Author: Robert Evans

IT Director for the Purdue University College of Education

IT Director for the Purdue University College of Education

Windows Media for Macintosh

Do you have a Macintosh and need to view streaming video that is in a Windows Media format (such as a WMV video file)?  No problem!  You can use free software from Microsoft called “Windows Media Components for QuickTime”.  Below is a link where you can obtain the software, along with requirements and features…

Windows Media Components for QuickTime

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/products/windows-media-player/wmcomponents
(download and install this software on your Mac)

System requirements

– Intel or PowerPC G4 and G5
– Mac OS X version 10.4 or later
– QuickTime version 7.0 or later (for free Player)
– QuickTime Pro version 7.0 or later (for exporting movies in Player Pro, Studio, Studio Pro and Studio Pro HD)

***Playback features:

Supported audio codecs

– Windows Media Audio 9
– Windows Media Audio 9 Professional
– Windows Media Audio 9 Lossless
– ISO MPEG Layer 3 (MP3)
– Microsoft G.726
– Microsoft IMA ADPCM
– Microsoft G.711 aLaw
– Microsoft G.711 uLaw
– Microsoft ADPCM

Supported video codecs

– Windows Media Video 9
– Windows Media Video 9 Advanced (VC-1)
– Windows Media Video 8
– Windows Media Video 7
– ISO MPEG-4, versions 1.0 and 1.1
– Microsoft MPEG-4, versions 2 and 3
– Microsoft Motion JPEG 

Supported File formats

– Advanced Systems Format (ASF)
– Advanced Stream Redirector (ASX)
– Audio Video Interleaved (AVI)

Supported Network protocols

– MMS Real-Time Streaming Protocol (RTSP)
– MMS HTTP
– HTTP
– FTP

Video Editing Software and Hardware

Are you looking for a good video editing program?

Windows 7 has a free and simple video editor named “Windows Live Movie Maker” that you can download from the Microsoft web site. 

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/looking-for-windows-movie-maker

Windows Live Movie Maker is a good video editor for simple edits and creating WMV files.  It also supports AVCHD files that come from HD camcorders.  

If you’re looking for something with more features, we recommend Sony Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum.

Sony Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum
http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/moviestudiope

Sony Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum costs about $100.00 through GovConnection:

Sony Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum from GovConnection 
http://www.govconnection.com/IPA/Shop/Product/Detail.htm?sku=11548266&cac=Result

Vegas Movie Studio HD gives you much more granular control of the video editing process and has a great visual timeline for creating clips, arranging them in the order you want, and creating fades and transitions.  If you’re interested in a demo, contact Bob Evans (bob@purdue.edu).

Camcorder…

Also, if you’re looking for a good camcorder, the Education IT team has been using a Sony HDR-CX110 Handycam flash-based camcorder with a 16 GB flash card.  This has been a good camera for recording meetings and events.  It can record both HD video and lower resolution video.  The video files generated by this camera, though large, work well natively within Windows 7 and are editable within Sony Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum.

Sony HDR-CX110 Handycam
Records to SD card and supports 1080i high definition.

We use Sony Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum to render the video files to smaller wide-format H.264 MP4 files that can be placed on a web server or SharePoint site and downloaded by those who need access to the video.  See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.264/MPEG-4_AVC

One thing to keep in mind when recording in HD mode is that the files will be very large and you will need ample storage space AND you will need to significantly compress video that will be placed on a streaming server so devices with low bandwidth network connections can download it.  For most recording needs, lower resolution and lower bit rates work well.  As long as the audio is good, most people will be able to get a sense for what is happening in the picture.

Purdue: Supercomputers Slow Down to Stay Cool in Summer Heat

An article about Purdue in CHE:

A group of information-technology specialists at Purdue University has found a way to beat the heat for a university data center’s two supercomputers. This summer, when temperatures rose and the campus cooling system wasn’t doing enough to bring them down, Purdue’s IT team reined in the clusters’ computing speeds to cut down on the heat the computers were generating.

For the rest of the story…

 http://chronicle.com/blogPost/Supercomputers-Slow-Down-to/26363