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Introduction
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There are many different audio and video formats out there, and most devices (such as the iPod) and programs (such as Windows Media Player) will only take a few specific formats. A DVD or WMV movie will not play on an iPod, for example, without being converted into an MP4 file. Many commercial programs will do this conversion for you, but there are a few good ones that will do it for free. None of these programs are quite perfect. Some support more formats and devices, some are easier to use, and some are more stable. While some are better than others overall, which one is best for you will depend on your specific needs. Note: I don't own DVDs, so I'm not qualified to review DVD rippers. If you want to review them, or have software suggestions, leave them here. |
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Discussion
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For those perks, try FormatFactory. It supports dozens of devices (in addition to generic encoding) and does audio and picture conversions, making it the most complete converter in this review. The sidebar-based interface is a little garish, but responsive and stable. Although the sheer amount of devices supported will throw beginners for a moment, making (and saving) advanced tweaks and adding files is easy. If only it used less popup meus, and and didn't include a static banner ad for eBay, it would be perfect (and still is the best) converter for advanced users.
F
Recommended for niche use SUPER: Great for simple but advanced custom jobs, and has some presets. Has an annoying interface Tested and not recommended Actusoft Free Video Converter: Koyote Soft with bad presets and other minor bugs |
For most users, the best choice is 
Somewhere in between is 
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2.3.0.0 
Unrestricted Freeware 
NT/2000/XP/Vista/7
This category is maintained by volunteer editor Arithmomaniac. Registered site visitors can contact Arithmomaniac by clicking here.
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It would be nice of you had just one Mac option. Know any good ones off the top of your head?
One more suggestion has been there on the forum for Iwisoft Video Converter. I used it... seems good. Here is the forum link :
http://www.techsupportalert.com/freeware-forum/software-suggestions/2396...
Anupam
I downloaded and installed the new version of Quick Media Converter yesterday. I did not find it to be good. The expert mode is REALLY for experts... there are no suggestions... no drop-down boxes to help choose the different video attributes... just plain empty boxes for you to fill in.
The interface is not that good... and when you change it to expert mode, you cannot figure out anything :O.
The easy mode looked OK, but when I tried to convert a DAT file to mpg, which I have converted successfully with all other converters, QMC was not able to do it, and threw an error.
I uninstalled and deleted QMC... its out of my PC for good :D.
Anupam
Wow, the review was updated so soon. Good work :). I was surprised to see Koyote Video Converter as the top choice. I didn't think it would replace FormatFactory.
One thing about Koyote Video Converter... when I installed and ran it... PC Tools Firewall says its trying to act as server and accept incoming connections. If I block it, the program throws the usual windows error, and does not run. I find that behavior very odd and suspicious. Why would a program want to act as server... and would not run if that is blocked.
I had more points to say, but I will post them later on... I was not able to do the conversion work I had to do, since few days.
I found Oxelon Converter to be nice too, but yes as you mention, tweaks are less, and no device support. Device support in converters is not a problem I think, because separate converters for devices are available.
I came across another new converter today : MediaCope. Saw it on FreewareFiles. It has audio/video player, audio/video converter, audio/video cutter, image resizer/cutter, internet tools and slideshow. Impressive. Will try it soon.
Quick Media Converter has a new version 4.0.0.0.
More later. Keep up the good work :). Thanks for a great review.
Edit : Just saw the size of new version of Quick Media Converter. Its whopping 44.91 MB :O. I am having second thoughts about downloading it :D.
Anupam
I deal with AV. It defeats 50% of the my purpose if Koyote converts video only. FF is still my choice for AV conversion. Not sure about others though.
I agree with you. FormatFactory is my choice too. It offers so many conversions... audio, video, images, and can even rip DVDs too. I also found it to be useful both for average, and experienced users.
Anupam
Thanks for the MediaCope and Koyote tips. I'll have revised reviews soon.
A clarification...Koyote does AV conversion. It just does not convert from or to MP3, AAC, etc. They have a seperate converter for that, which I need to review also.
Arithmomaniac
Very welcome :).
I checked Koyote Video Converter today. It does not do audio conversion... only videos. It can extract audio from the video file, and convert it to another format though. But it does not accept audio file as an input, and convert it to another audio format.
I tried MediaCope today too. It requires .NET framework SP1... and I think that will be a disadvantage for the product, as many users do not like to install .NET frameworks unnecessarily... including myself.
I however tested it on my cousin's PC, after installing .NET 2.0 SP2.
The program looks good, and the interface is different. But the video conversion part was very unsatisfactory... even useless in my opinion. The FPS were 30 and 24, which are not exact. 29.97 is for NTSC and 25 for PAL. Further, even the display resolution choices are not standard. Quite disappointing. I wouldn't want to convert my videos with MediaCope, unless they offer some standard attributes.
I haven't checked on the other features... so can't say about that. But, the main was the video conversion, and it was disappointing.
I checked out the audio converter though, and noticed that it allows conversion to AC3 too, a feature which I have not seen in another audio converters.
