MTS files are typically created by HD camcorders such as those from Panasonic and Sony which save videos out in the AVCHD (Advanced Video Coding High Definition) format, in either 1080i or 720p resolutions. These files are common on the Sony HDR-SR camcorder series and tend to use the MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 standard to encode video and audio. MTS files are also found on many Blu-ray Discs, but most commercially produced titles are encrypted.

You can now convert MTS files into any one of the following formats:

• 3gp – 3GPP Multimedia File
• 3g2 – 3GPP2 Multimedia File
• aac – Advanced Audio Coding File
• ac3 – AC3 Audio File
• avi – Windows video file
• flac – Free Lossless Audio Codec
• flv – Flash video
• gif – Compuserve graphics interchange
• iPad – MPEG-4 (H264) Video File
• iPhone – MPEG-4 (H264) Video File
• iPod – MPEG-4 Video File
• mp3 – Compressed audio file
• mov – Apple QuickTime Movie
• mp4 – MPEG-4 Video File
• mpg – Moving Picture Experts Group File
• ogg – Ogg Vorbis Compressed Audio File
• wav – Windows audio file
• webm – Multimedia Container Format
• wmv – Windows Media Video

Head over to Zamzar to convert your MTS file today !

Happy converting,
The Zamzar Team.

3GA is a file format developed by the 3GPP organisation (Third Generation Partnership Project) that is supported by variety of mobile phone producers including Samsung, Nokia and Android phones. It is used as the default recording format for audio in popular mobile phones such as the Samsung Galaxy S2/S3/S4 and contains audio data in a variety of different codecs,such as AMR-WB+, AMR-NB, AMR-WB, AAC-LC, HE-AAC v1/ and HE-AAC v2.

See the list of supported conversions that we now support from the 3GA file format below:

• aac – Advanced Audio Coding File
• ac3 – AC3 Audio File
• flac – Free Lossless Audio Codec
• m4a – Compressed Video File
• mp3 – Compressed audio file
• mp4 – MPEG-4 Video File
• ogg – Ogg Vorbis Compressed Audio File
• wav – Windows audio file
• wma – Windows media file

We hope this new feature will help all of you who have been stuck looking for a way to convert your 3GA files into a different audio format.

Don’t take our word for it – Go try it out for yourself today !

Happy converting,
The Zamzar Team.

Introduction

With iOS devices becoming increasingly popular and their cameras capable of recording HD video, more of us are capturing important life moments on our iPhones and iPads. But how can you ensure these memories are not lost, and that you can easily share them with friends and family ? One option is to save your photos and videos to DVD.

This guide will step you through the simple process of converting and transferring your video from your iOS device to a DVD disc. We will use Zamzar to upload and convert your video, and free iDVD software from Mac OSX to burn the files to DVD.

1 – Convert your video

Go to http://www.zamzar.com your iPad or iPhone and when prompted select ‘Choose Existing’ to grab a video from your photo library.

NOTE: Your device must be running a minimum of iOS 6 for Zamzar to be able to detect these files correctly.

Now choose your video file:

In the drop down list in “Step 2″ select MP4 as your target format. Then enter your email address in “Step 3″ and click “Convert”. Please be aware that if you are not connected to WiFi your network provider may charge you for the data used in uploading the file. You will receive an email from Zamzar when your converted file is ready to be downloaded.

2 – Download your file

From your computer, open the email from Zamzar and download your converted file:

Ensure that you save the file in your ‘Movies’ folder so that iDVD will be able to find it:

3 – Open your video in iDVD

Go to the ‘Applications’ menu in Finder and select iDVD:

Once open choose ‘Create a New Project’ and give it a meaningful name. Make sure to select Widescreen as the aspect ratio (for more on aspect ratio see the useful links at the end of the article) as you will need this to be able to make use of the most recent themes.

4 – Personalise your DVD

The iDVD menu will then appear. Scroll through the Themes to find one that suits your movie. In this example the ‘Center Stage’ theme has been selected.

