Slashdot Log In
DivX 7 Adds Support For Blu-ray Rips (H.264/MKV)
Posted by
timothy
on Tue Jan 13, 2009 09:47 AM
from the matroska-navratilova dept.
from the matroska-navratilova dept.
mrspin writes "DivX looks set to continue to be the video format of choice for 'grey' content, with the company announcing that version 7 adds support for H.264 video and, more significantly, the Matroska (MKV) container. Anybody familiar with Blu-ray rips found on BitTorrent sites or other filesharing networks will instantly recognize the MKV file format in combination with the H.264 codec as a popular way to deliver High Definition video on a PC. And now that DivX is throwing its weight behind the Matroska container, MKV support should increasingly find its way on a range of non-PC devices, such as Blu-ray players, HD digital televisions and set-top boxes."
Related Stories
Submission: DivX 7 adds support for Blu-ray rips (H.264/MKV) by Anonymous Coward
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Full
Abbreviated
Hidden
Loading... please wait.
H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:5, Interesting)
And now that DivX is throwing its weight behind the Matroska container, MKV support should increasingly find its way on a range of non-PC devices, such as Blu-ray players, HD digital televisions and set-top boxes.
I don't know man, I think both DivX & Adobe have hidden costs even if both like you to view them as "open." I would put my money on Adobe coming through with better player/container support & marketing. On top of that, I don't know of any plans for DRM in Matroska.
So while this is great news for the people who want to put their home videos out there with software that doesn't support DRM (is the average user really going to care though?), I think that the MPAA & porn industry are going to be the deciders here (as they usually are).
My prediction: Flash 9 will become so pervasive that everyone will use that as a container instead of asking their users to download & install a DivX codec.
Re:H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't understand why you think DivX won't succeed. For years no-name DVD players have almost all supported DivX, and now even my Pioneer unit is DivX 6 certified. It doesn't seem like a stretch that they will support 7.
Personally, I love having 3 or 4 DVDs on a single disk for traveling. Since my portable player supports DivX, I can fit more than a whole season of Dora on a single disk and keep the little one quiet on long trips.
Parent
Re:H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:5, Funny)
Careful, statements like that will get you ragged on in here about how you're a horrible parent (by people who have never even touched a member of the opposite sex, let alone had kids of their own), and you should be taking your child outside to play - while you're in the car on long trips. ;-)
Parent
Re:H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:5, Funny)
Followed by rabid environmentalists demanding that you don't use your car for long trips or that you don't even travel that far.
They will then battle with the radical feminists claiming you subjugated a free womyn by forcing her to have kids.
Well, let's get some popcorn while we wait :)
Parent
Re:H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:5, Funny)
Sometimes it's hard to have a conversation on Slashdot with the radical feminists leaping in all the time. :)
Parent
Re:H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:4, Funny)
Careful, statements like that will get you ragged on in here about how you're a horrible parent ... and you should be taking your child outside to play - while you're in the car on long trips. ;-)
If you haven't been pulled over because your kid had their head out a window/sunroof, you're doing it wrong.
/sorry dad, but you only got a warning
Parent
Re:H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:5, Funny)
I know; think of the quality loss! Your kid's eyesight is going to develop poorly after being exposed to those compression artifacts.
Parent
Re:H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:4, Funny)
It's called the "backhand" slap" which usually followed the exclamation "I'll turn this car around!"
Parent
Re:H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:5, Funny)
Slacker. I accelerate to 100, roll the minivan down the off-ramp, powerslide across four lanes of traffic, and then hop back on the interstate. No need for this "backhand" or "I'll turn this car around!" you speak off. Although everyone will need a change of pants at your destination.
Parent
Re:H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:4, Funny)
I think I met you on the way to work this morning.
Dick.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Dad, is that you?
Re:H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:4, Funny)
Drugs. I'll have to remember drugs.
