BabelSoft / 博语软件

Here's the thread dedicated to the latest beta made available. Use betas at your own risk as they still have bugs, but you can download them to try the new functionalities.
Current beta cycle is for the incoming v1.3.2, which adds support for common audio and image file formats.

1.3.2 b1

New stuff:
-Better support of wmv / asf files
-Fix cover art for wmv
-Add cover art for mkv
-Fix memory leak while processing cover arts
-common image file formats:
--Support real transparency for .bmp (MS: black background), .tga (MS: grey background) on Vista+
--Add support for .jpg (faster), .bmp (really faster), .tga (bit slower)
--Other image formats not extensively tested yet (.gif, .pcx, .png)
-common audio file formats:
--Add support for .flac, .ape, .mp3 (do the same as MS thumbnailer), .m4a (do the same as MS thumbnailer)
--Other audio formats not extensively tested yet (.wv, .wma)

Known bugs:
-Common audio and image file formats doesn't work on Windows 8 yet
-Support for common audio and image file formats on WinXP/Vista/7 is enabled by manually adding them as User Defined Extensions (bottom part of the File Formats tab). Better User Interface to follow soon
-If a file format is registered in Windows with the wrong PerceivedType, Media Preview may not generate any thumb for it
-[regression] some VC-1 encoded video doesn't get any thumb anymore, because of a missing fix
-{regression] MKVs embedding font files don't get any thumb when cover art enabled

Download:
http://www.babelsoft.net/bin/MediaPrevi ... 404-b1.msi
http://www.babelsoft.net/bin/MediaPrevi ... 404-b1.msi

Here's beta2. If you want to test it and beta1 is still installed on your system, please uninstall beta1 before trying beta2. As they both have the exact same version, Windows doesn't uninstall beta1 but install both versions alongside with unknown side-effects...

1.3.2 b2

Fixed bugs:
-Common audio file formats doesn't work on Windows 8 yet
-Support for common audio and image file formats on WinXP/Vista/7 is enabled by manually adding them as User Defined Extensions (bottom part of the File Formats tab). Better User Interface to follow soon
-If a file format is registered in Windows with the wrong PerceivedType, Media Preview may not generate any thumb for it
-[regression] MKVs embedding font files don't get any thumb when cover art enabled

New stuff:
-Robust system to enable support of new format categories (applied to audio and image formats).
-Support of every audio formats with cover art embedding capabilities.
-Support of the most common image formats.
-Added some video formats (bink, wtv, dvr-ms and a few others).
-Jpeg auto-rotate / orientation partially supported (see bug section).
-The config tool now enables to easily select audio and image formats through their dedicated tabs.
-The config tool also supports "live testing" of audio and image formats.

Previous Known bugs / not fixed yet:
-Common image file formats doesn't work on Windows 8 yet
-[regression] some VC-1 encoded video doesn't get any thumb anymore, because of a missing fix

Known bugs:
-Wavepack audio files and Jpeg image files aren't supported on WinXP yet.
-Advanced options of the config tool are only applied to video file formats.
-Jpeg auto-rotate / orientation partially supported. Sometimes, Windows doesn't use custom thumbnailer but revert to the crappy vanilla thumbnailer...
-Tiff partially supported.
- Some dvr-ms don't get any thumbnail.

Download:
http://www.babelsoft.net/bin/MediaPrevi ... 404-b2.msi
http://www.babelsoft.net/bin/MediaPrevi ... 404-b2.msi

Here's beta3. It's mainly a fixed and accelerated version of beta2, which was quite buggy yet.
Please uninstall any beta version before trying the latest beta to avoid unexpected behaviour.

1.3.2 b3

Fixed bugs since beta2:
-Common image file formats doesn't work on Windows 8 yet
-[regression] some VC-1 encoded video doesn't get any thumb anymore, because of a missing fix
-Wavepack audio files and Jpeg image files aren't supported on WinXP yet.
-Advanced options of the config tool are only applied to video file formats.
-Some dvr-ms don't get any thumbnail.

