AVI files, no audio in Video Studio Pro X4

[john30454]

I just recently purchased Video Studio Pro X4 and found it to work well in most respects except when I have no audio when working with AVI files. I have wanted to burn to DVD but can not hear any audio. I have tried installing the KLite codec package as well as any other codecs I could find that might be relevant onto my Windows Vista Ultimate 64 bit system. I have looked at all the message boards and Knowledge bases as well as working in depth with the program itself. I have tried a number of things suggested during my investigation. I have been unable to find any resolution and would hate to ask for a refund of a product that seems to work very well in all other respects except this one. Given no other option this is what I will have to do if I can not resolve the issue.

[skier-hughes]

The first thing to do is identify the avi file from the 800+ that it could be.
Then ensure you have the right codec for this file ONLY installed. Installing codecs willy nilly leads to more problems than it solves.
Try again.
If this doesn't work, it could be that the file is incompatible with VS.
In this case, I'd suggest you trial some of the others before getting a refund and buying another, as it is often the case, the same files don't work with most programmes.
The other option is to convert it to a file type that does work, such as wmv, mpeg2. The best option will be decided upon by the file type it is.

This will tell you what the file type is, which codec you need and if you already have it.

http://www.myvideoproblems.com/Tutorials/avicodec.html

[Ken Berry]

You could also right click on one of the AVI clips inside Video Studio -- either in the timeline or the library window -- and copy ALL its Properties here.

[teknisyan]

This can be a codec issue.

Here are some of the codecs that you may want to install.
RealPlayer: http://www.real.com/
DivX: http://www.divx.com/en/software/divx-plus/codec-pack
XviD: http://downloads.xvid.org/downloads/xvidcore-1.3.2.zip
Windows Media Player: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/wind ... dia-player or just download the Windows Encoder at http://www.microsoft.com/expression/pro ... rview.aspx
QuickTime: http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/
Direct X: http://on-msn.com/aLrk0j (WinXP)
Direct X: http://www.microsoft.com/Windows/window ... tx-11.aspx

[john30454]

I am a bit confused by all the discussion on codecs. My logic is that if I did not have the correct codec on my machine then why does the AVI file play ok in all my other players, which it does. Just to confirm I did check the file to assure I had the correct codec and found that I do (DivXNetworks Divx v5, Supported, MPEG Layer-3, Supported) so this must be a type of file that will not play correctly in the Corel program which I find disturbing given that I did not suspect that I would run into this type of problem with a top notch software company. If this is true then my only option is to return it for refund and look elsewhere as I do not want to have to convert everything in order to play it in Video Studio Pro.

[Ken Berry]

That would be a slightly strange decision -- to give up the entire software just because the sound is not working with DivX files... DivX, as you may realise, is really a distribution format and mainly only used to highly compress commercial movies.

If you indeed have version 5 of DivX on your computer, then you need to be aware that that is now a very old version, and we are now in the 7 series of it. If you go to the DivX.com website, you can download the latest (and free) version of the codec and try that. It certainly works on my computer with VS X4, in both video and audio for DivX. Mind you, at the same time, I would have to admit that some people have had trouble getting the latest version to play in X4, and have found that version 7.5.5 works best with it.

It is also a little strange that you are wanting to burn DivX to a DVD, and I wonder whether indeed you are using the correct software -- though not for the reason you might thing. DivX, though it calls itself AVI, is really highly compressed mpeg-4 which uses the .avi extension as a wrapper format. A video DVD must by international standard use much less compressed mpeg-2. In decompressing the DivX you will get both loss of quality and significant increase in the size of the file produced.

What I suspect you may be doing -- though you might want to confirm this -- is edit some DivX/AVI but then burn it in its original DivX format to a DVD to play on your TV. Now to do that, the DivX is not burned in the video DVD format, but just as a data archive. Just about every stand-alone DVD player these days can recognise DivX on a disc and will play it, just it will play a true video DVD. But I stress again, with DivX it would be a data disk not a video DVD. Now you can edit DivX in Video Studio, but you cannot burn it to disc in its native format using Video Studio. All you need is the same program that you burn any data to disc with, be it documents, photos, music or software. Even Windows itself can do it. But not Video Studio because it is designed to produce video discs which conform to international standards, and for the purposes of VS in the burning stage, DivX is not video but data... You will find the same with any video editing package: you can edit DivX in it but need something simpler to burn it to disc in DivX format...

[skier-hughes]

The discussion centres on codecs because you need the right codec to play and to edit the file.
Playing a file and editing the file works in different ways, so not all editors can work with files that play.

If you'd said in your original post which file it was, that you'd got the right codec installed, instead of saying you'd been installing all types of codecs, then the only answer needed would have been to use this file in VS you'll need to convert it, which did form part of my reply.

As you do not want to convert, I also refer back to my reply and urge you to trial the other software before purchasing another programme as you could end up in the same situation again and again.