Crashed on Windows XP Pro SP3. I'm going to have to uninstall.

There are so many video converters. Some of them might even work. Not this one.

Crashes on Win 7. Also installed MS Visual C 2008 redistributable without permission.

Mike #18, I don't have time right this second, but frys.com has Magix Movie Edit Pro 17 Plus HD on sale for $19.99 this week if it isn't sold out. $60-80 everywhere else. It claims to do what you want and you can download a time limited trial. I have it (paid ~$70) but haven't gone deep into it yet or needed to try what you want, and can't since I don't have any AVCHD. Sorry, don't want to spam, but this could be a good deal right this second for anyone needing a really full video editor.

#8: "... compressed to a 598mb matroska file (.mkv) which is the ideal format for Blu-ray rips because if it were an .avi it would be much larger..."

FWIW, both mkv & avi are containers, just like Quicktime's mov. Mkv is cool, please don't get me wrong, but it's what's inside the container that counts. The downside with mkv is not as many apps handle it -- in that case use something like MKVcleaver to put the same content into a nearly identically sized avi, & many more apps will take it.

"... MediaAvatar HD Video Converter did not have that resolution in the drop down box or an option to custom input a resolution."

If the rez you're after is missing, type in what you want in the drop-down box & it works fine.

* * *

#10: "... Really slow converter. Seems to work by copying movie in almost real time to a lesser format. Tried it on 2 different movies and took almost the same time as the original movies to convert. "

Transcoding times usually depend on a lot of factors, & often times [e.g. HD] it's slow no matter what. On this rig at least, encoding 1080p to AVC, real-time [i.e. 5 minutes encoding a 5 minute video] if it maintains quality *is* fast. You can set the x264 encoder to go faster, but quality suffers. OTOH I found mediAvatar HD Video Converter faster than usual from DVD spec video to AVC [target = 854 X 480]. If you like the app otherwise, & if transcoding times are slow compared to other ffmpeg converters, try the checkbox in preferences for DS filters, & if that doesn't help, see if you have something else running at the same time that might conflict -- PowerDVD for example [along with several other media handling apps] by default has video-related services running with Windows.

* * *

#14: "... When I tried this program on a .SWF video ONLY the audio was converted plus the first frame…no video."

You might have to extract the flv video & whatever audio from the .swf file beforehand... a .swf file can hold the player & whatever else beside the actual video you're after. FLV_Extract might work.

I'm hoping that *maybe* this will help save someone else a bit of the hours & hours I've invested trying to find a good HD AVC encoder along with a good, separate or included Blu-Ray authoring app.

I want/need a good way to encode HD video as Blu-Ray compliant AVC/H.264, then put it on a disc that'll play in our Blu-Ray player. It's quite possible to use another [non Blu-Ray/AVCHD] format, then use a media player box of some sort or a PC to playback, but logically I can't see much advantage to not using the Blu-Ray or AVCHD formats since files would be stored on optical discs anyway. Where I part company from many people burning HD at home, is that I feel if I'm going to spend hours encoding, if I can have the result Blu-Ray compliant or not, it might as well meet spec [years from now I won't have this same Blu-Ray player, so to *me*, being able to say it works with *this player* isn't saying all that much]. All of my searching for a good solution made me very interested in mediAvatar HD Video Converter, but sadly I still haven't found a solution. You can use the X264 encoder to do Very nice, Blu-Ray compliant AVC [ http://goo.gl/x0VBx ], but then you need a way to put it into AVCHD or Blu-Ray format to create a disc that'll work in Blu-Ray players, & what I've tried so far won't accept it. multiAVCHD will work to a point, but doing menus is a bit weak & tedious. DVDit HD *may* work, but the only legal way for me to find out is by buying it after the holiday. There's a chance Roxio Creator 2011 *may* work (same company as DVDit), but 2010 doesn't, & again no trial.

The Sony Vegas/DVDA AVC encoder stinks, Adobe Premiere Elements won't do HD, & after trials of everything I could find from Ashampoo to TMPGEnc [including most everything in between, from companies like Arcsoft, Corel, Cyberlink...], I found they don't come close to fitting the bill. I bought Nero Multimedia Suite 10 [the trial won't encode HD] & found their AVC encoder *may* work, though it's a bit slow, & when I tried to use it the other day on a project I found it wouldn't import an avi file using the UT near lossless codec. Long story short, for HD in AVC/H264 there just doesn't seem to be a great solution right now. Mpg2 does work [you have to be careful to choose an encoding app that has a Blu-Ray profile, & use it], & while less efficient than AVC, it can be a decent alternative, at least until something better comes along.

RE: mediAvatar HD Video Converter, I found that it'll work for me without installation, so once I can verify it's video works on a DroidX cell, I'll keep & use it or not... in tests it did do a very nice job, very fast. Testing HD it was fairly fast, but with the AVC input/output formats used at least, it's not good enough quality to be usable. RE: all the alternatives over at videohelp.com, I've tried most, & haven't found something yet that'll let me *easily* use the x264 settings in that above link to make it Blu-Ray compliant.

#14 I couldn’t get it to convert a swf file either. In my case I got no sound just a 20k blank file.

However, it did convert a FLV file to MP4 quite satisfactorily, but, in doing so, shot the file size out to 76.2Meg from a small 3.21Meg.

I expected a blow out in file size but not to this extent so I wonder how the other conversions stack up in this respect?

I have tried this program out, and found that it does a great job converting NSV files (Winamp captures) to AVI. One click, good quality, and - most importantly - the sound / video sync is right on. Considering how difficult it is to find a good NSV to anything converter, I think this is a great program.

