Video Formats for non-Windows Users?

ccdotnet asks: "I look after a small web site for a rising sports star. We have a small number of short videos in .WMV (9) format available for download. These .WMV files are typically 3-5 MB in size (we do a "low res" and a "hi res" version). Each video is typically 1-2 minutes and 320x240. The site gets maybe 100 visitors per day. Our outbound hosting bandwidth is _very_ limited, so although we are keen to cater for non-Windows users (around 7% of our visitors), I've struggled to find a suitable video format which doesn't blow the size of the file right out. Ideally I would like to keep these files at a similar size but at the same time want to maintain a reasonable video quality. Are users of other platforms just out of luck? What non-Windows/Mac video formats can people recommend so that I can deliver this content to people who can't play .WMV for one reason or another?" A few years ago, playing .WMV files might have been problematic for users who didn't use either a Macintosh or a Windows-based operating system. Now, with MPlayer and its derivatives making strides, it's not as much of an issue. Of course, there are still .WMV files that don't play well in Mplayer, but what suggestions would you have for creating Mplayer-safe .WMVs as well as other, more cross-platform friendly formats?

Comments

XVID

[pestie]

I'm thinking XVid - open source, tight compression.

Stay away from Quicktime

[DaveCBio]

I know a lot of media companies seem to like Quicktime, but I think that's because they are probably Mac based. On Windows QT is unstable no matter what audio/video CODEC is used. I'd go with one of the MPEG standards because everyone can play those.

Re:Quicktime is cross-platform

[jafac]

Unfortunately, when you standardize on QuickTime Player, your POOR USERS are subjected to the incredibly annoying NAGWARE if they don't fork over the $30 for QTPro - and another $30 for QTPro when Apple decides to update QuickTime Player, which usually amounts to no new features you'll ever be aware of, and sudden inability to play files you used to be able to play.

Don't get me wrong. I would LOVE to be a fan of QuickTime, if Apple would just FIX the above issues. Which have nothing to do with the technology, and everything to do with brainless marketroids.