Joining AVI to MKV & Things that I need to know

[TooNice]

Hello,

In the past, I've used VirtualDubMod which has worked perfectly fine for joining AVI files. For mkvfiles, I ended up using mkvmerge.

I've got a few questions I would much appreciate if someone could answer:

1. What does the term 'muxing' refers to exactly? Silly question I am sure, and it has been bugging me for a long time.

2. I find that by joining two avi files using mkvmerge, I end up with a mkv files that is a few MB smaller than an avi output using VirtualDubMod.
a) Is this a case of MKV being somewhat more efficient, or is there a setting within MKVmerge that could have caused re-encoding to occur?
b) Assuming there is no re-encoding, is there any reason why I would want, or not want to merge all my split AVI into MKV? (e.g. compatibility considerations)
c) If I use MKVmerge on two AVI files and two SRT files, would I end up with a single MKV file that I can switch on/off the subtitle at will?

3. There is one thing I like AVI - when I look at the file properties in Windows, I can easily see the Image (resolution), Audio (bitrate) and Video (codec, data rate, etc.). AVI Codec can easily pull those details too. On the other hand, I have to open the MKV file under MPC to pull those details out. Is there any way to change that?

Cheers.

[joseph5]

1. What does the term 'muxing' refers to exactly?
2. I find that by joining two avi files using mkvmerge, I end up with a mkv files that is a few MB smaller than an avi output using VirtualDubMod.
a) Is this a case of MKV being somewhat more efficient, or is there a setting within MKVmerge that could have caused re-encoding to occur?
b) Assuming there is no re-encoding, is there any reason why I would want, or not want to merge all my split AVI into MKV? (e.g. compatibility considerations)
c) If I use MKVmerge on two AVI files and two SRT files, would I end up with a single MKV file that I can switch on/off the subtitle at will?

3. There is one thing I like AVI - when I look at the file properties in Windows, I can easily see the Image (resolution), Audio (bitrate) and Video (codec, data rate, etc.). AVI Codec can easily pull those details too. On the other hand, I have to open the MKV file under MPC to pull those details out. Is there any way to change that?

Cheers.
1. To put a video and/or audio stream inside a container.
2. Matroska is more efficient, there's no reencoding.
2b. There would be incompatibility only if you want to watch the files in a standalone player.
3. Download MediaInfo.

[Adub]

Well, when you mux anything there is now re-encoding done.

Think of muxing like this. You have files. Files go into a folder.
Now, for multimedia, you have video files and audio files. In terms of folders you have what are called containers, like Matroska or MKV, MP4, AVI, ASF, MOV, etc, etc.

When you mux a file, you take the video and audio and you put it into your favorite container, that can then later be accessed by other programs, meaning your favorite player.