i used pinnacle mediacenter 4.1 to record a tv broadcast using the divx 6.6 codec (using divx portable profile in MC4.1). usually the recordings, albeit shorter timewise work fine, but right at the end of this particular recording process i was watching a dvd, it was paused and using very little processing power at the time the computer was saving the recorded file. however something must have crashed because when i tried accessing the file, i kept getting prompted that the recorded file is currently in use. so i rebooted the computer and have been trying to open it since but no luck. “Windows Media Player encountered a problem while playing the file. For additional assistance, click Web Help." i only need to access a part of this file since there was going to be a 30 min or 1hr show on at some point during those 12 hours but since i didn’t know what time i recorded the whole stretch and figured i’d edit out the part i needed later. i tried using dr divx (both 1.0.6 and 2.0) on another computer to encode the file but both versions rejected it. gspot states: “Note: 4.02 GB unneeded bytes at end of file AVI v1.0” i know that pinnacle mediacenter saves data to the hard disk as it records the live broadcast (the file grows as time passes during recording) so that means my show is probably saved and if anything is corrupt, it’s probably toward the end of the file which i don’t need anyways. so how can i recover some of the data in this file? any assistance would be most appreciated. many thanks in advance.
Have you tried loading it into VirtualDub. VirtualDub, look for 'stable' download. http://virtualdub.sourceforge.net/
thank you very much attar, i'm relieved to say the video is there however without audio...this is the error i get in virtualdub i'm using vista ultimate so what audio codec do i require to get this to playback? thanks for your help.
Did GSpot indicate the audio type and codec required? When loaded in Virtualdub: File > File Information, was there any indication at all? AC3?? This such a huge file, maybe better selecting a short section to save and work with that.
thanks attar. no there aren't any indications of any information on the audio side, however i already have AC3 and coreavc 1.1 installed and can playback matroska and wmv 1080HD clips without any problems. it seems that the audio isn't the only issue, the bar that counts the frames at the bottom of virtualdub suggests that 16h31m of video has been recorded however the channel also has the time on it which states that the recording started around 12:00pm = Frame 0 (0:00:00.000)and ended around 9:45pm = Frame 891515 (16:31:01.000). to make matters worse i think the program i wanted to record came on after 9:45pm, however i'd like to get this file working properly to be certain it didn't skip anything as i used the arrow keys to fast forward through the file in virtualdub. i still suspect that the last 2h15m is somewhere in the file...but inaccessible due to this sync issue. if anything is corrupt it should only be the last 30 mins or so.
VirtualDub did say that no decompressor could be found (to play it?) Here's a decompressor (it can be uninstalled from the Control Panel) which will play AC3 in VirtualDub. I'm not sure if what's installed just now is a decompressor or a decoder for Dolby. http://www.free-codecs.com/download/AC-3_ACM_Decompressor.htm
thank you attar, i should have pointed out the error i mentioned above is from the virtualdub log file. when i try opening the file in virtualdub, i still get the same message, with the exception that only the yellow bullet points are listed, this is the exact error message. i'm still getting this message after installing the AC3 codec you provided above, it doesn't appear to have had any affect. your thoughts? again, many thanks for your help attar, it's much appreciated.
The VirtualDub forum is where the creator of the program hangs out. It's the best chance of getting anything from that file. http://forums.virtualdub.org/index.php?s=2b4d7671d18d2f18169aad1ad46e24fc
