vlc or media player classic?

[Jorge]

Hey all
I was wondering on which player to use for playing back video. Now I know both have there pro's and con's. But what about quicktime video. For example: Lets say I go online and want to watch a quicktime video, but I don't have quicktime, and only have vlc. Will vlc play the streaming video like this one down here.

http://www.apple.com/trailers/disney/piratesofthecaribbeanatworldsend/

I'm tired of having all these different players, and I want to have one for all, or two, but one would be great.

[lordsmurf]

VLC. It has it's own codecs, you don't have to bog down the computer with codecs. VLC has more advanced features too.

I only use MPC for Quicktime and Real Alternatives, as VLC doesn't support those.

[gadgetguy]

MPC will play elementary streams (separate audio and video files) but I haven't found a way to do that in VLC. But with these two, you should find it difficult to find a video file that you can't play.

[Jorge]

thanks for the info, but I mean streaming quicktime content. You know when you click on a video link online, then a little blue quicktime icon comes out, and it plays the video streaming. Will vlc still play the video thats streaming online, not downloaded.

[lordsmurf]

VLC doesn't play Quicktime period that I know of.

[Jorge]

Ok, thanks. Now the only thing I notice, that vlc is a bit buggy when moving the slider to advance the video. Does anyone have the same issue?

[edDV]

Ok, thanks. Now the only thing I notice, that vlc is a bit buggy when moving the slider to advance the video. Does anyone have the same issue?

What's wrong with Quicktime for Windows?

[Marvingj]

VLC is very good regardless....

[Jorge]

I just don't like the fact that, I need different a player for different things, like streaming quicktime content. I guess vlc is what I should use.

[Jorge]

Is there a way, that I can get windows media player 11 to play everything like vlc can?? Sorry for the double post.

[Krispy Kritter]

WMP won't do QT or RM. You will need the actual apps themselves or the alternatives, which work with MPC and I believe VLC.

[ozymango]

What's wrong with Quicktime for Windows?

What's right with Quicktime for Windows?! :P

If you've gotta watch a genuine QT video, I'd probably just use Quicktime, though for pretty much anything else I despise QT almost as much as the Real player. Feh! A pox on both programs!

But be careful when you install it as it'll wanna become the default player for most of your web stuff, and then you end up with this little tiny window that you can't resize and ... grrr.

I'm sorry, what was the question again?

[cal_tony]

I use VLC to play ISO files mostly.

[redwudz]

MPC or my new favorite, GOM player, both work well. Add Quicktime Alternative and Real Alternative, along with VLC and you should be covered for about anything out there. VLC isn't the easiest to configure, but it has many uses. It handles and exports streaming video. It can transcode video and it has a dozen pages of configurations. And it will play ISOs and VOBs or full DVDs, along with being able to play a partially downloaded or corrupted video file. Well worth having in your toolbox.

[Jorge]

This is some good info, maybe I'll give a try for a while, if it works out better than mpc I'll keep it.

Thank you all for your help.

[Jeremiah58]

Jorge,
I would recommend KMPlayer to you.
It plays everything and it has been constantly updated.
Since you asking - you would love its slider to advance the video.

[DRP]

MPC for me. I have VLC too but only use it for previewing partially downloaded videos on P2P to check for fakes and then only because the P2P app supports it's use whereas it doesn't MPC. I am yet to find a video that can't be played with MPC.

[Jorge]

Well, sorry for taking so long to reply, I thank you guys for all your help. I guess I'll give vlc another try. I just can't stand the fact that I still need quicktime to handle all my online quicktime viewing. If anyone ever finds a solution let me know, I would really appreciate. Thanks again.

[Krispy Kritter]

It kinda defeats the whole purpose of QT (and RM among others) developing their own player and media format if they let other players natively support their content.

[Jim44]

I just can't stand the fact that I still need quicktime to handle all my online quicktime viewing.

Did you try Quicktime Alternative? It works just fine for me with streaming content inside Firefox. I just viewed the "Pirates" trailer in your first post.

