

I'm using Media Player Classic under Vista Ultimate for the most part, although I've got VLC and WMP and Quicktime and everything else on this machine. I'm running a GeForce 7600GT with component out on a Core 2 Quad machine.

I've heard here and there that newer videocards "help out" on video decoding, but I don't really need it to free up CPU time or anything, but instead improve the quality of the output video. Games are less of a concern, I'm more or less a full-time Xbot now, so if the Geforce 9600 does it as well as the 9800 GTX+ or whatever, I'd rather save the money. Also, if I'm exporting to a LCD HDTV, would simply going from a component video connection to a HDMI connection solve my problem?

how do I tell a browser in osx which plugin should handle a certain file type?

krautland — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 21:35:11 -0800

how do I tell a browser in osx which plugin should handle a certain file type? I installed the vlc plugin for osx to enable safari and firefox to handle vlc-streams.

vlc also tries to handle mp3 files opened in either browser.
I don't want it to do that. I prefer quicktime handling such files in-browser, which is exactly what used to happen. (the qt plugin can begin playing while still downloading, the vlc plugin says "no video" until the whole download is completed.)

how do I tell a browser in osx which plugin should handle a certain file type? is my only option to trash the vlc plugin completely?

I tried RCDefaultApp 2.0.1 but had no luck.

Stream Video to Wii without Orb

jules1651 — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 20:29:44 -0800

Is there a way to stream video to my Wii from my Mac using VLC? I am currently running Orb from the virtual windows machine on the mac I access via vmware fusion, but I am not too impressed with the video quality.

Streaming AAC players for OS X besides VLC?

korpios — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 09:36:07 -0800

Is there a streaming audio player (i.e., internet radio) that will play AAC streams under OS X, and isn't VLC? I have a subscription to Digitally Imported, a collection of Internet radio stations that I adore; since my bandwidth is a tad limited and subject to the odd congestion issue, I prefer to use the AAC streams (16 Kb/s) rather than the MP3 streams (24 Kb/s). Thing is, I run OS X; I haven't been able to find a single audio player that supports AAC streams besides VLC, and, frankly, VLC is one of the worst damned applications I've ever used. (I say this as a computer geek / programmer, mind you.) I'd even be fine with a command line player, if the interface was halfway decent (i.e., something that would let me switch between several streams ... a curses interface, perhaps?). Ideas, hive mind?

Name That Tune/Video (Center)

ill3 — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 03:13:45 -0800

Naming Filter: Hive mind, please help us name our open source OS X media center application! I have been impressed by the hive mind's creativity when it comes to naming things, most recently the Lawyer Golf Team.

Sorry for the long explanation that follows, however, I think coming up with the best name is going to require a little bit of context.

I'm currently working on an open source project (free as in beer and speech) that is a recent fork of the well known and highly regarded XBMC project. In fact, I shamelessly plugged it here in an ask.mefi answer earlier. As many of you may know XBMC originally was called XBox Media Center. It was an app that could be run on a hacked XBox that allowed you to play media on your XBox (divx, h.264, mp3s, etc) pulling the media either from local disks or across the network using windows shares, ftp, etc. What made it a media center, rather than just a media player (like the excellent VLC and Mplayer) the application also has a great skinnable navigation and metadata system. XBMC will scan your media library (which in most cases would be located on a computer somewhere else in the house) automatically guess what piece of media the particular file was, and download and associate the appropriate meta-data. This would allow you to look for movies or songs based on Genre, Year, etc, all while flipping through the DVD's or CD's cover art. The interface is also optimized for use with a remote control, to make it easier to use from the couch than say QuickTime. It's easier seen than explained, here is YT video of it in action running the xTV skin (a skin inspired by Apple Tv).
A little over a year ago the core XBMC.org team decided to start porting what many consider to be the best media center application ever written, to other platforms starting with Linux. They have made great progress and they have already have a highly usable application for Linux. About 6 months ago myself and a few others decided to embark on an OS X port of the application, based on some amazing progress that the head of the new OS X port had made in just a few weeks. There was already quite a bit of pent up demand, as many thought the Mac Mini was an ideal HTPC (Home Theater PC) platform, again discussed here. We started out as a part of the larger XBMC team until very recently, both teams decided that we had enough philosophical differences that it made sense to amicably split up. Up until the project had been called XBMC on OSX and/or OSXBMC. We have currently been using the OSXBMC name as a place holder until we come up with a better name. There are a few reasons for wanting a name change, the big ones are :
- Having XBMC in the name does not differentiate us enough from the original XBMC.org project (the original XBMC guys have politely asked us to make our name a little more distinct) and it perhaps it makes it seem like an XBox is required to use the application.
- Something a little less "acronymy" would be nice, more in the tradition of Mac apps.
- It's possible that someday we will release versions of our (keeping in mind that at this point "our" software is 98% composed of XBMC's code) on platforms other than OS X, so we would like to get away from having the platform in the name.

