media players

[prev] [thread] [next] [lurker] [Date index for 2003/09/29]

I tried to limit this to maybe one media player, or maybe just one OS or 
something but no, I realised I hate them all. Streaming, static - it 
doesn't matter ... I'm an equal oppurtunities hater.

I hate the fact that they all try and grab all the file types. I hate 
the fact that half the time a given file is an "unrecognised format", I 
hate Real Player for, well, lots of stuff actually but because it trys 
to open a file and then goes to "download software from Real.com" and 
then fails to do anything.

I hate the fact that I can't drag a file into Quicktime. 

Windows seemed to be going somewhere with it's installed codecs thing - 
theoretically that should mean that, no matter what player I loaded up, 
it should all 'just work' [tm].

Does it? Does it bollocks.

I hate mplayer - it spews loads of debug stuff out to STDOUT. In fact I 
don't know which is more irritating - the fact that it does that or the 
fact that so many enconders seem to produce junk. I hate the fact that 
some clips I discover it hangs on unless I forceably skip past the 
problem spot. I hate Xine for being so fricking difficult to compile and 
install. 

Media players are a simple concept. Files comes in, choose codec based 
on magic, play file through codec.

IT'S REALLY NOT THAT DIFFICULT.


*sigh*

• media players Simon Wistow 11:51 on 29 Sep 2003
  • Re: media players Philip Newton 12:51 on 29 Sep 2003
    • too deep to show
  • Gavin Estey 14:10 on 29 Sep 2003
    • too deep to show
  • Earle Martin 14:20 on 29 Sep 2003

Generated at 14:02 on 01 Jul 2004 by mariachi 0.52