What is the best way to handle .mod files in premiere pro cs4?

Question

I recently got a JVC Everio GZ-MG130u and as I'm sure many of you are aware, it saves footage in the .mod format.
I have googled this and found quite a few different solutions, but I'm just wondering if anything has changed since some of these solutions were posted, or in other words, what is the best way at this current point in time to handle .mod files in premiere pro cs4?
As far as I know, the best thing to do is convert the .mod to .avi and then import it into premiere so it can be edited.. Is there a better way to do it than this? Also, by doing it this way, will I have separate audio and video tracks?
Thanks.

Answer 1

I have just done a bit of reading, here. All of the quotes that follow are from users who have posted in that thread.
It seems that there isn't one solid answer on this subject. The thread that I linked to was started 2 years ago, and replied to just 4 ago, so it's relatively current.
I noticed a couple different interesting statements:
posted by mmontgomery:
In the case of .MOD, you are actually getting a MPEG-2 file. The way
video files work is that there is a codec (COmpressor/DECompressor)
algorithm and a file wrapper (or extension). A JVC .MOD file is a
MPEG-2 encoded file, with a .MOD extension.
You're faced with two
challenges, first the .MOD file type is only recognized and support by a
few applications. I think we covered some of those already. The
interesting thing about wrappers and extensions is that they can be
dealt with in a variety of ways. Sometimes all you need to do to convert
the video file to a compatible video file is to change the extension.
In the case of .MOD files that's not enough. The .MOD wrapper apparently
does a few more things than just bare a unique extension name. It
requires a slightly more complicated method to convert that file. That
is why there is supplied software and that certain third party
applications have .MOD support.
(posted 2 years ago)
This seems to indicate that Ann's solution of simply re-naming the extension is not good enough, unless I am mis-interpreting what she meant.
However, another user said:
posted by futball8:
I edit with Adobe Premiere Pro CS3. All I have to do is simply rename
the .MOD files as .MPG and then import into PP CS3. It takes a small
amount of time to conform the audio, but no file conversion is
necessary. It's a pretty slick workflow and I've never encountered any
problems editing them this way.
(posted 5 months ago)
One can only assume that simply re-naming the extension from .mod to .mpg works in some circumstances, and doesn't work in others. I assume it depends largely on the editing software being used. Perhaps there are still issues that futball8 was simply unaware of or never encountered.
That said, there seems to be a couple of different real solutions to this problem that I have found:
1. Simply use an editing program that supports .mod file format. While pe7 and pe8 supposedly support the .mod format, the following should be noted:
posted by macksgarage:
While Elements 'supports' these files, it is markedly unstable and  frequently crashes while using the files, though the application is otherwise reliable.  The solution I have arrived at is to repair the  container using ffmpeg. (see #3)
(posted 5 months ago)
2. Use a file conversion utility of your choice that will covert .mod to .avi, or another desired format. Import the resulting .avi file into premiere pro cs4.
3. Use FFmpeg. This seems to be the best solution as it does not convert any audio or video:
posted by macksgarae:
If you are not familiar with ffmpeg, it may be a bit of a bear to
learn, but it's not only useful for this, but functions as a video swiss
army knife useful for splicing, muxing/demuxing, and rendering just
about any format into just about any other format.
ffmpeg is an open source project from the linux world, but it has
been ported and is supported on windows.  Fetch it here and place it somewhere handy
on your system.
To rewrite the container into a nice, standards compliant .mpg file
that doesn't make applications die, WITHOUT rerendering video or audio
itself, I use this command.
ffmpeg -i INFILE.MOD  -acodec copy - vcodec copy OUTFILE.mpg
This not only renames the file, but actually rebuilds the container
around unmodified video and audio data, yielding a file which works much
more stably with Adobe applications, and presumably others as well, as
ffmpeg's open source development goals result in very standards
compliant files.
(posted 5 months ago)
Now, this seems to properly address the issues that can arise from simply renaming .mod to .mpg, as suggested by Ann. So from this point, I assume you can simply import the .mpg into Premiere Pro cs4 (or any other .mpg compliant program) and edit without issue, but it seems like I remember hearing something about Premiere not liking mpegs or something like that, so in that case, maybe it'd be better to skip this and go with option #2. But, it's been awhile since I've touched any NLE, much less premiere pro cs4, so I could be completely wrong and it may have no problems handling mpegs.
All of the things that I've quoted here came from the same thread, so I don't know how accurate any of this is, but the people that have posted these things seem fairly knowledgeable. If someone reads all of this and can confirm or deny any of it, it would be much appreciated.
Option 1 is not really an option for me, because I am sticking with premiere pro cs4 -- I'm not going to get another editor just because it has .mod support. That leaves me with options 2 and 3: Convert to avi, or change the file wrapper/extension properly with FFmpeg and then simply import the resulting .mpg file... Which is better? Or is there yet another solution that I am unaware of that would be even better?