Can someone tell me what the file type AVI means.
Why when I download an AVI file will it not play on my PC.
If I do download it can I burn it onto DVD for playback thru a dvd player, also what is the best file type to download video to burn to dvd

AVI stands for Audio Video Interleave. It is a special case
of the RIFF (Resource Interchange File Format). AVI is defined by
Microsoft. AVI is the most common format for audio/video data on the
PC. AVI is an example of a de facto (by fact) standard.

Personally I would recommend VLC for playback since it has in-built codecs. But you can also get avi codecs to play in other players. See CODECs list and alternate players for Movies

Nero & Roxio burner programs have the ability to convert & burn most (but not all) avi types. And yes, avi is simply like the outer shell, what's inside can vary greatly.

Thanks for the feedback.

Are you saying that even though I can't playback AVI files on my PC, if I have nero (which I do) I can burn them and then watch on a dvd player. I have quite a view MPEG videos but can't seem to burn these to disc.

Thanks for your help

If you have Nero then you'll need the MPeg2 codec that comes with the newer versions of Nero. With that you should be able to burn dvd's. Likewise Nero will convert the AVI files over to MPeg2 which is the format required for DVD's. In the link I gave you there's also another program listed there (TMPG encoder) you can use to burn or prepare videos for burning to dvd. It is a shareware program however so you can only use it for a period of time before you'd need to register it. For earlier versions of Nero I think you need to purchase the MPeg2 codec separately from their site.

As for playback, QuickTime on its own cannot view all formats. You'd need to get the DivX codecs/plug-ins. At least with VLC all the codecs are built into the player itself.

Hi LOTR

I'm totally new to this and it all seems a bit technical, thanks for sticking with me thru this difficult time. Anyway, on the top of the codecs info link you sent me there is an advert for AVS media http://www.avsmedia.com/VideoConverter/index.aspx They have a programme that will convert file types, is this the sort of thing I should get and would you recommend them.

Thanks

lol the advertising on the forum we have little control over (Google ads - they show depending on what content is in each thread.) There's similar ads on this page also. I have no idea how good those converters are. I could not recommend something I don't know about. They may well do the job but the question is do they do it well without any noticeable loss of quality? Are there better ones out there or cheaper for same quality, etc.?

I'd recommend you visit http://www.videohelp.com/ which has lists & reviews of good converters (some free), & it also has a forum section. Ask the experts in this area! (I do my conversions on mac, not windows so I'm not very knowledgable about the best windows alternatives.)