[flyhigh37]

Ok, so to make a long story short, I am about to print 500 CD's of a multimedia program I have been making over the past year. Distribution had to happen within 2 weeks, so I am in a tight time schedule. my question is this: The program we have made is really just a huge flash presentation (450megs worth). Using a sketchy 3rd party program called FlashJester, we have imported .avi movies into this program (yes, it is for windows, a fact I am very displeased with). I have made all of these videos on my mac at home. Then using quicktime I exported them as .avi, using the compressor "cinepak". Now when I played these movies on the pc's they played fine, no problem about a missing decompressor or anything. however, is there any chance that some Joe Shmow who pops this into his computer will be unable to watch the video due to a lack of the proper decompressors??? In previous years that this cdd has been made, users have been guided through a self install, to place the necessary codecs onto their pc. Will this be necesary with cinepak, especially since as of now they have been playing in windows media player just fine?? Or is this codec a standard of windows media player (and I can therefore assume that all users will have the media player). I would hate to burn all of these disks, just to find out we left something as simple as that out. Thank you all for the suggestions.
-flyhigh

[C-Eye]

There's always going to be someone out there who won't be able to view your demo. I would assume if it works fine on Windows 95 with that release's Media Player, it should work well for most.

I tried to search Microsoft's Windows Media site for info on supported codecs to no avail, but I assume any AVI that QuickTime outputs should work. There are some discussion forums for Windows Media at http://msdn.microsoft.com/windowsmedia/default.asp

My advice is that you test your CD on as many platforms and operating systems as possible, and include a 'Read Me' that lists minimum system requirements.

Good luck!

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[jcarr]

I'd include a the full installers for QuickTime (Mac OS and Windoze) on the CD. Download them here.

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I'm cookoo for Cocoa Apps!

[flyhigh37]

ok, thank you both for your responses. follow up question. If I install the standalone quicktime player by putting it onto all of the cd's I am making, is that just going to install the nessesary codec for the movie to play (since we aren't using quicktime itself to play these movies). Also, i made a stop at cinepak.com and am slightly confused, because they sell the "Windows cinepak codec" for 120 some dollars?? what is the difference?? thanks again
-flyhigh

[neoguri]

they sell the "Windows cinepak codec" for 120 some dollars?? what is the difference??

Sorenson does the same- that is: sell encoding software with which you have more control over the encoding possibilities. So you can make better quality quicktimes.
I agree with c-eye: just test it as much as possible. If it works on a clean install of w95 it'll probably work on all win versions. Installing QT on the pc won't make a difference imo.
Good luck...

[supernature]

Cinepak has been around for a long time now. It's hard to imagine someone having a computer that can't decode Cinepak. But then again, Windows didn't have much multimedia when it first came out. I'd say, just have Windows 95 as a minimum requirement, and have some sort of Windows media player installed.

[flyhigh37]

ok thank you all again for you responses. Although from my research I tend to agree with you all, I have been advised by previous year's editors that I really should include the codec for cinepak on the cd, to ensure complete compatability. Fine. So then I take a walk over to apple.com and get completely LOST looking for it. Does anyone know where I may find the windows self contained cinepak codec installer?????? Thanks!!