>> Take a stroll to this site
>>
>> http://www.videohelp.com/
> 
> I'll do that...

Much confusion ensures...

Between ffmpeg, mencoder, libavcodec, ffdshow and the myriad of 
frontends available, I'm left wondering which way is up. So many bits of 
software, all seperate, yet all interrelated somehow. Really confusing!

Mind you, trying to figure out video codecs is no easier. At least 
Xiph.org gives their codecs *names*. Others seem to think it's 
acceptable to just assign a code number to each standard they issue. The 
result is a seemingly never-ending stream of codes, symbols and TLAs 
that seems almost indecipherable.

Reading Wikipedia we find that MPEG-4 "is just a container format", but 
at the same time "DivX and XviD are different implementations of the 
MPEG-4 codec". And as if that wasn't enough, it seems that DivX and XviD 
are supposedly different, and yet supposedly they're also the same.

I'm *so* glad I don't need to actually comprehend this stuff... After 
all, I'm only trying to edit a DVD, so I only need to worry about MPEG2.

The site did point out something interesting though: Apparently there's 
an altered version of VirtualDub that supposedly comprehends MPEG2. If I 
can persuade it to transcode the stuff to some uncompressed format then 
I'll be able to edit it. I can then recompress it before uploading. 
(Ordinarily I'd try to avoid recompressing, but since the video data is 
pretty suboptimal to begin with... how bad can it be?)

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