Jim

[DRP]

I thought we did give you a solution. The answer is MPC + QuickTime Alternative + Real Alternative + XviD + DivX v3.11a + Windows Media Format 9 Series Runtime + ffdshow (only for FLV1 support).

With that player and those codecs you will find it very hard to find a video anywhere you can't play. About the only thing you won't be able to play will be 3gp mobile phone videos, but I'm sure you can add another codec to provide support for them if you really want.

The only thing you'll need VLC for is previewing unfinished partial downloads.

[Jorge]

whoops, sorry about that, didn't notice that post, sorry about that. I'll give it a try, thanks for the solution.

[Jorge]

Hey all I just ran into a problem. I just downloaded a video in real media format. I was wondering can I use vlc with the real alternative to play the video. I just installed it and I can't seem to get it to work. Can anyone give me some help?

[redwudz]

VLC uses it's own codecs, so it can't use Real Alternative or Real codecs, if that's what you're thinking. I suspect that's a licensing problem or issue. And Real doesn't like licensing anyone else to use their format. I don't know how Real Alternative gets around that.

I see this from a Wikipedia article, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VLC_media_player :

VLC supports all codecs and all file formats supported by FFmpeg.

So unless FFmpeg was modified, no Real or Quicktime.

[John_Jordan]

For DVD playback, which do you think is better out of the two in terms of quality produced? Is the VLC able to match the powerdvd/mpc codecs?

thanks

[jeanpave]

I like MPC better because it has the ability to move the cursor along with the picture (- both move at the same time -), even at fullscreen, and it's significantly lighter on resources.

But, if you don't want to install every codec that you discover, at some particular point in time, that you need, and if you want to play subtitles (out of the box, so to say), VLC is better.

(As for DVD playback, I'd never use MPC or VLC over PowerDVD 6. Yes, I still use version 6.)

[Seeker47]

O.K., but what version of VLC ? I got out of the habit of using it some time ago, standardizing more on MP-HC, with GOM and the system-default WMP-11 (which is probably there anyway, in XP SP3 or later Windows) as infrequent fallback options. I recall that at some point here the user reviews on later VLC development took a tumble. (For whatever that's worth.) But, reminded of certain things by this thread, I think I'd like to add it back to the mix. The "right" version, though. As long as you keep the associations-grabbing thing under control, I don't think there is too much of a downside to having several players on call, for choices in viewing whatever you run into.

I like MPC better because it has the ability to move the cursor along with the picture (- both move at the same time -), even at fullscreen, and it's significantly lighter on resources.

This is another issue, but sometimes you can't move the sliderbar to increment / decrement the video. With any player. Some .WMVs (that format, at least) turn out to be non-seekable (the video will lock up or close), or have a very disconcerting strobe-flashing effect as you move through the frames. Many of those videos will have this going on because they are faulty in some way, but I'm not sure that applies to all of them. I see a lot of different "flavors" of the WM codec having been used over the years in making them, from WMV 2 up through WMV 9 Professional etc. For the latter, I think you may need to have various codec extensions that have been added to WMP-11, or the equivalent.

[jimhoofd]

I would choose MPC (with the right codecs) above VLC. but if you want one player you might aswell use totalmedia theatre 3 which is not for free but plays everything

[creamyhorror]

I would use VLC to watch certain DVDs whose menus (used to) give MPC-HC trouble.

For watching everything else, MPC-HC is the better choice. It certainly doesn't have any trouble with subtitles, which should be enabled by default in recent versions. It doesn't have the wrong levels/washed out look that VLC does (for me anyway). It's far more customizable, when coupled with ffdshow, if you're looking for best quality. And it has DXVA and multithreaded decoding for H.264, which VLC doesn't.

[YiuKorochko]

Hey all. You know VLC can handle QT and RM formats?

So long as you have those or alternative codecs installed on the system, VLC has an option in the settings called "Use system codecs when available".
I've been going to film school for two years now and with the codec pack and VLC, I've had no fuss playing back their terrible QT encodes.

I personnally recommend K-Lite Mega.