I am thinking about purchasing this program to convert video files and play them on my ipod. I tried the FREEWARE Videora iPod converter but it doesnt work right on my machine for some odd reason. So should I buy this program or not. What are your alls opinions about this program, or other program suggestions. this is the program http://imtoo.com/ipod-movie-converter.html. I currently use AnyDVD+CloneDVD Mobile to convert DVDS.
There are other freeware solutions for mp4 encoding that you could try first such as MeGUI. In my experience most ipod converter apps use libavcodec/format and other free libs anyway. MeGUI can encode AVC via x264 or MPEG-4 via XviD or libavcodec. For audio it uses Nero's free encoder which is probably better quality than what Imtoo is using unless they licensed an encoder instead of using faac.
From a header of an encoded file "libfaac 1.24". The liavcodec/format dll's contain "Copyright (C) 2004-2005 Xilisoft Corp." instead of Copyleft ffmpeg or something like that. It isn't their (Xilisoft) work. If they don't care about GPL/LGPL, then I doubt very much that they are paying MPEG-4 license fees. Anyway, the fact is that they are using faac. I'm sure they would try an use Nero or Coding Technologies' encoder if they thought they could get away with it, because the fact is that faac is nowhere near as good as either. So what are my opions on it? Crap. Not worth 1 cent.