My kid has, um, CAR SICKNESS! Yes, that's it. Car sickness. So, um, I have to give her Dramamine. Yup.
Parent
Re:H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:4, Informative)
FLV was never a streaming container in the first place. In fact, being nothing more than a unmanaged HTTP download that you watch while it still loads, it's a very crappy way of "streaming" data. I can do that with most formats, by downloading them to the disk, and then playing them in my favorite media player. I did this with MP3s since 1999.
I did not even have to re-download it, every time I wanted to play it.
FLV can't even come close to MKV in things of media containers. MKV supports multiple streams of video, audio, subtitles, or in fact anything that you can think of (eg a stream for some special effects device), stream tags, timecodes, cues, stereoscopy, stretching/compressing, attachments (eg cover, background information, reviews), segment linking and chapters. Oh, and of course, because it's EBML, you can add your own "tags" and functionality as you like, without affecting the compatibility to old programs. And it's made for very flexible streaming.
Parent
Re:H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:H.264/HE-AAC support in Flash Player 9 (Score:5, Funny)
Pfft. Fuck streaming, it is always crappy.
Generalizations always suck.
Parent
So, remind me again... (Score:5, Insightful)
Remind me again, how does Matroska + H.264 automagically equals "Blu-ray Rips" and piracy in general?
Isn't that a bit like saying that Bittorrent automatically equals pirated software?
Re:So, remind me again... (Score:5, Funny)
H.264 gives unequalled compression on CP and terrorist training videos.
I'm not sure about the technical reasons behind this.
Parent
Re:So, remind me again... (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure, technically it doesn't equal that.
But really, that particular argument would carry more weight if there existed any MKV+h.264 files that weren't pirated. I can't recall ever seeing one.
Parent
Re:So, remind me again... (Score:5, Informative)
Neither the summary nor the article said anything about piracy, whether "in general" or otherwise. You made that association on your own.
Are we reading the same article?
From TFA:
DivX looks set to continue to be the video format of choice for 'grey' content
Anybody familiar with Blu-ray rips found on BitTorrent sites or other filesharing networks will instantly recognize the MKV file format in combination with the H.264 codec as a popular way
Now, unless you are aware of a completely legit interpretation of the words "Blu-ray rips on filesharing networks" that I am not aware of...
Parent
Re:So, remind me again... (Score:5, Informative)
I have 1000 DVD's all "tagged and bagged" in my media center.
It's all tied together through the home network so that a
number of "thin clients" attached to TV's and any computer
attached to the home network can see all of that.
That is VERY convenient.
I don't have any BD-ROMs yet, but I will. They will get
sucked into the media center like everything else. They
might even end up as MKVs.
HELL, based on this news it might end up shuffled around
so that it's in MKV rather than AVI.
BTW, every one of those ripped DVDs is within reaching
distance of where I am sitting presently.
Parent
Re:So, remind me again... (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
DivX (the codec) is irrelevant (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
It's nice to see DivX (the company) back Matroska, but does anyone really use DivX (the codec) anymore? Their ASP codec is consistently inferior to Xvid, and so my faith that they will be able to develop a new AVC codec that bests x264 is not terribly strong.
Yes, people still use Divx. Go to the alt.* groups on Usenet to see how many. I watch a foreign TV that is unavailable in the USA and I watch it via Divx encodes that people who live in the broadcast country make and place on Usenet.
As far as "inferiority" to Xvid goes, that was true years ago, but today I doubt that you'd be able to tell any difference between Xvid encoded material and stuff correctly encoded with the commerical Divx codec.
Re:DivX AVC is MainConcept (Score:4, Informative)
I'm big supporter, and user, of x264, but I always thought MainConcept was the slightly better H.264 codec.
This codec comparison [compression.ru] is a year old now, but I've always used these generally yearly tests as a yard stick. MainConcept and X264 are the clear winners, with MainConcept probably slightly ahead overall. If you're short on time, just start reading at page 30.
