[MPlayer-users] mencoder -ovc copy produces a "null codec" footprint?

[Reimar Döffinger]

On Fri, Dec 26, 2014 at 12:17:44PM -0800, Yang wrote:
> I copied my DVDs to my DLNA server, so I could stream them on my home
> network.
> 
> but the client VLC (as well as xbox ) fails to recognize the codec used by
> the file, saying "can't find codec for format '  ' ".
> 
> 
> while if I use some compression codec in mencoder, such as mpeg4, it seems
> that the code footprint is written in the file, so vlc is able to see it.
> 
> 
> 
> how could I fix this, some way to manually "decorate" the existing file
> with a codec signature?

Not sure what you did to "copy" the DVDs, it doesn't sound like any of
the recommend ways or there's a bug in the DLNA server.
In short you should use mplayer -dumpstream, not mencoder with -ovc copy.
Or some of the many other tools like vobcopy.
Alternatively, maybe you'd want the -ffourcc option?
Probably something like -ffourcc "mpg2" or so.