Mac unable to process WMV?

Let'sgoflying!

Let'sgoflying!

Touchdown! Greaser!
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Dave Taylor
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I have a friend with a mac who cannot see wmv videos I send him. All he sees is pages of gibberish.
What can he do to see the videos short of having them hosted?
 
can I dl the F4M and change the format for him?
seems unbelievable this is still a problem!
 
Let'sgoflying! said:
can I dl the F4M and change the format for him?
seems unbelievable this is still a problem!
Click to expand...
It's not, usually. WMV is prevalent enough on the net that he should have encountered a need for Flip4Mac long before now. Be that as it may, you can't download it unless you're running a Mac too. He needs to install it on his system.
 
Is my computer capable of presenting this to his computer in a format he can read?

I suspect I can burn a dvd which he can see.
so what format are dvds? maybe I can convert it to that, then email?
 
Let'sgoflying! said:
Is my computer capable of presenting this to his computer in a format he can read?
Click to expand...
Yes, if you upgrade to Quicktime Pro. You could then use it to convert the video to a Quicktime movie.

I suspect I can burn a dvd which he can see.
so what format are dvds? maybe I can convert it to that, then email?
Click to expand...
A DVD's video is encoded in MPEG4, but there's a lot of other stuff that goes along with it. You could build a DVD, then convert it to a .ISO image and email him that - but it'd probably be a gig or so at last unless you're talking about a very small amount of video.
 
Let'sgoflying! said:
Is my computer capable of presenting this to his computer in a format he can read?

I suspect I can burn a dvd which he can see.
so what format are dvds? maybe I can convert it to that, then email?
Click to expand...

Ask if he has Flip4Mac installed, and if not send him the link to download and install it.

As Jay says, otherwise you're in for a lot of work unless you post it to YouTube. :cornut:

Why isn't there a private video sharing service? ...OOPS! THERE IS!
http://help.youtube.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?answer=59208&topic=16612

Dave, read the above. Upload it to YouTube, mark it as private, and add your buddy as a contact. That means you both have to create accounts on YouTube.
 
Thanks Mike
I did try yousendit.com, another sharing site - but all he got was gibberish.
I will ask if he trusts youtube to keep it private and see if he can view youtube videos first.

It drives me crazy that all these gyrations are required in the year 2009 to share a simple video.
I spent hours today trying to make someone a few business cards with a photo they sent me. A million tiny adjustments later and it is close but still not right.

"Computer technology is in its infancy"
 
Let'sgoflying! said:
It drives me crazy that all these gyrations are required in the year 2009 to share a simple video.
Click to expand...
You can thank Microsoft for that. Quicktime was out for years before Microsoft came out with WMV. Heaven forbid they should adopt someone else's standard.
 
Let'sgoflying! said:
Thanks Mike
I did try yousendit.com, another sharing site - but all he got was gibberish.
I will ask if he trusts youtube to keep it private and see if he can view youtube videos first.

It drives me crazy that all these gyrations are required in the year 2009 to share a simple video.
I spent hours today trying to make someone a few business cards with a photo they sent me. A million tiny adjustments later and it is close but still not right.

"Computer technology is in its infancy"
Click to expand...

You weren't going to solve the problem by sending the unreadable file another way. :tongue: Troubleshooting involves separating and addressing the "layers" of the problem.

Note that when you upload to YouTube you have an option (prolly on by default) to make the video public. Just don't choose that. Follow the instructions above.
 
Dave, make it easy on both of you. If he's not comfortable with this video being on YouTube as Mike suggested, even if it's marked as private (for whatever reason), then have him download and install for FREE the Mac Version of the open-source VLC media player. (there's a Windows version too, if you want to try it).

http://www.videolan.org/vlc/ << have him click "Mac OS X" under the Download VLC section

It supports WMV files natively, and he can play what you've sent him.
 
You guys are making this way too complicated:
If you are creating the .wmv in Windows Movie Maker, export it as an .avi instead. Problem solved.

Quicktime sucks, and there's no reason for any Windows user to have to buy software to make things work on a Mac. Remember, the Mac is trying to make things easier, not harder (I suppose).
 
Nick I tried your idea and successfully made a .avi but it blossomed the size from 14 to 222mb! (also unusable = unemailable)

As far as the mac vs pc thing goes.....I think the average joe computer user like me really has no interest in whose fault it is - we just want to get the job done!!
 
Let'sgoflying! said:
Nick I tried your idea and successfully made a .avi but it blossomed the size from 14 to 222mb! (also unusable = unemailable)

As far as the mac vs pc thing goes.....I think the average joe computer user like me really has no interest in whose fault it is - we just want to get the job done!!
Click to expand...

Hmmm...There's gotta be a nice, easy way to compress video on a PC.

BTW, I'm a Mac user now. I'm just realistic about it :D
 
SkyHog said:
Hmmm...There's gotta be a nice, easy way to compress video on a PC.

BTW, I'm a Mac user now. I'm just realistic about it :D
Click to expand...

Change the frame rate and/or video size. Nothing is simple.

UPLOAD IT TO YOUTUBE.
 
Why is he against installing a free program (flip4mac) that would take less than five minutes to download and install? It seems odd to put in so much time trying to find a workaround to a problem that was solved years ago. :confused:
 
A couple of more options, what program are you using to create the .WMV? Will it output an MPEG? QT will display MPEG just fine.

The AVI issue you had sounds like you were not using any compression. Try picking a codec like MPEG4.

Joe
 
Areeda said:
A couple of more options, what program are you using to create the .WMV? Will it output an MPEG? QT will display MPEG just fine.

The AVI issue you had sounds like you were not using any compression. Try picking a codec like MPEG4.

Joe
Click to expand...

I would have suggested that but since MPEG compression is patented and has a royalty there are no free programs that can write it and many commercial programs don't offer it. MPEG is the main reason why Quicktime Pro costs $29.
 
Isn't the microsoft media player still available at microsfot.com?
 
Bob Noel said:
Isn't the microsoft media player still available at microsfot.com?
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Not any more. Microsoft got out of the business entirely and let Flip4Mac have it all. If you go to Microsoft's web site looking for a WMV player for Mac OS X, they'll send you to Flip4Mac.
 
Bob Noel said:
Isn't the microsoft media player still available at microsfot.com?
Click to expand...

Nope, amazingly, Microsoft links to Flip4Mac, which requires Quicktime to work!

They really must have dismissed all of their Mac developers.
 
Last edited:
mikea said:
Nope, amazingly, Microsoft links to Flip4Mac, which requires Quicktime to work!
Click to expand...
Well, if you're making a video codec for Mac OS X, it only makes sense for it to be a Quicktime plugin. Quicktime is a part of every OS X system, and already has all the necessary infrastructure in place; all you need to do is write the codec itself.

They really must have dismissed all of their Mac developers.
Click to expand...
Not all. They're still actively developing the Office suite for OS X.
 
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