codec packs vs seperate codecs

andy

Ok I have been reading alot of information tonight and it seems like most people are against codec packs. I am not sure I fully understand the reason, but I am willing to believe that it is not the best thing for a system. I am just looking for playback codecs not encoding.

The reason I am bringing this up is I have a desktop with no internet access but 410GB of hard drive space. I download alot of stuff with my laptop mooching off of my schools line and get alot of videos from friends. The problem I am running into is I am not able to play all those videos because my system does not have the correct codecs. If I should not use codec packs is there a program which will tell me which codecs I need for a paticular file, so I can download it with my laptop and transfer it to my desktop? I am using VideoLan Client (VLC) now but I would like to play my files in other programs. (I hate to say this but I use Windows Media Player 10 because for some reason I really like the interface.)

So to reiterate. I would like a program that would tell me what codecs a file uses so I can download the codecs and install them on a computer without internet access. OR I would like a codec pack that will cause me as little problems as possible but get me the most codecs so I won't need to get more. I say as little problems as possible because I have 35 GB of installed programs on my computer and as most of you know it is a pain to reinstall all programs and config them the way you want after a fresh install.

Thanks in advance to any info.

Originally posted by bassmadrigal If I should not use codec packs is there a program which will tell me which codecs I need for a paticular file, so I can download it with my laptop and transfer it to my desktop? I am using VideoLan Client (VLC) now but I would like to play my files in other programs. (I hate to say this but I use Windows Media Player 10 because for some reason I really like the interface.)

GSpot
showthread.php?s=amp;threadid=82313

Originally posted by bassmadrigal
(I hate to say this but I use Windows Media Player 10 because for some reason I really like the interface.)

Well if a 'nice interface' is enough for you to choose one of the worst media players ever then go ahead - for me the inablitiy to configure the codec being used / combined with ultra slow speed is reason enough to not use it

Also I'd go for seperate codecs - gives you control and is easier to troubleshoot then codec packs (for what does Joe Average need a DV50 codec anyway?!).

I guess it all depends on what the codec pack has to offer!

Remember the word quot;codecquot; referes to quot;encodersquot; and quot;decodersquot;!

In my opinion quot;encodersquot; and quot;decodersquot; should be installed sepatately.

They should also include clear options to register and unregister their filters!Cheers

With more advanced players (such as the one in my sig or ZoomPlayer Pro) it does no longer matter whether you install codecs separately or as a codecpack. Those players build the graph manually.

More simple players who use just a very simple graph rendering engines (BSPlayer, MPC or TCMP) can have problems with codecpacks so it's not advisable to install them when you use these players.

Codec packs are practically useless with ffdshow. There is very little ffdshow can't decode. Further it has nice configs for everything and a great uninstaller. It is not known to mess anything up in general and uses low ammounts of CPU most times. Ffdshow is based off ffmpeg which is the encoder/decoder engine for videolan and mplayer. It handles all major MPEG 4 codecs and most other common codecs as well.

The problem with codec packs is that they are often out of date even overwriting newer files already on your PC. They have also been known to install hardware dependant filters that will thurroughly mess up playback on a system without said hardware. To boot some of the codecs they install get installed wrong or are not very good causing further playback issues. Codec packs were ok ideas for people who knew what they were dooing back in the day. But unfortunatly most people had no idea what they were doing and just installed everything and in the process trashed their system. Hence codec packs are bad. And due to ffdshow almost irrelevant these days.

Also I kinda agree with everyone else on WMP10 and have to say WTF? I am still quite partial to MPC. But I am also impressed with mediaportal. So much so that I am making my HTPC dual boot between geexbox and Windows so I can use it there.

Talking about VideoLAN... Can anybody here play Mpeg4/MP3 in .MP4 with it?Cheers

Boy you guys have some strong opinions about WMP. The main reason I use it is the filtering options. I have 120GB of music and 70GB of video on my hard drive and wmp so far is the only program I have found that has all the sorting options I like. (Year released, genre, actors, random 700MB of music, etc..) Plus I don't want to take up precious hard drive space installing all of these seperate players when I can use a player that is built into windows and has everything I need. Plus I don't know of any free players that will go out online and find missing id3 tags for music and rename filenames and move the files into the right folders. Now by no means am I a windows fan or a Microsoft fan. It is just to time comsuming to run linux on a major gaming machine. And to relearn video playback software when I already have one that works for my needs seems pointless to me. Sorry to be forward but Neo Neko kindof pissed me off for slamming me. Communist was atleast nice about saying WMP is crap. And I do have the latest VLC but I still like WMP better.

Ok now that I have that off of my chest.

I already had gspot and there is a file that it says it has 2 compatible audio codecs installed, but then when I render through the directshow it comes up with an error. The error:
0x00040242 VFW_S_PARTIAL_RENDER
As far as I can tell it is the audio, because most players (wmp, ati mmc, wmc) installed on my system have no problem with the video.
GSpot says the audio is:
ac3 (0x2000) Dolby Labratories, Inc
with the following  compatible codecs
Nero Digital Audio Decoder
DMO DolbyDecoder

Originally posted by bassmadrigal
Boy you guys have some strong opinions about WMP. The main reason I use it is the filtering options. I have 120GB of music and 70GB of video on my hard drive and wmp so far is the only program I have found that has all the sorting options I like. (Year released, genre, actors, random 700MB of music, etc..)

Not to continue the WMP bashing but I do have a large collection of mp3 files (mostly recorded from radio) and the Winamp (2.91) library does a nice job of filtering and indexing it - not to mention that it runs a hell lot faster than WMP.

Originally posted by bassmadrigal
Plus I don't want to take up precious hard drive space installing all of these seperate players when I can use a player that is built into windows and has everything I need. Plus I don't know of any free players that will go out online and find missing id3 tags for music and rename filenames and move the files into the right folders.  

Yeah thats the problem these days - we want all the automatization - accept a little bit of slowiness and lack of essential features (dumbing down) and are happy if things work. Thats of the main thing why some people are more than happy with bloated programs like WMP.  This kinda reminds me of a similar thread here some time ago: web browser?! quot;It has to burn CDs, be a photo indexing software, burn CDs again quot;

I find it rather inconvenient to run a media player like WMP for simple MP3 listening - it first opens up slowly - then it loads its nice 'Media Guide' (unless you turned it off) and after some time it accepts user input.

As said before try Winamps library - its fast (after indexing) and eats lot less memory and doesnt do more than playing mp3 files like... default visualization?! - What a nonsense

/EDIT If you cant find Winamp 2.91 - cause Nullsoft removed it due it being to user light-weight and not-bloated  here is a mirror:

i suppose we can't force you not to use WMP... just understand we're all pretty left-wing around here, especially when it comes to the IT industry (and interference with it from the entertainment industry).

another very powerful yet lightweight music player is Foobar2000.  of course it wont play video, and doesn't have unnecessary stupid visualizations (it'll do a VU display and a spectrogram if you need it).

one thing i use it for is ReplayGain.  you wont see the point in having this feature until you have to go back to WMP... basically it scans your songs and determines how perceptually loud they are, then turns them down or up to a common reference level (based on movie industry monitor calibration standards).

what this means is you'll never have to reach for the volume knob between songs - this'll save your ears if you have a mix of '80s and recent stuff, or classical and rock, etc.  try playing Metallica's 80's songs side-by-side with their latest album without changing the volume.  i dare you...

btw, winamp also does replaygain, but only for mp3, and only if you install an alternative decoder to the one that it ships with (in_mpg123.dll i think it's called).