I've uninstalled RealPlayer, and installed VLC

If you were looking at the article I posted the other day about RealPlayer using Flash to play MP4 videos. I said that I might uninstall RealPlayer, and I did later that day. Personally I find that RealPlayer is bloated, and consumes a lot resources (I can't show you a CPU graph, because I'm not installing that software again). And I guess it also loads lots of plugins as Flash is an example.

Uninstalling RealPlayer was very simple, and the uninstall looked normal. it was no fancy graphic uninstaller like some programs. After uninstalling, the RealPlayer uninstaller did not reset my icons for my media files. Now I have broken icons for my flv files and other files that I don't open in Windows Media Player, or MediaGo. Guess I have a project to do.


To install VLC, just head over to their website. Download the 22 MB file, and run it. It is not signed, so just a fair warning. VLC is open source, so you can contribute code to the project if you want. You can also donate/contribute. VLC uses its own self contained codecs, so it has no dependencies I guess (at least in terms of codecs).

The list of formats that VLC can play can be found here. Right now I am going to take a look at format factory, also free software. It can convert many types of files. I installed it 3 days ago, and I am collecting thoughts for a review.