DivX ;-) Deux Update

Epitaph writes "The author of the DivX ;-) codec (a high-quality MPEG4 codec used quite heavily by DVD pirates to recompress movies) has recently released more information about his next-generation codec: DivX ;-) Deux, or Project Mayo. MPEG4 is the future standard for internet video, and since DivX ;-) Deux is going to be free, this is a very interesting project to keep an eye on. There's now an 'Ask Gej' section where you can ask the author questions, or suggest new features for the future codec. He's also looking for coders, so help the guy out!"

Comments

Death to Pronounciation

[OlympicSponsor]

People who put punctuation in their product names ("DivX ;-)", ":CueCat:", "!nnovation") should be shot.
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And so what if it is?

[Pope Slackman]

A CODEC is just a tool.
So what if it can be used to illegally distribute video?
I can just as easily use it to compress and distribute content *I* created.

If I smack a trick with my crowbar because he beat up
one of my ho's, did the crowbar manufacturer assualt the trick? No. I did.
Likewise, if Bobby W4r3z D00d rips his parent's DVDs,
and uses DivX to encode them, did the DivX people violate copyright? No. Bobby did.

--K
I better get an extra karma point for the pimp analogy.
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Re:Is divx *PIRATED* M$ software?

[jon_c]

It's definitely hacked. The rationale for DivX is that ever since AVIs have been disabled to use MS-MPEG4, DivX unlocks that hack (among other things), and renames it to a different FOURCC code, so the divx dll won't conflict with your Media Player codecs. That way, Microsoft can stealthy update your codecs all they want, but divx codecs will not be overwritten.

for those wondering what the FOURCC thing is It's "A Four-Character Code used to identify Resource Interchange File Format (RIFF) chunks. A FOURCC is a 32-bit quantity represented as a sequence of one to four ASCII alphanumeric characters, padded on the right with blank characters. RIFF (Resource Interchange File Format) is a specification used to define standard formats for multimedia files and to prevent compatibility problems that often occur when file-format definitions change over time. Because each piece of data in the file is identified by a standard header, an application that does not recognize a given data element can skip over the unknown information."

From MSDN. Bassicly multimedia formats are typically "layered" files, the RIFF format has each sublayer identified with a FOURCC, all this mean is that each sub part of the the file has a label that uses four charaters.. in the case of WAV it's actually WAV(space) or for your C guys,

char *four_cc = {'W', 'A', 'V', ' '};

Actually these days MS wants you to use a GUID for identifing the approiote codec (spelling.. bla!!). anyway, just a technical rant. In the past i've had to deal with AVI's. AVI's are just like video versions of WAV's. as in that they are codec independant media formats. WAV's are PCM RIFF files, they start with WAVE, but can tell the client what codec to use, thats why you've seen MP3 files with .wav extensions. and MPEG-4 videos in .AVI's, or really any codec.

I'm not sure but I think the only reason MS uses extensions like .asf and .asx is A: marketing, newer extensions=new (better) tech. B: work into a more propietery arena, plenty of programs can play .AVI, but how many can play .asf? only one Microsoft (brand) Media Player. actually anyone could write a .asf player. the freakin program is just a big (fat) ActiveX object. it even has a low level COM API if you want to get more into it.

The funny thing is that the old sk00l .AVI API is a LOT easyer to work with then the new sk00l .ASF (WMP4) API, .AVI actually has functions like GetFrame(), while the .ASF is more like PleaseAskForFrame(a, y, x, s,w ,er,) CanIPLEASEGetFrame(fuck, me, up, the goat, ass), FuckOffAndDie(arg), anyway, that's how I remember it, i think the actualy functions names are a little different.

btw: I'm a contracter at Microsoft Research, here we have something called a "Vitrual Kichen" it's a big 4 way live video confernce projected on the wall next to all the free pop. I spoke to the fellow who developed it, I was asking him about using ACM (Audio Compression Manager SDK) for MPEG compression, he told me that ya, it's a bitch, and that to "really" use it you need some magic (licence) key. he mailed me later with some code for a class that makes it easyer to work with, and the key... maybe I shouldn't have told yall that... oh well.

I better stop before i get modded down to OT..

late,
-Jon

Another hack?

[Frac]

As far as I know, DivX is just a simple hack of Microsoft's MS-MPEG4 codec (V3, I think). What Gej and Maxmorice has done was nothing much than hacking the encoding and decoding dlls of MS-MPEG4 to encode movies with a DIV3 and DIV4 FOURCC code.

The reason why DivX got so popular is that it was the right thing at the right time. There was no technical wizardry involved, relative to projects such as LAME or Ogg Vorbis. I doubt Maxmorice or Gej can even explain the whole MPEG4 spec.

It's almost akin to someone telling you that they hacked a Palm V to have 8mb instead of 2mb, and now they have decided to make their own PDA. Hmm?

My question is - given that "An early version of DivX ;-) Deux is complete," did they hack another MS-MPEG4 codec, or are they coding something from scratch? It's been only a short time period since they announced the project, so I hope it's not just another hack (which brings to another question - how can they expect investors to put money in a company that illegally binary hacks some other companies' software?)

The killer "app" for Mayo-at least for me

[64.28.67.48]

What I would want (and pay good money for) is a DVD player that plays this format using regular CD-R's. Kind of like the MP3 CD players, but for video. Like those little discman-sized DVD players (or the VCD players in Asia). Unfortunately, I can imagine the MPAA, DVD-CCA and who knows who else making a fuss over something like that. A guy can dream, though...

I do amateur video (no, not *THAT* kind) for fun, and I know that low-rent videographers like me have been drooling over the thought of being able to make DVD's. You get durability (right now I use a tape drive for archiving video; with DVD I could master right from my archive format), pure digital format, high quality, and portability (you can play on standard home video equipment). The only problem is the high cost of DVD-R drives, media, and DVD authoring software that puts it out of reach. If you can use a standard CD-R recording a standard ISO disc (no new hardware, software, or media), all you would need is a standalone player.

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