I have old .mov files from '03. When I open them on Mavericks with the latest Quicktime, it says "converting" and it takes a very long time to convert the files. So I let it. Once the file is converted its size blows up. I believe I had a 40min .mov video tutorial that was like 200mb in size, once converted it became an 8gb file!!
Not sure how deeply you want to go into this. Basically, the end file size depends on the ratio of data rates used by the source file and and the new destination file. If the target data rate is 5 times that of the source file, the the resulting file will be five times larger. if the data rate ration is increased by a factor of 20, the the output file will be twenty times larger. In the example you cited above, the 8 GB file is 40 times larger than your 200 MB source file. On the other hand, conversion times are normally determine by the complexity of the material in the source file, the target quality setting, and the relative efficiency of the target codec. In this case, QT X "normally" uses the H.264 video codec and the AAC audio codec to perform your conversions but may use ProRes 4-2-2 video with LPCM audio if the source file was encoded with a codec common designated foe video editing use. H.264 is a highly efficient video codec that is relatively slow depending on the specific settings used. In the case of your QT X player conversion, motion vector prediction, video quality, entropy, and progressive display transformation, target dimensions, etc. settings can greatly influence the time it takes to perform the conversion automatically. So if you wish to have more manual over target dimension, H.264 video quality, or definitely wish to store the files to ProRes 4-2-2/LPCM compression formats, then use the batch conversion contextual menu now built into the Mavericks Finder.
I have 20GB of backed .mov files if I convert them all it will become Terabytes of data. What is the problem and how can I solve it? I opened the original files using VLC and it worked fine.
Actually, if all of your files end up with expansion ratios on the same order as your example above, the target storage requirements would only be about 800 GB.