Hello,
I'm currently running current i386 on my amd64 processor.

I'm considering to move to the amd64 distribution but I noticed that the

win32-codecs package is only for i386.
Is there currently a win32-codecs alternative for amd64 or is it possible to

watch avi (+/- all codecs) movies on amd64?
Thank you very much!

Didier

I've been using mplayer on amd64 for more than a year now and played

various formats and encodings. The only problems I encountered were with

newer wmf formats (which is usually poor quality anyway and quite often

some `funny clip' you receive from your local oha user group).

mplayer plays every damn format out there. :)
It works quite well on OpenBSD though there are rough edges.
Try some advanced option of mencoder and boom...
Anyway I better shut up or send patches. 
As to win32codecs working on amd64 if you can run them under a chroot

jail and try 32 bit emulation it might work.
Hey I am talking thro' my hat and you know what that means.
But I have played several video formats(avi, wmv...) without the closed

source win32codecs package.
I wonder why people look any further when there is something as sexy as

mplayer...
regards,

Girish

On which OS would that be?

IMO vlc has higher quality playback of most media, can do things

mplayer can't, has a nicer ui, etc, etc ...
--

jakemsr@sdf.lonestar.org

SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.lonestar.org

UI?
Well I am a command line person. 
mplayer cannot understand DVD menus. That is the only problem mplayer

has IMHO.
I honestly tried vlc. But it was too GUI oriented, all sorts of ugly

output like KDE and other C++ junk out there...
Now I again it is my opinion. 
Can you tell me what vlc can do that mplayer can't?
Have you tried to "study" mplayer's man pages, the html documentation

and stuff?
It takes a long time to learn but once learnt you start feeling that it

is the best thing since sliced bread.
This article should give an idea.
http://linuxjournal.com/9787
Best,

Girish

ogle is about the only unix app out there which works reasonably well

with dvd menus.
mplayer has a lot of minor issues. Lots of option combinations make it

dump core. Some extra functionality is broken. Its command-line options

are often hard to figure out. It's mostly single-threaded, which is annoying

with recent processors. Some of its codecs don't synch properly on fast

forward... but yeah, apart from all these problems it works fine.
For jakemsr: as far as video quality goes, mplayer can have it fairly good,

probably as good as vlc or better. But you have to play with post-filtering

options to get there.

no doubt mplayer is highly configurable and can do lots of things.

certainly its strongest attribute is its ability to recognize and

play all sorts of media.  no doubt it is a useful tool.  I

would not have bothered to clean up the audio interface (or add

bktr support) in OpenBSD if I thought it was worthless.
but more and more, I like things that work well by default and have

easy to understand interfaces.  I have found that vlc has smoother

playback -by default- than mplayer.  vlc of course has libpostproc

based post processing filters, too.  and I have found that ffmpeg is

a much more straight forward tool for transcoding than mencoder, and

is plenty tweakable, as far as balancing encoding speed/compression/

quality.
--

jakemsr@sdf.lonestar.org

SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.lonestar.org

command line media player.  sorry, but that doesn't make sense, IMO.

I mean, if you're playing a video, you have a video window .. it's
$ vlc --help | wc -l

VLC media player 0.8.6c Janus

     169

$ mplayer --help | wc -l

     39
yes, in -current the vlc port can be built with aRTs and Esound

support, and it does use wxWidgets for the GUI.  however, it does
rtp stream server.  sound server output (in -current).  playing
yes.  it's a mess.  how can e.g, mpg321 know that file.m3u is a playlist,

but mplayer needs to have -playlist specified?  and if -playlist is
I see a statements like:
It is a mature application that has no parallel.  MEncoder, it companion

video encoder program, does a much better job than FFMPEG in transcoding

video, although it is a bit difficult to use and learn.
that have no basis.  how and why MEncoder "does a much better job than

FFMPEG in transcoding video"?  there is no comparison whatsoever

between ffmpeg transcoding and mplayer transcoding.  further, mplayer/

mencoder are heavy users of libavcodec/libavformat (FFMpeg libraries).

that's what all those 'lavc*' options are.
$ ffmpeg -i input.avi -target ntsc-dvd dvd.mpg
takes any AVI input and outputs a DVD compliant NTSC mpeg2 PS.  what

is the mplayer equivilent?
--

jakemsr@sdf.lonestar.org

SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.lonestar.org

Didn't you check out the menu option in my article?
mplayer has a sexy OSD. :)
Well any reasonable UNIX app should have an extensive set of command

line controls and tweaks.
Doesn't matter if it is multimedia. Even some web apps have the same
This is not apples to apples comparison.
mplayer can play any media. In fact you don't need any other

application. You can also stream with mplayer in an indirect way. It can

play SIP urls and play Internet streams. You cannot run a media server.

