AVI file won`t open - unsupported or damaged

Question

I am using Premiere CS5, and did an edit about 5 days ago with .avi files recorded with FRAPS - screen recorder, everything was fine...
When I open that project now, it asks me to find the file because I changed my HDD letter, and when I find it, it says "Unsupported or damaged file"
I don`t know why?
How it worked few days ago?
The same is happening when I try to import that in new project...
The files has just been on hard drive, and I haven˙t touched them...
I can play them only with VLC...
I tried Digital Video Repair, and show like it fixed the file, but I still can`t open it up..
How can it be that the file damages itself?

Answer 1

Yep... seen it before
Download VLC Media Player and install it.
In the folder containing your AVI files, create a new text document called "avi2mp4.bat" (without the quote marks). Be sure it has the .BAT extension.
Paste the following into the batch file:
@ECHO OFF
for %%a in (*.avi) do "C:\Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\vlc" -I dummy "%%a" --sout=#:file{dst="%%~na".mp4} vlc://quit
If VLC is installed in the Program Files folder and not the Program Files (x86) folder, remove the " (x86)" from this line, and save the file.
To run the batch, simply double-click it, or you can drag and drop AVI files onto it, and they will be rewrapped as MP4s with the same filename as the original. If you use the drag and drop approach, you can save this file anywhere on your hard drive, and any files dropped onto it will be converted and placed in the same folder as the original.
That's it; the MP4s will (should, anyway) import into Premiere without any further workarounds.