A couple of weeks ago I was bemoaning that Freeview HD recordings in Windows Media Center don’t covert with MCEBuddy one of my favourite application for converting TV files. The good news is that MCEBuddy 2.0 is on the way and it will work with h.264 files so it will be compatible with Freeview HD recordings.
Over the weekend the developer posted about the new version which has been in development for over 2 years. The current build is a test of the core engine and not a direct replacement for the full version of MCEBuddy but you can download it and give it a try (full instructions on the download page). I am looking forward to giving this a try and seeing how the final version worked out
Birth of The Reload
For what feels like a bazillion years I’ve been working on MCEBuddy 2.0. Almost two years ago I thought I was close to a finalised product when WTV and a broad mix of HDTV codecs appeared on the scene. And so all the wheels fell off. The methods used by MCEBuddy 2.0 up to BETA 11 relied on MPEG2 video, which was no longer the only DVR recording type. The complications of the proprietary Microsoft WTV file format used for TV recordings made this even more complex. I had to rethink the whole design of MCEBuddy and it got a whole lot more complex.
Struggling With the Source
MCEBuddy is freeware based upon FOSS (Free and Open Source Software) source code and applications. This is how MCEBuddy is able to be free to you. During the last 2 years I’ve thankfully received a wide range of recording files from beta testers (more is always good!). What I discovered is that the FOSS tools available had not matured sufficiently to support HDTV. To an extent they still haven’t. To put it simply, the majority of FOSS tools are focused on ‘DVD backups’ where the vide stream is usually very clean. Applying them to TV recordings often makes them choke. Unfortunately this is not predictable. So now I had to test each option against a range of recording types that have been changed from WTV. Then generate a matrix of what worked reliably and see if I could come up with a combination that would work. This took a long,long time. Also, since no-one else was trying to do the same thing I was (in its entirety) there was nothing out there that I could build upon. Once I had put together a library and toolset that would do the job I started on BETA 13, which was released today.
Why So Much Testing and So Bug Intolerant?
The value of MCEBuddy is that it runs as a service. This means it can wake up when you are not there and do your conversions. After watching your first progress bar for a video conversion, it gets pretty boring. You want it being done when you are not there and when you are not using your system. If the activity is occurring when you are not there it bloody well better work reliably as you are not there to cater for the glitches. So coding a service is muchharder than a GUI based tool as you can never say ‘well the user will just deal with that’. This is also why this beta cycle starts with a GUI wrapped about the MCEBuddy engine and will finish with the service (+GUI +Command line).
Thanks and Let’s Get Going
It’s been a long haul. I have not been on the site or forums to answer questions for quite a while as what little time I’ve had I’ve been devoting to getting MCEBuddy 2.0 going. I’d like to make a special thank you to those of you that have been posting MCEBuddy help on my behalf and those that have been posting TV recording snippets to help me with my testing. I’ve been getting a real cultural education with some of them!
MCEBuddy 2.0 is back on the rails again, so let’s get stuck into it!
Hi Ian, great podcast, getting very much into the media centre ethos and want more all the time. What is the update on this?
What I want is and easy way to burn copies to DVD for temp use by the kids etc. I tried this but all I have is Freeview HD recordings! any suggestions?
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Hi Ian, great podcast, getting very much into the media centre ethos and want more all the time. What is the update on this?
What I want is and easy way to burn copies to DVD for temp use by the kids etc. I tried this but all I have is Freeview HD recordings! any suggestions?