For that you can use darkice,liveice,shout* or even ffserver.
Of course I tried vlc for this very purpose but I am sorry to say I was

disappointed.
The documentation asks me to use the GUI. I don't like that.
I am sure you know this but still.
mplayer can play
a) audio

b) video

c) streams

d) analog television

e) digital television
Now what remains? :)
Have you checked the filters and plugins? It is mind boggling.
And the tweakability with the input keys and commands?
$ mplayer -input keylist
$ mplayer -input cmdlist
LIRC is pretty basic these days but mplayer is quite tweakable to one's
But where is the documentation?
Anyway I might be biased here. I don't like the smell of vlc.
mplayer plugin for firefox. Have you checked that out?
I got that working for OpenBSD but for some reason it does not play

sound most of the time.
I hope some port of it is in the works...
Buddy,
You are seriously mistaken here.
The -playlist option cannot be avoided because mplayer expects a media

file as input.
You can get the best of both worlds with the -playlist option. Check out

my article.
You can invoke the input subsystem from a FIFO file. Really cool. :)
ffmpeg screws up the videos. Did you know that?
I have burnt my finger several times with it. There are plenty of bugs

and there is hardly any tweakability there.
It is very easy to goof up when you cut videos.
It somehow does not get the mpeg keyframes and their integrity

correctly...
[ message continues ]

because you do not say how or why it is better.  are the options

more sensible?  is the compression better?  is the overall output
I am the ffmpeg port maintainer.  I use ffmpeg regularly for video

capture and transcoding.  it works quite well for me, and there are

no outstanding bug reports for the port.  I have never heard from you

about "ffmpeg screws up the videos".
look, someone asked about playing media on amd64 and whether

win32-codecs was important.  this immediately made me think of

mplayer because it really seems to want to use those blobs, so

I offered some other options which I prefer, while you insist

that mplayer is the be-all-end-all.  no I don't write articles,

but I do work on OpenBSD's multimedia ports.
--

jakemsr@sdf.lonestar.org

SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.lonestar.org

To answer the above questions, I will try my best.
I don't get what you mean by compression but "options being sensible"

does not sound like something I can answer.
I will still try. It does give me enough options to play with. Whereas

ffmpeg hardly gives any.
Overall output being smoother?
It depends on the output driver. mplayer has support for a zillion

output drivers. No other application can match in that respect.
If you have xv support, I would think that mplayer can do a better job

than any other application. It makes use of optimal memory/CPU

resources. Even if you don't have xv support mplayer can do a good job.

Since the options are rich.
Higher quality vs lower bitrates?
It depends on the CODEC and as you know both mplayer and ffmpeg use the

same libavcodec library (more or less).
But mplayer/mencoder supports a great deal more tweakability.
If it screws up the video, there is a problem in the algorithm and

not in the port.
I shall get back to you with bug reports in future.
mplayer using blobs?
I never want anyone to use blobs either. No one in this camp wants that.
In fact in one of my first responses I specifically said that I could

play without using the closed source drivers.
Anyway let us move on.
Nice talking to you.
Best,

Girish

On Thu, Nov 15, 2007 at 12:28:49PM +0530, Girish Venkatachalam wrote:
when you quit talking "through your hat" I will no longer be

compelled to call out the bullshit.
--

jakemsr@sdf.lonestar.org

SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.lonestar.org

I committed a workaround a couple of days ago that might help.

Cheers!
--

Antoine

Wow! That is great news. :)
I specifically had problems with DVD creation and creating a video with

still pictures.
Thanks. I shall test if I get time.
Best,

Girish

try playing the movies with ffplay from the ffmpeg package.  if

that can do something useful, then you don't need win32-codecs.
as far as media players, I prefer vlc or kaffeine.
--

jakemsr@sdf.lonestar.org

SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.lonestar.org