Sound file formats that work in both Mac & PC

[Kurt]

Using Office 2004 on Mac OS 10.3.9

The file formats that MS says are acceptable either simply don't work or
cross platform.

On a recent project, I inserted an AIFF sound file. Fine for Macs, does
not work for PC. PC user had to convert to MP3 to play. Then worked fine.

Conversely, this evening, I tried to insert an MP3 Sound file into PPT.
Wouldn't allow, had to convert it to bloated file size WAV to get it to
take.

Anyone have any insight to this?

 

[TAJ Simmons]

see

PC to Mac and Back
http://www.rdpslides.com/pptfaq/FAQ00281.htm


I'd go for mono WAV files

Cheers
TAJ Simmons
microsoft powerpoint mvp

awesome - powerpoint backgrounds,
http://www.awesomebackgrounds.com
free powerpoint templates, tutorials, hints, tips and more...

 

[Kurt]

see

PC to Mac and Back
http://www.rdpslides.com/pptfaq/FAQ00281.htm


I'd go for mono WAV files

Good tips, but isn't it terrible how difficult MS makes it to cross
platform?

What they need to do is tell you upfront in the instructions that
certain file formats (actually many of the formats they say you can use)
will not cross platform Mac to PC.

Sounds simple to me, why do you suppose they don't do this?

 

[David M. Marcovitz]

My speculation is that the Mac platform is overall an afterthought for
Microsoft, and Microsoft has a separate group that does Macintosh
PowerPoint development.
--David

--
David M. Marcovitz
Microsoft PowerPoint MVP
Director of Graduate Programs in Educational Technology
Loyola College in Maryland
Author of _Powerful PowerPoint for Educators_
http://www.loyola.edu/education/PowerfulPowerPoint/

 

[Kurt]

My speculation is that the Mac platform is overall an afterthought for
Microsoft, and Microsoft has a separate group that does Macintosh
PowerPoint development.
--David

But MS makes a big deal about touting their Mac group. In fact , big
wire services articles were just distributed on this. It makes good
money for them.

I will speculate that MS has a bureaucracy that prevents interchange
between groups, but the Mac group knows full well how the program
interfaces with PCs, so this is no excuse.

 

[Steve Rindsberg]

I will speculate that MS has a bureaucracy that prevents interchange

between groups, but the Mac group knows full well how the program
interfaces with PCs, so this is no excuse.

I think the problem is quite different. PowerPoint doesn't have the ability to
play most media files built into it (on either platform). It uses the
system-level media services provided by Windows or OS X.

The system dog doesn't get wagged by the PPTail on either platform. PPT's
developers don't dictate what they get to work with, they get a fait accompli
handed to them. A fait worse than death when it crosses platforms. <g>


================================================
Steve Rindsberg, PPT MVP
PPT FAQ: www.pptfaq.com
PPTools: www.pptools.com
================================================

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Hi Kurt,

If only it were as simple as a bureaucratic bungle.

The way PowerPoint handles audio and video files has not been updated
much over the years. WAV and AVI are handled internally, but everything
else is handed over to the operating system to play.

The philosphy behind this is to take advantage of the richness of files
available on Macintosh and Windows platforms respectively. On the Mac,
anything that QuickTime has then PowerPoint inherits that capability
"for free." Similarly on Windows, but QuickTime is not the supported
application there.

That worked pretty well when there was a great divide between the
platforms. Now that divide is much less of an issue, and there are
hundreds more formats and codecs to deal with. These days cross-platform
compatibility is more advantageous the depth of support within each
individual platform.

On the Windows side, their OS is undergoing the same kind of gut
wrenching changes that we recently went through on the Mac. It's my hope
that between Vista and Tiger Microsoft will come to some new way of
handling audio and video files so that all kinds of files from Flash to
windows media files work as best they can on either platform. So whether
it's QuickTime or Real Media player if an application on the platform
exists and a codec exists then the media should play. That's a big
request and a tall order to fill. There are licensing arrangements that
have to be considered, and the horror of the US Digital Millenium
Copyright Act and similar acts in other countries to contend with.

I'm hoping that something better than what we have now can be worked
out, but realistically the media world has become overly complicated and
hard to work with. So I'm hoping for something better but not expecting
everything to turn out really smooth across platforms.

-Jim

 

[Steve Rindsberg]

Oh and fwiw, sound and movies aren't just a cross-platform issue.

PPT presentations with media cause plenty of problems between one Windows
system and another, even when they have the same version of Windows and Office.


================================================
Steve Rindsberg, PPT MVP
PPT FAQ: www.pptfaq.com
PPTools: www.pptools.com
================================================

 

[Kurt]

Hi Kurt,

If only it were as simple as a bureaucratic bungle.

The way PowerPoint handles audio and video files has not been updated
much over the years. WAV and AVI are handled internally, but everything
else is handed over to the operating system to play.

The philosphy behind this is to take advantage of the richness of files
available on Macintosh and Windows platforms respectively. On the Mac,
anything that QuickTime has then PowerPoint inherits that capability
"for free." Similarly on Windows, but QuickTime is not the supported
application there.

That worked pretty well when there was a great divide between the
platforms. Now that divide is much less of an issue, and there are
hundreds more formats and codecs to deal with. These days cross-platform
compatibility is more advantageous the depth of support within each
individual platform.

On the Windows side, their OS is undergoing the same kind of gut
wrenching changes that we recently went through on the Mac. It's my hope
that between Vista and Tiger Microsoft will come to some new way of
handling audio and video files so that all kinds of files from Flash to
windows media files work as best they can on either platform. So whether
it's QuickTime or Real Media player if an application on the platform
exists and a codec exists then the media should play. That's a big
request and a tall order to fill. There are licensing arrangements that
have to be considered, and the horror of the US Digital Millenium
Copyright Act and similar acts in other countries to contend with.

I'm hoping that something better than what we have now can be worked
out, but realistically the media world has become overly complicated and
hard to work with. So I'm hoping for something better but not expecting
everything to turn out really smooth across platforms.

-Jim

The easy solution, of course is simply to indicate in the instructions,
which formats work and which don't at this point in time.

A simple chart, that would take an MS employee about 30 minutes to do,
would answer hundreds of hours of customer research and tech support
questions. It could be easily updated as needed.

We're talking a multi-billion dollar software company. There's simply no
good excuse for not doing otherwise.

Boy, I should be making the big bucks at Microsoft!

 

[Steve Rindsberg]

The easy solution, of course is simply to indicate in the instructions,
which formats work and which don't at this point in time.

And if there a way of stating that with any degree of certainty, MS might do
it, but given the number of codecs and the way various media player software
hijacks the system, there's simply no way to do that.

Don't think for a minute that what you're asking for isn't on our minds too.
Or that the PowerPoint program managers don't know it.

================================================
Steve Rindsberg, PPT MVP
PPT FAQ: www.pptfaq.com
PPTools: www.pptools.com
================================================

 

[Kurt]

The easy solution, of course is simply to indicate in the instructions,
which formats work and which don't at this point in time.

And if there a way of stating that with any degree of certainty, MS might do
it, but given the number of codecs and the way various media player software
hijacks the system, there's simply no way to do that.

Don't think for a minute that what you're asking for isn't on our minds too.
Or that the PowerPoint program managers don't know it.

================================================
Steve Rindsberg, PPT MVP
PPT FAQ: www.pptfaq.com
PPTools: www.pptools.com
================================================[/QUOTE]

Something is better than nothing.