gHacks technology news » video codecs http://www.ghacks.net A technology blog covering software, mobile phones, gadgets, security, the Internet and other relevant areas. Mon, 23 Nov 2009 22:22:46 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.6 en hourly 1 Video Inspector Displays Video Codecs Information http://www.ghacks.net/2009/05/18/video-inspector-displays-video-codecs-information/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/05/18/video-inspector-displays-video-codecs-information/#comments Mon, 18 May 2009 11:05:11 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/2009/05/18/video-inspector-displays-video-codecs-information/ microsoft windowsIt sometimes can be quite difficulty to find out why a video is not playing properly on a computer system. This is even more true for inexperienced users who usually solve the problem by installing yet another codec package. That’s obviously not the best way of dealing with the matter as the installation of codec packs can lead to incompatibilities and system errors. Experienced users work with video players like KMPlayer or VLC that play almost every video file out of the box.

Users who swear on video players that rely on system wide codecs on the other hand can use a software program like Video Inspector that analyses video codecs and displays the information needed to play the video on the computer system.

The tool can be integrated in the Windows Explorer context menu to display information about the current video file directly. The alternative is to use the interface to browse the computer system for supported video files. It covers the popular AVI, Matroska, MPEG I, MPEG II and QuickTime containers which means it cannot identify other video formats like wmv.

video codecs

Information about the video codec and audio codec are displayed immediately after loading a video into the software program. Various information about the video are displayed including the codecs used. Probably more important than that is the visual aid that is telling the user if the proper codecs are installed to play the video. A download button is present in case they are not to immediately download them to the computer system (using codecsdb.com).

Video Inspector comes with a few extra tools and options that include displaying all installed audio and video codecs, burning or converting the video to DVD, extracting the audio, splitting the video or changing the FourCC.

There has been some bad blood lately about products published by KC Softwares as they started adding Relevant Knowledge to their software programs. Relevant Knowledge actively monitors a user’s browsing and purchasing on the Internet. Many spyware and antivirus companies therefor classify Relevant Knowledge as spyware.

It has to be noted that Relevant Knowledge is only included in the full builds of the program. A lite version is provided on the same download page that does not include this component.

Viable alternatives to Video Inspector are G-Spot, AviCodec, Media Info or Codec Installer.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/05/18/video-inspector-displays-video-codecs-information/feed/ 3 Fix Broken Video Codecs With Codec Sniper http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/19/fix-broken-video-codecs-with-codec-sniper/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/19/fix-broken-video-codecs-with-codec-sniper/#comments Sun, 19 Apr 2009 08:57:26 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/19/fix-broken-video-codecs-with-codec-sniper/ video codecsIt is not uncommon that dozens or even hundreds of audio and video codecs get installed on a computer system over time. Some are installed by applications, some by codec packs and some manually by the user. Besides compatibility and playback problems that can arise out of this it also means that video codecs stop working properly. Many of these codecs might not be needed depending on the video player in use. SMPlayer for example uses binary codecs that do not need to be installed making many of the installed video codecs redundant.

Video Sniper is a portable software program for the Windows operating system that will display all audio and video codecs that are installed on a computer system. The codecs are listed by class, name, path and name, version and most importantly status.

The status is either ok or broken. The latter meaning that the codec is not properly installed on the computer system anymore. These codecs – and actually all the others – can be deleted easily by pressing the delete button in the application. The delete button will work on all installed codecs on the computer system which means users should be very careful before pressing the delete button.

video codecs

Another option provided by the software program is to save the list of codecs in text format on the computer system.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/19/fix-broken-video-codecs-with-codec-sniper/feed/ 4 Display And Test Video Codecs http://www.ghacks.net/2009/01/18/display-and-test-video-codecs/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/01/18/display-and-test-video-codecs/#comments Sun, 18 Jan 2009 10:41:16 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=9973 The free portable software Graphstudio provides an interesting visual way of displaying the video codecs used by the computer system to playback a selected video. Probably even more interesting is the option to test the playback with additional video codecs that can be loaded into the program’s interface. New video and audio files can simply be dragged into the interface of the software. The codecs that are currently used to play the file on the computer system are displayed instantly. A click on the Play button will play the video using those settings.

New Filters can be added by clicking on the Graph > Insert Filter menu on the top. Keep in mind that not all filters will work with all multimedia files which is indicated by arrows that will not connect. A new filter has to replace an existing filter in the chain. You can delete arrows by clicking on them and pressing the delete key. You draw new arrows by clicking and holding the mouse button on one of the connectors and moving it to another connector.

test video codecs

A right-click on any element in the interface will display a Properties link. A new menu will pop up allowing to configure the selected filter or codec right in the software. The same menu displays additional advanced information about the selected filter.

Graphstudio can be downloaded as a 32-bit and 64-bit version for the Microsoft Windows operating system.

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