Mercurial > mplayer.hg
view DOCS/xml/en/formats.xml @ 15847:26204cc17ab7
More fixes by the Wanderer and tip about another SVCD constrain suggested by Giacomo Comes
author | gpoirier |
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date | Wed, 29 Jun 2005 08:23:10 +0000 |
parents | 8b9738526dd7 |
children | e660acd11abe |
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<?xml version="1.0" encoding="iso-8859-1"?> <!-- $Revision$ --> <sect1 id="formats"> <title>Supported formats</title> <para> It is important to clarify a common mistake. When people see a file with a <filename>.AVI</filename> extension, they immediately conclude that it is not an MPEG file. That is not true. At least not entirely. Contrary to popular belief such a file <emphasis>can</emphasis> contain MPEG-1 video. </para> <para> You see, a <emphasis role="bold">codec</emphasis> is not the same as a <emphasis role="bold">file format</emphasis>. Examples of video <emphasis role="bold">codecs</emphasis> are: MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4 (DivX), Indeo5, 3ivx. Examples of file <emphasis role="bold">formats</emphasis> are: MPG, AVI, ASF. </para> <para> In theory, you can put an OpenDivX video and MP3 audio into an <emphasis role="bold">MPG format file</emphasis>. However, most players will not play it, since they expect MPEG-1 video and MP2 audio (unlike <emphasis role="bold">AVI</emphasis>, <emphasis role="bold">MPG</emphasis> does not have the necessary fields to describe its video and audio streams). Or you might put MPEG-1 video into an AVI file. <ulink url="http://ffmpeg.org/">FFmpeg</ulink> and <link linkend="mencoder"><application>MEncoder</application></link> can create these files. </para> <sect2 id="video-formats"> <title>Video formats</title> <sect3 id="mpg-vob-dat"> <title>MPEG files</title> <para> MPEG files come in different guises: </para> <itemizedlist> <listitem><simpara> MPG: This is the most <emphasis role="bold">basic</emphasis> form of the MPEG file formats. It contains MPEG-1 video, and MP2 (MPEG-1 layer 2) or rarely MP1 audio. </simpara></listitem> <listitem><simpara> DAT: This is the very same format as MPG with a different extension. It is used on <emphasis role="bold">Video CDs</emphasis>. Due to the way VCDs are created and Linux is designed, the DAT files cannot be played nor copied from VCDs as regular files. You have to use <option>vcd://</option> to play a Video CD. </simpara></listitem> <listitem><simpara> VOB: This is the MPEG file format on <emphasis role="bold">DVDs</emphasis>. It is the same as MPG, plus the capability to contain subtitles or non-MPEG (AC3) audio. It contains encoded MPEG-2 video and usually AC3 audio, but DTS, MP2 and uncompressed LPCM are allowed, too. <emphasis role="bold">Read the <link linkend="dvd">DVD</link> section</emphasis>! </simpara></listitem> <listitem><simpara> TY: This is a TiVo MPEG stream. It contains MPEG PES data for audio and video streams, as well as extra information like closed captions. The container is not an MPEG program stream, but a closed format created by TiVo. For more information on TiVo stream format, please refer to <ulink url="http://dvd-create.sourceforge.net/tystudio/tystream.shtml"> the TyStudio page</ulink>. </simpara></listitem> </itemizedlist> <para> Series of frames form independent groups in MPEG files. This means that you can cut/join an MPEG file with standard file tools (like <command>dd</command>, <command>cut</command>), and it remains completely functional. </para> <para> One important feature of MPGs is that they have a field to describe the aspect ratio of the video stream within. For example SVCDs have 480x480 resolution video, and in the header that field is set to 4:3, so that it is played at 640x480. AVI files do not have this field, so they have to be rescaled during encoding or played with the <option>-aspect</option> option. </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="avi"> <title>AVI files</title> <para> Designed by Microsoft, <emphasis role="bold">AVI (Audio Video Interleaved)</emphasis> is a widespread multipurpose format currently used mostly for MPEG-4 (DivX and DivX4) video. It has many known drawbacks and shortcomings (for example in streaming). It supports one video stream and 0 to 99 audio streams and can be as big as 2GB, but there exists an extension allowing bigger files called <emphasis role="bold">OpenDML</emphasis>. Microsoft currently strongly discourages its use and encourages ASF/WMV. Not that anybody