The project's home page is http://www.osxbmc.com if anyone could possibly want or need any more information.

Thanks very much!

Can Vista be configured so that playback of all common media types Just Works?

hAndrew — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 07:59:20 -0800

In Windows Vista, is there a combination of software and settings that will let my Dad play all the media files he wants without further difficulty? I want to set up my Dad's new computer, which runs Vista Home Premium, so that it runs media embedded in web pages, runs standalone files too, and doesn't break Vista's Aero interface. He's not a computer expert, so I want media of all common types to Just Work^TM. These seem to be my criteria:

1a. When there is media embedded in a web page, such as here, it works.

1b. The embedded media players make it possible to go full-screen, or at least to easily open separate media players that can.

2a. Standalone media files play when they are double-clicked.

2b. Clicking links like this one (in, say, Firefox) opens the relevant media player with as few clicks as possible, preferably zero.

3. None of the above break Vista's Aero interface, even when going full-screen.

Here's what I've found:

* A combination of RealPlayer and Quicktime solves 1a., except that embedded RealPlayer has poor performance and they both fail 3.

* Alternatively, a combination of Real Alternative and Quicktime Alternative with Media Player Classic solves 1a., except Media Player Classic fails 3. when going full-screen.

* VLC solves 2a.

* In Firefox, when clicking on the link in 2b., the "Do this automatically for files like this ..." checkbox is greyed out.

* Nothing I've tried except (built-in) Windows Media Player and VLC satisfies 3. in full-screen mode.

More info

I'm particularly interested to hear from anyone who has a Vista/Firefox configuration in which all these media tasks Just Work.

While trying to set this up for my Dad, I realised that I too had this problem (albeit to a lesser extent) in the XP/Firefox setup on my computer. I now realise I subconsciously open media that isn't Just Working in other media players or I view source -> dig for direct links, etc.

Seeking OS X media player with specific features

chudmonkey — Tue, 20 May 2008 13:26:04 -0800

What video/media player do you use in OS X? Can you recommend one that has some specific features (listed inside)? I've asked basically this same question before, but that was a few years ago and I'm hoping something has changed since then.

I really, really want a Leopard-compatible player with ALL of these features:

-"Always on Top" playing
-Variable-speed playback, preferably with automatic audio pitch-shifting, preferably with a control that shows precisely what % of normal speed is being played.
-Frame-by-frame playback.

I currently have the following installed:

VLC 0.8.6f - No variable-speed playback, no frame-by-frame.
Mplayer 1.0 rc2 - No VSP, no frame-by-frame, no "on top"
Quicktime 7.2.1 - VSP is via an imprecise slider and pitch-shift is not automatic.

MPlayer is actually my favourite, despite having none of my desired features. I like the way it looks. Quicktime is my least-favourite, despite having nearly all the features. It's better now than it ever was, so I'm really just clinging to a bias. The VSP system is shoddy, however.

