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Divx on iPhone?

One of the minor pain points of switching to the iPhone was the loss of the ability to watch Divx movies on my portable media solution. Not familiar with Divx? Can't say I blame you: it's a video codec that allows you to encode a video is a very compressed format without too much evidence of such on playback. Why does that matter? Well, your average DVD is about 6-8 gigabytes. Your average blank DVD is 4.7 GB. Your average CD ROM? A measly 650 MB. See the need to compress? You get the picture: if you want to build a library of your own videos and keep the space under control, being able to compress the video is a big plus. As a result, I have a significant amount of Divx movies that I can watch on my Divx-capable DVD players, but not on my iPhone. What to do?

Courtesy of RegNow, a division of Digital River, who frequently sell software that can be immediately downloaded and used, I was introduced to the Movavi Video Converter. Yep, it does just what it says: it takes any video format you have, and converts it to the video type of your choice. It also claims to be able to rip DVD's, although I have not put it to the test (I have another solution for that), I am happy to report it does work. Flawlessly and fast.

Best of all, courtesy of RegNow, I (and now you, dear reader) was offered the ability to pick up this handsome utility for less than one Andrew Jackson: $19.95. In other words, for the price of a typical DVD, I can now convert all of my library to formats I can watch on my iPhone. I debated doing so for all of 30 seconds, and I can honestly say I am quite pleased with the results. Note: if you plan to take advantage of this, make sure you remove the "Extended Download Service" they throw in the shopping cart if you don't want it; it adds another $7 to the price otherwise.

iPhone users, the rejoicing can now officially begin.

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