cares. </para> <para> There is a hack that allows AVI files to contain an Ogg Vorbis audio stream, but makes them incompatible with standard AVI. <application>MPlayer</application> supports playing these files. Seeking is also implemented but severely hampered by badly encoded files with confusing headers. Unfortunately the only encoder currently capable of creating these files, <application>NanDub</application>, has this problem. </para> <note> <para> DV cameras create raw DV streams that DV grabbing utilities convert to two different types of AVI files. The AVI will then contain either separate audio and video streams that <application>MPlayer</application> can play or the raw DV stream for which support is under development. </para> </note> <para> There are two kinds of AVI files: <itemizedlist> <listitem><simpara> <emphasis role="bold">Interleaved:</emphasis> Audio and video content is interleaved. This is the standard usage. Recommended and mostly used. Some tools create interleaved AVIs with bad sync. <application>MPlayer</application> detects these as interleaved, and this climaxes in loss of A/V sync, probably at seeking. These files should be played as non-interleaved (with the <option>-ni</option> option). </simpara></listitem> <listitem><simpara> <emphasis role="bold">Non-interleaved:</emphasis> First comes the whole video stream, then the whole audio stream. It thus needs a lot of seeking, making playing from network or CD-ROM difficult. </simpara></listitem> </itemizedlist> </para> <para> <application>MPlayer</application> supports two kinds of timings for AVI files: <itemizedlist> <listitem><simpara> <emphasis role="bold">bps-based:</emphasis> It is based on the bitrate/samplerate of the video/audio stream. This method is used by most players, including <ulink url="http://avifile.sf.net">avifile</ulink> and <application>Windows Media Player</application>. Files with broken headers, and files created with VBR audio but not VBR-compliant encoder will result in A/V desync with this method (mostly at seeking). </simpara></listitem> <listitem><simpara> <emphasis role="bold">interleaving-based:</emphasis> It does not use the bitrate value of the header, instead it uses the relative position of interleaved audio and video chunks, making badly encoded files with VBR audio playable. </simpara></listitem> </itemizedlist> </para> <para> Any audio and video codec is allowed, but note that VBR audio is not well supported by most players. The file format makes it possible to use VBR audio, but most players expect CBR audio, thus they fail with VBR. VBR is uncommon and Microsoft's AVI specs only describe CBR audio. I also noticed that most AVI encoders/multiplexers create bad files when using VBR audio. There are only two known exceptions: <application>NanDub</application> and <link linkend="mencoder"><application>MEncoder</application></link>. </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="asf-wmv"> <title>ASF/WMV files</title> <para> ASF (Active Streaming Format) comes from Microsoft. They developed two variants of ASF, v1.0 and v2.0. v1.0 is used by their media tools (<application>Windows Media Player</application> and <application>Windows Media Encoder</application>) and is very secret. v2.0 is published and patented :). Of course they differ, there is no compatibility at all (it is just another legal game). <application>MPlayer</application> supports only v1.0, as nobody has ever seen v2.0 files :). Note that ASF files nowadays come with the extension <filename>.WMA</filename> or <filename>.WMV</filename>. </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="mov"> <title>QuickTime/MOV files</title> <para> These formats were designed by Apple and can contain any codec, CBR or VBR. They usually have a <filename>.QT</filename> or <filename>.MOV</filename> extension. Note that since the MPEG-4 group chose QuickTime as the recommended file format for MPEG-4, their MOV files come with a <filename>.MPG</filename> or <filename>.MP4</filename> extension (Interestingly the video and audio streams in these files are real MPG and AAC files. You can even extract them with the <option>-dumpvideo</option> and <option>-dumpaudio</option> options.). </para> <note> <para> Most new QuickTime files use <emphasis role="bold">Sorenson</emphasis> video and QDesign Music audio. See our <link linkend="sorenson">Sorenson</link> codec section. </para> </note> </sect3> <sect3 id="vivo"> <title>VIVO files</title> <para> <application>MPlayer</application> happily