[MPlayer-users] combining multiple avi's

[Elmo]

Has anyone else noticed that the command listed in the help file:

cat 1.avi 2.avi | mencoder -noidx -ovc copy -oac copy -o output.avi -

combines the two files okay-- except for the several second gap in the 
video at the end of the first avi which is not accompanied by a 
corresponding gap in the audio, causing the audio and video for the 
entire second avi to be out of sync?

This has happened with every movie I've tried this with since I started 
using mencoder two years ago, I feel like I must be taking crazy pills 
or something that I've never seen anyone else post about this...

The only thing that occurs to me is that the index on the first avi is 
being sandwiched as data between the two avi's.  Any thoughts?

I can give you system information if you like, but I'm running the most 
current version of mplayer/mencoder from marillat's debian mirror.  My 
system hardware has changed pretty significantly in the last two years, 
so I'm pretty sure it's not the hardware... except perhaps that it's 
i386.

Thanks for any suggestions, this has been bugging me for a long time.

-Brian Neltner