Present Status of Quicktime on Windows XP-64
December 16th, 2005 by Luc-Eric - Viewed 28655 times - Popularity: 47%Presently getting movie formats on Windows 64-bit is difficult.
Here’’s the situation.
You can’t mix 32-bit and 64-bit in one application
Windows 64-bit runs both 32-bit (Win32) and 64-bit (Win64) applications. However, Win64 applications cannot use 32-bit DLLs, and vice-versa. (Video codecs are DLLs) Both binary formats live in completely different address space. (It’’s not a Windows problem btw, it’’s just not doable.)
So this means that on your machine, you may have the Quicktime player up and running, a Win32 application, but you”re not able to use Quicktime in a Win64 applications.
On XP-64, there is both a 32-bit and 64-bit version of Internet Explorer to accomodate the fact that many browser plug-ins, including Quicktime, are not available in 64-bit format yet.
Scrapple From The Apple
In the Win64 version XSI and other products, it is not possible to use Quicktime because we”re waiting for Apple to give us a 64-bit version of the Quicktime DLLs and SDK.
When Apple will finally decide to honnor us with a port to 64-bit, it’’s possible that not all codec will be available, since these depend on third parties. It may not be entirely bad faith on the side of Apple : Quicktime is essentially based on the old Mac OS API, pre-OS X. Even on Windows, that is : the old Mac OS 8 API is emulated. As far as I know, Apple doesn”t have a 64-bit quicktime on its own operating system.
Update august 2007 : The word on the street is that Apple will not port its C API to Windows 64-bit, because it’s considered obsolete. This means applications like XSI and other Windows 64-bit application will not be able to use QuickTime. Perhaps a 64-bit solution for QuickTime will be available in the future, and application can be written to use it. I wouldn’t expect anything before a year or two!
AVI
With regards to AVI in XSI Win64, the situation isn”t much better.
The reason is that XSI relies on Video For Windows (”VFW”), which Microsoft considers obsolete, and replaced by DirectShow, and then Windows Media. However microsoft is also very serious about backward compatibility, so VFW is available, even if it dates back from Windows 3.0. But they are porting only a few of the basic codecs to 64-bit. In some cases, they may not own the codecs and the code, in other cases, they may be implemented in assembly language, and very expensive to port and test if it’’s obsolete anyway.
So on your 64-bit workstation, XSI 32-bit and XSI 64-bit will have a different list of AVI codecs available.
If you need to generate AVI with specific codecs that are not available, or QuickTime movies in general, your only solution right now with XSI 64-bit is to also install XSI 32-bit and use the 32-bit flipbook to do the conversion. (Note that the XSI flipbook doesn”t take or look for any license tokens.)
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Luc-Eric Rousseau
Team Leader, User Interface
Softimage|XSI
December 16th, 2005 at 5:37 pm
What a hotch-potch…
December 19th, 2005 at 3:35 am
Good to know for when switching to the full 64-bit world. Like flipbook, perhaps there will be a flurry of standalones springing up in the migration age of 32/64. Aside from the windows and mac codecs, Linux hasen”t had much on the video codecs available. At least not the easy way.
December 20th, 2005 at 7:34 pm
You also can”t use Python on 64-bit Windows without building it yourself. Worth keeping in mind.
July 14th, 2006 at 2:11 am
When are Apple going to give us a version of QT that works on Win64? It’’s really pathetic that they have taken this long to get it working.
July 31st, 2006 at 4:02 am
Well, the funny thing is, Apple can”t provide a good version of 7 which works on xp64, but during the installation it doesn”t say this, after upgrading from 6.5 pro to 7 you are left with a trashed installation of quicktime.. So apple should really stop the installation of QT7 when it detects XP64 (which isn”t hard as any decent installer can detect it)..
But there is luckily for us an alternative: http://www.free-codecs.com/download/QuickTime_Alternative.htm
It does run on XP 64 pro.. After the installation I did have to say ”yes” to install something from the apple site.. So my advice would be to install Quicktime alternative, then go to http://www.quicktime.com and then you”re ready…
So if some people with too much time on their hands can solve the problem, why can”t the buggers at apple do it….