Note the ‘Drop Zone 1’ that has appeared in the screenshot above. This allows you to personalise the DVD menu. You can add video or still images to this section. We will add a photo by clicking on the ‘Media’ button towards the bottom right and then choosing ‘Photos’ from the menu that appears. Browse to an image and then drag and drop into the ‘Drop Zone 1’ area:

5 – Add your video

Next click on the ‘+’ symbol in the bottom left of the screen, and then choose ‘Add Movie’:

A box will then appear with the text ‘Add Movie Here’ on the main window and the movies sub menu will automatically appear in the right hand side. Browse to your movie and then drag and drop onto the button.

The name will automatically change to the file name of your movie. You can amend this to something more suitable. This text will then be a button within your DVD menu that you can select when playing your DVD, just like a professional movie:

By clicking on the play icon in the bottom menu you can preview how your DVD will play. You can also try clicking the button you have created:

6 – Burn your DVD

Once you are happy with your movie you can now burn it to DVD. First insert the blank DVD into the drive. Then click on the icon next to the preview icon to burn the DVD.

The burning process should begin automatically. The time it takes to burn the DVD will depend on the size of the movie content, and the speed of your DVD drive

Once complete insert your DVD into a DVD player and you enjoy watching your movie !

Happy Converting (and burning) !
The Zamzar Team.

Video to MP4 – The Background

MP4 files are multimedia files that can store Video, Audio and further data depending on the content. Apple use the MP4 container format for their iPhone, iPad, iPod through iTunes and Sony has embraced it for their PSP and PS3 devices propelling it’s popularity.

Video to MP4 – How can it be played ?

MP4 files can be played through a number of programs – the most common program associated with playing the MP4 file is the Quicktime player, however it can also be played through Apple’s iTunes and VideoLAN’s VLC Media Player.

Video to MP4 - If I can’t open it, how can I convert it ?

This is where we here at Zamzar come in Zamzar is an online file conversion site that doesn’t require you to download any software in order to convert your MP4 files. Follow these steps to convert your MP4 file into a format that you can open on the machine/device that you are on :

Video to MP4 – Convert your file – Step One

Browse for your file on your local computer and select / drag that file across onto the Zamzar site.

Video to MP4 – Convert your file – Step Two

Select the file format / device that you are looking to convert to.

Video to MP4 – Convert your file – Step Three

Enter your email address – this is where Zamzar will send the link for you to download your converted file.

Video to MP4 – Convert your file – Step Four

Click the button confirming you are happy for Zamzar to convert your file. You will then receive an email with a link to your converted file.

Video to MP4 – Retrieve your file – Step Five

Open the link to your file and select the download button to download your converted file.

Video to MP4 – Open the file – Step Six

You should now be in a position to open your converted file in your media player of choice.

Hopefully this has proved useful in understanding how to convert your video files to MP4. Head across to Zamzar now to start converting.

Happy Converting !
The Zamzar Team.

The Guardian Newspaper’s unsearchable PDFs …

Last Friday (22nd February 2012) the Guardian newspaper found itself in just such an unenviable position after the BBC released a slew of PDF files (relating to an independent review of the BBC’s handling of the Jimmy Saville scandal) containing scanned, un-searchable text. Not exactly the most helpful format for journalists looking to make use of the files in a hurry !

Optical Character Recognition & Zamzar to the rescue

Fortunately Zamzar was able to step in and help – We used specialist OCR (Optical Character Recognition) technology to analyse the 30+ PDF files and produce readable, searchable text.

You can read more about our assistance in a story by the Guardian’s technology editor Charles Arthur : “BBC Pollard inquiry: why is it so hard to search the documents?“

OCR (Optical Character Recognition) technology has a reputation for being costly and difficult to use, so we are pleased to say that we’re currently working hard to make it available on the main Zamzar site so that we can help to liberate more documents ! Do let us know if this might be of interest to you.

Happy Converting !
The Zamzar Team.

This means you can now convert your files regardless of whether they are named in Russian or Hebrew, Greek or Swedish … and pretty much any other language you can think of (Esperanto anyone ?).