Fixed bugs, not mentioned with beta2 listing:
-Gif not supported (Didn't see this until I realized the thumbs for gif were taken from the system cache and not generated by MP...)
-Uninstalling doesn't unregister MP from audio and image formats

New stuff:
-Win XP: fixed every issues related to this platform. I mainly use Win7 so I wasn't aware that beta1 & 2 were really bad on WinXP...
-Win 8: big performance boost while generating thumbs in every case. MP was really slower on Win 8 than on WinXP/Vista/7 and I found out why...
-All: an added performance gain while generating thumbs when Entropy is disabled.
-All: Advanced options are now more intuitive to use and can be applied to every file type (video, audio and image)

Previous Known bug / not fixed yet:
-Tiff partially supported.

Previous known bug / cannot be fixed:
-Jpeg auto-rotate / orientation partially supported:
-WinXP doesn't allow to replace the vanilla thumbnailer for any image file formats...
-WinVista hasn't any issue
-Win7/8 both allow to replace the vanilla thumbnailer for every image file formats. The thing is that for some kinds of jpg file, it reverts back to the vanilla thumbnailer, mainly for raw jpg directly coming from digital camera. It's less annoying on Win8 as in *most* cases it can handle Exif orientation well. But yeah, in some cases, it doesn't take orientation into account...

Download:
http://www.babelsoft.net/bin/MediaPrevi ... 404-b3.msi
http://www.babelsoft.net/bin/MediaPrevi ... 404-b3.msi

Here's beta4! Probably the last beta before the final version.
Sadly, I won't be able to release the final version before end of August as I'll go for vacation at the end of this week for 2-3 weeks.

1.3.2 b4

New stuff since beta3:
-Fixed a use case where thumbnail adornment options didn't work at all.
-Fixed a complex use case where Media Preview couldn't replace another third-party thumbnailer, e.g. Real Media...
-Updated translations (only missing Arabic for now) thanks to all those volunteers, cheers!
-Eventually found a solution to get a unified installer through a 3-tier architecture:
1. installer is a 7z compressed archive, so if installer has been corrupted (e.g. partial download), it'll tell you right away.
2. installer contains a bootstrap that let you choose the installer language and then automatically select the 32- or 64-bit version for you.
3. installer still contains both of the original .msi archives, so you can still do scripted batch installs by getting the .msi back after manual unzipping.

Previous Known bug / not fixed yet (same as with beta3):
-Tiff partially supported.

Previous known bug / cannot be fixed (same as with beta3):
-Jpeg auto-rotate / orientation partially supported:
-WinXP doesn't allow to replace the vanilla thumbnailer for any image file formats...
-WinVista hasn't any issue
-Win7/8 both allow to replace the vanilla thumbnailer for every image file formats. The thing is that for some kinds of jpg file, it reverts back to the vanilla thumbnailer, mainly for raw jpg directly coming from digital camera. It's less annoying on Win8 as in *most* cases it can handle Exif orientation well. But yeah, in some cases, it doesn't take orientation into account...

TODO before final version:
-"Fill Up Thumbnail Cache": allow network drives through a new checkbox
-Fix iPhone mov/mp4 orientation

Download:
http://www.babelsoft.net/bin/MediaPrevi ... b4.sfx.exe

Here's beta5! The last beta before the final version.

1.3.2 b5

New stuff since beta4:
- Installer bootstrap: fixed keyboard navigation
- Conf tool: [Test & Cache / Fill Up Cache] allow network drives during scanning
- Conf tool: Limit "Fill Up Cache" to video formats
- Conf tool: Added a "Remove All" button to the User Defined Format feature
- Conf tool: Improved the User Defined Format / Browse function, scanning is now done in a separate thread and can be stopped
- Conf tool: Image support for tiff format disabled
- Core: now support mov/mp4 orientation (mostly used by iPhone recorded videos)

Previous known bug / cannot be fixed (same as with beta3):
-Jpeg auto-rotate / orientation partially supported:
-WinXP doesn't allow to replace the vanilla thumbnailer for any image file formats...
-WinVista hasn't any issue
-Win7/8 both allow to replace the vanilla thumbnailer for every image file formats. The thing is that for some kinds of jpg file, it reverts back to the vanilla thumbnailer, mainly for raw jpg directly coming from digital camera. It's less annoying on Win8 as in *most* cases it can handle Exif orientation well. But yeah, in some cases, it doesn't take orientation into account...

