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File Types

You probably know what a .ZIP file is; well the other files are the same. They are all compressed files. A compressed file, called an archive, can contain one or more files. The files have been sized down in size. Each extension corresponds with a different compression technique.
Typically, RAR archives don't come in a single file; the compressed files are split over a number of RAR files. Version 2 has one .rar file accompanied by .rxx files (x being a number). Version 3 starts with part01.rar and is accompanied by partxx.rar files (xx being a number).

Some popular compression programs:

» PowerArchiver
» WinRAR
» WinAce
» WinZip

Show/Hide .3GP .MOV .QT

These files are video files. You can play these files if you have the right codec's installed. You can download the official QuickTime player or you can go for an alternative like the QuickTime Alternative.

Show/Hide .APE .FLAC .SHN

These are music files that have been compressed without discarding any frequency ranges like what for example .MP3 does.

Show/Hide .ASF .AVI .DIVX .MPEG .MPG .WMV .XVID

All of these file types are video's. You will need the right codec's to play them, getting the right program won't do it. Check out the K-Lite Codec Pack if you need a certain codec. You can use GSpot to determine the exact codec the video uses.

Here are some of the video players you can use:

» BSplayer
» Media Player Classic
» VLC media player
» Windows Media Player

Show/Hide .BUP .IFO .VOB

These three files are usually found together in a folder called Video_ts. These files form a direct backup of a DVD's file system. You can burn the files with a DVD video burner like Nero.

Show/Hide .BWI .BWS .BWT

These files together form a CD image. These formats were introduced by a CD burning program called BlindWrite. You can use emulation software or burn a CD (see .BIN/.CUE).

Show/Hide .CBR .CBZ

These files are actually the same as the ones mentioned above. They are archives usually used for comic books. A .CBR file is the same as a .RAR file and a .CBZ file is the same as a .ZIP file. You can use the same programs mentioned above to open them.

Show/Hide .CCD .IMG .SUB

These files together form a CD image. These formats were introduced by a CD burning program called CloneCD. However, due to copyright laws, CloneCD was ruled illegal. These files formats are little to not in use anymore. They are similar to the .BIN/.CUE files (see .BIN/.CUE).

Show/Hide .CDI

A CD image format introduced by DiscJuggler. You can burn this file to disk with Alcohol 120%. You can also use its emulation function or emulate it using DAEMON Tools.

Show/Hide .CUE .BIN

These two files form a CD image. The .BIN file contains everything that was on your CD and .CUE tells your CD-burning program what format the .BIN is.

You can burn the CD image on a CD with most CD-burning software. Here are two:

» Nero
» Alcohol 120%

However, you don't need to burn CD images to a CD. You can simply emulate a CD/DVD drive on your HDD and access them directly from your PC. The following software will help you do that:

» Alcohol 120%
» DAEMON Tools

You can also extract MPEG streams from a .BIN/.CUE file with VCDGear.

Show/Hide .DAA

This is an advanced disk image format that can be password protected and split into multiple volumes. The letters stand for Direct Access Archive. DAA files are compressed but they can be extracted, mounted, and edited without being decompressed first. The following program can handle these files:

» PowerISO

Show/Hide .ISO

This is a CD image like the .BIN/.CUE files but then only one file (see .BIN/.CUE for more info).Apart from the usual CD burners and emulation software that can handle .ISO files, these programs were specifically designed to handle .ISO files:

» WinISO
» IsoBuster

Show/Hide .M3U

Commonly known as a playlist; it allows you to queue multiple files in a program. The file acts as an ordered list telling the program what file comes first, it does not contain any actual content like music for example.

Show/Hide .MP2 .MP3

These files are music files. The .MP3 format is the most popular music file format at the moment. Certain frequency's have been discarded to create a file that is smaller. There is little chance you will notice this while listening to your songs. Any music player should be able to play these files.

Show/Hide .MDF .MDS

These two files from a CD image. These formats were introduced by Alcohol 120%. You can use emulation software or burn a CD (see .BIN/.CUE).

Show/Hide .NFO

These files are used by Microsoft Windows for its system info program. But in the file sharing world these files contain info about the files you downloaded with it. These files will include the following info: the release group, the release date, a description of whatever it came with. Usually there's also a load of good looking text art and there can be other info too about suppliers, packagers, protection types, crack types, sizes, install notes, greetings to other groups, group news and the name of the NFO creator might also be included.

