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I am glad to see I called this one correctly. Looks like tipping point for H.264 is finally here, and hopefully the support across the industry will accelerate from here on.

The big news today is from Adobe, announcing that their up and coming Moviestar player will support this high quality codec, allowing video quality up to HD streaming via our good old broadband.

The only trouble I see is the very high performance computer that is needed to properly decode highly compressed H.264 stream for high-definition full-screen playback. I hope Adobe takes this into account, and on slower machines makes it usable, showing lower quality video but without stutter.

Now, bring On the improved compression tools! Yesterday I tried every ‘Advanced’ and ‘More’ button I could find in Sony’s latest Vegas 8.0, but the best I found was H.263 …. Sony, get right on that! Vegas has been my favorite Video editing tool for years now, so it would be shame for me to have to leave them over this.

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I am still struggling with exact instructions on creating not just any old MP4 file, but one that is XBOX 360 compatible. It turns out to be very very hard, for unknown reason. I’ve emailed Major Nelson from XBox at Microsoft, but so far he’s busy, obviously.

I did manage to create MP4 files from my media, which play fine using VLC and QuickTime players, but I wanted them to play inside Vista Media Center. And, it turned out to be not as hard as it sounds, so just follow these simple steps to success (should work just as well for Windows XP Media Center, though I haven’t had a chance to try it there yet):

1. Set Windows Vista Restore Point, in case something goes Awry. Simply Right-Click on your Computer (on Desktop or Start-Menu), and select Properties. Then, choose System Protection under Tasks. Finally click the Create button, at the bottom (just above Ok/Cancel buttons). Name your Restore Point and it should be created in no time.
2. Download and Install Haali Media Splitter (aka Matroska Splitter) download link on the right there.
3. Download and Install latest beta bundle of FFDShow software. Make sure to grab the beta, which is more Vista compatible (unlike latest stable).
4. Almost done! Now, you just need to tell Media Center that it’s ok to include MP4 files. Open RegEdit for this, and find and adjust the following key:
       [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT.mp4]
       “PerceivedType”=”video”

That should be it. You can also make Explorer work with these files, simply right click on one of your MP4 files, select Open With, and point to your Windows Media Player. Make sure to mark ‘Always use selected program to open this file type’.

If something goes wrong, or some program that used to work misbehaves after these steps, you can always go back to System Restore and restore your Backup point created in step 1.

Meanwhile, I am continuing my struggle to find best/easiest/most compatible method of  creating MP4 files. I have expanded beyond Windows (Vista or XP) and into Linux (Ubuntu actually), but thus far still no satisfactory solution found. The image, to the right of here is a small sample of H.264 codec options. Just PART of Single folder, out of 4 total folders!
Easy, right???

If I ever figure it out, I will sure post the explanation here

Meanwhile, make sure to enjoy Shared Links on the right, which are updated daily, often every few hours!

UPDATE:  I installed Haali Media Splitter on the new Windows Vista Basic that we got with new Vostro computer (more on that later) and it cause IE 7 to start to crash on it. Of course I had restore point, but be forewarned.

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So, which Codec are you storing your Media in? Things like Home Movies, or recorded TV shows? How about your Music collection? Don’t even know or care what Codec is?

You should care! For one, because of the nightmares of what plays on which device at what quality and why. After installing elaborate suite of software, you usually can get computer to play pretty much anything, provided your PC is fast enough, of course.

But, what about iPod, Zune, and myriad of other MP3/4 video/audio players? And how about XBox 360 media extender? Or AppleTV, or huge collection of other divx and media extending players for home?

So why can’t vendors and companies get their act together? Why can’t technology industry standardize on a single preferred codec, or at least on top 3, and provide support for the media creation/editing/playback on major Operating Systems and devices?

I guess it’s the same reason the HD-DVD and Blu-Ray fighting it out right now… Greed!

But, we’re not totally doomed, since it’s only 2 major standards, and not Ten, right?

So what are we to do? If you are using Windows, the only standard that is flexible and seem pretty well supported is WMV. But, who owns that format? Microsoft does! If I archive all my home videos in WMV HD, will I be able to freely extract/play it 10 years from now? How about 20? Or 40?

That is why I decided to take a look at MP4/H.264 codec. It is already embraced by Apple and even by Microsoft’s own Zune player. Recently, support for this codec was added to XBox 360 media extender (partial support, for now), so momentum seems to be building. And, since it is developed through partnership of standard groups, no single entity, such as Microsoft, owns it.

Now, if only it were easy to convert media into MP4. I originally planned to put my numerous attempts to encode into MP4 in this post, but seeing how it’s already way too long, I’ll hold off on that until my upcoming post, stay tuned.

Meanwhile, what codec do you use and why? Do you take into account the quality as well as the storage space needed to preserve your memories and your favorite media? Please, leave me some comments!

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