Can't play some Mp4's

[Yvan]

i have plenty of mp4 files working on my p3, but every now and then i download one that won't play it just says "not supported format (Video Profile main)"

[CrowdAds]

[Olley]

MP4 is a container. What's inside can vary quite a bit. Look at the properties of the ones that don't play and that may explain why they don't.

[Yvan]

oh okay thanks

[electron]

I see this error all the time when I use Handbreak's normal preset instead of the iPod Touch preset... but I don't know what it really means..

[meetooman]

Originally Posted by electron

I see this error all the time when I use Handbreak's normal preset instead of the iPod Touch preset... but I don't know what it really means..

H264 specification defines some quality profiles and levels, each one sets some encoding parameters and features (B-frames, CABAC, trellis, etc). There is a great page from Robert Swain explaining it.

With encoding software like ffmpeg you can then use preset parameters corresponding to your player supported levels. Here is the ffmpeg presets list on my present installation:

baseline
default
fastfirstpass
hq
ipod320
ipod640
lossless_fast
lossless_max
lossless_medium
lossless_slower
lossless_slow
lossless_ultrafast
main
max
normal
slowfirstpass

For example, my Sony device can only play H264 baseline video files. So I use the ffmpeg command with 2 switchs: ffmpeg *** -vcodec libx264 -vpre default -vpre baseline ***.