To studyaboutthe Audio\Videofile formats

Audio file formats:

AIFF Audio Interchange File Format : is one of the most common audio file formats used on both Macintosh and Windows. It is cross-platform compatible, and most CD writers can accept AIFF files when writing a Red Book audio CD. WAVWave - Windows native audio format. AU Sun audio format - Native format on Sun/UNIX systems, and common on the Internet.Handles 8 - and 16-bit uncompressed sound, and Law encoding. MP3 MPEG-1 Audio Layer-3 format offers a very high rate of compression for audio files (about a 12:1 ratio) while preserving the original level of sound quality to the ear. Because of its high quality at small size, mp3 has exploded in popularity, and many sites offer mp3 files for download (most are offering these files in violation of copyright). Digital audio is typically created by taking 44,100 16-bit samples per second (Hz) of the analog audio signal, this means that one second of CD-quality sound requires 1.4 million bits (about 176K bytes) of data. Using a knowledge of how people actually perceive sound, the developers of MP3 devised a compression algorithm that reduces data about sound that most listeners cannot perceive. MP3 is currently the most powerful algorithm in a series of audio encoding standards developed under the sponsorship of the Motion Picture Experts Group (MPEG) and formalized by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). SD2 Sound Designer II - Native format of DigiDesigns Sound Designer pro audio software. Also used natively by Macromedia DECK II and many others. SND Sound Resource file - Apple-standard format for sound file resources dating back to the earliest Macs. Not commonly used these days. MOV QuickTime movie file - Audio-only QuickTime files are sometimes useful. SE SoundEdit - an 8-bit file format native to older versions of SoundEdit. Contains sound data in the data fork, and loopback location, selection (cursor) location, waveform color, labels, recorded pitch setting, and playback pitch setting in the resource fork. SE16 SoundEdit 16 - Native format of SoundEdit 16, includes tracks, cue points, spectral data, and optionally System 7 information, as well as all the information in the original SoundEdit format. System 7 Sound - a format introduced in version 7 of the MacOS, allowing desktop double-click playback.

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Free and open file formats

wave standard audio file container format used mainly in Windows PCs. Commonly used for storing uncompressed (PCM), CD-quality sound files, which means that they can be large in sizearound 10 MB per minute. Wave files can also contain data encoded with a variety of (lossy) codecs to reduce the file size (for example the GSM or mp3 codecs). Wav files use a RIFF structure. ogg a free, open source container format supporting a variety of codecs, the most popular of which is the audio codec Vorbis. Vorbis offers compression similar to MP3 but is less popular. mpc - Musepack or MPC (formerly known as MPEGplus, MPEG+ or MP+) is an open source lossy audio codec, specifically optimized for transparent compression of stereo audio at bitrates of 160180 kbit/s. flac Free Lossless Audio Codec, a lossless compression codec. TTA - The True Audio, real-time lossless audio codec. aiff standard audio file format used by Apple. It could be considered the Apple equivalent of wav. raw a raw file can contain audio in any codec but is usually used with PCM audio data. It is rarely used except for technical tests. au the standard audio file format used by Sun, Unix and Java. The audio in au files can be PCM or compressed with the -law, a-law or G729 codecs.

Open file formats

gsm designed for telephony use in Europe, gsm is a very practical format for telephone quality voice. It makes a good compromise between file size and quality. Note that wav files can also be encoded with the gsm codec. dct A variable codec format designed for dictation. It has dictation header information and can be encrypted (often required by medical confidentiality laws). vox the vox format most commonly uses the Dialogic ADPCM (Adaptive Differential Pulse Code Modulation) codec. Similar to other ADPCM formats, it compresses to 4-bits. Vox format files are similar to wave files except that the vox files contain no information about the file itself so the codec sample rate and number of channels must first be specified in order to play a vox file. mmf - a Samsung audio format that is used in ringtones.

Proprietary formats

mp3 MPEG Layer-3 format is the most popular format for downloading and storing music. By eliminating portions of the audio file that are less audible, mp3 files are compressed to roughly one-tenth the size of an equivalent PCM file sacrificing quality. aac the Advanced Audio Coding format is based on the MPEG2 and MPEG4 standards. aac files are usually ADTS or ADIF containers.

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mp4 or m4a MPEG-4 audio most often AAC but sometimes MP2/MP3, MPEG-4 SLS, CELP, HVXC and other audio object types defined in MPEG-4 Audio wma the popular Windows Media Audio format owned by Microsoft. Designed with Digital Rights Management (DRM) abilities for copy protection. atrac (.wav) the older style Sony ATRAC format. It always has a .wav file extension. To open these files simply install the ATRAC3 drivers. ra & rm a Real Audio format designed for streaming audio over the Internet. The .ra format allows files to be stored in a self-contained fashion on a computer, with all of the audio data contained inside the file itself. ram a text file that contains a link to the Internet address where the Real Audio file is stored. The .ram file contains no audio data itself. dss Digital Speech Standard files are an Olympus proprietary format. It is a fairly old and poor codec. Gsm or mp3 are generally preferred where the recorder allows. It allows additional data to be held in the file header. msv a Sony proprietary format for Memory Stick compressed voice files. dvf a Sony proprietary format for compressed voice files; commonly used by Sony dictation recorders. IVS A proprietary version with Digital Rights Management developed by 3D Solar UK Ltd for use in music downloaded from their Tronme Music Store and interactive music and video player. m4p A proprietary version of AAC in MP4 with Digital Rights Management developed by Apple for use in music downloaded from their iTunes Music Store. iklax An iKlax Media proprietary format, the iKlax format is a multi-track digital audio format allowing various actions on musical data, for instance on mixing and volumes arrangements. mxp4 a Musinaut proprietary format allowing play of different versions (or skins) of the same song. It allows various interactivity scenarios between the artist and the end user. 3gp - multimedia container format can contain proprietary formats as AMR, AMR-WB or AMR-WB+, but also some open formats amr - AMR-NB audio, used primarily for speech awb - AMR-WB audio, used primarily for speech, same as the ITU-T's G.722.2 specification.