August 9th, 2006 at 11:17 am
I don”t know what you mean my trashed installation of quicktime, but if you install a new version of Quicktime, you loose the ”pro” feature. You need to buy again the Pro option for every major release of quicktime.
September 15th, 2006 at 4:40 am
The only codec that I have had an issue with under XP64 is HuffyUV. I was able to install Quicktime (32 bit) on the 64 bit OS by using the standalone installer. You cannot install the iTunes/QT combined installer.
I have used not only AE, but Juicer 2 (Digital Juice) to create 32bit QT files with embedded alpha without issue on XP64. Uncompressed AVI’’s with and without alpha work fine too. And there is no issue with Microsoft DV. I”ve done a little work using Cineform’’s 720p HDV too. No problems there either.
The key to QT under XP64 was finding the standalone installer. Someone posted it a link for me in one of the Adobe user forums and it worked fine.
September 15th, 2006 at 11:19 am
Mike, the problem is Quicktime for 64-bit applications, not 32-bit applications like After Effects and Juicer 2.
There is no 64-bit version of Quicktime, and therefore 64-bit application like XSI cannot support Quicktime.
What you”re using is the ”normal” 32-bit version quicktime under 64-bit windows” backward compatibility support for 32-bit application.
64-bit application vendors like us are waiting for Apple to give us a Win64 version of Quicktime.
Same thing for AVI. There is no version of these codecs for 64-bit application, this is all explained in the article.
October 10th, 2006 at 9:02 am
Hello. I”m new to Softimage XSI and Windows too.
I would like to work with my new 64bit Workstation and the new Microsoft Windows Vista R1 (Beta).
I”ve got a problem with the driver for the iButton Dongle.
Is there any solution for this problem or must i buy the Microsoft Windows XP x64.
Thanks alot for your answers.
Regards, Aldo
October 10th, 2006 at 9:36 am
Aldo, you”re probably better off fielding these concerns to the friendly folk at Softimage Support. The people here definitely won”t be as authoritative on licensing subjects as Softimage would.
Thanks.
April 17th, 2007 at 6:19 pm
I hope this will be dealt with soon. Very soon. We are losing market share now boys…. It would be nice to use my 64 bit machines? The client prefers to send quicktimes.
Whats up Softimage?
April 17th, 2007 at 10:54 pm
Unfortunately this is not a Softimage thing. It is an Apple thing, thus questions should be directed there. When Apple comes out with a 64bit windows version of Quicktime all will be well in XSI/QT land.
June 7th, 2007 at 11:11 am
I see that this thread started at the end of 2005 and here we are in the middle of 2007 (1.5+ years) and Apple still leaves us crying for 64-bit Windows QuickTime support. I realize that this is an SoftImage XSI blog, but the same issue exists for Maxon Cinema 4D which also utilizes QuickTime for certain audio/image/video support.
When will Apple provide a 64-bit DLL, API, and codecs? There are now not only the single Windows XP Pro x64 out there (what I use) but also several flavors of Windows Vista 64-bit. In the coming months, mainly due to pre-installs of Vista, the number of 64-bit Windows OSs is going to skyrocket. While Jobs moans and groans over iPhone, iPod, and iTunes, will he even notice that he is losing Windows base due to some form of obstinance?
Anyone recommend an alternative API lib for PNG and PICT image support that’ll work in Windows 64-bit using C++?
Sad, sad, sad
February 7th, 2008 at 4:02 am
[...] um pouco mais, descobri uma explicação mais técnica para a incompatibilidade em um artigo direcionado a usuários do Softimage XSI. O problema todo está relacionado limitação do Quicktime ainda ser uma aplicação de 32 Bits, o [...]
April 28th, 2008 at 3:20 pm
yeah! Andrew Jakobs is right. Why apple cannot do something to solve the problem about incompatability of xp64bit in quick time player but xp32bit does…. they must to do something. they can if they like. :/