I'm open to any suggestions you can make, or corrections of my above impressions. I know MPlayer is open-source as has been released in multiple flavours, but I haven't found one with variable-speed playback yet.

Thanks in advance!

Automatic Screenshots from a DVD

muckster — Tue, 06 May 2008 20:46:34 -0800

Automatic screenshots from a DVD? I know how to take individual screengrabs from a a movie with VLC or Media Player Classic -- but I'd like to get a whole bunch at once. Is there windows software that will let me set an interval and extract a series of screenshots automatically?

All together now

rtha — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 11:22:49 -0800

How can I stitch some video files together? I have some video files (both .flv and mpeg4 formats) that I'd like to stitch together - that is, stitch the .flv files to other .flv files, or mpeg4 to mpeg4. If they need to be converted to something else, please advise.

The files are 25-50 MB in size, and all have sound.

I'm running a 1GHz powerPC powerbook G4, 10.4.11. I have iMovie and VLC. I'd like to be able to do this with what I've got; if I have to acquire something else, I'd like it to be free (though that's not a dealbreaker), and it would be great if it's something you've personally used. I'll probably need some hand-holding.

Youtube mobile via firefox and VLC on XP?

wogbat — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 09:09:26 -0800

I want to watch youtube MOBILE on my computer (m.youtube.com) but can't quite get it. Firefox and VLC gets me close, but not easily and sadly without sound. Would I better off with some smartphone emulator? The situation: My internet bandwidth isn't good. And the youtube mobile files seem to be the exact same content...just smaller screensize and resolution for mobile phones. Perfect. I can browse over to that site via Firefox , copy the rtsp:// link (instead of standard http://) and paste it into VLC.

HOWEVER, 2 issues. One, I have no sound. Two, it's a lot of steps.

I've tried registering the rtsp:// protocol in firefox to open VLC by default and it didn't take.

I'm on XP, but have used inspiration from this:
http://ubit.buffalo.edu/linux/ublinux4/rtsp.php
and this
http://zerlinna.blogweb.de/archives/73-Watching-Video-streams-mms-and-rtsp-protocol.html)

Is VLC not the right option? Do I have to "rediscover" the "joys" of realplayer?
Or am I missing some obvious solution?

Thanks!

Why won't my mp3s and videos play?

champthom — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 21:48:35 -0800

Why won't my mp3s and videos play on my computer...at all? The other day, I load up Winamp to listen to an mp3, except nothing happens. It still stays at the 00:00 mark. I figure maybe it's because I need to update to the new Winamp so I upgrade but still, nothing happens and the mp3 won't play.

I try playing the mp3 in VLC, Windows Media Player, Media Player Classic, and iTunes but no luck in any of them. In Windows Media Center (I'm running Vista), I got an error message saying it's an "unknown audio error." I have a similar problem with videos as they won't play in Winamp or Media Player.

There's nothing wrong with my speakers or anything like that, as I still get sound just fine (like I have no problem getting sound from Flash video).

I haven't toyed around with any of my codecs and frankly, I'm not sure what the problem is, especially since they won't play on any program, and frankly, I'm out of ideas.

Best media players for wmv, keyboard shortcuts, and transparency?

abkadefgee — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 14:20:49 -0800

What media players have decent keyboard shortcuts, don't mess up wmv files when fast-forwarding, and can be set as transparent? I'm going through a lot of different video files on my hard drive, trying to clean up. Some of them are old home videos or projects which are inexplicably saved as wmv files. I'd like to figure out which ones are worth keeping by playing through them, but when I fast forward using alt+rt arrow in VLC, the video frame freezes or becomes distorted and it takes a few moments to return to normal. This means I could be missing something and I have to take the time to watch the clip all the way through.

I'd also like to be able to play my videos in a transparent mode so I could check email and complete other tasks while watching downloaded tv shows.

Can anyone suggest a media player that can play wmv files correctly while fast-forwarding and transparently display movies, but that also has the quick fast-forwarding shortcuts of VLC?

