Converting + Encoding Fuze compatible video on Apple Macintosh OSX and/or Linux !

My Wife and I have both been very happy Sansa Clip owners for quite some time. I recently decided that I needed an MP3 player upgrade – so that I could sychronize my ever growing iTunes library without having to “cherry pick” specific albums as I previously did with my Clip – and therefore purchased an 8Gb Sansa Fuze + 16Gb SanDisk memory card.

One of the primary reasons that I purchased the Fuze – over the newly released 8Gb Sansa Clip – was the fact that the Fuze is advertised as having the ability to "watch your favorite video clips**".**

After spending most of my free time this week fiddling with VLC, mencoder, DivX converter, ffmpeg, Quicktime, etc. – I’ve come to the conclusion that it is simply not possible to convert and/or encode videos compatible with the Sansa Fuze unless you use the proprietary Windows software provided by SanDisk (and even then it seems to be an iffy proposition at best).

-1-  Can someone from SanDisk please inform me of the exact video specifications and suggested Macintosh OSX and/or Linux video encoders/converters that will produce Sansa Fuze compatible video?

-2-  Can someone from SanDisk please inform me when the propsed Sansa Fuze firmware upgrade with relaxed video codec requirements is scheduled to be released (and is there a Beta available)?

 Thanks in advance for your time and effort…

You could try to get the trail version of Xilisoft Video Converter for Mac, and see if you can encode the Video with settings as close as possible as listen in the convert video for sansa fuze post.

I got these specifications from Sandisk awhile ago when trying to fix this same problem:

MP3 for your Audio Codec: 

–bitrate:128kbps

–no. of channels:2
–sample rate:44100khz

Video Container: Fully interleaved AVI
Codec: MPEG-4 (Simple Profile level 1 or 2)
Bitrate: Up to 512 Kbps
Resolutions: QCIF+ (224x176)
FPS: Up to 20 fps

Thanks for your replies, Symen and Pikidalto!

I downloaded the trial version of Xilisoft, but it unfortunately didn’t produce files that my Sansa Fuze found acceptable.

Also, based on what I’ve read on this forum, it seems that most folks are still using SMC (Sansa Media Converter) as a final step prior to uploading movies to their Fuze – even if they use another piece of software to perform a conversion.

My goal is to find the magic sequence of instructions that I can give a command-line encoder/converter like “ffmpeg” (available on Windows, Macintosh OSX, and Linux) that will allow easy, one-step conversions that can then be uploaded to my Sansa Fuze without the use of SMC…

If you find that magic command, please let us know. I am a hardcore Linux user - to the point where I refuse to use Linux on any of my own computers - and would like to be able to put some of my videos on my Fuze.

Can someone post a short fuze compatible video for testing purposes (preferably one that does not have any “audio sync” issues)? Other folks have posted various snippets of extracted video information discovered using Windows video tools, but I would like to compare that with some of the information from Macintosh OSX and/or Linux Video software.

I tried to locate the sample music video that comes included with the Fuze, but it seems to be mysteriously hidden and/or not visible when mounted as a USB drive on my Macintosh…

@nycasphaltsurfr wrote:
I tried to locate the sample music video that comes included with the Fuze, but it seems to be mysteriously hidden and/or not visible when mounted as a USB drive on my Macintosh…

Content loaded via MTP to the Fuze’s internal memory is not visible to a host computer when connected via MSC/UMS. And vice-versa. That’s why you couldn’t find the videos.

If you want to connect via MTP on your MAC, you could try XNJB. I don’t have a MAC, so I can’t comment on how well it works…

Can someone post a short fuze compatible video for testing purposes (preferably one that does not have any “audio sync” issues)?

I download videos from YouTube and other sites that are converted to MP4 files.  Then the Sansa Media Converter converts them to AVI files.  I’d send you one if I could.

With my full-length movies, though, there is a delay with the audio.  Can anyone help with that?

Regarding the video and audio sync problems with the Fuze, I believe I’ve got to the root of the problem.  SMC is a nice little program but is a little bit simple minded.  It likes video clips to be presented to it in more or less the format in the first place into which it will eventually convert it. The Fuze plays video at 15fps with video at 224 pixels wide, and at whatever proportional vertical ratio that works out to be for your video clip (usually about 96 pixels for a movie).  I use Handbrake to convert DVDs into this format prior to loading them into SMC.  It’s worked perfectly now ever since I made this discovery.

The only problem I have now is that I too would like to accomplish this on a Mac without having to keep switching to a PC just for movies.  Anyone made any progress in that regard? 

Message Edited by NickW on 01-03-2009 05:38 AM

Message Edited by NickW on 01-03-2009 07:02 AM

Does Xilisoft have software that will rip and convert a DVD to AVI in one step, like they do for iPods (MPEG 4?) ?

If not, someone should send them a link to this board–they could see what a great market they would have, just from Fuze users!