Anupam
Name of this article is "Best Free Audio / Video Format Conversion Program" and Gizmo's top pick doesn't support audio conversion at all? Also it doesn't work on my system because I don't have installed Microsoft .NET Framework.
If you want similar audio conversion, try X2X (which I'll co-nominate in a future edit).
As for .NET, just get it. I used to hate it, but it's basically a key part of programming for Windows now.
Arithmomaniac
Based on the recommendations here I have tried both Formatfactory and Mediacoder. I wanted to convert a batch of wmv's to avi (xvid)as a test, with specific bitrates, custom resizing, and audio to mp3. Neither one worked satisfactorily.
Formatfactory does not allow custom resizing, nor bitrate settings above 2400 (or something like that).
Mediacoder produced avi's that were not recognised by Virtualdub as proper avi files, despite the fact that it seemed to have used XVID to do the encoding (according to MediaInfo).
Neither seem to have advanced filtering either (gamma, colour, noise, blocking, smoothing etc).
It is possible that both can do what I want, but the configuration options to do so were not easily detectable.
I have been using Super for several years and have had no problem with its interface, and at least it reliably works to give me what I want. It looks like I have to stay with Super + Virtualdub.
There is so much to read here, and I have one basic question...this coming from a newbie: I just want to burn a movie I downloaded to a dvd+r. It is a mp4 file. I use win. media player (pc, win 7) & it doesn't support mp4 or avi, which I also need. Is there a free program out there that would do this? Nothing fancy...simple simple simple.
Came across more media converters :
Aura Video Converter
Actusoft Video Converter
X2X Free Audio Converter
Anupam
I couldn't find Actusoft's home page.
Aura is another Any knockoff.
I'll have X2X tested by next week.
The home page is www.actusoft.com
Anyways, I had tried to rip a DVD with Actusoft, and it failed terribly. Even on selecting multiple titles, it will just rip one, and that too on individual selection. After conversion, the output file was just 4kb. Needless to say, I uninstalled the software without looking at other features.
I tried 2 products by X2X ... one was VideoAudio Merger... I tried merging audio files, and it worked well.
The other one was Video Flip and Rotate. That worked well too.
So, I think the audio converter could be worth looking at.
Anupam
Yikes...looks like I have my work cut out.
Arithmomaniac
LOL... like I said, take your time buddy :D.
Anupam
I have seen some new media converters on some sites. If possible, could you review them please? Take your time of course :).
Here they are :
Oxelon Media Converter
Koyote Video Converter
Kigo Video Converter
WinX Video Converter
Clone2Go Video Converter
Sofonica Audio Video Converter
Thanks :)
Anupam
I looked at some of the above converters.
Sofonica Audio Video Converter is too basic. You can just select the output format, but cannot change any attributes. Not much useful.
Clone2Go Video Converter, and Kigo Video Converter look like clones of Any Video Converter... same interface, same functions, even the same settings. Wonder who is copying whom.
Anupam
The only ones here that support iPod and are not knockoffs are Oxelon and Koyote. I'll look at them by next week.
Thanks for the update :).
Yea, Oxelon and Koyote looked little different from others. WinX looked good, but I had converted a video with it, and the video did not have any sound. Maybe, I will give it another try later on.
Anupam
Hi, everyone! I'm sorry that this page hasn't been updated recently, but I've been very busy. DVDVideosoft will replace XMedia in my next review.
Arithmomaniac
MEDIACODER is as fast if not faster than Format Factory because it is more customizable. If you don't know what you are doing you get the beginner preset Format Factory. As soon as you learn what variable bit rate, keyframes, and rate distortion optimization are, thats when you make some fireworks with MEDIACODER
I would just like to put in a comment for MEDIACODER, mainly because of all the complaining and whining I see for it being buggy. Yes you do need to know what you are doing when you use MEDIACODER. Yes it is buggy and is picky on settings. BUT, there is NO free software that can encode all types of media with as high quality as MEDIACODER. Can you say H264 video with almost all the command line options, provided in the GUI! Prove me wrong. Somebody will try.
WMP can covert files to MP3 format for you. The concern is for videos and the ipod vedio converter works very well for conversions of many different formats to MP4 and the best thing is that it is free.
AutoGordianKnot would this program not nave a place in here?
the download page for format factory has this warning "Attention: NOD32 was wrong to report virus, Please don't worry.
We promise there are no harmful code in FormatFactory." on it today (29th sept 09). now i'm worried! is it safe?
OH! It is infected alright! Instantly, ground my system to a virtual halt! STAY AWAY!!!!
I used it just a couple of days ago.. and FormatFactory works really well, without any issue. It did a great job of converting video files.
Anupam
If it's safe. What caused the NOD32
Birdog from the flatlands of Kansas
It may be a false positive or it may not. The only way is to check this out for yourself by uploading the file detected to VirusTotal and then making a decision from the results displayed there.
http://www.virustotal.com/
I'm still using it.
