Portable SMC -- How & Why

[mikiem]

I've been doing video for a while, & yesterday got a chance to play around with a Fuze 8GB, to see what it would handle; some people enjoy crossword puzzles -- I enjoy this. I was only partially successful... I’d read posts that said use one video converter or another, and I’d read where dozens of owners found that only the Sansa Media Converter worked. While it’s indeed possible that somewhere out there a software alternative exists, I throw my lot in with the group that says use the SMC. The Problem: SMC is a Really, ***REALLY*** nasty bit of work! If it’s not too late, my personal advice is DO NOT install it as is – instead turn it into a Portable App – but first, why I think you should bother...

For what is essentially a very simple task, converting video, the SMC_4_256.exe install file I downloaded from the Sansa site, makes far too many changes to Windows. There are dozens of video converters out there, and by & large comparing their Windows footprint to SMC is like comparing a grain of rice & a softball! At the very least, use a free program called Universal Extractor to unpack SMC_4_256.exe into the set-up files in their own folder. Then remove the sub-folder called: “3rdPartyApp”. If/when you then run Setup.exe, you’ll get a warning message [just click OK], but you’ll avoid having an older version of DirectX installed, an older version of Microsoft’s visual C runtime, an older version of Windows Media and so on.

The SMC install doesn’t play nice, & will not in my experience skip these installations if they are already installed. Skipping them in the worst case (if you then have problems) means simply downloading and installing the latest versions from Microsoft, or if you don’t want to bother, running the separate setup files in that “3rdPartyApp” folder. Not skipping these installations might cause problems with other software you have installed, and getting things working can then take much longer. As it is, removing that sub-folder and running SMC setup will still make roughly 3500 changes to your Windows Registry in XP! [as recorded by the free program InstallWatch Pro]. Talk about taking things over & bloat. But SMC doesn’t stop there...

SMC includes code licensed from Intervideo, the WinDVD folks now owned by Corel. It includes quite a bit of code actually, including a bunch for things like disc burning & DVD navigation etc. that in SMC (for the Fuze at least) are irrelevant. WinDVD & the [in my opinion] much more compatible & popular PowerDVD often conflict with each other. SMC uses DivX encoding, and included files can take over from DivX software you already have installed. I have no idea why it installs a driver called InterVideo ASPI Shell [1999-2003], or it’s potential effects on installed CD/DVD burning software.

Harder to pin down when it comes to unintended consequences, most times when you edit &/or play audio/video in Windows, Windows chooses between the installed Direct Show filters to simplified, read & play those media files. When Windows has more than one choice, & it picks the wrong one, you usually have some sort of problem [that’s 1 reason VLC is so popular, using it’s own rather than Windows installed DS filters]. And you guessed it, SMC installs a whole bunch of these Direct Show filters, greatly escalating your chances of having problems.

As an alternative I’m recommending folks try the following to convert SMC into a Portable App that can run from your hard drive or an USB stick or whatever, not making all these permanent changes to Windows that can cause all these sorts of problems. On the plus side it’s very simple & it’s free & it doesn’t take long. On the down side I had the Fuze for a matter of hours, so I can’t say the portable version will do everything with every conceivable media type -- I can’t say that of the original. I’m not posting the portable version because 1) the kind folks at PortableApps.com prefer only open source apps be posted, 2) I didn’t have time to really test true portability – if the portable SMC done on one system worked just as well on another.

* * *

TO convert SMC_4_256.exe to a Portable App I downloaded that file from the Sansa site. The program I used for the conversion is Portable App Creator from here: http://portableapps.com/node/9909#comment-71004. Portable App creator is a bit different to install, so please read the docs etc with it – long story short, the installation program sort of puts the actual program you’ll use together, which is explained when you read the docs & post.

Creating the portable app version of SMC, or any program works best on a PC where it’s never been installed. I feel it’s important to back up the Windows Registry first using ERUNT – Google and you’ll see lots & lots of sites providing ERUNT downloads. It’s also useful to create a Windows Restore Point (I do that second). Of course if you want to do a full image backup, that’s even better. Then run Portable App Creator, following the program’s really easy directions, installing SMC_4_256 (minus the 3rd party folder) to an USB stick – this creates the stand-alone version, including all the registry settings & even the driver.

The next step, because the Portable App Creator isn’t perfect, is putting the system back the way it was – the reason for the extra trouble creating the portable app version is you don’t want 3500 registry changes etc. Unless you did a full backup, which you’d now restore, uninstall SMC through Control Panel [Add/Remove programs or Vista/Win7 equivalent] with the USB stick removed, because Windows Restore isn’t perfect either. Then restore the Restore Point, then restore the ERUNT backup.

To use the Portable SMC, or any portable app created this way on your hard drive, copy the portable program’s folder to your hard drive, navigate to the “Data” sub-folder, open & edit the path in the .ini file. For SMC opening this ini file looked like this:
----------------------
[application]
Drive = PA
Folder = PortableApps\SansaPortable\App\SanDisk
File = Sansa Media Converter.exe
----------------------
You just need to change the path [Folder = ...] to reflect wherever you’ve put it.

[CrowdAds]

[OmegaChrono]

Sounds interesting, a lot of work though. Any chance you could put it into a .rar file and upload it? You don't really have to go through the trouble, but it would make it easier for us to use SMC without installing it.