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Perian is a free, open-source plug-in that can help QuickTime users play more formats, including most major codecs.
Billed as a "Swiss Army Knife for QuickTime," Perian installs a preference pane and automatically installs components for over two dozen formats--everything from AVI, FLV, and DivX to curios like DTS Coherent Acoustics audio, Xiph Vorbis (in Matroska), and various subtitle formats. The settings give you a few options, for the likes of alerts and audio output, but most of Perian's functionality happens invisibly during playback.
The one format that Perian won't help with is WMV (so you'll need something like Flip4Mac for that), but otherwise this free plug-in should add a lot of firepower to your Quicktime playback options.
Publisher's Description
From The Perian Team:
Perian enables QuickTime application support for additional media types:
- AVI, FLV, and MKV file formats
- MS-MPEG4 v1 & v2, DivX, 3ivx, H.264, FLV/Sorenson Spark, FSV1, VP6, H263i, VP3, HuffYUV, FFVHuff, MPEG1 & MPEG2 Video, Fraps, Windows Media Audio v1 & v2, Flash ADPCM, Xiph Vorbis (in Matroska), and MPEG Layer II Audio
- AVI support for: AAC, AC3 Audio, H.264, MPEG4, and VBR MP3
- Subtitle support for SSA/ASS and SRT
What's new in this version:
- Added Indeo 5 decoding. [r1271]
- Fixed several bugs in Matroska support (1.2 regression) [r1240, r1243]
- Incomplete AVI files were not fully imported (1.2 regression) [r1242]
- Fixed subtitles crashing in 10.4 [r1240]
- Fixed a rare crash with .mp4 [r1265]
- No error was shown if the installer somehow failed [r1270] Note that it does not try to correct errors, only report them.
- Fixed crash in SSA support [r1250]
- Fixed invisibl... See all new features
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All versions:
4.3 starsout of 46 votes
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Current version:
4.5 starsout of 11 votes
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My rating:
Write review
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"Front Row is a lot better now!"
Version: Perian 1.2.1
Pros
Allows playback of flash and divx file types in front row and quick time making things a lot easier.
Cons
Initial installation issues
Summary
Works as advertised.
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"Invisible."
Version: Perian 1.2.1
Pros
invisible.
Cons
absolutely none
Summary
downloaded it and enjoy...!
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"It just works fine, as it should."
Version: Perian 1.2.1
Pros
It just works fine, as it should.
Cons
It just works fine, as it should.
Summary
It just works fine, as it should.
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"Works wonderfully in the background"
Version: Perian 1.2.1
Pros
Easy setup
Automatically converts files to whatever format they need to be in
Makes QT so much more useable
Must-have if you download a lot of videos from varied sourcesCons
None so far
Switching PAL files to NTSC would've been nice though, for Toast.Summary
I was wracking my brain and wasted so much time trying to convert downloaded FLV files with other programs, just to be able to view them on my old PB G4. This add-on completely eliminates this need. Now I can just double-click on ANY file (with Flip4Mac for WMVs) and it opens and starts playing as if it were a native QT file. Tried dragging some odd files into Toast 9 to burn a DVD-Video, and it even automatically converted them for THAT, with no degradation whatsoever. AMAZING! It won't do anything to improve the quality of your files or convert between NTSC and PAL, but not only does it allow you to view them, in whatever format they're in, but it also opens up so many more options for HOW they're viewed.
Without Perian, I'd still be sitting here needlessly converting video files (which can take several hours on my slow G4--overnight with some files), and further degrading their quality in the process. This has "dumbed down" newfangled video files on my Mac to the point where even *I* can view any file with confidence! -
"Installed easily."
Version: Perian 1.2.1
Pros
I have no comment at this time.
Cons
I have no comment at this time.
Summary
I have no comment at this time.
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"This is a miracle!!"
Version: Perian 1.2.1
Pros
It seems to work well with various video types on my G3 ibook. I haven't tried all video formats though. No new player is needed, files open in quicktime.
Cons
None so far.
Summary
This is the best video playback alternative out there for mac. Especially for older macs.
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"It does what it says it'll do."
Version: Perian 1.2.1
Pros
Easy and works instantly.
Cons
None. Never heard of this app, so I was a bit hesitant, but it worked!
Summary
All I wanted to do was to play some video files that didn't play with QuickTime, so I tried to find different apps that would play my videos. A pop-up message in QT took me to a QT Components recommended page, so I tried DivX Mac. With DivX, it played the video, but no audio - it actually gave me this message: "This file contains a track in the Dolby AC3 Audio (code ?8192?) format. You may need to install a DirectShow decoder for this audio format in order to hear the soundtrack of this file."
Unfortunately, it wasn't easy to figure out exactly where to get this DirectShow decoder for Mac, but I came across a forum post that recommended this Perian plug-in and it worked marvelously. No restart required - it took me less than a couple of minutes to download, install and play my videos w/ Perian. Not sure why this wasn't on QT's recommendations page, but it should be. -
"Enough for my needs"
Version: Perian 1.2.1
Pros
Easy to use
Cons
no cons found
Summary
Recommend to hesitant users.
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"Does what I needed it for"
Version: Perian 1.2.1
Pros
Quick, easy, transparent.
Cons
None that I've encountered so far
Summary
If you have any movies/videos you need to play with QT, this will probable do it for you and you'll never even know that it's there.
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"You complete me!"
Version: Perian 1.2.1
Pros
After downloading, I was able to add AVI files to Toast and make a DVD out of them
Cons
None......
Summary
A must have if you use Toast!
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