You can use Microsoft WordPad to view the info file as plain text, but you should really use a NFO viewer like DAMN NFO Viewer.

Show/Hide .NRG

A CD image format introduced by Nero. You can use emulation software (see .BIN/.CUE) or you can burn this file to disk with the following programs:

» Alcohol 120%
» Nero

Show/Hide .OGG .OGM

The files are music files known as Ogg Vorbis. It is roughly comparable to other formats used to store and play digital music, such as MP3, VQF, AAC, and other digital audio formats. It is different from these other formats because it is completely free, open, and unpatented. Vorbis music files will sound better then MP3 files that have the same size.

Media players that can play these files:

» Winamp 2
» Winamp 3
» Foobar2000
» Zinf

Show/Hide .P01 .PAR .PAR2

These files are part of the Parity Archive Volume Set. You'll encounter them often at newsgroups. They come with the original files of course with an index file at the beginning of a post and different sizes of volumes at the end of a post. These files can fill in gaps from corrupted or missing parts when downloading from a newsgroup. You can use these files with QuickPar.

Show/Hide .RA .RAM .RM

These files are video files. Get the right codec's to play these files. You can download the official RealMedia player or go for an alternative like the Real Alternative.

Show/Hide .SFV

This file is used to check multi-volume archives if all files are complete and not corrupt. This is most useful when checking if everything was uploaded correctly to a server or when downloading from newsgroups. Though they do tend to show up on file sharing networks, there's no use for them there. These files can be handled by hkSFV.

Show/Hide .SVCD .VCD

These Video CDs or Super Video CDs are what the full names suggest; video files. Some DVD players will play them, some won't. Go here to check if your DVD player does.

You can burn these files to CDs using any of the following programs:

» PowerArchiver
» WinRAR
» WinAce

Films
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Show/Hide Asian Silvers / PDVD

Put out by eastern bootleggers, they are usually bought by groups to release as their own. There are a lot around in the scene at the moment because silvers are very cheap and easily available in a lot of countries. Mainly smaller groups who don't last more than a few releases go about it this way. A PDVD is the same thing pressed onto a DVD. The quality is usually better than the silvers and they have removable subtitles. Usually released as VCD though ripped like a normal DVD.

Show/Hide CAM

A CAM was made by someone at the theatre with a digital video camera. They may have used a mini tripod but most of the time this is not possible and you might notice some shaking once in a while. Moreover, other people at the theatre could walk past the camera. The sound is recorded by an onboard microphone resulting in a low quality sound. Not only can you hear the film, you'll probably also be able to hear people laughing or having a difficult time opening a bag of crisps. The whole picture might have been filmed from an angle because seating was not very good. If properly cropped you won't notice it, though if any text is shown in the film, you will. CAM quality can differ a lot and is probably the worst quality around; sometimes you just have to be lucky!

Show/Hide CVD

Combine VCD with SVCD and you get CVD. Supported by most DVD players as well. It supports SVCD's MPEG2 bit-rates, but uses a resolution of 352x480 (NTSC) as the horizontal resolution is generally less important. Currently no groups release in CVD.

Show/Hide DivX Re-Enc

A DivX re-enc is a re-encoded VCD original into a smaller DivX file. These will mostly show up on file sharing networks. Labelled like "Film.Name.Group(1of2)". Common release groups are SMR and TND. The quality is always very poor. You should stay away from these!

Show/Hide DivX / XviD

Designed for multimedia platforms, DivX uses two codec's. There's a low motion and a high motion. Older films used to be encoded in low motion only, having various problems with high motion. When encoding a method known as SBC (Smart Bit-rate Control) is used. This method was developed to switch codec's. This results in a much better print. The format is Ana orphic and the bit-rate and resolution are interchangeable.

Although there have bee players in development in the past, it's very unlikely that we'll ever see a DVD player capable of playing DivX. The reason is that high processing power is required, and there are different codec's for playback.

The majority of PROPER DivX rips (not Re-Encs) are taken from DVDs. They generally have up to two hours of good quality per disc. There are various codec's around, the most popular are the original Divx3.11a and the new XviD codec'