Newbie Question

[preskitt.man]

While I am very comfortable with most things digital and electronic, I am feeling like a fish out of water with
regard to video.

Until recently, all I seemed to have to worry about was sever major file type (.avi, .wmv, .vob) and whether or not Widows Media Player (or some other player) had the codec. If it didn't, either it would go out and
automatically download the codec, or I could just download the a codec pack, and pretty much be done with
it.

Ok, streaming comes along and DLNA. Fine. Thought this would solve all sorts of problems. Well, DLNA is like most other standards it seems - you can pick and choose what features of the standard to implement, or so it would seem.

OK, then I find Mezzmo, and many of my problems are solved, until it comes to a point where it doesn't seem to work well or at all. Then I start reading around, and it seems like there are dozens of video types, and
virtually any video type can be embedded in any extension (and I'm not even getting into audio).

So, sorry for the long pre-amble), but two questions:
Is there a good Streaming Video 101 guide out there somewhere explaining all this in human terms.
I downloaded several files claiming to be VIDX and it has an .AVI etenstion. I am using Mezzmo 2.3.2 with a Sony BDP S570. Am using the NTSC No DIVX profile (also tried the NTSC DIVX profile). Either way, when I bring up the menu on my TV from the Sony, these files don't even show up. Wrong profile? Something
special I am not doing? Chalk it up to some things Mezzmo just can't do. BTW, WMP will play the file just
fine on the PC, and Windows DVD Maker will crate a DVD out of them.

Thanks for any help.

Dave

[Paul]

Dave,

I am not aware of any existing Streaming 101 guide, but we can start making one together

You are right that file extensions do not really mean all that much and can hide anything inside. It's all about containers and specifics formats inside them.

For example, if you right-click in Mezzmo on that XVid file and use the "Get FFmpeg Information" command, we can see what the file is exactly (post the output here). If it's not showing up on the BDP and you are using the "No DivX" device profile, then check if your transcoding is turned off, because if it is and your player doesn't support those files, then they won't show up.

Also, playing files on your PC or even via a USB stick on a device is different to actually streaming and playing them via DLNA - this complicates things further when looking at files, because if a device can play that file from a USB stick, it doesn't necessarily mean it will play the same file when streamed.