Audio and video not syncronized

[Lucas]

I have had a bunch of movies and TV shows that the audio and video are out of sync. Is there something I can do to correct the syncronization of the two, or do I need to delete and re-downlaod. I am using Nero 7, but on windows media player and crystal player they are still out.

[kluelos]

You've possibly got a filter/codec problem. Those're fun. (Well, yes, it could be file corruption, but that's not likely to affect a bunch of files.)

First, download VLC from videolan.org and try watching the movies in that. If they work -- well, first, VLC's a pretty good player, so if you're happy with it, stick with it -- but second, it means that yeah, you've likely got a filter problem. It comes from downloading "codec packs" without clearly understanding what you're doing. VLC is a good test for this because it doesn't use system filters at all. That means it also doesn't support some things very well, like Matroska, so can't really be used for that. OTOH, if you're not much into anime, you'll likely never hear of Matroska and be none the poorer for it.

If you want to fix your filter problem, well, wait a second or two for Dark Shround to pop up here, and he'll give you some pointers on it.

[Dark_Shroud]

lol, I felt my ears burning. But yeah, there are a couple troublesome open source containers out there but everyone is starting to accept Matroska due to it's features. And like kluelos said unless you're into anime most people will put things in .avi that might have a divx/xvid encode. Instead of h.264(really good) with god knows what audio.

But to get back on track VLC will play most files for you. For everything else you can use CCCP, which is now the official Matroska pack. CCCP is small, doesn't cause conflicts, and their decoders work better than most of the actual codecs. It will work with Windows Media Player but you get the option to install some players that come with it. Media Player Classic is the good one. B) Click on the image in my sig for their website.

[Lucas]

Thanks for the pointers, media player and VLC player works well and is in sync. I am still having problems with Nero, it is not in sync. I would like to burn these so I can have more free space on my computer. Any suggestions for burning software? My dvd burner came with nero so thats what I have used so far.

[Dark_Shroud]

If its a disc image you're looking to burn then use Imgburn. If you're looking to burn a file to disc then Nero will work just fine. Their player might stink but their burning is ok, as long as its not a disc image. Of course you could use XP's drop and drag/send to burning method which works well for files. :)

[Lucas]

With the cccp installed will everything be in sync if burned in nero (since it is still out on their player), and played on a dvd player? Or are there other programs that would be recommended, faster or just better?

[kluelos]

(deep breath, here)

Ok, first, the sync issue isn't really a problem with Nero's viewer, it's a problem with your system, and it's kinda like having three outfielders all going for the same fly ball -- and running into each other. Larry, Moe and Curly at the World Series. Those are your current set of filters.

If you burn it with Nero or anything else, it's not going to fix that problem, so it will still play badly in Nero and fine in VLC. What it will do on somebody else's system depends on their system problems or not. The problem isn't with the files. It's with how your computer in its current configuration, tries to handle those files during playback.

Next. "DVD Video" means a disk that is in a very particular, very rigidly defined, and very old format, so that it will play on any stand-alone DVD player. Notice that I said, "old". Most of what you download will not be in that ancient format. A little of it will be, but they'll mostly say so, and be disk images, and be about 4 GB in size. There are some exceptions, called "VCD"'s or "KVCD"'s, which are video CD's, not DVD's, and which will play in most standalone DVD players. Not all, but most.

That old DVD Video (or VDVD for short) is monstrously inefficient compared to modern storage schemes. It takes a long time to convert between one and another. If you take a video you've downloaded with Bittorrent, and tell (e.g.) Nero to convert it to a VDVD, it will take that 800 Mb file and swell it to 4 gigs of wasted space in that ancient format, without any corresponding gain in video or audio quality, and it will tell you to go away for several hours while it finishes. (And this is BEFORE you actually burn the disk.)

I recommend you not do that.

But you need to determine your priorities, and exactly what you want to do/how badly you want to do it. You have several alternatives.