Need some help converting an .avr video on a DVD or thumb drive to a format viewable on a Mac.

Any help is appreciated.
Mac haters stay away. Not having a good day and will bite if provoked.

P.S., I have worn Google out and could not find any program.
All that initially led you to believe for Mac were for Windows only.
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Carlos, I'll check later what some of my software can do and get back to you.
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http://www.squared5.com/
?

(I don't even know what an avr is)

Do youtube or vimeo recognize it? If so you might be able to convert that way...
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Adam, no rush.

I have a new DVR for my home surveillance cameras with a built in DVD recorder if I want to save anything from the built in hard rive for future reference. Turns out it creates a .avr file and a .exe for EF Media on the DVD that can only be played on a PC.
I thought I would be able to burn a DVD and take it directly to a non PC DVD player as I did with my prior system but was in for a shock when I tested it out today for the first time.
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Julian, please see my last post for more info that may help you guys help me.
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Yeah looks like squared5 is the way to go.
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Yeah, I'm not familiar with the container type offhand either and I can't recall if I've ever dealt with an AVR file before. I don't have remote access to the video edit systems from here, so I'll have to check them later.
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You could try opening it with VLC... :-)
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A DVR makes sense, that's what my initial lookups on the container (file type) were saying. Well, that or an Atari ST 8bit audio file from 25 years ago...

I have some more questions, but since it's a security system, I'll send them via PM.
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That was my first thought at the beginning of this thread too, but needed to check the codec list first.
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Carlos, why not simply install VLC player (Mac version), it plays pretty much any format available out there. I'm a very recent convert to Mac and well, Windows platform does have its better points (lack of Backspace space on Mac is just stupid to begin with).
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Couldn't you use a windows simulator on your Mac to play the video files?

Or am I off base here?

I've never heard of .AVR but to me this seems a bit easier.
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Did not work.
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Trying squared5 next.

Update.
Unsupported format.
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Using Boot Camp and a Windows license on my Mac will ultimately work but trying to avoid that route.
Would almost rather just buy a netbook to dedicate to this system to do conversion.

My son in law found a program on his laptop (PC) that can convert this to any format that can then play anywhere.
Was looking for something similar for Mac but can't find it.
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Caros, I just installed another player in addition to VLC: http://handbrake.fr/

Have you tried this? http://www.fileinfo.com/extension/avr
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Greg, that's the old AVR format from 25 years ago, when it was for the Atari ST audio.

The current AVR container appears to be a nonstandard H.264 (MPEG-4) package, and as such, they have tweaked something in there that makes it unintelligible to most players (just about everything plays H.264 these days since it's part of the blu-ray standard). Unfortunately, there's very little information out there on this AVR container, and some of which appears to be in conflict and possibly incorrect.

The more I look into this, the more I fear that Carlos might get get stuck with no option short of an added computer.
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The link above points to a Mac sound player. I have not tried it since I have no avr files on hand. What's funny is that it seems avr files were Mac files to begin with, strange they don't support it now days.

I had to switch to Mac last month as I ran into some installation/configurations issues while upgrading Ruby on Rails code to latest releases. The switch is a pain, in general, at least for now after 20+ years of developing apps on Windows. Like I said, just typing and not having a Backspace key is ridiculous in many ways. So, I am not that surprised with the avr file format issues.

I'll check some more if the link I provided does not point to an app that can play the format.
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Carlos,
If you have to use a Windows app, one possibility that might work is CrossOver:
http://www.codeweavers.com/products/crossover/
This avoids having to have a Windows OS - but I don't know whether the player app would work with it. Looks like there is a free trial though...

On the flipside, if you don't want to Dual Boot, you can of course buy Parallels or VMWare Fusion. But those cost more... Virtual Box is a free app that does the same thing:
http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads
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You have to use the del key or Fn+Del. I hate OSX but I do have to admit the Mac Pro towers have excellent hardware in them. This problem doesn't appear to be any fault or defect in OSX, it's a proprietary container meant to work only with their software.
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