Playing SVCDs on a PC

[doug1937@hotmail.com]

Is there a way to get Windows Media Player to play SVCDs? If not, what is your best recommendation for an SVCD player? OK, now what's your best recommendation for a FREEWARE SVCD player? (grin)

[RoopeT]

Ok, a freeware solution to play SVCDs on computer:

First of all, you must have MPG2 Direct show filters installed on your system (can be found on www.doom9.org). After these filters are installed, you can open the mpgs located in the SVCDs /MPEG2 folder in media player or any of it's more advanced replacements.

Windows media player can't handle the SVCD aspect ratio correctly, so it's better to use a player that has built-in aspect ratio options, BSPlayer should do. However, I think that you can't access some of the SVCD data even with BSPlayer: you can't change the audio stream and the SVCD chapters aren't working (I'm not sure of this, haven't tested). But for standard SVCD playback this is OK.

For SVCDs with menus, multiple audio tracks and chapters you'll need a (software) DVD player. VideoLAN is a freeware DVD player (Win, Linux, meybe also BeOS) that's supposed to have all the features, but I haven't tested it so I can't really comment.