I have several converters already, so I'm passing on this one, but it sounds quite good for straight conversions. Since I don't have a fancy cellphone or whatever you call them these days, I don't need all the extra formats, but I can see where others would jump at the chance to have a converter.
If I make no more comments this year, I want to wish everyone a very happy, peaceful and prosperous time, and hope that you can be with your friends and family and enjoy whatever holiday you celebrate!

I was happy when I saw .SWF in the input list
Unfortunately When I tried this program on a .SWF video
ONLY the audio was converted plus the first frame...no video.

I contacted support but have notg heard back

Thanx, just what I needed to convert movieclips to my new phone!

Downloaded to see if it could import subtitles. It can't. There's nothing that sets it apart from the others, I will stick with Handbrake, and Avidemux for hard coding subs.

@#9, I gave your comment a thumbs up but afterward I found it difficult to find a credible site to download it (Many I couldn't access because of my browser protection apps. virustotal.com shows 3 AVs that says there is a virus in X2X free Video-Audio Merger....including Kaspersky. Just an FYI for you and all that considers downloading it.
If it's a false positive, a good company contact the AV companies and get it resolved.

Be careful during install, as it try's to install the stupid bing toolbar. You need tu remove the opt in checkmarks or it will hijack your homepage and search engine preferences.

Really slow converter. Seems to work by copying movie in almost real time to a lesser format. Tried it on 2 different movies and took almost the same time as the original movies to convert. Within 5 minutes.

If you want to combine a number of videos into one video file then download X2X free Video-Audio Merger.
You can save the merged video files to several different formats

Installs and registers swimmingly. There is no question as to whether it is truly registered afterwards. Using Windows 7 – 64 bit I chose to convert a Blu-ray back-up of a the movie Tombstone which was compressed to a 598mb matroska file (.mkv) which is the ideal format for Blu-ray rips because if it were an .avi it would be much larger.

I converted it to a “PSP video for firmware 2.00 and above.” This converts it to an .mp4 format. According to the freeware program VideoInspector, the original resolution was 1280x528 [2.42.1] FPS 23.976. MediaAvatar HD Video Converter did not have that resolution in the drop down box or an option to custom input a resolution.

The whole process took 56 minutes and produced two copies. Maybe that's why it took that long. I don't care about the time it takes if the quality is good. (Which it was.) Maybe someone can tell me why it produced two copies. – What is something I did wrong? The output file's resolution is 368x208 which is ideal for a PSP and is high Quality/HD quality.

As already mentioned, FormatFactory and Handbrake are very popular free alternatives or if you just want to convert a DVD to DivX / XviD I recommend Auto Gordian Knot which is also free.

MediaAvatar is very simple to use and has some nice feature and options. MediaAvatar is very reputable and popular. I am happy with today's giveaway.

thanks for this. very easy to handle, a large variety of input and output formats in spite of poor video editing features, anyway, enough for me, great!

Can register using any names! Good stuff!!

At least the MultiCore functionality doesn't work when converting a single video - in my case on Windows 7 Prof. x64. First of all the software is certified for W7 as stated in the GAOTD description, so please no "wtf dood u cna not use x64 y u use x64" :-)))
Please consider these pics: http://picasaweb.google.com/akari.kamigishi/Pictures#
The first picture is showing the CPU usage both from the Windows task manager and the application during the conversion process. The second picture shows that during that time, the number of active cores to be used in the conversion process is "all cores".
Perhaps mediAvatar HD Converter is capable of converting "n videos" on computers with "n cores" but so can any other software by just starting multiple instances.
Multi-core conversion usually is done by slicing a video at the key frames and thus creating thousands of little jobs. Something is going wrong here or I understood "multi-core" in a very wrong way. :)
Can mediAvatar please look into that issue?

it is ok, but output video files are not High-Definition and high quality video. and i personally use PCHand Video Converter. it can help me to convert HD/SD video to SD/HD video keeping High-Definition and high quality output video.

Installed successfully, thanks for sharing.
Just the thing for my Multimedia Collection!
In my multimedia collection, Im in favor of HandBrake, snowfox total video converter, formatfactory, and I thumb up snowfox dvd & video converter according to personal like, not only coz its powerful fundamental practical function, also coz its Improved output format.
Thanks GOTD for sharing.

it works ok for me, but output file are not High-Definition video. so i choose PCHand Video Converter, it support convert HD video / SD video to videos in different format and convert HD video to HD video as well. Besides, it supports 1:1 converting without reducing quality of the video.

The Good
* Straightforward and easy to use.
* Can do video -> video, video -> audio, and audio -> audio conversions.
* Can convert HD and SD videos.
* Supports many input and output formats.
* Supports many electronic devices.
* Users are given full control over output file properties.
* Has the ability to automatically split input files by length or size.
* Has the ability to make full use of all CPU cores (if applicable).
* Has the ability to automatically close program, or shut down, hibernate, or sleep computer after conversions have finished.
* Has the ability to prevent computer from hibernating/sleeping during conversions.
* Supports NVIDIA CUDA technology (requires applicable hardware).

The Bad
* Developer claims to be able to "convert batches of pictures like JPG, GIF, BMP and PNG to a video and play it as a slideshow" but the program won't properly input any image files during my tests.
* Lacks a lot of the basic editing capabilities rival shareware video converters have.

Free Alternatives
iWisoft Video Converter
FormatFactory

For final verdict and recommendations please click here.