Tuesday, August 09, 2011

Convert Movies for Personal Viewing

Do you you use a video converter to transfer movies to your phone or MP3 player so you can watch them anywhere?  I always wondered why anyone would want to.  I mean, those screens are so small.  But then Jeffrey got a new phone at the Fair on Sunday.  Our provider, US Cellular, is a big sponsor of the fair, so they always have a shop set up and offer some really good deals, so it's a good time to upgrade.  He got a fancy Android Smart Phone with internet access, a slide-out keyboard, and a  5MP digital camera and HD camcorder.

We were watching the horse pulls later in the evening, and I had to play with it, of course.  First I shot a video on my phone, and then I tried his.  Wow, his screen is super clear!  I'm not sure what format it saves the video in, probably  AVI or MP4, and we haven't actually taken it off the phone, but it looked amazing on the phone's screen.  It really wouldn't be bad at all to watch a movie on that screen, especially when you consider only one person is going to be watching at a time.  I am going to have to find a good video converter and put at least a couple movies on his phone so he'll have them.  He wanted me to put a movie on his Archos tablet a few months ago so he could watch it on the plane when he went to Oklahoma.  Unfortunately, he didn't ask until quite late the night before he had to leave, and his tablet had to do some kind of conversion of its own, which was going to take ages, so he didn't get a movie.

I'm not sure what format the new Android phone is going to want for videos - MP4, WMV, MOV, or something else, but it looks like a good video converter  makes it really easy.  Just select your MP3 player or phone, and it rips your DVD or converts a YouTube video to the proper format, size, and quality.  This one I looked at supports over 180 devices, so whether you have an iPhone, Nokia, Samsung, HTC, or any other phone, chances are yours is supported. 

Easy or not, I'd still like to try it when I'm not rushed, like right before a long trip when he'd like to have a movie to watch.  He can carry a few movies around in his phone the same way I'd like to carry a few books in mine.  Guess I better get busy...