.mkv does not play on QuickTime, even with Perian

It could be a 'difficult' form of Matroska file. FYI Matroska is just a container like MOV or AVI, and some mkv have the video encoded with Real Video Codec (RV9 RV10). Perian+QT can't decode this, but VLC will play .mkv files just fine on OS X, as long as they don't use H.264!

It's a bit of a lottery until Matroska decide to support the Apple platform. I have found this:

http://mkv4mac.free.fr/index.php?lang=en&p=lec

which may help.

But there may be another workaround: 1. Get Info the mkv file
2. Change to extension to wmv. Save as wmv and that could work better.

Or this link may be helpful:

http://www.squidoo.com/mkv-converter-mac

Recently, a poster (ZachP14) suggested this:

"There's a program called Plex that runs .mkv files awesome on my 2.0 ghz macbook."

http://www.plexapp.com/

Maybe worth a try?

I have quicktime pro with perian and divx and mkv files play but the sound is 5 seconds ahead of the video and sometimes behind the video any help for that other than exporting and changing the sound format and deleting the original and adding the new one to the movie because that alot of work for all she shows i have saved recently to do that to

Wienier:

I too was stumped trying to figure out why .mkv files would play on Quicktime 7 in Leopard on my home theater mini, but wouldn't play on Quicktime X in Snow Leopard on my upstairs mini, like you said, even with Perian installed. Eventually I found this Perian "tweak" which makes Quicktime realize that it can open .mkv files. Download, unzip, and run this program once: http://astrange.ithinksw.net/perian/Perian%20-%20Open%20in%20QT%20Player.zip. Quicktime will now be able to open your .mkv files.

For your reference, I found it on this thread: http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies-archive.cfm/1271991.html

As for Plex. it isn't just for playing certain types of files, it is a very powerful home theater media player based on the X-Box Media Center platform. It plays every file format I've thrown at it, from .wmv and .mkv to .m2ts. The controls/interface are there, but you have to install the app and set up your media library and do quite an in-depth setup, etc. It's a fantastic program (best home theater media center I've ever seen for the Mac), but if you're just wanting to individually play .mkv files, probably more than you need.

--Equusz

Message was edited by: Equus

Message was edited by: Equus

Just a FYI:

There's a video player called "Movist" that works really, really well for mkv files. It seems to be new and I 've seen very few posts about it so I just thought I'd put that out there. I've been trying to play these files in both Quicktime and VLC but both have their own problems—especially if you try to fast forward or reverse. "Movist" doesn't seem to have any problems with this at all.
I know you're trying to run mkv files through Quicktime so this may not be exactly to the point, but I just wanted to put that out there.

Adding Perian at least got them playing, but it can't handle the high bitrate of BD movies 720 or 1080p.
They play fine with VLC, but then I can't use Front Row.

Oh definitely. Especially on the slower imacs and minis I've had jittery playback of high-bitrate .mkv files using both Quicktime and VLC. Thats why I use Plex...butter-smooth playback for every type of video file out there.

Perhaps that "Movist" app mentioned by a previous poster would work better for you if you don't want the learning curve involved in setting up Plex.

I'll check it out...thanks!

Hey Equus,
Just to say, thanks for pointing me to Plex...yes there's a bit of clicking around to get it setup, but well worth it and now unlike VLC it's integrated.