Problem with webm

Here's the place to discuss anything about Media Preview in English.
bitwyse
Posts: 8
Joined: Wed Dec 20, 2017 11:23 am

Problem with webm

Post by bitwyse »

Hello
Super programme, use it all the time.
Never had any problems until the other day: some '.webm' videos dowloaded from YouTube (only some, other '.webm' created locally work fine).
When I try to open a window for a folder with these videos (displayed as miniatures) Windows Explorer takes 96% of the processor time and I have to kill it.
Any ideas? Thanks

Configuration: Windows XP Pro SP3, Pentium 4 3GHz, 2 GB memory
BabelSoft
Site Admin
Posts: 342
Joined: Sat Jun 02, 2012 9:23 pm

Re: Problem with webm

Post by BabelSoft »

I think it's because those video files have been encoded with the very recent HEVC codec. At the time I released the latest version of Media Preview, its specifications haven't been released a long time ago, practically no video files were encoded with this fairly recent codec. So I didn't bother getting Media Preview compatible with it and so, it can't decode any images out of those kinds of video files and just get stuck while trying to render something out of them.
bitwyse
Posts: 8
Joined: Wed Dec 20, 2017 11:23 am

Re: Problem with webm

Post by bitwyse »

OK! - thanks for your reply.
Actually I reconverted those files so it doesn't happen any more! (tired of the hang-ups) and then deleted them.
But I'll download them again tomorrow and check the codec used.
Best regards
zamar19
Posts: 2
Joined: Tue Dec 26, 2017 7:21 pm

Re: Problem with webm

Post by zamar19 »

BabelSoft wrote:I didn't bother getting Media Preview compatible with it
Can you fix it in the next version & current beta?
bitwyse
Posts: 8
Joined: Wed Dec 20, 2017 11:23 am

Re: Problem with webm

Post by bitwyse »

Sorry I didn't reply before - end-of -year fêtes etc.
The videos which caused the hang-ups were:
.webm
Video format (according to "mediaInfo": VP9 (VP_VP9 in hex in the file)
Produced by: Lavf56.30.100

It doesn't matter much for me: if necessary I convert them anyway to .mp4, .ogg (.ogv) and .webm (again) to put on Internet to use with HTML5.
So it's a minor problem - of couse it would be ideal...

Best regards
BabelSoft
Site Admin
Posts: 342
Joined: Sat Jun 02, 2012 9:23 pm

Re: Problem with webm

Post by BabelSoft »

zamar19: I don't have that much time anymore to work on Media Preview. Before going to a stall, I was working on making the config tool more intuitive to newbies. As I was in middle of this work, my source code repository is currently in a non-compilable state and thus I can't do a quick update to add proper support to new codecs. I must clean this mess before and so I must find some time to do this...

bitwyse: VP9 and HEVC codecs were both pretty new at the time. So I can confirm that's what's happening.
bitwyse
Posts: 8
Joined: Wed Dec 20, 2017 11:23 am

Re: Problem with webm

Post by bitwyse »

Thanks, Cyril
I understand the problem: also have a lot of programmes/sites to update and not enough time.
If you ever get around to it maybe you'll let us know? Thanks
All the best
bitwyse
Posts: 8
Joined: Wed Dec 20, 2017 11:23 am

Re: Problem with webm (VP9)

Post by bitwyse »

Hi !
Things have changed! - especially YouTube!
Almost ALL the new music videos I download now are .webm (or .mp4) with VP9...

Any possibility of fixing this problem?

(I'm going to have to stop using Medai Preiew, with great regrets, because 90% of my video icons are now blank.)

Best regards
BabelSoft
Site Admin
Posts: 342
Joined: Sat Jun 02, 2012 9:23 pm

Re: Problem with webm

Post by BabelSoft »

Webm is VP9 but mp4 is still about h264 on YouTube.

The last beta version was like 6 years ago. I bet that the underlying video decoding library (ffmpeg) has changed a lot since. Sorry, I won't even try to see if I can still make this work :p

I developed Media Preview thinking I could make a living by developping stuff I liked to do, not stuff I've been ordered to do. After 3 years, not only I didn't make a living out of it but the only lousy alternative copied everything he could from Media Preview. So, it became quite good actually. But he made it for completely free and he's backed by a huge community using the related codec pack. He was either a student learning for fun, or he was working on this because he could make a living from ads revenue thanks to the huge community behind this codec pack, or any other reasons.
In short, I lost the incentive to go on with Media Preview. Maybe I was too optimistic anyway by thinking I could live off my personal creation. Then I got back to where I could make a living: by doing stuff I'm being ordered to do :) . As I still have this knack for personal creations, I directly went open source by creating Negatron, something in another domain entirely.

Really, VP9 is only used in streaming. Video files I actually download are still in h264. H265 is still not a thing. I still use Media Preview as-is and it's enough for me. Thanks for your support all those years but I think you should be one of the last person besides me still using it ;) . If you think you need something else, be my guest :) . Media Preview is an old application that made his time.
bitwyse
Posts: 8
Joined: Wed Dec 20, 2017 11:23 am

Re: Problem with webm

Post by bitwyse »

Well thanks for many years use. It WAS really good.
I got round the VP problem by excluding WEBM (not too many) - but now almost all YouTube videos downloaded use VP9 (plus files named .mp4...).

I had the same disappointments as you trying to sell software - everybody thinks it's great - FREE!
Cheers.
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