Recovering *.avi files

[blockers]

Hi.

Basically, i have a very big problem. I copied my video files (25gb odd) to our file server, so that i could reinstall windows without losing them all. They took up the exact same amount of room as they had on my computer (when they played fine); so i assumed they had all be copied properly.

I have just copied them back to my computer and now they do not play well. They have sound, but no video. Is there a way to recover these files? As they seem to take up the same amount of room as they did before, so the video is there, it just cant be played.

Can it be fixed or shall i just delete the whole lot

Thanks
Will

[tommylittleboy@]

It sounds to me as if you havent got the codecs installed. For example DivX, Xvid or 3ivx etc. As you have just reinstalled, these codecs would have been lost, however a simple trip to www.divx.com or a search on google for xvid and download + install these codecs should sort it

edit: oh, by the way, I should have said, the files are fine, dont try and change or fix them, its the computer cannot decode them yet

[blockers]

THanks for the help, i am trying to play in winamp 5.08 btw...i thought that supported .avi by default, ill try and find a codec though.

THanks for the suggestion

[tommylittleboy@]

yeah, most divx/xvid/3ivx files have the .avi extension anyway. Just as a guide, if the videos are about 2hrs long and have a size of 700MB --> 1GB with good quality they are likely to be divx/xvid etc. An uncompressed AVI file of the same quality would be at least 10x the size

heres the link to the codec on divx (most videos use divx)http://www.divx.com/divx/download/

[Stoo]

From memory, you'll need divx, xvid, ac3decode, ogg, and possibly a better mp3 codec than the standard windows one

[blockers]

Downloaded kazaa mega codec pack, had it before and it seemed pretty good. It has proven its worth once again!!!

Thanks very much for suggesting codec's, i must just be getting lazy with winamp playing pretty much everything!

An air guitar is it on its way to you tommylittleboy@

Thanks so much

Will

[tommylittleboy@]

An air guitar is it on its way to you tommylittleboy@

haha! only cos the same thing happened to me a year ago

[Rabs]

The vast majority of divx/xvid .avis will play with just the xvid codec installed as this also plays divx streams. I also usually just install the AC3 one also and thats it for codecs.

[adeypius]

i use videolan client
covers everything and more


http://www.videolan.org/vlc/