demuxes VIVO file formats. The biggest disadvantage of the format is that it has no index block, nor a fixed packet size or sync bytes and most files lack even keyframes, so forget seeking! </para> <para> The video codec of VIVO/1.0 files is standard <emphasis role="bold">h.263</emphasis>. The video codec of VIVO/2.0 files is a modified, nonstandard <emphasis role="bold">h.263v2</emphasis>. The audio is the same, it may be <emphasis role="bold">g.723 (standard)</emphasis>, or <emphasis role="bold">Vivo Siren</emphasis>. </para> <para> See the <link linkend="vivo-video">VIVO video codec</link> and <link linkend="vivo-audio">VIVO audio codec</link> sections for installation instructions. </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="fli"> <title>FLI files</title> <para> <emphasis role="bold">FLI</emphasis> is a very old file format used by Autodesk Animator, but it is a common file format for short animations on the net. <application>MPlayer</application> demuxes and decodes FLI movies and is even able to seek within them (useful when looping with the <option>-loop</option> option). FLI files do not have keyframes, so the picture will be messy for a short time after seeking. </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="realmedia"> <title>RealMedia (RM) files</title> <para> Yes, <application>MPlayer</application> can read (demux) RealMedia (<filename>.rm</filename>) files. Here are the lists of the supported <link linkend="realvideo">RealVideo</link> and <link linkend="realaudio">RealAudio</link> codecs. </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="nuppelvideo"> <title>NuppelVideo files</title> <para> <ulink url="http://frost.htu.tuwien.ac.at/~roman/nuppelvideo/">NuppelVideo</ulink> is a TV grabber tool (AFAIK:). <application>MPlayer</application> can read its <filename>.NUV</filename> files (only NuppelVideo 5.0). Those files can contain uncompressed YV12, YV12+RTJpeg compressed, YV12 RTJpeg+lzo compressed, and YV12+lzo compressed frames. <application>MPlayer</application> decodes (and also <emphasis role="bold">encodes</emphasis> them with <application>MEncoder</application> to MPEG-4 (DivX)/etc!) them all. Seeking works. </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="yuv4mpeg"> <title>yuv4mpeg files</title> <para> <ulink url="http://mjpeg.sf.net">yuv4mpeg / yuv4mpeg2</ulink> is a file format used by the <ulink url="http://mjpeg.sf.net">mjpegtools programs</ulink>. You can grab, produce, filter or encode video in this format using these tools. The file format is really a sequence of uncompressed YUV 4:2:0 images. </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="film"> <title>FILM files</title> <para> This format is used on old Sega Saturn CD-ROM games. </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="roq"> <title>RoQ files</title> <para> RoQ files are multimedia files used in some ID games such as Quake III and Return to Castle Wolfenstein. </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="ogg"> <title>OGG/OGM files</title> <para> This is a new fileformat from <ulink url="http://www.xiph.org">Xiphophorus</ulink>. It can contain any video or audio codec, CBR or VBR. You'll need <systemitem class="library">libogg</systemitem> and <systemitem class="library">libvorbis</systemitem> installed before compiling <application>MPlayer</application> to be able to play it. </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="sdp"> <title>SDP files</title> <para> <ulink url="ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc2327.txt">SDP</ulink> is an IETF standard format for describing video and/or audio RTP streams. (The "<ulink url="http://www.live.com/mplayer/">LIVE.COM Streaming Media</ulink>" are required.) </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="pva"> <title>PVA files</title> <para> PVA is an MPEG-like format used by DVB TV boards' software (e.g.: <application>MultiDec</application>, <application>WinTV</application> under Windows). </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="nsv"> <title>NSV files</title> <para> NSV (NullSoft Video) is the file format used by the <application>Winamp</application> player to stream audio and video. Video is VP3, VP5 or VP6, audio is MP3, AAC or VLB. The audio only version of NSV has the <filename>.nsa</filename> extension. <application>MPlayer</application> can play both NSV streams and files. Please note that most files from the <ulink url="http://www.winamp.com">Winamp site</ulink> use VLB audio, that can't be