[Vorbis] 2nd attempt - Repairing vorbis files

[xiphmont at xiph.org]

On 3/17/07, Tomas Valusek <tvalusek at seznam.cz> wrote:
> Hello,
>
> thanks for your answer, BUT I want my oggs to be playble by ANY player,
> including WinAmp.

The most common reason Ogg files become 'corrupt' is some program
sticking an ID3 tag into them.  This is and was always invalid, but
several program authors insisted on doing it anyway...

Of course, we don't know yet that was the problem.  The only way to
make a Vorbis file entirely unplayable is to corrupt the header
packets, and the reason I bring up ID3 is because ID3v2 will stuff
garbage before the first page making it undetectable as Ogg in many
players.

The validator Ralph mentioned (as well as the Vorbose tool) will tell
you exactly what happened to the file.  If it's extra garbage like
id3, you'll be able to recover.  OTOH, if it's a hard disk error that
reall ylost data-- you may be out of luck.  Missing a chunk of data
int he audio will be tolerated by any player, but if any of the first
two headers are gone, you're toast (third header is recoverable).

Neither Winamp nor Quintessential are picky about Oggs.  The files
from back in teh beta days still play fine (unless some recent
releases of WinAmp have introduced bugs).

[When you say rejected, do you mean 'play badly' or 'not recognized at all?]

Monty