Just a little laugh...

[Praxis]

I convinced the leader of a Bill Gates Fan Club who was a jerk repeatedly to debate me (blackmail; if he deleted my posts, he'd end up looking like he was afraid to debate, hehe ) with Mac OS X vs Windows, OS vs OS alone, ignoring all else.

The poor fool is a complete idiot, like a lot of the obsessive trekkies in the ST vs SW section of the site...

I'm sure even those of you who don't like Macs will admit the OS is very good, better than Windows. Its core OS is very, VERY similar to Linux, with a more user friendly GUI...essentially, its BSD for PowerPC processors with a fancy GUI and support of a major company.

Anyway this poor snot thinks Windows is superior to Linux, Mac OS X, UNIX, and EVERYTHING...
So now on to the funny stuff.

1) He actually replied a refutation to his own post, thinking it was one of mine, once.

2) Reviewing his posts, you find that he does his best to turn it into a Microsoft system vs Apple system despite having agreed to an OS vs OS debate

3) Reviewing his posts, you find that he ignores almost all the major points and nitpicks on little details, like nonsensical blabber about "Power User Accounts" in XP being limited accounts, so Windows is more secure...huh?

4) If you put together parts from his other posts, he actually SAYS that Apple has faster hardware for video editting and similar task, that Apple's RISC processors are more efficient, etc, things I didn't even bring up, and then continues with, "But Windows is better, because it has to run on inferior hardware!" That's like saying, "The Federation is better, because they have to use weaker ships and still fight!"

5) He outright lies and says that Windows Movie Maker can save in .avi and mpeg...which it most certainly can't, at least on my PC, then calls me a liar.

6) He dismisses Mike Wong's entire site as "Linux Propoganda"...

7) He dismisses Ars Technica's articles...


Hope you get as good a laugh at this dolt as I've had
He most certainly does not know how to debate...reminds me of the Trekkie sided ST vs SWers...

[DaveJB]

5) He outright lies and says that Windows Movie Maker can save in .avi and mpeg...which it most certainly can't, at least on my PC, then calls me a liar.

WMM v2 can save files as .AVI's, but not MPEGs.

[Praxis]

Checking...
Windows Movie Maker Version 2.0.3312.0
I've got 2...the one that came with XP Home, service pack 1.
No AVI, unless I save to a DV camera.

Either way, he accuses me of lying when I said mine doesn't save AVI, which, well, it doesn't, LOL.
Perhaps its something in Service Pack 2?
He's attempting to prove that WMM is the #1 best free movie editor ever...what a hoot. iMovie whoops the pants off of it, and saves in AVI, MPEG, Quicktime, and other formats...plus I bet theres dozens of open source ones.

It's interesting to know, I guess I'll have to get Service Pack 2 on this computer

OH BTW, in regards to your sig...I perfer "Ode to the Small Lump of Green Putty I Found Under My Armpit one Midsummer Morning," second worst poem in the galaxy, to "Oh Freddled Gruntbuggly,"...

[DaveJB]

If you choose the "save it to my computer" option, then select DV-AVI as your output, it'll save it as an .AVI. Of course, it's pretty useless as my 700MB .AVI of "A Shot in the Dark" would take up about 23GB with that option!

[Praxis]

Ah I see, its hidden down there REALLY, REALLY deep, and its not true AVI- just raw DV. It has 0 compression, and is therefore useless- my 15 kb video file becomes 11.5 megabytes for under 5 seconds of low quality video.

Also, he claimed it took two clicks to do...It took me 10 clicks...

That's raw DV, completely useless to anyone but a digital artist with a massive hard drive who wants to send it to another program Utterly useless to send to a friend.

I'll point this out when he continues insisting it's better, ty.

[Praxis]

Oooh, I really burned him with that last post...
Let's just say he called Mr. Wong's site a 100% propaganda site, half quoted me three times in a row and immediately below one of the half quotes accused me of 'twisting his words' (despite the fact that I quoted the entire paragraph of his in EVERY reply, and he only quotes a couple words in his reply)...
And of course, he ignored my request for him to explain WHY he calls OS X 'not flexible or compatible'...for the fourth time. LOL

[phongn]

Ah I see, its hidden down there REALLY, REALLY deep, and its not true AVI- just raw DV. It has 0 compression, and is therefore useless- my 15 kb video file becomes 11.5 megabytes for under 5 seconds of low quality video.

Nitpicking here: it is probably a true AVI. Remember that the AVI format is merely a container format, you can shove whatever you want in it. Same goes for QuickTime or most other formats.

Also, DV is compressed using an algorithm similar to MJPEG.

[Praxis]

I tested this.
I took a 16 kb avi file I generated in 3ds max, imported it to Windows Movie Maker, and exported it to DV-AVI.
It ballooned to 11.5 MEGABYTES...

