Quicktime Pro; playing avi (xvid) files

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Quicktime Pro; playing avi (xvid) files

hi all - hope someone can help me. I have some avi files with the xvid codec that i can't play in QT-P. They play fine in Windows Media Player (among others) and I have the xvid codec installed but all i get is a black/grey screen with no sound. QT-P picks up the length of the video and 'plays' it (ie - i can see the progress bar moving) but not getting anything. I'm on a PC (Windows XP) and i want to be able to use QT-P to convert avi files to mp4 so i can watch on my AppleTV - but I can't convert a file I can't even watch on QT-P. Any thoughts??

Dell PC, Windows XP

Posted on Sep 30, 2010 12:03 PM

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Answer 1

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E-Maniac

Level 1

5 points

Sep 30, 2010 12:11 PM in response to gah123

It might be a non-standard codec. I suggest that either you get a xvid plugin for quicktime if any or you set WMP as the default player for avi files. I had a similar problem where most video converters couldn't read certain video recordings because of the codec.

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Answer 2

gah123 Author

Level 1

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Oct 1, 2010 5:32 AM in response to E-Maniac

Thanks for the response. Two comments, as I say I'm hoping to be able to use QT-P to do my conversion to mp4's for my AppleTV (currently using Handbrake but my converted files are very pixelated and unusable) so in order to do that i need to be able to play avi(xvid) files in QT-P first so unfortunately that rules out WMP. As for the xvid plugin for quicktime I assume that's what's available through the Apple site which i did install but am having no luck with. Sigh.

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Answer 3

varjak paw

Level 10

170,200 points

Oct 1, 2010 1:10 PM in response to gah123

To the best of my knowledge, there is no xvid plugin for QuickTime for Windows, only for the Mac version of QuickTime. All the plugins available for Windows that I can find do not work with QuickTime. So you'll probably need to use some other software to handle converting your videos to MPEG-4.

Regards.

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Answer 4

gah123 Author

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Oct 2, 2010 10:36 AM in response to varjak paw

Thanks for the response Dave. That's unfortunate as i just spent $50 to get QT-P so i could do exactly that!

Thanks again.

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Answer 5

AD-Town

Level 1

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Nov 11, 2010 4:35 AM in response to gah123

Wish I'd come across this post about 10 minutes ago... bought Apple TV a few hours ago, loved it thus far, only to do the exact same thing, drop another 50 bucks on QT pro only to find out it won't convert the load of xvid avi's I have...

Thanks for nothing...

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Answer 6

speszel

Level 1

0 points

Dec 1, 2010 4:01 PM in response to AD-Town

Get iFlicks, you get 2 weeks demo time, but it is worth the $20 or so.
Does a good job and is fast. I too experienced avi format ****, bought my ATV at the weekend, some avis will play but not others. iFlicks ads a header and then packages the rest of the avi into the file in seconds or it will "flatten the file in to .mov" also works well.

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Answer 7

chance8

Level 1

0 points

Dec 2, 2010 10:12 PM in response to gah123

I know exactly how you feel. I purchased QT pro for the same thing and it doesnt work. Tried to ask for my money back and they just pointed me to the help pages, which doesnt help at all. Waste of $50 i have ever spend. So frustrated.

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