decoded yet. Moreover streams from that site need an extra depacketization layer that still has to be implemented (those files are unplayable anyway because they use VLB audio). </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="gif"> <title>GIF files</title> <para> The <emphasis role="bold">GIF</emphasis> format is a common format for web graphics. There are two versions of the GIF spec, GIF87a and GIF89a. The main difference is that GIF89a allows for animation. <application>MPlayer</application> supports both formats through use of <systemitem class="library">libungif</systemitem> or another libgif-compatible library. Non-animated GIFs will be displayed as single frame videos. (Use the <option>-loop</option> and <option>-fixed-vo</option> options to display these longer.) </para> <para> <application>MPlayer</application> currently does not support seeking in GIF files. GIF files do not necessarily have a fixed frame size, nor a fixed framerate. Rather, each frame is of independent size and is supposed to be positioned in a certain place on a field of fixed-size. The framerate is controlled by an optional block before each frame that specifies the next frame's delay in centiseconds. </para> <para> Standard GIF files contain 24-bit RGB frames with at most an 8-bit indexed palette. These frames are usually LZW-compressed, although some GIF encoders produce uncompressed frames to avoid patent issues with LZW compression. </para> <para> If your distribution does not come with <systemitem class="library">libungif</systemitem>, download a copy from the <ulink url="http://sourceforge.net/projects/libungif">libungif homepage</ulink>. For detailed technical information, have a look at the <ulink url="http://www.w3.org/Graphics/GIF/spec-gif89a.txt">GIF89a specification</ulink>. </para> </sect3> </sect2> <!-- ********** --> <sect2 id="audio-formats"> <title>Audio formats</title> <para> <application>MPlayer</application> is a <emphasis role="bold">movie</emphasis> and not a <emphasis role="bold">media</emphasis> player, although it can play some audio file formats (they are listed in the sections below). This is not a recommended usage of <application>MPlayer</application>, you better use <ulink url="http://www.xmms.org">XMMS</ulink>. </para> <sect3 id="mp3"> <title>MP3 files</title> <para> You may have problems playing certain MP3 files that <application>MPlayer</application> will misdetect as MPEGs and play incorrectly or not at all. This cannot be fixed without dropping support for certain broken MPEG files and thus will remain like this for the foreseeable future. The <option>-demuxer</option> flag described in the man page may help you in these cases. </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="wav"> <title>WAV files</title> <para> </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="ogg-vorbis"> <title>OGG/OGM files (Vorbis)</title> <para> Requires properly installed <systemitem class="library">libogg</systemitem> and <systemitem class="library">libvorbis</systemitem>. </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="wma-asf"> <title>WMA/ASF files</title> <para> </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="mp4"> <title>MP4 files</title> <para></para> </sect3> <sect3 id="cdda"> <title>CD audio</title> <para> <application>MPlayer</application> can use <application>cdparanoia</application> to play CDDA (Audio CD). The scope of this section does not contain enumerating <application>cdparanoia</application>'s features. </para> <para> See the man page's <option>-cdda</option> option which can be used to pass options to <application>cdparanoia</application>. </para> </sect3> <sect3 id="xmms"> <title>XMMS</title> <para> <application>MPlayer</application> can use <application>XMMS</application> input plugins to play many file formats. There are plugins for SNES game tunes, SID tunes (from Commodore 64), many Amiga formats, .xm, .it, VQF, musepack, Bonk, shorten and many others. You can find them at the <ulink url="http://www.xmms.org/plugins.php?category=input">XMMS input plugin page</ulink>. </para> <para> For this feature you need to have <application>XMMS</application> and compile <application>MPlayer</application> with <filename>./configure --enable-xmms</filename>. If that does not work, you might need to set the <application>XMMS</application> plugin and library path explicitly by way of the <option>--with-xmmsplugindir</option> and <option>--with-xmmslibdir</option> options. </para> </sect3> </sect2> </sect1>