TODO before final version:
-Image / Restore Default Setting button doesn't do anything (forgot to implement it)
-when unselect image and sound support from installer, related module are still installed

Download:
[Link deleted. Thumbnail engine doesn't work anymore in this version because the latest version of FFmpeg changed in a way that isn't compatible with Media Preview thumb engine anymore]
[Update 2: ok, it's actually because I forgot some debugging code that was messing everything up..., I should put up a fixed beta soon]
[Update 3: Fixed sorry for the mess... http://www.babelsoft.net/bin/MediaPrevi ... b6.sfx.exe]

Hi,
are you planning any support for h265 video tracks?
Thank you very much for your software!

Yes, it's already there in my developer version, along with VP9. The final release has been delayed because somebody kindly proposed to translate Media Preview into Italian, else it would have been out last week-end. So it should be ready for this week-end.

Here's some apologies. I announced back in October that the next official version was nearly ready but it's still not there...
So what happened? Well, early November I updated my version of FFmpeg to prepare the release and then a lot of stuff didn't work anymore: FFmpeg completely changed its way to manage memory, resulting in big memory leaks in Media Preview. But this update is mandatory as it contains everything required for H265 support.
So, I spent some times to fix everything, a job that I finished mid-December. After this, Christmas and the new year passed by. Somebody submitted a new translation and told me that grammatical numbers (singular/plural) were badly handled by the config tool. Something I've just finished to fix today. So, Media Preview is ready for official release, or is it? I prefer to do a last round of testing but sadly it means I'll have to postponed this for after my holidays, i.e. for early February.

In the meantime, you can play with beta9, the last version I gave to the translators:

1.3.2 b9

New stuff since beta6:
- Core: updated FFmpeg
-- Added support for HEVC/H265 and VP9 codecs
-- Changed the way to handle memory
- Core: fixed a memory bug and a no thumbnail bug when processing very small image files
- Config tool: when Flash ActiveX is missing (i.e. IE version, mandatory for SWF support), open the install link directly in IE instead of using the default browser
- Config tool: If audio and image plugins haven't been installed, remove related tabs and options
- Config tool: added Italian translation and misc translation updates

New stuff only in my dev version (i.e. stuff for the coming official release):
- Config tool: better support for grammatical numbers
- Installer: fixed a bug where the wrong msi (i.e. install file) could get used, actually installing the wrong version in the system

Download:
http://www.babelsoft.net/bin/MediaPrevi ... b9.sfx.exe

I've tried most betas but always get this error when filling the thumbnail cache for each file:



I'm using Windows 8.1 64-bit. Is this a known issue?

This error means that Media Preview has encountered a file with some unexpected properties and failed to create a thumbnail for it.
Now this can happen because (from the most possible case to the least):
1. I already fixed this in the latest beta but you're still running an older beta. Until beta10, there was a bug in the installer that could make it picking up the wrong install file at times. Can you uninstall any beta versions you got, download beta10 and try again?
http://www.babelsoft.net/bin/MediaPrevi ... 10.sfx.exe
2. You have a file with properties Media Preview still can't handle. If beta10 is still failing, can you look at the last folder it was processing and send me the media files this folder contains? If altogether they're too big, let me know. I'll try to send you a version of Media Preview that will tell you which file triggers the bug.
3. Windows 8.1 has changed the way it handles Shell add-ins like Media Preview comparing to Windows 8.0, particularly in the memory managing area. If 1. and 2. didn't let me find the source of the bug, I'll have to do some scalability testing on Windows 8.1.