How do I convert videos from my Sony HDR xr160 camcorder?

Question

(Translated from German:)

How can we get videos out of a Sony HDR CR160 camcorder attached to an USB port? How do I convert them to a more generally available format?

There is only software for Windows or MacOS available from the manufacturer.

Answer 1

Any USB storage device (e.g. any camcorder, camera etc.) can simply be plugged in to an USB port and mounted as removable storage device. No additional drivers are needed to do so. We can browse the files on our camcorder with the default file manager Nautilus and simply copy & paste or drag & drop them to the desired location on our hard drive.

Provided we had installed ubuntu-restricted-extras , and libavcodec-extra-53 we should be able to view most the file formats from camcorders in our video player (default will be Totem movie player).

To convert to another format we do have quite some applications for the desktop, or the command line to help you. See this question: best video converter and more.

There are also excellent German tutorials on this:

• Videobearbeitung
• Codecs

Answer 2

This may help, in my case it didn't.

I went to my Sony HDR XR160.

• Menu
  • Installation
  • USB LUN Settings (German: Einstellung)
  • Switched to single"

As for instance: I formerly had a clip, which was shown 3 GB in size. It would not move to my pc, always "Diese Ressource wird bereits verwendet." When I re-connected the cam, then it became clear: the file was in two, it was 1,9 GB and another one 1,6 GB. There may be a chance to even transform the whole file, but for me, it worked this way.

Answer 3

On Ubuntu 16.04, if your XR160 reboot immediately when you choose USB Connect. Check the following settings on your camcorder.

USB Connect setting-> Mass Storage USB LUN Setting -> Single

Then turn off and turn on the power of your XR160, choose USB Connect, it should mount automatically. Then you will find all your video files in AVCHD/BDMV/STREAM