{"id":3788,"date":"2012-04-14T19:46:03","date_gmt":"2012-04-15T02:46:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/multimedia.cx\/eggs\/?p=3788"},"modified":"2012-04-27T23:20:22","modified_gmt":"2012-04-28T06:20:22","slug":"solving-the-xvd-puzzle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/multimedia.cx\/eggs\/solving-the-xvd-puzzle\/","title":{"rendered":"Solving The XVD Puzzle"},"content":{"rendered":"

I downloaded a multimedia file a long time ago (at least, I strongly suspected it was a multimedia file which is why I downloaded it). It went by the name of ‘lamborghini_850kbps.vg2’. I have had it in my collection for at least 7 years. I couldn’t remember where I found it. I downloaded it before it occurred to me to take notes about this sort of stuff.<\/p>\n

I found myself staring at the file again today and Googled the filename. This led me to a few Japanese sites which also contained working URLs for a few more .vg2 samples. Some other clues led me to a Russian language forum where someone had linked to a site that had Win32 codec modules that could process the files. The site was defunct but the Internet Archive Wayback Machine<\/a> kept a copy for me, as well as copies of several more .vg2 samples from a defunct Japanese site previously involved with this codec.<\/p>\n

Sometimes this internet technology works really well. But I digress.<\/em><\/p>\n

Anyway, through all this, I finally found a clue: XVD<\/strong>. and wouldn’t you know, there is already a basic page on the MultimediaWiki<\/a> describing the technology. In fact, while VG2 is a custom container, the MultimediaWiki states that the video component has a FourCC of VGMV, and there is already a file named VGMV.avi in the root V-codecs\/ samples directory, something I vow to correct (that’s a big pet peeve of mine– putting samples in the root V-codecs\/ or A-codecs\/ directories).<\/p>\n

XVD… XVD…<\/strong> XVD…<\/em> why does that sound so familiar? Oh, of course; there is a company named XVD<\/a> and they have an office in the Bay Area which I have passed on numerous occasions, like this morning:<\/p>\n


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Someone originally connected with the multimedia technology in question operates a website which contains an unofficial history of the XVD tech<\/a>. At first, I was wondering if the technology was completely defunct (and should therefore be open sourced). But if XVD’s solutions page (dated 2010)<\/a> is to be believed, the technology is still in service, and purported to be better than H.264 and VC-1: “The current generation of XVD video compression technology provides better video quality at any given data rate than standards-based codecs (H.264 or VC-1) with four times lower encoding complexity (when compared with H.264 Main Profile).”<\/em><\/p>\n

If they say so. For my part, I’m just happy that I have finally figured out what this lamborghini_850kbps.vg2 is so that I can properly catalog it on the samples site, which I have now done, along with other samples and various codecs modules<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This episode reminds me that there’s a branch office of Zygo Corporation<\/a> close to my home (though the headquarters are far, far away). The companies you see in Silicon Valley. Anyway, long-time open source multimedia hackers will no doubt recognize Zygo from the ZyGo FourCC & video codec<\/a> transported in QuickTime files that was almost decode-able using an H.263 decoder. <\/p>\n

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I may never learn what Zygo’s core competency actually is, but I will always remember their multimedia tech every time I run past their office.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Exploring the background of a custom multimedia format called XVD<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[249,251,248,247,250],"class_list":["post-3788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","tag-multimedi-archaeology","tag-silicon-valley","tag-vg2","tag-xvd","tag-zygo"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t