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Video File Formats

The following is a brief explanation of the different video file formats found commonly online: Most videos files have at least two types of file formats. First there is the container, and then the codec which is used inside the container. The container is what describes the whole structure of the file, and specifies which codecs are being used. The following is a list of some of the more common types of container formats: Flash Video Format (.flv) Because of the cross-platform availability of Flash video players, the Flash video format has become increasingly popular. Flash video is playable within Flash movies files, which are supported by practically every browser on every platform. Flash video is compact, using compression from On2, and supports both progressive and streaming downloads. AVI Format (.avi) The AVI format, which stands for audio video interleave, was developed by Microsoft. It stores data that can be encoded in a number of different codecs and can contain both audio and video data. The AVI format usually uses less compression than some similar formats and is a very popular format amongst internet users. AVI files most commonly contain M-JPEG, or DivX codecs, but can also contain almost any format. The AVI format is supported by almost all computers using Windows, and can be played on various players. Some of the most common players that support the avi format are:

Apple QuickTime Player (windows & Mac) Microsoft Windows Media Player (Windows & Mac) VideoLAN VLC media player (Windows & Mac) Nullsoft Winamp

Quicktime Format (.mov) The QuickTime format was developed by Apple and is a very common one. It is often used on the internet, and for saving movie and video files. The format contains one or more tracks storing video, audio, text or effects. . It is compatible with both Mac and Windows platforms, and can be played on an Apple Quicktime player.

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MP4 Format (.mp4) This format is mostly used to store audio and visual streams online, most commonly those defined by MPEG. It Expands MPEG-1 to support video/audio "objects", 3D content, low bit rate encoding and support for Digital Rights Management. The MPEG-4 video format uses separate compression for audio and video tracks; video is compressed with MPEG-4 video encoding; audio is compressed using AAC compression, the same type of audio compression used in .AAC files. The mp4 can most commonly be played on the Apple QuickTime Player or other movie players. Devices that play p4 are also known as mp4 players. Mpg Format (.mpg) Common video format standardized by the Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG); typically incorporates MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 audio and video compression; often used for creating downloadable movies. It can be played using Apple QuickTime Player or Microsoft Windows Media Player. Windows Media Video Format (.wmv) WMV format, short for Windows Media Video was developed by Microsoft. It was originally designed for internet streaming applications, and can now cater to more specialized content. Windows Media is a common format on the Internet, but Windows Media movies cannot be played on non-Windows computer without an extra (free) component installed. Some later Windows Media movies cannot play at all on nonWindows computers because no player is available. Videos stored in the Windows Media format have the extension .wmv. 3GP File Extension (.3gp) The 3gp format is both an audio and video format that was designed as a multimedia format for transmitting audio and video files between 3G cell phones and the internet. It is most commonly used to capture video from your cell phone and place it online. This format supports both Mac and windows applications and can be commonly played in the following:

Apple QuickTime Player RealNetworks RealPlayer VideoLAN VLC media player MPlayer MIKSOFT Mobile 3GP Converter (Windows)

Advances Streaming Format (.asf) ASF is a subset of the wmv format and was developed by Microsoft. It is intended for streaming and is used to support playback from digital media and HTTP servers, and to support storage devices such as hard disks. It can be compressed using a variety of video codecs.

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The most common files types that are contained within an ASF file are Windows Media Audio, and Windows Media video. Real Media Format (.rm) RealMedia is a format which was created my RealNetworks. It contains both audio and video data and typically used for streaming media files over the internet. Realmedia can play on a wide variety of media players for both Mac and Windows platforms. The realplayer is the most compatible. Flash Movie Format (.swf ) The Flash movie format was developed my Macromedia. This format can include text, graphics and animation. In order to play in Web Browsers, they must have the Flash Plug-In Installed. The flash plug in comes preinstalled in the latest version of many popular Web Browsers. The RealVideo Format The RealVideo format was developed for the Internet by Real Media. The format is used for streaming of video at low bandwidths. This sometimes causes the quality of the videos to be reduced. Video Files .3g2 .3gp .asf .asx .avi .flv .mov .mp4 .mpg .rm .swf .vob .wmv 3GPP2 Multimedia File 3GPP Multimedia File Advanced Systems Format File Microsoft ASF Redirector File Audio Video Interleave File Flash Video File Apple QuickTime Movie MPEG-4 Video File MPEG Video File Real Media File Flash Movie DVD Video Object File Windows Media Video File

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