Parent
DivX? (Score:3, Interesting)
Xvid seems to have taken over as the 'gray area' encoder of choice from what I've seen.
And do people still pay much attention to the actual "DiVX" people? Even when I used Divx it was all mplayer/mencoder, ffmpeg, vlc, etc.
Grey area (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If it's popular because it's good, why is it still mostly used for piracy rather than other things?
Let me rephrase that: What it is used for other than piracy?
I have seen a couple really low-budget games that use it. (And both the game and video was shitty quality.) Some (really high-tech) people send their personal videos in it. I've not seen -anything- else use it.
So their comments are spot-on. It is what people use it for, and it got popular because people use it for that.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
No, it's popular because of piracy because piracy made it popular. I'm not using logic to say it's popular because of piracy. I'm using history.
Really? Do you need to associate it with piracy? (Score:5, Insightful)
Come on, was the piracy spin really needed? Youtube uses them, DVD/Bluray players use them, MP3 players use them, heck Windows 7 is even including DivX, H.264 (though not sure if it's through the new DivX codec), and AAC support now. Hate to break it to you, but these codecs are used for a lot more things other than copyright infringement.
Downloading isn't even illegal... (Score:5, Insightful)
I can't be bothered to learn how to properly rip HD content from a blu-ray when there are already experts who can do/have done it for me.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
None of those use MKV.
What Gray Content? (Score:3, Interesting)
DivX looks set to continue to be the video format of choice for 'grey' content,
Not sure what gray content you are referring to. I'm assuming this is about legal shades of gray, but there aren't any in terms of content (or at least not the ones you are probably talking about):
There is exactly nothing illegal about making copies of your own discs for personal use.
There is a law against distributing ripping software (the DMCA), but it doesn't sound like you're talking about that.
There is a law about distributing the content itself, but that isn't gray - it's illegal.
The only gray areas are content used for criticism and education.
'course - entirely possible I've misunderstood what "grey" is supposed to mean - maybe a hipster term for re-encoding or something.
Re:What Gray Content? (Score:4, Informative)
There is exactly nothing illegal about making copies of your own discs for personal use.
In the US, at least, the DMCA would beg to differ with that interpretation, for media protected by an anti-circumvention device. That would be pretty much anything relevant today aside from audio CDs.
Parent
MKVs (Score:3, Interesting)
Confusion... (Score:3, Interesting)
MKV is a container format. It's not impossible for a container format to induce overhead, but in all likelihood that isn't the case.
The codec would be something like h264,xvid,indeo,theora,etc for video, aac, mp3,vorbis,wav,etc.
I don't know about Quicktime, but avi is horribly limited. Ogg seemed to have promise for a container format, but for whatever reason MKV came about with support for some killer features menus and vobsub format subtitle tracks. I have never seen an mkv with menu, but I have heard
Codec vs Container (Score:5, Interesting)
Took a while for that distinction to sink in. Here is another container format you'll be hearing about a lot more in the coming months. QAM [wikipedia.org] and ATSC [wikipedia.org]. QAM is only a signal modulation and can be used to stream any kind of container format--usually some variant of ATSC. Think of it, I guess, as like the low-level ethernet stuff--ethernet doesn't care if you use TCP/IP or IPX/SPX. ATSC is kind of like TCP/IP or IPX/SPX, it defines how information is sent over the low-level stuff, but for the most part it doesn't care what the information is (MPEG2, H.264). ATSC typically only carries MPEG2, but I guess it has been updated to carry H.264/MPEG4. I guess it can only carry AC-3 audio streams and not mp3.
If you really want to force yourself to learn about video and audio codecs and containers, force yourself to use ffmpeg on the command line for a while. It's docs and number of switches can seem daunting at first, but just remember what you are trying to do is tell it what codecs to use, what bitrates to use, and any modification to the video/audio stream (aspect ratio, resolution, framerate, etc). If you type "ffmpeg -formats | less", you'll get a list of what your version of ffmpeg can read and what containers and codecs it can write to. Keep in mind not every container can hold all the codecs; you'll have to consult wikipedia for that. The whole exercise will make you think about every aspect of your transcoding experience.