[phongn]

I tested this.
I took a 16 kb avi file I generated in 3ds max, imported it to Windows Movie Maker, and exported it to DV-AVI.
It ballooned to 11.5 MEGABYTES...

So? That doesn't refute either of my points that (1) you may have AVI-enscapulated DV files and (2) that DV is a compressed video format.

[Praxis]

But it's *not* compressed. I imported an AVI file, exported it to DV-AVI, and it is almost a thousand times larger in file size. Definitely not AVI compression.

[DaveJB]

It's compressed, just not by a great deal. A raw, uncompressed stream of video data is something like 20MB/s (I'll check around, see if I can get a more prescise figure).

EDIT: Supposedly, an uncompressed video stream at 640x480 at 30FPS takes up 18.4MB/s of data, which will only increase when you take the audio stream into account. Your clip would be pushing 100MB if it were totally uncompressed.

[Praxis]

My clip is only about 2 seconds long (I rendered it in 3ds Max 4.2 with a custom Coralskipper model I attempted to make, with the coralskipper blasting an X-wing).

According to WMM, DV-AVI = 30mbps.
Is your figure talking about Megabytes per second, or MegaBits?
WMM is saving it at 30 megabits per second compression...if thats compressed, its a rather pathetic compression.

[DaveJB]

Megabytes, though WMM is probably taking the audio stream into account as well.

[Praxis]

Still, if under 2 seconds of low quality video = 11 MB, its not very good compression. Perhaps you're right and its a bit lower than raw DV, but its certainly several hundred times more than standard AVI.

[phongn]

Still, if under 2 seconds of low quality video = 11 MB, its not very good compression. Perhaps you're right and its a bit lower than raw DV, but its certainly several hundred times more than standard AVI.

Praxis, there is no such thing as "standard AVI" compression. You can't compare it to MPEG4 or MPEG2 like that; AVI is merely a container in which you can throw stuff in.

When you upconverted from your puny 16KB file to DV, of course it looked poor. Try saving it natively as DV and see what it looks like, or saving as raw/losslessly compressed (HuffYUV) and then converting to DV.

Other points: In the video world, "DV" is actually a specific term, not a generic abbreviation for "digital video." It refers to a video format with a 25-megabit video stream. It also supports four-channel 12-bit 32kHz audio or two-channel 16-bit 48kHz audio. For consumer work its quite good; in the broadcast work its considered overcompressed (especially as its color sampling is relatively poor at 4:1:1 or 4:2:0).

Despite that it DV (and immediate derivatives DVCAM and DVCPRO) is very commonly used in the broadcast world because it has pretty good quality at a relatively low cost.

[Praxis]

Well, my point is that WMM is saving AVI files nearly a thousand times bigger than 3d Studio Max...Which is, well, useless, why would I want my files to be a thousand times larger?
The only *usable* format if you don't want ballooning video is WMV.

Zarax's claim is that WMM is the best free video editor in existence and can save in lots of formats. In reality, it can save in WMV (used by only Microsoft products) and a version of AVI that takes up nearly a thousand times more space than others.

Wow, impressive
See what I mean?

[Slartibartfast]

Technically it's AVI, but IMHO (which is another way of saying that I'm right and anyone who says otherwise is an idiot ), if you can't choose which codec to use for compression (from Windows' multimedia panel) then it doesn't "truely" save an AVI.

[phongn]

Well, my point is that WMM is saving AVI files nearly a thousand times bigger than 3d Studio Max...Which is, well, useless, why would I want my files to be a thousand times larger?
The only *usable* format if you don't want ballooning video is WMV.

IMHO, DV is perfectly usable

Zarax's claim is that WMM is the best free video editor in existence and can save in lots of formats. In reality, it can save in WMV (used by only Microsoft products) and a version of AVI that takes up nearly a thousand times more space than others.

That's because WMM is designed to work with DV cameras over FireWire. It's a stripped-down editor for people who just want to plug in their camera, edit and then dump to DVD or tape. You might note that Apple's competitor to WMM, iMovie, has similar restrictions.

As a free NLE, it's pretty good, IMHO.

[Praxis]

IMHO, DV is perfectly usable

Only for big time movie editors that have huge hard drives and need the raw DV originals (say, movie editors for TV shows and movies)...absolutely useless for sending a movie to a friend, since it's almost the same quality but over a thousand times larger in file size.

That's because WMM is designed to work with DV cameras over FireWire. It's a stripped-down editor for people who just want to plug in their camera, edit and then dump to DVD or tape. You might note that Apple's competitor to WMM, iMovie, has similar restrictions.

As a free NLE, it's pretty good, IMHO.

