Why is choppy playback on my mac?

I'm a video game programmer with 20 years experience in software, and have a reasonable understanding movie playback software.

I also have a Nikon (S6100) and the problem is nothing to do with PC memory or CPU speed. The Nikon creates a broken version of the MPEG-4 AVC H.264 format, which results in choppy playback. I've tried Quicktime, VLC and the cameras own player - ViewNX2 - same result for all of them.

Converting the buggy .MOV files the Nikon creates to a .avi format produces perfectly smooth (flawless) video, but with the sound out of sync. I can also create perfect quality (lower res) DVD video, but with the sound missing.

I have spoken to Nikon about all this and they are quite simply clueless and will take no responsibility. As there is no firmware up[date for this camera I'm taking the camera back, as it is basically flawed.

I've read a few sites with customers complaining about choppy video for this camera, so it looks like the model itself is flawed.

http://us.sanyo.com/dynamic/product/Downloads/VPC-CS1_OM_English-6223243.pdf

p.60 of the manual describes different recording modes with lower resolutions (1280x720) pixels and lower frames per second (30fps).

I would choose from the menu to record in a lower resolution and lower fps mode so that the quicktime program can display the video at a good rate for you.

I don't know what kind of macbook you have, but usually such problems are due to the older macs not having enough speed to display high definition video with all its data all at once.

I used to have problems a few years ago, before i upgraded my hardware on PC's, with choppy video that was High Definition.

The G4's are getting dated. Video playback may or will be choppy, may be time for a newer unit.

minoHD playback is choppy, period.
This sort of cheap, so called video cameras, have nothing in the way of motion interpolation.
The result is very jerky motion, especially if you pan or tilt the camera.
You would probably be better off using the video capture feature in your stills camera or mobile phone.

Download the file to your computer. That way, you'll be playing it directly from storage, not through an adaptor & cord.

Clean the Head of your Camcorder

Have you found a solution to this problem? I'm having the same issue. Thanks.

millsj @ shaw. ca

Camera needs Tape Path adjustment and qualified camera tech person can do the job.

This seems like a tape playback problem. Can you look at the output of the tape in the camera directly into a monitor? And checking the tapes on another machine would also be good.

The fast movement breakup can be something in the playback circuitry of the camera. It may not show up in the viewfinder. Also yo umay try repacking the tape. Fast forward it to the end and rewind it all the way.

OK... If you have vista it may be that. Here is where I had my issue... one was a Sony camera on a Vista computer & now its a Olympus Stylus uploading to a puter where the sound card isnt working, & even though I upload it to picasa/photobucket or something & it HAS sound from the camera its self it doesnt play the audio, I uploaded the vids on my XP puter & its working, but also try- Here-

http://esupport.sony.com/US/perl/swu-download.pl?mdl=DSCS500&upd_id=3206&os_id=28

Yes its for a sony camera but AVI is AVI. Let me know if this fixes your issue b/c it fixed mine! BOTH times!