PS: is it me or does chrome have a horrible spellchecker?
Parent
This makes no sense.... (Score:5, Informative)
DivX makes an announcement that thier DivX player can now support a format that even Media Player Classic can play with an open source codec?
First off, MKV is a container which can add features to an encoded video stream such as chapters, subtitles, additional audio streams etc.
The corresponding DivX container (Introduced with DivX6) is far inferior with its limited support for audio codecs and its insistence on DivX video encoding profiles.
DivX the codec is simply a MP4 based video/audio encoder.
You can wrap virtually any video or audio format in an MKV container and it should work just fine. I see no reason why DivX encoded movies could not be wrpped in an MKV container!
I have never tried to encode DivX into an MKV container for several reasons:
1. DivX is not the best MP4 Codec out there, XviD is better and freely availiable (It is a fork of the original OpenDivX).
2. DivX started bundling thier codecs with all sorts of crapware some time ago which really tuned me off the codec.
3. x264 is already availiable for high definition encoding.
4. DivX encoding will cost you money with the Pro version.
5. It is bloatware.
Basically DivX are trying to make money by charging inexperienced users for functionality that is already freely availiable.
If you want to watch virtually every availiable format without problems with a choice of video players I suggest the Combined Community Codec Pack (http://www.cccp-project.net/).
Or you can go ahead and pay the ignorance tax that is DivX.
Re:This makes no sense.... (Score:5, Insightful)
You're missing the point. This is about slapping logos on things, so people know what they're getting. Here's how it works.
My DVD player contains decoders for MPEG1 and MPEG2 video, and Dolby Digital. My receiver can also decode DTS. My HD DVD player can - on top of those standards - decode H.264, VC-1, and Dolby TrueHD (and a bunch of other Dolby standards.)
But there are limitations. None of these players can decode an arbitrary MPEG1 stream. If I encode a 1080p24 MPEG1 stream, they'll choke. This is because 1080p24 is not a supported profile. Likewise, the Receiver will probably choke if I find a 1Mbps AC-3 Dolby Digital stream and try to get it to play it.
The purpose of the DVD and HD DVD logos when put on players is to say "This equipment supports these standards", and the purpose of the logos when put on discs is to say "This disc is formatted to this standard."
That's what DivX are selling. They're not selling you what you already have. They're selling you a known quality. They're making it possible to make DVD players that support H.264 video and AC-3 audio, in such a way that you know that IF you create an MKV of a supported bitrate, using a supported resolution, using a supported profile, using the supported codecs, using the supported framerates, you will know that that MKV will work on every player that carries the DivX 7 logo.
Oh, and they're selling the software to player manufacturers, but the player manufacturers have to get it from somewhere...
Parent
Why is Matroska used? (Score:4, Insightful)
Somewhat tangential, but can someone explain why Matroska is the favorite container for ripped H.264 video? While I can appreciate that it is the 'open' alternative to the other formats it does not have significant technical advantages. However, open source ideology doesn't usually trump practical concerns in the ripping communities. Many devices and programs commonly used with ripped video, like media servers, media extenders, portable media players and many software players deal poorly with .mkv files. So why the heavy bias for .mkv as a container format instead of something like .mp4?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The short answer is that AVI does not have proper support for the b-pyramids in H.264. You can put H.264 into AVI but this involves putting the b-frames into the same packets at the i-frames and this causes the timecodes and seeking to get messed up. Additionally AVI only a
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Because it's simply the best out there for it. It support just about everything you can mux into it. AVI just don't cut it any more. MP4 was close and it is a good container but it left one important thing out. In a bout of stupidity rivaling the bay of pigs and the bush election the audio codec of choice for dvd, ac3, was left out of the spec. That's right. The standard audio format can't be used in mp4.
