I love being able to play video files in Front Row while sitting on my couch using the Apple remote, it's the closest thing I have to Apple TV. The only problem is that because Front Row only plays files that Quicktime is capable of, it's not always possible to play the video files I have stored on my computer as many of them are DivX. But there is of course a solution.
DivX for Mac is a codec that allows quicktime to play any DivX file, and thus allows Front Row to do the same. All you have to do is download the codec from www.divx.com and install it. Once I did this I was able to play DivX files using quicktime, I had to restart my computer before it worked in Front Row so don't panic if it's not working for you straight away.
You still won't be able to import videos into iTunes so if you want to access video files in Front Row you will have to put them into your Movie folder.
Hopefully this will help make Front Row a more useful program for you, it sure has for me.
Apr 25, 2008, 10:54:00 PM
Are you able to stream .avi and .wmv files encoded with divx in Front Row or does it only work with .mp4 files encoded with divx? Have you ever tried to stream AC3 encoded files? Did you get any sound? Thanks.
May 12, 2008, 4:43:00 AM
I have played .avi files and they worked fine. Not sure about anything else though. I don't see any reason why it wouldn't work. I did have to restart my Mac to get it to work the first time but other than that it has been great!
May 18, 2008, 4:01:00 PM
Sorry - I know your not IT support. However, you seem like you know this topic.
I've just installed the Xvid and DivX codecs for QuickTime and now the thumbnail previews are showing up in Front Row but when I actually play the movies in Front Row they don't work. They do in Quick Time however, did you get this same problem?
Aug 15, 2008, 7:13:00 AM
I had that problem when I first ran Front Row but after restarting my computer it worked fine. Not sure why I had to do that to get it to work though.
Feb 19, 2009, 4:18:00 AM
I have a load of .avi torrents I have downloaded, however, when I go into Front Row I can not see them listed. Does anyone know do I associate the location (which is in my personal drive on my Mac Pro) of these files with Front Row?
Thanks
Feb 19, 2009, 12:28:00 PM
PeaceAsia: I would recommend the following workaround. Download a program called VideoDrive (http://www.aroona.net/VideoDrive/Home.html), which will allow you to import all kinds of video formats (e.g. mkv, avi, wmv) into iTunes Movies section. What it does is creates a relatively small MOV reference file (~4mb) and puts it in the Movies folder on your hard drive. That way, it tricks iTunes into thinking that it's playing a Quicktime file.
Now, it works because presumably you have Flip4Mac and divx codecs installed for Quicktime on your Mac. It won't necessarily work on Apple TV because you wouldn't have Flip4Mac and divx codecs installed on Apple TV. Mind you, I don't have Apple TV at home, so I can't vouch for how it would perform, but it seems to me that it might not necessarily work.