Why won't Quicktime play .mov files from my new video camera?

Question

Why won't Quicktime play .mov files from my new video camera?

Quicktime used to play just about everything. Now, it's a rare video file that will open. Even .mov files often don't meet its exacting standards. Case in point — footage from my new Panasonic S1H won't play in Quicktime, even though it's in a Quicktime wrapper. What's up with that? If I bring it into FCPX, it plays fine — just not Quicktime. Wha...? I dragged one of these files to my old "cheese grater" Mac Pro, and Quicktime 7 played it like butter.

I'm finding VLC Player more and more useful as Quicktime becomes less and less. Why does Apple deliberately hobble their software, and make it less and less helpful? I'm finding older Macs more necessary than ever.

iMac 27″, macOS 10.12

Posted on Jun 23, 2020 11:18 AM

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Answer 1

Barney-15E

Level 10

122,324 points

Jun 23, 2020 1:24 PM in response to Brie-Eating Surrender Monkey

One .mov is not the same as another .mov. It is not the file wrapper that is important, but how the video and audio was encoded. You can probably encode the video into a dozen formats and they would all be a .mov file.

Catalina did drop support for lots of older audio and video codecs (the magic that encodes and decodes the audio/video content).

VLC media player can play just about anything.

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Answer 2

Jun 23, 2020 1:41 PM in response to Barney-15E

The codec is garden variety AVC. Nothing exotic, novel or ancient about it. A gazillion cameras shoot AVC. There’s no reason — no reason at all — for Apple to hobble Quicktime so it’s no longer able to play it.

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Answer 3

Jun 23, 2020 3:54 PM in response to Brie-Eating Surrender Monkey

Here's a video file Quicktime has no problem playing. It appears to be AVC also, and is even in an MXF wrapper. The thing I notice between them is a big difference in bitrate.

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Answer 4

Barney-15E

Level 10

122,324 points

Jun 23, 2020 3:23 PM in response to Brie-Eating Surrender Monkey

The codec is garden variety AVC. Nothing exotic, novel or ancient about it. There’s no reason — no reason at all — for Apple to hobble Quicktime so it’s no longer able to play it.

Does Apple use it on their iPhones or iPads?

You'd have to ask Apple why they don't support it, if that is really the problem.

Does it import into Photos or iMovie?

I haven't picked up my camcorder in over five years, so I don't have any ability to test AVHCD (if that is what you meant--I don't have anything that uses AVC).

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Answer 5

Jun 23, 2020 3:45 PM in response to Barney-15E

There's nothing exotic about AVC. It's been around forever, and will likely be way into the future. Quicktime used to open this type of file. I've just noticed that once-award-winning Quicktime has become a shadow of its former self. It's so disheartening to see my favorite tools ruined, and for no apparent reason. I wonder if Apple ever asks video pros what they want? Do they care?

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Why won't Quicktime play .mov files from my new video camera?

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