AVCHD camcorders and play M2TS/MTS from AVCHD camcorders on Windows and Mac

AVCHD has become regular topic to whose who have AVCHD camcorder for shooting videos. An AVCHD camcorder is a digital camcorder that record and export video files in AVCHD format with a .mts or .m2ts file extension.Sony and Panasonic released the first AVCHD camcorders in autumn of 2006, followed by Canon and JVC.

What is AVCHD?
AVCHD (Advanced Video Coding High Definition) is a format for the recording and playback of high definition video, and is one of HD video formats.

AVCHD utilizes MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 (AVC) video coding and either Dolby AC-3 (Dolby Digital) or uncompressed linear PCM audio coding.Aside from recorded audio and video, AVCHD includes features to improve media presentation: menu navigation, slide shows and subtitles. The menu navigation system is similar to DVD-video, allowing access to individual videos from a common intro screen. Slide shows are prepared from a sequence of AVC still frames, and can be accompanied by a background audio track. Subtitles are used in some camcorders to timestamp the recordings.

As a matter of fact, AVCHD specification allows for both high definition and standard definition recording. For high definition, all major variations are supported, including 720p, 1080i and 1080p.

Famous brand AVCHD camcorders:
Some AVCHD camcorders are well-known all over the world. Such as Sony, Panasonic, Canon, JVC etc. But not all of them product videos in AVCHD, in stead some series do.

Sony: Sony NEX-FS100, Sony HXR-MC50E; Sony NEX-5, NEX-5C; HDR-XR550; HXR-NX5, HDR-AX2000; HDR-CX105; HDR-CX500E, HDR-CX520E; HDR-XR100; HDR-XR200VE; HDR-XR200V; HDR-XR520V; HDR-XR500V; HDR-CX12; etc

Panasonic:AG-AC130/AG-AC160,AG-AF100/AG-AF101/AG-AF102, HDC-SD60/HDC-TM60/HDC-HS6, HDC-TM700/HDC-SD700/HDC-HS700, AG-HMC40, HDC-TM350, HDC-TM30/HDC-TM10, HDC-SD10,etc

Cannon:HF S21, HF S20, HF S200, HF M31, HF M30, HF M300, HF R11, HF R10, HF R100, HF S11, HF S10, HF S100, HF20, HF200, HF11 , HG20, HG21, etc
JVC: GZ-HM30, GZ-HM1, GZ-HD620, GZ-HM300, GZ-HM400, GZ-X900, GZ-HD320, GZ-HD300, GZ-HM200, etc

Hitachi: DZ-BD10HA
Leica Camera: LEICA D-LUX 5, LEICA V-LUX 2

How to play AVCHD videos?
Speaking of which in advance, AVCHD playing software requires powerful machines. AVCHD requires 2-4x the processing power for realtime playback, placing a greater burden on the computer's CPU and graphics card. Improvements in multi-corecomputing and graphics processor acceleration bring AVCHD playback to mainstream desktops and laptops. In order not to shorten the life-span, please play AVCHD on your desktops or laptop after take a second consideration! A suggestion for you is to convert AVCHD MTS/M2TS to friendly format for your computer before playback.

Play AVCHD on Windows.
It is possible to play AVCHD video in Windows Media Player and Windows Media Center. However, neither WMP nor WMC supports AVCHD natively and needs additional codec’s installed to be able to handle AVCHD video.
The good news is that Windows 7 will have native support for AVCHD/M2TS videos. In the meantime, a registry patch (http://www.avchdplayer.com/index.php/avchd-player/playing-avchd-video-with-windows-media-player-11-and-stream-avchd-to-playstation-3-ps3/) that will associate AVCHD/M2TS files with WMP and WMC was also found. You should be aware that M2TS files will only be playable in WMP/WMC with latest versions of ffdshow-tryouts and Haali media splitter.
Apart from playing AVCHD with WMP/WMC, you also can download VLC Media Player, which is a free and open source cross-platform multimedia player; or purchase other commercial software for AVCHD playback on PC.

Play AVCHD on Mac.
Presently, QuickTime is the default media players from Apple but it does not play AVCHD natively. To play AVCHD on Mac OS X, additional software is required. Such as VLC Media Player. It is quite easy to play AVCHD video with VLC player. You just need to launch it, drag the target AVCHD/MTS video into the display window.That is it. Or you can right click Media -> Open File -> Locate the .mts file -> Click OK.