Software review: Pinnacle Mobile Media Converter

Mobile Media Converter from Pinnacle is a small video conversion tool designed to shift movie files or DVDs to a video iPod or Sony PSP.

There’s not a lot to the package; you're offered a choice of converting a DVD or a file located and on your hard drive and must then select the quality level. Four levels of quality are available for each of the two supported devices.

You can also direct converted video to your hard drive, which is useful if you own any of the huge number of other portable media players that support mpeg4. If you choose this method, though, you'll need to copy it over to the device yourself.

A preview window allows you to check over the converted video file before you perform the conversion.

Aside from these features, there really isn't much else to play around with.

The conversion process is pretty flawless. Although there are obviously restrictions preventing conversion of copy-protected DVDs, the range of file types supported is impressive, including Wmv and DivX formats.

Conversion times for files work out at about 1:4, so a two-hour movie will take around half an hour to convert. Should you pick the highest quality, it will take slightly longer.

Converting from DVD is more directly related to the quality you convert to, ranging from about 1:3 to 1:1 at the highest setting.

In our tests, the consistency of the converted files is very good and we noticed no audio lag even at the lower settings.

For convenience and ease of use, Mobile Media Converter certainly scores highly. There were, however, occasional glitches when it came to recognising DVDs, so you may have to rip some discs to the hard drive first.

As with all retail conversion software, it’s worth remembering that if you’re prepared to put a bit more legwork in, there are free tools around that you can use instead.

Afterdawn's website has some good resources and a number of guides should you want to take this route.

Related reviews:
X-oom Ipod Media Suite
A collection of four applications to enhance your iPod

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