Now to be fair you can mux ac3 in a mp4 container using what is called user tracks or streams,
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
AVI seems to have alot more overhead than MKV. There is a utility to convert AVI files to MKV files and I noticed the resulting file was often a a megabyte or two smaller than the original AVI file. When you're targeting a storage medium with a relatively limited amount of space (e.g. DVDs, MP3 players, etc.) I suppose it could help fit a bit more content on there.
I noticed occasionally I'd have audio sync problems on the converted files though so I stopped doing it since a few megabytes here and there do
Re:Why is Matroska used? (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't know why it's currently a favorite, but like ZFS, the goal for Matroska is for it to be the end-all be-all of container formats. They eventually want to be able to have DVD-like menu systems, for example. How sweet would it be to be able to rip your DVD (including menus and special features?)
Matroska also supports an unlimited number of tracks. That's pretty neat, though I don't know if anyone's doing much with that.
As I noted in another post, it even allows for variable frame-rate (VFR) encodings, meaning that the frame-rate can change in the middle of the video stream. This addresses a common problem with encoding DVD rips from sources with mixed content.
Most modern television is filmed at 24fps (really 23.976). The film is then sometimes telecined to 30fps (really 29.97) to display on interlaced NTSC TVs. A goal for encoding is to reduce filesize--so if you can recover the 24fps video from the 30fps "source" (from a capture card or from a telecined DVD) then you can encode only 24fps instead of 30fps. In addition, you don't have interlacing in your output. The recovery process is called inverse telecine (IVTC.)
The problem comes when producers draw on the video. Special effects may be created at a different frame rate than the filmed scenes. IVTC will be unable to recover if the animation is at 30fps. You'll get awful-looking animated shots. Alternatively, you can try deinterlacing instead of IVTC, but then you get awful-looking motion in the non-animated segments.
Enter Matroska. Now you can IVTC when appropriate, deinterlace when appropriate, and simply keep the source frame-rate when appropriate. You get the best of all worlds, and all because you can store VFR video streams.
Parent
An open letter to the powers-that-be (Score:3, Interesting)
... or at least the ones that handle the media that can be read by the Xbox 360.
Please add MKV support to the Xbox 360. Don't touch anything else.
Thanks!
Re:I don't understand (Score:5, Informative)
That's simple : DivX is a video software, not a video format. It always has been. DivX 4-6 is based on one standard format : MPEG-4 Part 2 (aka MPEG-4 Visual, aka MPEG-4 ASP). So they are just updating their software to support the latest standard format, H.264 (aka MPEG-4 part 10, aka MPEG-4 AVC).
The equation video codec = video format is just a bad habit, and most of the time false today with proprietary things like Indeo ou RealVideo less and less used.
Parent
Re:I don't understand (Score:4, Informative)
MKV also supports variable frame rate encodings, which is very useful for encoding animation.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
*This asterisk inserted for the humor impaired. Laugh.
Way to be out of touch (Score:4, Insightful)
MKV is superior container because it allows multiple streams within a single container, including multiple languages and subtitles. It *doesn't care* about the underlying codec's. For cripes sake, it supports DTS-HD out of the box without any special extensions. I have a feeling MKV is exactly what's needed right now. A lot of hi-def media devices are already supporting it, everything from China these days supports it.
You can imagine that media companies hate it simply because it doesn't allow lock in to a format.
And in case you don't get it, this is not not like an OGG VOBIS debate; this is about using open standards for data. You're making the equivalent argument that all documents should be in MS Office format because that's all you ever use.
MKV is here to stay simply because it's perfect for 2009.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
A few years ago, forums were full of "How do I convert from h264 to DivX?"
Progress isn't instant. MKV is better, and the knowledgeable people are pushing it. It will likely catch on from sheer stubbornness... which will be good.