VLC command line to autoplay a dvd?

allthewhile — Sat, 25 Aug 2007 18:59:07 -0800

VLC Player Filter - I would like to know if there is a command line that I can put in my VLC player shortcut to autoplay dvds without menus. I'm trying to configure vlc as the default dvd player for my media center. I can get it to auto-fullscreen but want it to autoplay dvds when the program is started.

A reverse Slingbox?

yellowbkpk — Sun, 22 Jul 2007 09:41:38 -0800

Is there a set-top box that performs the opposite of a Slingbox? I have a Ubuntu server at home with a TV tuner in it. I am using VLC to stream the TV tuner to my machine in another city over the internet. I change the channel by logging in via SSH and issuing a "tune" command (that uses ivtv-tune to set the frequency). This works great for when I am sitting in front of the computer, but I'd like to be able to be a vegetable on the couch in front of the television and use a remote control to change the channel on a set top box and watch it through the television.

Is there a set top box that is less complicated, power hungry, and noisy than a complete computer that will a) allow me to run VLC, b) display VLC's output in full screen on the television, and c) issue SSH commands with the push of buttons on a remote control?

How can repair my video codecs?

cheero — Mon, 16 Jul 2007 17:20:42 -0800

How can repair my video codecs? Out of nowhere, I cannot see any video in my AVI files but I can hear the audio just fine. Windows Media Player 11 simply does not load when I click to open an AVI. It is fully installed and everything but when I try to click on an AVI to open it -- nothing happens. I've installed the VLC player in hopes that plays it, no dice. Same goes for Windows Media Classic.

I've installed the k-lite codecs pack which worked for me for years but for some odd reason, things crapped out on me.

I've also used GSPOT to see what codecs were needed for certain movies but each time it said that everything was fully installed.

How can I rectify this extremely annoying problem? Is there some kind of tool I can use that will repair this?

The specs I am running are: OS: WinXP Professional 5.1 Service Pack 2 (Build #2600) CPU: Intel Pentium D , 2.99 GHz Video: Plug and Play Monitor on nVidia GeForce 7800 GTX Sound: SB Audigy 2 ZS Audio

Thanks in advance

Mac DVD player that can increase playback speed while preserving audio quality?

HotPatatta — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 11:43:50 -0800

Is there a Mac DVD player that will allow me to increase the playback speed while not causing the actors to sound like Karen Walker from "Will and Grace" or the resident munchkins from Oz? I love to watch movies but I don't really have a lot of free time. With my old PC, I used WinDVD, which allowed me to increase the playback speed. Usually, I would watch DVDs at 1.25-1.5 times the regular speed. The great thing about it was that when the speed is increased, the program automatically adjusts the pitch of the voices, so that instead of the voices sounding like chipmunks, they sound just like the actors speaking more quickly.

Is there a similar program that I can download for a Mac? I run OSX Tiger on a MacBook. As far as I can tell, the OSX DVD player (which sucks!) doesn't let me increase playback speed and neither does VLC player. I don't need lots of bells 'n' whistles, only the ability to increase the speed and still get audio. I'm willing to pay under $50.

One other thing: Often when I watch DVDs using the OSX DVD player or VLC player, the program just closes right in the middle of the movie playing. Anybody know why?

Playing incomplete .avi woes.

Solomon — Fri, 13 Apr 2007 17:10:10 -0800

I'm looking for a plugin for VLC (or, an alternate media player) that is capable of handling incomplete video files downloaded from a Bittorrent network. Certain chunks are available, but others aren't. I want to be able to view the available data in a continuous stream, that plays everything available, irrespective of where in the timeline it is.

A plugin that does this for eMule is available [http://www.emule-project.net/home/perl/help.cgi?l=1&rm=show_topic&topic_id=138]. It takes the available video data, compiles it into a file, and then VLC plays it. Or something like that. However, I can't get this plugin to work with Bittorrent.

I'm using Windows XP.