We hope this helps make converting your files even easier

     Convertissez vos fichiers maintenant – en ligne et gratuit!
     Konvertera dina filer nu – online och gratis!
     Konvertieren Sie Ihre Dateien jetzt – online und kostenlos!
     Convertire i file ora – online e gratis!
     Convierte tus archivos ahora – en línea y gratis!
     Преобразование файлов теперь – онлайн и бесплатно!
     แปลงไฟล์ของคุณตอนนี้ – ออนไลน์และฟรี!
     המר קבצים שלך עכשיו – האינטרנט ובחינם!
     Μετατρέψτε τα αρχεία σας τώρα – σε απευθείας σύνδεση και δωρεάν!
     تحويل الملفات الآن – على الانترنت ومجانا!
     今あなたのファイルを変換する – オンラインで無料！
     转换您的文件 – 在线免费 !

Go convert your file now !
The Zamzar Team.

Drag & Drop Your Files !

 
We’ve upgraded our upload tool so that you can now drag & drop multiple files into the main window rather than having to select them individually – this is especially handy if you have lots of files to convert at once.

Multiple File Select

 
You can still use the file picker tool if you want but we’ve upgraded that too, so that you can select multiple files there as well (using ⌘ on Mac, or shift on Windows):

Faster Conversions

 
We’ve also improved our conversion process to give you even faster conversions – When you upload multiple files we now start converting as soon as each file has uploaded (as the other files upload in the background). We report the status of these conversions back to you in the progress column of the status window:

Why not try out the shiny new upload & conversion process today ?

Happy Converting !
The Zamzar Team.

This is a kick in the face for the many millions of people still using and relying on older versions of Microsoft Office to prepare and view their documents, especially in corporate and government circles where employees can be stuck 2 or 3 revisions behind the latest software. Some might argue that it’s nothing more than a cynical ploy by Google to drive traffic back to their Apps products by forcing users to view documents in Google’s walled garden, rather than on a local computer. Either way it’s the user that gets hurt. What’s worse is that they have given users just five days notice.

We’re pleased to say that Zamzar can help you out – If you are a Google Apps user who needs to share a file in an older Microsoft office format we’ll convert your file for you for free (up to 100MB in size) – Just follow these 2 simple steps:

• Export your document from Google Apps as a .docx, .xlsx or .pptx file
• Head over to Zamzar, upload your file for conversion and select .doc, .xls or .ppt as the output format

It’s that simple !

As an added benefit if you signup for any of our premium accounts we’ll give you a 50% discount on your first month’s payment – Just use the promo code GOOGLE_REFUGEE on our signup page

Happy Google Apps Converting !
The Zamzar Team.

The EFF is renowned on the web for taking on the kind of David v Goliath cases that others shy away from – Since they were founded in 1990 the EFF has represented ordinary people against the likes of the U.S Department of Justice, MGM, Sony BMG and Apple. They fight on behalf of the average person to protect the freedom which we have grown accustomed to on the Internet.

We’re no strangers to online bullies here at Zamzar, having recently been threatened with legal action by Google and we are proud to be able to help the EFF continue the fight against big government and overzealous corporations.

The EFF is a non-profit organization and depends entirely on public support to continue successfully defending your digital rights. If you want to join us in helping why not donate to the EFF today ?

The Internet stands for freedom – let’s keep it that way.

Thanks,
The Zamzar Team.

People want their formats to be in a more standard form with the ability to play them on a multitude of devices – with this new enhancement you can now play the TS file on your iPhone, iPad, PC or Mac – enjoy !

See the list of supported conversions that we now support from TS below :

• 3gp – 3GPP Multimedia File
• 3g2 – 3GPP2 Multimedia File
• aac – Advanced Audio Coding File
• ac3 – AC3 Audio File
• avi – Windows video file
• flac – Free Lossless Audio Codec
• flv – Flash video
• gif – Compuserve graphics interchange
• iPad – MPEG-4 (H264) Video File
• iPhone – MPEG-4 (H264) Video File
• iPod – MPEG-4 Video File
• mp3 – Compressed audio file
• mov – Apple QuickTime Movie
• mp4 – MPEG-4 Video File
• mpg – Moving Picture Experts Group File
• ogg – Ogg Vorbis Compressed Audio File
• wav – Windows audio file
• webm – Multimedia Container Format
• wmv – Windows Media Video

We hope this new feature will help all of you who have been stuck looking for a way to convert your TS files into both video and audio.

Don’t take our word for it – Go try it out for yourself today !

Happy converting,
The Zamzar Team.