Where's the DVR-MS Support?

[Jason Dunn]

Any other Media Center PC owners getting fed up with the lack of support for DVR-MS video files? For those that haven't seen that file format before, it's the metadata wrapper around the MPEG2 file that MCE uses. The net result is that you end up with an MPEG2 file that can't be opened by most software, unless it specifically supports DVR-MS. The format has been around for a couple of years now, but I'm still shocked at the sheer number of video editing and encoding programs that can't cope with the file format.

Windows Movie Maker, Microsoft's own product? Can't do it. Windows Media Encoder? No dice (codec error). DivX Create? Error. Adobe Premiere 2.0? File format unsupported. Roxio and Sonic software supports DVR-MS, but only by re-saving it as an MPEG2 file, which is an ugly and time-consuming kludge. There are some freeware tools out there that allow you to crack open DVR-MS files and extract MPEG2 files, but they're ugly and semi-functional. I just tried using one called AutoDVRconvert and it gave me a DirectShow error and wouldn't convert. <sigh>

And to make things even more depressing, Microsoft will be changing the file format again in the Vista time frame, apparently breaking what little application compatibility exists now - and the person who told me this didn't seem think it was a problem. What's the deal here? Is the TV industry putting pressure on Microsoft and third party developers to stop them from creating software that easily lets us work with the TV shows that we've recorded? Or is this some sort of general apathy, thinking that end users really don't want to manipulate DVR-MS files? Either way, it's a frustrating situation.

[bluemax]

I thought this was a DRM issue. That M$ didn't want anyone to be able to edit or otherwise manipulate the files.

Bill B.

[Jason Dunn]

I thought this was a DRM issue. That M$ didn't want anyone to be able to edit or otherwise manipulate the files.

No, I don't think so, because there are some programs that can work with the files, and I'm sure that Sonic/Roxio for instance wouldn't have a product on the market that cracked DRM and thus violated the DCMA...

[mcsouth]

I wouldn't be surprised if the TV/movie studios have something to do with the lack of support. Maybe it's just the conspiracy theorist in me, but I suspect that there are more back room politics going on than we can imagine over this issue. I've seen articles where TV execs are quoted as indicating that recording a TV show permanently is violating the copyright of the show - apparently that is part of the scheme behind the move to make (Tivo?) some DVR's only retain content for a specific period of time - after which it would "time out" and not be available for viewing. Some articles claim the studios are pushing for this to be mandated for all DVR's, with the time out occurring within a matter of hours after the recording.

I have really wanted a Win MCE box for a while now, and was planning on building a new unit this spring, but I've heard enough of these kind of issues to make me kind of hesitant about doing this - I may wait for Vista to see how much worse it gets...... :P

[Jake Ludington]

Conspiracy theories don't apply in this instance. Arrogance would be more accurate. If all your devices are Windows Media compatible, you don't need a third-party converter because Windows Media Player 10 will do it for you, right? :roll:

Most of the programmers who are hacking video solutions aren't using Media Center. If you look at the sheer number of tools for converting TiVo files (which are very similar), it's fairly obvious which PVR is the favorite of the people writing third party software. MyTV ToGo (http://www.jakeludington.com/downloads/20051104_mytv_togo.html) currently represents the best solution I've found for converting DVR-MS for either the PSP or iPod, in addition to Windows Mobile devices. Video Vault (http://www.divmm.com) from Diversified Multimedia is another option, although for those who like to tweak their settings, it's probably going to be frustrating.

[gerardov]

Nero can work with DVR-MS files, but the product I use all the time to work with DVR-MS files (although not directly, it will also extract the MPEG2 file in about 5 minutes per hour of video) is Pegasys TMPEGEnc Express 3.0 (http://www.pegasys-inc.com/en/product/te3xp.html)... it is a bit expensive to my point of view, but it works like a charm, I use it all the time to transcode my DVR-MS files to WMV or other formats that can be edited, burned or archived. It even has editing and filter tools that can be used from the program itself.

[Jason Dunn]

Pegasys TMPEGEnc Express 3.0

Interesting...I haven't heard/thought about them in many years. Good to see they're still around!