The Good
* Straightforward and easy to use.
* Supports many input and output video formats.
* Does video -> video and video -> audio conversions.
o Does both SD and HD video conversions.
* Has support for electronic gadgets, such as the iPhone, the PSP, and the XBox 360.
* Allows users to do some basic video editing, such as crop, trim, add watermark (text or image), change brightness, change contrast, add an effect, and deinterlace.
o Available effects are gray, invert, gamma, sepia, embossment, flip vertically, flip horizontally, 3D grid, posterization, solarization, threshold, "video", and halftone.
* Allows users to merge videos together.
* Supports batch processing.
* Allows users to automatically shutdown the computer after conversion.

The Bad
* Cannot make full use of multi-cores.
* No NVIDIA CUDA support.
* No option to keep output video resolution the same as input.
* "Video Quality" option has no correlation to the output video resolution.
* Cannot add subtitles to videos.
* Does not support drag + drop.
* No option to add an entry in the Windows Explorer right-click context menu.
* Extremely RAM intensive.
* Has output profiles for a only a few mobile phones/smartphones.
* Many shareware "video" converters can also do audio -> audio conversions - this one cannot.

Alternatives
[Freebie] iSkysoft iMedia converter
[Freeware] FormatFactory
[Freeware] iWisoft Video Converter

For final verdict and recommendations please click here.

Ashraf  –  13 years ago  –  Ritieni questo commento utile? sì | no (+112)

Traduci

The program installed and registered without a problem on my laptop Win7 (x64) Home Ed. Computer. The first time I tried it, I attempted to crop the video and alter the brightness & contrast. to convert an avi. The program locked up. When I retried the same video (with the same changes), the program converted it -- with a noticeable decrease in video quality.

The crop feature is a disappointment. I was unable to pinpoint the beginning or ending with any accuracy. The *time boxes* show the start & end times, but no time box coordinates with where the actual play indicator is. Clicking on the beginning or ending crop bar causes the play indicator to immediately shift to the bar being moved, losing the place where the current play is and thus the accuracy of the crop. Attempting to begin playing at the starting crop was again in question as there is no time box for the play indicator. The crop I hoped for was several seconds off both the beginning and end.

The brightness and contrast produced noticeable changes, but the overall output quality was also noticeably less than the original. This was just the first use; I may try again later, but the initial impression isn't good.

John38111

John38111  –  13 years ago  –  Ritieni questo commento utile? sì | no (+49)

Traduci

#3: "I do not see AVCHD type file option in the HD Video folder?"

#6: "i also have alot AVCHD video clips, but this App seems cant deal them"

AVCHD is used by some camcorders, & there can be issues caused by how the camera encodes [records] video more-or-less un-related to the AVCHD format itself -- if/when you have problems Google/Bing to see how others with the same make/model camera deal with it.

AVCHD is a disc format like Blu-Ray, the same way mpg2 is packaged in a DVD layout that can be burned to disc. AVCHD discs are almost identical to Blu-Ray, but may play in more stand-a-lone players or devices. Many Blu-Ray players identify &/or play BD-5/9 [Blu-Ray burned to a regular DVD] as AVCHD discs. A free app called multiAVCHD can create AVCHD & Blu-Ray disc layouts, & there are many pay-ware DVD/BD authoring apps -- some of the bundled DVD/BD authoring apps like MyDVD in Roxio's Creator suite create AVCHD discs out-of-the-box, but you have to buy additional plug-ins for BD. That said, there are specs that the encoded video [AVC, mpg2, VC1] needs to meet, but it can get confusing because there are *in effect* more than one level of specs... Companies that produce or replicate video Blu-Ray discs [like the titles you'll buy in the store or rent] have compliance testing that video must pass -- AVCHD/Blu-Ray authoring apps *may* include the same (or almost the same) tests, or else they'll re-encode your video. There are a lot of encoders that will produce video that will play in most Blu-Ray players, but will not pass compliance checking. Personally I've never seen a converter create video that will pass BD authoring software compliance testing with the exception of Nero Vision, though it is possible using the x264 encoder http://goo.gl/x0VBx (which is included in ffmpeg).