Arithmomaniac
I have to say I think this is the best-managed category on the site. Consistently and conscientiously updated, the info is accurate and useful...just a great job. Arithmomaniac: thanks!
P.S. have recently bought a Mac machine which I am typing from now. Apparently Mac folks swear by Handbrake so, although my experience with it on Windows was that it was unreliable and disappointing, I will try it again at some point on this Mac and relay my impressions here.
Ok, as follow up...I decided to try right away. And I am sorry (and absolutely amazed) to say that my negative experience with Handbrake on the Mac dwarfs even that on Windows. It was not with the encoding (did not get that far, nor will I), but rather with the program itself. I installed v0.9.3 and decided to try a sample conversion of part of a DVD. But, it can't...I got a message that it "can't find VLC Media Player". Apparently it needs VLC to do this. Very negative start...I don't download a tool only to go chasing other tools that it needs to do its basic functions.
But ok, I'm familiar enough with VLC on Windows, so I download it, install, and try again. And AGAIN another problem...now I need "Fairmount" software in order for this to work. So, right out of the gate, what is supposed to be a simple single tool for basic DVD conversion requires TWO other pieces of software to even do this function. Actually I should say that I don't know if it actually needs any further software in this pleasant little download merry-go-round...I deleted both Handbrake and VLC at that point and won't bother with it again.
There is something quite dirty behind Handbrake, though you can't put your finger on it. Not a single of the real-life Mac users I know uses it, and yet on the internet it comes across as the video holy grail. Both of my experiences with it now - on both Windows and Mac - have been abject disappointments, and there is something more than a bit vile about its way of stringing a user along step by step and requiring other software that is not stated at the beginning. I will not be trying Handbrake again, ever. And this article is well accurate and correct not to have included it as a recommendation, regardless of the seeming hype and suggestions.
It's so odd how experiences from one user to another can vary. I use Handbrake on both Windows and OS X without any, or only minimal problems. It never asked me to install additional software - although I might have had VLC already, but I don't know anything about Fairmount... Bizarre...
I tried format factory for converting wma to mp3 and was sadly disappointed - just about everything I tried came back as a fail. I also tried pazerra, which worked but I couldn't get to take the information on artist etc. over to the new format - and as I was trying to convert large batches of files this was slightly inconvenient. Is Super worth a try?
I don't know if SUPER supports tag porting. MediaCoder does, I think.
Tried most of them and couldn't get the results I was looking for. In the end a friend pointed me in the direction of mediamonkey and the free version does the trick (even if limited to less than 100 files per conversion).
This comment is copied over from Site Suggestions and Feedback:
For future readers, the only 64-bit recommendation on this list is Mediacoder.
I always start (and usually end) my search for quality freeware here. This time I went with Format Factory and love. Quick, easy, and perfect for converting my weekly videos for my website. Keep up the good work here.
Regards,
Hey i put a comment with **soft anothers and you delete me.This is not democracy it is dictature.You delete a good comment because you don't like that others are not agree with you.
**soft flv to video converter is not free, so it has no place here first of all, as this site deals with freewares only. Second, the site page of **soft has not got very good WOT rating. Another reason why your comment was deleted. Please do not put false accusations on this site.
Anupam Shriwatri
Super is not so Super.
Quick Media Converter is so slow that I could spend all day waiting for it to convert one .flv file. And, it has a watermark right in the middle of the screen of the output file. Of course, $59 gets the watermark removed.
What is up with GIZMO?
I do not know where you got your download, but the link here for QMC is to a freeware. I use Format Factory, but just downloaded QMC and had no watermark on the converted video and I see no option to purchase within the program.
I clicked on the Cocoon Software link in the program and was taken to their webpage which indicates it is completely free, no trial etc
Also was voted one of the 12 best free windows applications of 2008 at lifehacker as well as one of the best freeware applications of 2009 at PCMAG.
Maybe a case of mistaken identity? There seems to be 100's of these things around. You only have to look at how many commercial variants appear on GOTD week after week. I know very little about this subject as I don't use these apps but like you I've only seen good reports for QMC.
Ahoy, tech savvy mates. I got a tv as a wedding present that has a USB port, which is a nifty thing, but will only play divx format video. Can anyone clue me in about which freebie to convert avi, flv, mp4 etc formats to the above format? Pretty puhleeze? Many thanks.
Bert.
Format Factory will do that. I have done all of those with FF.
After install, in FF select "Video" on the left and then "All to AVI".
On the All to AVI screen, select "Output Setting".
On the Output Setting screen look for "Video Encode" and click on the "Value" to the right of it. You will see a drop down menu and one of the options will be MPEG4(DivX). Select that and press OK.
Then "Add File" of "Add Folder" to select the videos you want to convert and press OK.
Back on the main screen, press "Start".
BTW you should also be able to play XviD encoded videos as well as DivX.
Edit: Saw it worked out. Good to hear.
Ok, did a trial and it all worked smoove, just like you said. Just the way I like it. Thanks again.
Bert.
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