What is a .MOD file?
The .mod extension means both tracker music modules and JVC camcorder video.
Camcorder video
- What it is
- A camcorder video clip - JVC Everio and some other cameras record MPEG-2 program streams with a .mod extension. Analyser reads the container and codec and plays it back.
- How to tell it apart
- A camcorder .mod begins with an MPEG-2 pack header (00 00 01 BA).
- Did you know
- JVC Everio hard-disk camcorders saved clips as .mod MPEG-2 files; renaming one to .mpg is often enough to make an ordinary player open it.
- Each .mod clip is shadowed by a hidden .moi companion file that holds the recording date, timecode and aspect ratio the video stream itself leaves out.
- JVC was not alone - Panasonic and Canon hard-disk and SD camcorders of the mid-2000s also wrote .mod, before the industry settled on AVCHD's .mts.
Tracker module
- What it is
- A tracker music module - a ProTracker / Amiga-style song with samples and patterns. Analyser reads the title, sample list, channel count and patterns.
- How to tell it apart
- A tracker module carries a 4-character format tag (such as M.K.) at offset 1080.
- Did you know
- The Amiga MOD format bundles its instrument samples inside the song, so a 1990s tracker tune sounds identical on any machine decades later.
- The four-letter tag at offset 1080 that marks a 31-sample module, M.K., is widely held to stand for the demoscene coders Mahoney and Kaktus who popularised the extended format.
- A MOD sets each note's pitch with an Amiga hardware sample 'period' value rather than a named note or frequency, a quirk that ties the format to the machine it was born on.
- Open a .MOD file
- Drag a .MOD file onto the Analyser home page (or tap to pick one). It opens entirely in your browser - nothing is uploaded, there is no account, and it works offline once installed.