[OT] - DVD Player

[John Wendel]

Amadeus W. M. wrote:
>>I have a Phillips 642 ( US $65.00 ) that plays many but not all DIVX 
>>files. If won't play Qpel encoded files (whatever that is). It also 
>>won't play HDTV resolution encodes. I still like it a lot.
>>
> 
> 
> I have the exact same model, and it does play divx files made (probably)
> in windows, but doesn't play ANY of the files I made with
> mencoder/transcode. I tried various codecs, divx, xvid, divx5, etc. to no
> avail. I even called Philips, and they said if I thought there was
> something wrong with the player, take it to a certified repair shop, where
> I would have had to pay $100 only to have it looked at (it was ~$70 new).
> The tech said the files must be made with some (obviously non-linux)
> software I never heard of using some obscure option (something about home
> or home theater). It might just be that I'm missing some options in
> mencoder. Do you have any experience with this?
> 
> Of course, it does play DVDs, even my transcode backups.
> 
> 

No Windows here, so I use mencoder on an FC3 box for video stuff. I use 
a locally compiled version of mplayer/mencoder (whatever the latest 
release is).

Here's a little 2 line script that I usually use with mencoder that 
works for me.

mencoder $1.avi -sub $1.srt -ovc lavc -lavcopts \

   vcodec=mpeg4:keyint=100:vbitrate=1000:vb_strategy=1:vpass=1 -oac copy

mencoder $1.avi -sub $1.srt -ovc lavc -lavcopts \

   vcodec=mpeg4:keyint=100:vbitrate=1000:vb_strategy=1:vpass=2 -oac copy

I'm not too hot with the millions of mencoder options, but the last 
video I made used the commands above to add hard subtitles to a video. I 
also use this to lower the video bitrate (makes it smaller).

The resulting videos play fine on my Phillips.

You might take a look at http://videohelp.com. Lots of info (too much). 
Sorry I can't be of more help.

John