Not at all for iMovie...I don't even *have* a DV camera. iMovie can save in several formats including MPEG-2 and 4, Quicktime, and AVI, plus VCD and burn straight to DVD...

I'd consider WMM good if it supported more formats, but I find it ridiculous that you can only save in WMV (which nothing but Windows Media Player can read) or a super-bloated version of AVI. It's extremely limiting.

[phongn]

Only for big time movie editors that have huge hard drives and need the raw DV originals (say, movie editors for TV shows and movies)...absolutely useless for sending a movie to a friend, since it's almost the same quality but over a thousand times larger in file size.

DV is superior in quality, you're feeding it low-quality stuff and thus getting low-quality stuff out. Get an original DV source and downconvert to MPEG4 (or MPEG2, even) and you'll notice the difference.

And duh, of course it is useless for sending a movie to a friend over the Internet! That's not what its designed for -- its designed for good-quality digital video data from a video camera. That's also why iTunes and WMM use it natively.

Not at all for iMovie...I don't even *have* a DV camera. iMovie can save in several formats including MPEG-2 and 4, Quicktime, and AVI, plus VCD and burn straight to DVD...

Ah, they must have added quite a few new things since I've last used iMovie since when I originally used it you could only export to QuickTime-enscapulated DV. I also thought much of that was using iDVD's API as well.

I'd consider WMM good if it supported more formats, but I find it ridiculous that you can only save in WMV (which nothing but Windows Media Player can read) or a super-bloated version of AVI. It's extremely limiting.

There are a few other programs that can read WMV; it is up to the programmer to decide if he wants to hook into Microsoft's WMV API. WMV is also becoming an open format because it is one of the official codecs for HD-DVD.

[Praxis]

Well, I know that DV is highest quality, absolutely 0 compression. What I'm saying is that WMM's version of AVI is utterly useless as far as normal AVI. I put in a low quality file and it blows up to 11 megabytes...utterly insane. Whereas if i save in WMV it stays about the same size.

Anyway, I'm getting a bit of a laugh now...
The coward (zarax) couldn't take it and IP banned me. There wasn't a single bit of offensive language in my posts there, either, and he agreed to a debate.


And he accused me of propoganda...

[phongn]

Well, I know that DV is highest quality, absolutely 0 compression.

DV is heavily compressed and is far from highest quality.

What I'm saying is that WMM's version of AVI is utterly useless as far as normal AVI. I put in a low quality file and it blows up to 11 megabytes...utterly insane. Whereas if i save in WMV it stays about the same size.

Define "normal AVI." Yes, I understand that WMM limits to you to WMV for doing anything other than archiving, but it isn't "useless."

[Praxis]

I said the AVI saved by WMM is useless, WMV is the only really usable format you can save in.

I thought raw DV was uncompressed?

Anyway, when talking about normal AVI I mean how big the files normally are as saved in professional programs, such as Final Cut, Adobe Premiere, 3d Studio Max 4.2, etc.

A 2 second video saved in 3ds Max 4.2 is 14kb, as I said, that same video is 11.5 MB in WMM, far more than AVI generated by other programs. On the other hand, that same 14kb AVI file stays about the same size if saved in WMV.

It's as if Microsoft purposely crippled AVI in WMM, considering how horrid the compression is compared to WMV.

[phongn]

I said the AVI saved by WMM is useless, WMV is the only really usable format you can save in.

Meh, I think it has its uses considering what WMM is primarily designed for

I thought raw DV was uncompressed?

Raw is uncompressed; DV is heavily compressed to a 25-megabit video stream.

Anyway, when talking about normal AVI I mean how big the files normally are as saved in professional programs, such as Final Cut, Adobe Premiere, 3d Studio Max 4.2, etc.

It depends on what you're doing. There is no such thing as the "normal AVI" when you talk about compression or audio formats.

A 2 second video saved in 3ds Max 4.2 is 14kb, as I said, that same video is 11.5 MB in WMM, far more than AVI generated by other programs. On the other hand, that same 14kb AVI file stays about the same size if saved in WMV.

You haven't told us:

1. What the framerate is (NTSC DV is usually 59.94 fields per second interlaced, but I've also seen 24 frames per second progressive)
2. What the color depth is (DV is 8-bit YUV)
3. What the color sampling is (NTSC DV is 4:1:1)
4. What the size of the frame is (NTSC DV has 525 scanlines)

For all I know, you're trying to convert a ten-frame 320x240, 256-color animation stored in Indeo 5 to NTSC DV.

It's as if Microsoft purposely crippled AVI in WMM, considering how horrid the compression is compared to WMV.

Uh, they crippled it in that they don't want you to distribute your files over the Internet in anything but WMV, yes. However, you can write the DV stream and then use another program to transcode it.