Convert DV to AU — Free Online Tool
Extract and convert the PCM audio track from a DV camcorder file into Sun AU format, encoding it as big-endian 16-bit PCM (pcm_s16be) — a lossless representation of the original audio data. This tool runs entirely in your browser with no file uploads required.
to
FFmpeg Command
Copy this command to run the same conversion locally with FFmpeg on your desktop. Download FFmpeg
Drop your DV file here
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Settings
Note: Browser-based encoding uses approximate quality targets. For precise CRF compression, copy the FFmpeg command above and run it on your desktop.
Estimated output:
Conversion Complete!
DownloadHow It Works
DV files store audio as uncompressed PCM (pcm_s16le — 16-bit signed little-endian) alongside the DV-compressed video stream. Since AU format is audio-only, the video stream is discarded entirely during this conversion. The audio is then re-encoded from little-endian PCM (as stored in the DV container) to big-endian 16-bit PCM (pcm_s16be), which is the default and most compatible codec for AU files. This byte-order swap is the only meaningful transformation — the audio quality remains effectively identical, as both are uncompressed 16-bit linear PCM at the same sample rate and bit depth.
What Each Flag Does
| Flag | What it does |
|---|---|
ffmpeg
|
Invokes the FFmpeg command-line tool, which is the underlying engine powering this browser-based conversion via its WebAssembly build (FFmpeg.wasm). |
-i input.dv
|
Specifies the input file in DV format — a tape-originated or file-based container holding a dvvideo stream and a pcm_s16le audio stream recorded by the camcorder. |
-c:a pcm_s16be
|
Encodes the audio stream as 16-bit signed big-endian PCM, which is the standard and most compatible audio codec for AU files. This converts the DV source's little-endian byte order to the big-endian format that the AU container expects. |
output.au
|
Defines the output filename and tells FFmpeg to write a Sun AU file. The .au extension causes FFmpeg to automatically select the AU muxer, which wraps the pcm_s16be audio in the simple Sun AU header structure. |
Common Use Cases
- Extracting dialogue or ambient sound captured on a DV camcorder for use in a Unix-based audio processing pipeline that expects AU files
- Archiving the audio track of old DV tapes in a simple, headerless-friendly AU format for long-term storage on Unix/Linux systems
- Feeding DV-sourced audio into legacy Sun Microsystems or NeXT workstation software that natively reads the AU format
- Extracting a clean, uncompressed audio reference track from a DV broadcast recording for synchronization or quality-checking purposes
- Preparing DV camcorder audio for streaming or embedding in early Java applets or web applications that relied on the AU format
- Stripping the video from a DV interview recording and saving just the audio in a simple PCM container for transcription workflows
Frequently Asked Questions
No — the audio quality is preserved completely. Both the source (pcm_s16le in DV) and the output (pcm_s16be in AU) are uncompressed 16-bit PCM; the only difference is byte order (little-endian vs. big-endian). No compression or resampling occurs, so the audio waveform is bit-for-bit equivalent in terms of amplitude and frequency content.
The video stream is dropped entirely. AU is a purely audio format and cannot carry video data, so FFmpeg automatically discards the dvvideo stream. Only the pcm_s16le audio track from the DV file is processed and written to the output AU file.
Yes. The AU format supports several other codecs including pcm_s8, pcm_u8, pcm_alaw, and pcm_mulaw. For example, to use G.711 mu-law encoding (common in telephony), you would change the command to: ffmpeg -i input.dv -c:a pcm_mulaw output.au. Note that mu-law and a-law are lossy encodings, so they will reduce audio fidelity compared to the default pcm_s16be.
On Linux or macOS, you can loop over all DV files in a directory with: for f in *.dv; do ffmpeg -i "$f" -c:a pcm_s16be "${f%.dv}.au"; done. On Windows Command Prompt, use: for %f in (*.dv) do ffmpeg -i "%f" -c:a pcm_s16be "%~nf.au". Each file is processed sequentially, extracting and converting the audio track independently.
No. The AU format has an extremely minimal header structure — it stores only sample rate, channel count, encoding type, and an optional free-form annotation string. DV-specific metadata such as timecode, recording date, or camera model cannot be represented in an AU file and will be lost during conversion.
DV files typically contain a high-bitrate compressed video stream (around 25 Mbps for standard DV) in addition to the audio. Since AU is audio-only, the output contains just the uncompressed PCM audio, which for standard DV (48 kHz, 16-bit stereo) is approximately 1.5 Mbps. A one-hour DV file might be around 12GB, while the equivalent AU audio file would be roughly 650MB — a dramatic reduction driven purely by the absence of video, not any audio compression.
Technical Notes
DV stores audio as pcm_s16le at either 48 kHz (2-channel) or 32 kHz (4-channel, depending on camcorder mode). When writing to AU, FFmpeg uses pcm_s16be by default, which is simply the big-endian representation of the same 16-bit samples — no quantization or resampling occurs unless the target codec requires it. AU files use a straightforward fixed header (magic number 0x2e736e64) followed by raw audio data, making them easy to parse but limited in metadata expressiveness. One notable limitation is that AU does not natively support multi-channel audio beyond stereo in a standardized way, which aligns fine with standard DV audio (which is also limited to two channels in typical consumer recordings). If your DV source was recorded in 4-channel 32 kHz mode, only the first audio stream will be mapped by default — you may need to explicitly specify -map 0:a:0 or -map 0:a:1 to select the desired track. There is no subtitle or chapter data to worry about, as neither format supports those features.