Video taken by Samsung Fascinate wont play on PC

Verizon V CAST Media Manager will not play video that I have taken with my phone. I've transferred several video clips that I made with the phone to my PC using V CAST Media Manager, just as the owners manual says to do, but when I select a file and hit the "play" button all I get is audio. Nor will the video files (mp4) play using other video players that are supposed to be able to playback mp4. At some point I would like to do some video editing too but need to get them to play first. I suppose I could get converter software and convert them to another format but what? I'd rather work with the originals if possible so as to maintain the quality for editing. By the way the videos I've taken and played on the phone are awesome.

I've also contacted tech support for both Samsung and Verizon. Samsung basically says it's Verizon's problem (no shock there) because it's Verizon Media Manager software. Verizon tech support hasn't given me a satisfactory response either.

So anyone else out there with this same issue, because I really doubt if it's just my phone?

Accepted answers

HarleyDrifter

OK everyone I've had a couple days to troubleshoot my Fascinate's video playback issues, and here's what I've found:

Transferring the Fascinate's files to a PC:

First of all, I've deleted Verizon's VCast Media Manager from my PC for two reasons:

It wont play the frikkin Fascinate's video files no matter what I do.
It's a lot easier to just transfer files directly into any PC by just connecting the USB cable. When I go into "My Computer" on my Vista PC, the drive that appears after connecting the cable is called "Removable Disk (I)". You wont see any of the phones data here yet until you pick up your phone and go to: Notifications > USB Connected > Mount. Now if you go back to the PC and click "Removable Disk (I)" > DCIM > Camera you will see all of your picture and video files displayed. You can view, edit, copy, delete, mail, play, or whatever, right from here if you want. By the way I renamed the drive from "Removable Disk" to "Fascinate" just to make it easier for me to find.

Playing the Fascinate's videos on a PC:

DivX Plus Player At first I couldn't get the Fascinate's mp4 video files to playback with any of the players on my PC including Verizon's VCast. After rechecking the phone's video specs, I saw that it was DivX Certified, went to the DivX website, downloaded the free DivX Player Plus, and "bingo" my video files finally played - beautifully - and I didn't have to modify or convert anything.
Windows Media Player I went to the Microsoft website and looked up Media Player and found out that it does not support mp4 format, however it did list the audio/video formats that it can play and one of those was WMV. I then dragged one of my mp4 video files over to the desktop (created a short-cut) and RENAMED the file extension from .mp4 to .WMV, then double clicked on the new icon, and "voila" it PLAYED. Now I didn't run this thing through any conversion software converting it to another format, I just changed the file extension and fooled Windows Media Player to play it, and it did. I'll admit I got a warning message after renaming the file but I ignored it, and the file played just as nicely as it did in the DivX player.
QuickTime Player This is Apple's player and anyone who has a Mac is using this player, however, you can also get a free PC version from them which I downloaded and to make a long story short, I renamed the file extension of my video to .MOV and guess what? It played and just as well as it did on the other two players.

By the way, after posting "Fascinate's video wont playback on PC" to Verizon tech support, they actually called me on the phone attempting to resolve the issue rather then just emailing me. Unfortunately I wasn't there to take the call and when I called back I got someone else who wasn't really set up to deal with video issues but they were very friendly and professional and tried to resolve it anyway. We didn't come up with a solution for as to why the Fascinates videos wouldn't play back, and I had already gotten the DivX player to work, so we left it at that. Still, I think that was pretty good of them to call me back. So anyway, I'm going to hit "Accept as solution" even though I don't think it's the solution, but rather it's good enough for now.

Well this has been my experience, I'm no expert, I'm just an old dog trying to learn a new trick in a world full of cats.

Lance

All comments

ARossetter

HarleyDrifter wrote:
Verizon V CAST Media Manager will not play video that I have taken with my phone. I've transferred several video clips that I made with the phone to my PC using V CAST Media Manager, just as the owners manual says to do, but when I select a file and hit the "play" button all I get is audio. Nor will the video files (mp4) play using other video players that are supposed to be able to playback mp4. At some point I would like to do some video editing too but need to get them to play first. I suppose I could get converter software and convert them to another format but what? I'd rather work with the originals if possible so as to maintain the quality for editing. By the way the videos I've taken and played on the phone are awesome.

I've also contacted tech support for both Samsung and Verizon. Samsung basically says it's Verizon's problem (no shock there) because it's Verizon Media Manager software. Verizon tech support hasn't given me a satisfactory response either.

So anyone else out there with this same issue, because I really doubt if it's just my phone?

When you get an issue such as this, it typically means that you are missing the video codec required to play back the video. Windows Media Player plays these back fine for me, but you may need to manually download a codec for your specific machine. Try downloading the DivX codec pack at http://www.divx.com.

I hope this information helps!

- Andy

PJNC284

You can also try vlc media player. It should play almost anything

bigfrank69

I like using Realplayer for all my videos on computer and have on phone

HarleyDrifter

Hi Andy,

Thanks for the response. You are really onto something here and it is somewhat of a solution. After posting I went back into the user manual and found this on page 83:

Your phone’s 4-inch 800x400 Super AMOLED screen plays HD videos

up to 720p, supporting H.263, H.264, MPEG4, 3GP, 3G2 (v9),and Xvid

formats. Your phone is also DivX Certified® to play DivX® video up

to HD 720p, including premium content.

I downloaded and installed the free DivX Plus Player from the DivX website and the videos would finally play for the first time. However, I still haven't been able to get them to play in V Cast Media manager, or in Windows Media Player, Real Player or Quicktime Player.

You said that you can get them to play on Media Player? Is that the free windows version or another? I have the latest update but can't even get Media Player to open or even "see" the video files. Did you have to do something special to get them to play on it? You also said to "try downloading the DivX codec pack". If I do that, then do I need to install the codec pack into each player to get it to work?

It seems to me that the player used by V Cast Media Manager should already have this "codec pack" since that's where Verizon has us transfer our videos to.

HarleyDrifter

PJNC284:

I've heard that this player does play a good variety of different formats, but admit I haven't tried that one yet. I'd like to get the videos to play from V Cast Media Manager since that's what the phone's user manual says to use. I would also like to get them to play on some of the more mainstream players so that others I share my videos with can also play them easily.

HarleyDrifter

BigFrank:

I've tried the free RealPlayer with the latest update and even though the player is supposed to play mp4, it wont play mine. Just like V Cast Media Manager, all I get is audio.

So have you actually played video made by your Fascinate on RealPlayer and if so did you have to do anything else in order to get them to play? Also, are you able to get your videos to play in V Cast Media Manager after transferring them over to your PC?

PJNC284

The text you pasted above is the media formats the phone itself will play, not necessarily the format the phone records in. I've never used vcast media manager. It's just bloatware imo since you can easily transfer music, videos, pictures by just mounting the sd card. As far as VLC media player, I use it for pretty much everything.