Often you can open the .m2ts file itself, but otherwise to get content out of a AVCHD/Blu-Ray layout check out BluRip &/or HdBrStreamExtractor -- both are front ends for the cli [command line interface] eac3to, which will demux the individual streams contained in the .m2ts files -- like .VOB files on a DVD, they hold the content. It can be difficult to handle [i.e. open, play etc.] that video [e.g. .h264 files], so both of these apps will save it in an MKV file container -- something like the free MKVcleaver can 1) strip the video out of the .mkv file, & 2) optionally put the video into an .avi container that more apps can & will work with. No re-encoding is involved in de-muxing the .m2ts file, or creating an .avi, but if you've got large files it can be time consuming.

* * *

Note that McAfee Site Adviser red-flags the developer site -- McAfee shows the downloads as green, their rating appears to be because of user reports/comments, & the Site Adviser page shows Aneesoft's rebuttal & request that the rating be changed.

mike  –  13 years ago  –  Ritieni questo commento utile? sì | no (+25)

Traduci

In tests Aneesoft HD Video Converter is picky about what it'll accept for input, doesn't have much in the way of output settings or customization of those settings, is slower than average, & was buggy, with more than a few crashes. It uses D3D, which *might* be why it wouldn't run in an XP VM, or it just might be the same sort of bugs that caused it to crash in win7 ult 64 SP1 RC. Since it bills itself as an HD converter I tested it with 1080p HD video in AVC & mpeg2 formats... One AVC video it accepted in an avi container wouldn't import as mkv, and wouldn't convert -- with 0 CPU activity it wasn't apparent it actually crashed until I clicked Cancel, & then had to use Task Mgr. to quit. It did work with another AVC video in an .m2ts file. With a much easier to handle mpg2 [still 1080p] it wouldn't accept the video as .m2v, would accept it but crashed with the same video as .mpg, but did work with it in a .m2ts file. Converting to one of the iPhone AVC [H.264] profiles it took 1.5 minutes to convert 2 minutes of video, with a max of 40% CPU using 2 cores of an AMD quad. The generic HD AVC profile didn't allow enough bit rate IMHO for 1080p, so I tried 1440 X 1080p, which can work very well for Blu-Ray on DVD -- with quality set to normal [higher quality means slower encoding with the x264 encoder ffmpeg includes] I frankly gave up when it took 4+ minutes to hit 50% of a 2 minute video -- CPU usage was in the 27% range. In fairness it might be faster at lower quality settings, & the output might still be good quality, but with only 20 something CPU use I didn't see the point of trying further -- unless you're multitasking you *want* close to 100% CPU use encoding/converting, but should *expect* at least something in the 50-60% range if/when you're moving very large amounts of video data [HD] in 15-25 GB files because reading &/or writing the files can be a bottleneck. Less important, previewing/playing HD video was poor.

In case Aneesoft HD Video Converter works for you installation isn't bad, as you get the program's folder [~18 MB in 152 files, 8 folders] & Start Menu shortcuts, with new registry entries limited to an uninstall key & license registration data.

For alternatives, videohelp.com has several converters &/or encoders, several have been & I assume will continue to be on GOTD, & dealnews.com has fairly often tipped folks off to free offers over the holiday season on many of the same apps seen on GOTD. If you have supported ATI graphics hardware they include their own converter as part of their driver package, &/or A's video converter uses the same basic code to hardware accelerate conversion/encoding. If your target is an AVCHD or Blu-Ray disc multiAVCHD uses the x264 encoder with settings to make sure it works.

mike  –  13 years ago  –  Ritieni questo commento utile? sì | no (+22)

Traduci

Boo hiss. I was hoping to like this tool, and the comments so far were encouraging, but I've installed it (which was indeed simple, thanks), and in trying to convert some FLV files to other formats, I find that each time it shows the "length" of the input files to be only about 10-15 minutes, when in fact they are all more like an 60-90 minutes. And of course the converted file is the same shortened length.

Is there something about FLVs that are a known issue? I searched the aneesoft site and found nothing to suggest that. I can open these same FLVs in any of a few players and can confirm they are indeed at least an hour long. I also (on the same computer) already run other converter tools (some obtained here from GOTD) and they do also all properly recognize the real length of the FLVs.

Someone may wonder if this problem is a time limitation in VC, but it is not. I opened some MP3 and MP4 files (converted from the same FLVs in question using other tools), and VC shows their length correctly, at over an hour.

I hope the vendor may have some thoughts, in case other GOTD users may also be interested in conversion of FLV files. It's hard to motivate us to pay for upgrades if the base version given away fails at the basics. Thanks.

Charlie  –  13 years ago  –  Ritieni questo commento utile? sì | no (+13)

Traduci