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Softpedia Editor's Review for Windows Essentials Codec Pack
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With Windows Essentials Codec Pack you should be able to play 99% of all movies and music files that you download
Written by Bogdan Popa on October 20th, 2011
The Windows codec market is so crowded that it’s sometimes impossible to pick one of the pack.
In fact, it’s difficult to choose the one that’s the most efficient, as all of them claim to benefit from the greatest features, although some do nothing than to slow down the operating system and lead to poor quality when it comes to audio or video files.
How about the Windows Essentials Codec Pack? Judging by its name, such a tool would have to work great on any computer that comes with Windows. Unfortunately, it’s not developed by Microsoft, so we won’t benefit from seamless integration, but it’s still a great product.
Just like its name suggests, this suite is actually a pack of the essential codecs you’d need to play audio and video files on a Windows computer.
Developers claim that after installing this pack you should be able to run 99 percent of multimedia files, but as far as we’re concerned, it could go as high as 100 percent. During our testing, everything worked like a breeze and we could open every file we had on our computers.
Installation however comprises some software that attempts to change the homepage and the default search engine for the web browsers installed on your computer. Plus, it asks the users whether to download Babylon Toolbar or not, an app that’s not required to work properly.
One of the useful things that Windows Essentials Codec Pack brings is a special repair function that could fix the existing codecs in case there’s something wrong that could affect functionality when trying to open multimedia files. The whole fixing thing takes only a few seconds, as during our testing we managed to repair two problems spotted on our computer.
All in all, Windows Essentials Codec Pack indeed includes the essentials tools you need to open multimedia files, so if you’re in search for a powerful codec solution, be sure to write down this one on your list.
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Windows Essentials Codec Pack description
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Here are some key features of "Windows Essentials Codec Pack":
· APE Source Filter: DirectShow audio decoder filter used to decode Monkey's Audio files (APE files)
· AC3 Filter: DirectShow audio decoder and processor filter used to decode audio tracks in movies (DVD, MPEG4 and others)
· AVI Splitter: Replacement for DirectShow's default Audio Video Interleave (AVI) Splitter (It can open many broken files and can reindex when needed)
· CDDA Reader Filter: DirectShow audio decoder capable of reading Audio CDs
· CDXA Reader Filter: DirectShow video decoder capable of reading (S)VCDs and XCDs
· CoreAAC Filter: Advanced Audio Coding (AAC) DirectShow audio decoder capable of reading AAC files
· CoreFlac Decoder: DirectShow audio decoder for the Flac audio codec
· FFDShow: DirectShow decoding filter for decompressing DivX, XviD, H.264, FLV1, WMV, MPEG-1 and MPEG-2, MPEG-4 and various other audio and video formats. It uses libavcodec from ffmpeg project for video decompression, postprocessing code from mplayer to enhance visual quality of low bitrate movies, and is based on original DirectShow filter from XviD, which is GPL'ed educational implementation of MPEG4 encoder
· FLV Splitter: Capable of splitting Flash Video files (FLV) and decoding On2 VP62 Video streams (notable users of the FLV format include Google Video, Reuters.com, Yahoo! Video and MySpace.
· OGG Splitter: DirectShow OGG Splitter capable of splitting OGG and OGM file(s) and enables to play / create .ogm wrapped video
· GPL MPEG-1/2 Decoder: DirectShow MPEG decoder filter can be used to play MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 streams
· MOD Source Filter: DirectShow filter decoder capable of decoding Tracker files (MO3, IT, XM, S3M, MTM, MOD and UMX)
· MPEG Splitter: DirectShow splitter capable of splitting MPEG1/MPEG2 files (MP(E)G, VOB, DAT, TS, TP, etc.
· MPV Decoder: DirectShow decoder capable of decoding MPEG1/MPEG2 Video streams, and DVDs
· MPA Splitter: DirectShow Splitter capable of splitting MPEG Audio files (MP3) and MPEG4 Audio files (AAC)
· MPC Source Filter: DirectShow decoder filter capable of decoding MusePack Audio files (MPC).
· MP4 Splitter: DirectShow Splitter capable of splitting MP4, M4A, 3GP and HD-MOV files
· Matroska Splitter: DirectShow splitter capable of splitting Matroska files (MKV and MKA)
· Media Player Classic: an open source media player that looks just like Windows Media Player, but has many additional features. It has a built in DVD player with real-time zoom, support for AVI subtitles, QuickTime and RealVideo support
· OFR Source Filter: DirectShow filter decoder capable of decoding OptimFROG Audio files (OFR)
· RealMedia Splitter: DirectShow splitter that allows you to play RealNetworks audio/video files.
· SHOUTcast Source Filter: DirectShow decoder filter capable of handling internet radio stations streams (http://www.shoutcast.com)
· WV Splitter / Decoder: DirectShow WV Splitter and decoder capable of splitting and decoding WavPack Audio files (WV)
· VobSub Filter: DirectShow Vob Subtitles filter capable of displaying (embedded) Subtitle files (SRT, SUB, IDX, etc)
Requirements:
· Internet Connection
What's New in This Release: [ read full changelog ]
· Added a 64-bit version
· New H.264 decoder
· Improved subtitle rendering
· Support for DTS-HD and Dolby TrueHD bitstreaming
Users are advised to pay attention while installing this ad-suported application:
· Offers to change the homepage for web browsers installed in the system
· Offers to change the default search engine for web browsers installed in the system
· Offers to download or install software or components (Babylon Toolbar) that the program does not require to fully function
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