WMV3

[thmanx]

does VLC suport the WMV3 codec, if it doesn't, does anyone know a program (for mac) that does, Windows Media Player 9 for OS X doesn't work.

[The DJ]

WMV3 avi's are not supported on Mac OSX at ALL. only WM3 .asf/.wmv files are. Blame microsoft.

[HyperHacker]

So suppose we are using Windows, what then?

[dionoea]

http://videolan.org/vlc/features.html

[HyperHacker]

Hmm, then why else might it not show the video of them? I've tried a few different ones but I can't get anything to play any of them.

[The DJ]

Digital Rights Management on Windows can be the cause of your asf/wmv files not working on Windows.

[HyperHacker]

They still play sound, though... Just no image. Some people seem to be able to play them with various programs.

[Vortix]

Yeah that's why I registered here...
I have the exact same problem. I have two dvd's stuffed with noir episodes... No image, only sound.

Damn Microsoft

[g_pan]

WMV3 avi's are not supported on Mac OSX at ALL. only WM3 .asf/.wmv files are. Blame microsoft.

I have wmv files that will not play with VLC, giving the WMV3 error message, but play fine with WMP9 in MacOSX. So I don't think it's a OS problem.

George

[BiQ]

The way I see it:

WMV3 codec is supported in Windows Media Player 9 for Mac. .avi container format is not. No free software media players can currently play WMV3-compressed video streams on mac, even if they might have some support for the .wmv container format, as well as .avi container format. In a nutshell, the reason that nothing can play .avi-contained WMV3 streams on mac is that Windows Media Player for Mac refuses to touch anything else than .asf and .wmv container formats, and no one else really can decompress WMV9 on mac but MS's player.

A thought crossed my mind. If we start with a goal to "get that .avi-WMV3 video to play on OSX, goddammit!" would a hackish and ugly solution to be possible?

How much is known about .wmv and .avi container formats? .avi I presume to be very well known, and .wmv is supported to at least some degree. The only thing we do not know that much about is the WMV3 video stream. Now, (and here is where I confess to know absolutely nothing about digital video) could it be possible to just get the video and audio streams from an .avi container and rewrap them in valid .wmv file? I am under the impression that there would be no actual need to de/compress anything in this scenario. If this worked, then OSX users could at least see the video, as WMP for Mac would agree to play it...

...now that I think of it, VideoLAN is probably NOT the right program to hope for this kind of functionality, and yes, this is not a perfect solution. But in the hope that someone who actually knew something about digital video reads this message, I'd like to know if this was even a feasible thing to do on paper...

EDIT: In the long run, however, I suppose that the better solution would be to get ffmpeg's WMV3 support working. My sincere thanks to all the great people doing work on these projects.

[wesley]

Interestingly, Windows Media Player 9 is no longer the only player that can play WMV9 videos... there's Flip4Mac's WMV components for Quicktime ( http://www.flip4mac.com/wmv.htm ) that let you play/encode the WMV9 files on Quicktime player. And you know Quicktime can play AVI files... But...

http://www.flip4mac.com/fusetalk/forum/ ... erthread=y

If the initial poster's right, the component only accepts WMV files for playback, just like Windows Media Player 9. The moderator there does not seem to have much clue in the issue, so I posted some further info about this over there. If Flip4Mac dudes can resolve this problem, we might have a solution (albeit non-free).