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HandBrake Abandons DivX As an Output Format
An anonymous reader writes "DivX was the first digital video format to really win mainstream acceptance, doing for movies what MP3 did for music (both good and bad). Eventually even Sony, the king of proprietary formats, caved into pressure and added DivX support to its DVD players and the PlayStation 3. Now HandBrake's developers have made an interesting choice for version 0.9.4 — they ditched support for AVI files using DivX and XviD. Your only option now is to convert DVDs and other media to MKV or MP4 files, with the option to save as Apple-friendly M4V files. So why is HandBrake ditching AVI and XviD support when it's a format that's won such widespread acceptance? In the words of the developers, 'AVI is a rough beast. It is obsolete.'"
First of all, this is not news. At least most of this happened ages ago. Second, fuck handbrake, its interface is shit. Try OGMrip, it does all the same stuff but it doesn't blow. It doesn't seem to do multiple subtitle tracks and such, but neither does handbrake. Dropping the only container format they actually supported fully seems like a seriously retarded move. But again, ogmrip actually handles all those container and video formats. I needed AVI with xvid and mp3 for my HP photo frame, so I had to find some alternative. As a special added Bonus, you can use ogmrip on screens with low resolution. Handbrake needs quite a bit of screen real estate due to interface design incompetence.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Seriously, if what they want to support is MKV and XviD, well that screams "For movie pirate use only!"
MKV is a format that the ripping community seems to be in love with and nobody else seems to care about. It is probalby the only container format out there that all the pro software I've used won't read. You take something like Vegas or Premiere or Final Cut and they open AVI, MPEG, QT, WMV, and such computer formats as well as all sorts of more specialized formats like native XDCAM or RED formats. However they don't open MKV files. That tells me there's all of zero demand for using MKV for content producers.
As for XviD, it's nifty shit, but not legal to use without a license. MPEG-4 is patented and licensed. The XviD project itself is safe because it is source only, and they allow that for academic/research type purposes. However if you want to actually compile it and use it to produce media, that legally requires a license. That is an advantage Divx has is that it is fully licensed (as are the MPEG-4 and H.264 encoders the pro software includes).
So if all they are supporting is XviD/MKV to me that says they are interested in supporting the movie pirate types, and not legit users. After all, as others pointed out, while AVI might not be the best it is the container that everything seems to support. Likewise, Divx is what you find the most support for on devices (my DVD player will play AVI/Divx files). So home users wanting to convert their media for playback would likely be interested in that.
The most ubiquitous and popular portable video format is still AVI/DivX, sorry. H.264 is the AAC to DivX's MP3, it may be technically better and many of the mega-hyped products may support it, but by and large the rest of the world doesn't give a damn about it or even know its existence.
No problem is insoluble in all conceivable circumstances.