Mac – Quicktime won’t play videos in Chrome

You can use ClipWrap ($50) to rewrap your AVCHD videos to a Quicktime/Final Cut compatible format.

Then, deinterlace your videos using JES Deinterlacer and export them preserving full quality (huge files though).

So the workflow is the following:

• Add videos to ClipWrap, select as output the "Rewrap (don't alter video samples)" option and save them to a new location.
• Open JES Deinterlacer and drop all videos to input's "hot-box"

• Select Project properties:

  • For 1080p30 go to Project > Deinterlace > Top Field, Adaptive, Local
  • For 720p60 go to Project > Standards conversion > 1280x720 60p

• Finally, go to Output > Export > QuickTime Movie

  • Settings > Compression Type > Apple ProRes 422 (LT)
  • and export the video!

So, your videos will be ready to import them to Final Cut.

I hope that helped!

Edit:

If you want to transcode the video files, just for viewing them in Quicktime, then you would have to select H.264 when exporting from JES Deinterlacer, than the Apple ProRes which is suitable for editing.

Generally Perian will cover most of your needs. Codecs are generally loaded on an "as needed" basis so you will be fine even if you install all of them. Note though that some of the older codecs listed may be PPC-only if they are really old and won't work on Lion.

Flip4Mac WMV is another good one, it is the official QT component for all of Microsoft's formats.