Hello everyone !
I struggle a lot when it comes to video formats, codecs, etc…
I often have problems with my TV being unable to read such or such files, or not being able to FF or RWD due to incompatibilities.
Do you know a good ressource somewhere on the net that could be some sort of reference/course for all stuff like encapsulation/ codecs, bitrate ?
I find it is such an horrible mess with these tons of file formats…
Thanks for any help !
I often have problems with my TV being unable to read such or such files,
What format does your TV play ? Are you playing a DVD or just a media file ? If a media file, read your TV manual. If a DVD then you don’t really have much choice about the format you need to use
Well, I have my TV hooked to the local network and reading various files from the PC. Movies, documentaries, etc…
I have noticed that .mkvs didn’t work. Some .mp4s do work. Others not. Sometimes a file can play, but without sound. Sometimes a file can play OK, but I cannot pause or rewind without the TV player crashing…
So I use Serviio, and it transcode most of my files to the TV (SONY Bravia KDL W705 from 2014). But even that is not fool-proof and was a pain to setup.
The problem is that i don’t have any overview of what is what…
I barely know what a container is. Up until today, i thought that xvid was a file format…
And I don’t find any comprehensive ressource about all that stuff, mainly tutorials about one specific software.
If you have the manual it may be able to tell you the container and formats that the tv supports
(mp4/mkv/ts/mov = container… MPEG4 / XVID / H.264 are video formats, mp3 / aac / ac3 are audio formats, there are loads more these are just some i listed off the top of my head)
so you need to figure out what your tv does and doesnt support… after that it is just a matter of converting your videos to a format that it does support.
ffmpeg is what i always recommend and is the most reliable. there are some gui applications for it but commandline is what i know.
ffmpeg
one of the best tools out there
but depending on ones needs ,a simple GUI like DVD-styler transcodes to VOD format for burning to a dvd
or Handbreak is a good tool for converting a ogv to a mkv for posting on youtube
but if you are trying to stream a vid from your computer to your TV via a network ether connection
have you looked at Kodi
https://kodi.tv/
or Kdenlive
( it is in the OpenSUSE software repos , i use suse linux so)
Thanks !
I#ll keep searching for some sort of reference. There are many great softwares out there, I know. My search is rather towards a reference explaining the differences between formats, their pros ans cons, etc…
Some links here explaining about contianers, file formats, video-, and audio-codecs.
https://app.zencoder.com/docs/faq/codecs-and-formats