Cannot download or view .avi file correctly

Hello everyone,

The scenario is:
I send to a Mac user a link in an email that provides access to a server source which serves the content of a file. The file is an .avi file (movie) We do not provide the file itself in this link - just access to the server.

Mac users are complaining that they are unable to view the AVI movie and some say they are unable to download the AVI movie but from our site admin we know that the file was indeed downloaded.

The question is: What directions can we explain to users so they successfully download from our link and view the AVI movie?


Now to get ahead of this we already provide these basic instructions:
Mac users: Hold the control key and left click on one of the links above using your mouse pad then choose Download link file or right click one of the links above with your external mouse and choose download link file to successfully download this screener. Once the file downloads choose a program that plays .AVI files to view this screener.

Aparrently this is not enough....
Thanks in advance for the help.

Regards,

John

Watching a .avi movie on a mac implies you can decode the movie / have the plugs to view it.

You can watch movies using VLC http://www.videolan.org/. to view the movie in the browser directly (no downloading), i use Perian http://perian.org/.

Both solutions applied at the Mac (OS) level, not on your hosting side.

hope this helps.

Thanks for this advice. I just found Perian today. May I ask another question? I see how it is possible to download Perian to a laptop. How can I download this program to an iPad??? On the page it says: Installation: Open the disk image and double click the Perian.prefPane icon.

Not sure how to do this.

Thanks again

John

Ah - on iPad its a different story.

.avi encoded files can rely on serveral codecs, like Divx/Xvid or Motion JPEG.
iPhones / iPads can play some of them.

The others need to be converted.
One tool that can handle it: Air Video

cheers

special thanks to this informative tutorial and powerful tool! it is really easy to use and I will recommend it to my friends!
Anyone who could post more detailed tips or tracks related to ipad on mac! I’m not proficient at all the functions of my new iPad, so I need! thanks! before this, I always use best converter for ipad , mac DVD to ipad converter to resolve some of incompatibility issue, but it's too hard for me to master! I need a video conversion software that could easily convert DVD or other video into MP4 that ipad accepts.

You can convert many Video Formats into an mp4-file (.m4v) using Handbrake http://handbrake.fr/. If this does not yet work on iPad (i did not test it) you can convert it using QuickTime to make it work.

hope that helps.