Need some HELP for video playback

[Arty-Sho']

Hello ! I just got my new J3 16gb today. Paid 200€ for it. It is really cool, though I still haven’t mastered all the possibilities. But I have already encountered a few problems with video. (Note that I’m not very familiar with video format conversion and tinkering. I’m also not the best in English, sorry if I make some mistakes).

First, I can’t play flv. MKV aren’t even recognized. And when I play mp4, I only get the audio. Well, I suppose it is normal. Haven’t tried with h264/x264, but I suppose it won’t work either. WMV seems to be ok.

But which really annoys me is that I can’t play my Cowboy Bebop episodes, which are in .avi (and I’m pretty sure that DivX is the codec). And this is strange, because I actually can play some crappy documentary films, that are also in .avi, so I don’t understand.

So, here’s some information about the file I got with my Gom Video Player:
Input Type : AVC1(GVC)
Input Size : 640 x 480
Output Type : YUY2
Output Size : 640 x 480

Is it the “AVC1(GVC)” that is the problem? Because if it’s AVC, it seems strange to find it in .avi, and anyway, when I got this series, there was written that it’s DivX. Or maybe I’m just stupid and I’m doing a mashup with all this video stuff.

Anyway, it’d be nice to get some help!

I read there was a way to play some normally non-supported formats with add-ons, maybe this could help? I also saw some apparently good add-ons on this site (Lynx, Leaf and Sense), and I’d like to get them. I want to know if they’re interfering with the firmware? Because I just got a firmware update which apparently boosts the battery life of 10-20%. But I have to admit that browsing is not as good and simple as on a computer, it hides some files, and when you create different folders in the VIDEO section for example, I see them as if they were all in one folder. The add-ons might come handy if they fix this problem.

Arty.

[hazza_t10]

Where to even begin!??

It is no surprise that most of the things you list don't work - because they aren't supported. The main containers supported are .avi and .wmv and .asf though it can support .mp4 in some specific circumstances. For codecs, the support is for DivX 3/4/5, XViD and WMV, though there is very limited support for h264.

Although these are the formats supported, not just any file will work. The resolution of the screen is 480x272 and you will be much better off if your video is close to this resolution. You can quite often get away with higher, but only to an extent, so be warned.

The video that you described from your 'Gom Video Player' is definitely not supported. First off, it is AVC, which is not formally supported. You can use AVC video with the right settings, and there are some guides on this forum telling you how to do that. However, it will definitely not work at 640x480.

For add-ons, I am not aware of any that allow playback of non-supported files. I don't think you'll have any success there.

If you were wondering why the player hides files, in 'normal' browsing it only lists files that it supports and it sorts audio files according to their ID3 tags. If you have unsupported files or untagged (or incorrectly tagged) then you won't see them. In the folder view it shows files according to their location when you loaded them on to the player, and even shows unsupported files.

To get files on my player, I recode them with a supported codec, resize them to 480x272, and keep a folder of these files so I don't have to keep re-doing them. If you recode specifically for the player it should also help to keep the file size down so you can fit more in the players memory

[DSperber]

Originally Posted by Arty-Sho'

First, I can’t play flv. MKV aren’t even recognized. And when I play mp4, I only get the audio. Well, I suppose it is normal. Haven’t tried with h264/x264, but I suppose it won’t work either. WMV seems to be ok.

According to the J3 user manual, the supported media types are as follows:

[Arty-Sho']

Thanks for the reply.
In fact, it's on this website that I saw that it could play (unoficially) MP4 and h.264.
http://anythingbutipod.com/2010/11/cowon-j3-review/
Anyway, I suppose it must drain more battery decoding an unresized MP4 video for example.
I don't really mind converting my video, the problem is to find a good converter. I haven't tried much jetAudio, but apparently, the free version woudn't let me convert video files (no more that 30sec.). I've tried X***soft Video Ultimate Converter, which boasts supports for all formats (well, I admit I've cracked it, but anyway, it doesn't work! It fails to convert most of the times, and the successfully converted files still don't work.)
Aaaaah... life's hard!

[dfkt]

I wrote in the review on the frontpage that only baseline h264 without CABAC is supported. It's a complicated standard with many different implementations and encoding profiles, the J3 only does the bare basics.

I see you circumvented our forum censor, that's a no-no... X***soft is a piece of ripoff garbage, bordering on malware. Almost every free encoder is better than that junk. Just look at the sticky threads in this subforum to see different methods for quality transcodes.

[Arty-Sho']

I've tried Format Factory (uh, I suppose It's okay to say that, since it isn't censored ) and that works just fine! It's hard to believe it's free and without ads.

And the most important, you can do water ripples with your mouse pointer in the banner rectangle!! Haha, just kidding.

[hazza_t10]

If you're up for recoding your videos then the best bet is definitely to look at the Sticky threads. Decent h264 encoding can be done very easily using RibBot 264, just check the guide in the sticky thread. If you need any help just give one of us a shout