What began as an educational project at the Ecole Centrale Paris over a decade ago, now results in the ease of access for millions of people who take advantage of the free VLC player option that is available on the Internet.  VLC (VideoLAN Client) was originally developed to stream videos across a network for a particular client – but has expanded to support various audio and video formats in addition to DVD and VCD files and is available for a free download in various spots across the Web.

The free VLC Media Player has been an open-source front-runner for some time now.  It is not the only alternative out there for a free audio and video playback device, VLC Media Player is hands down, one of finest.  Even if this product is free, it certainly has some great features.

Those that use the free VLC Media Player are able to get frame-by-frame progression, live recording of streaming video, and even speed checks that allow for either faster or slower playback.  VLC even has full customizable toolbars, so the user can have just the buttons and controls that they need or want in the interface, a standard with VLC is finer integration in the Gtk enviornments, and even AirTunes streaming.  With these added features and improvements, VLC continually offers superior back up support for an extensive range of video and audio formattings.  The VLC Media Player is an application that is a must-have for it’s fantastic ability to open any type of video including MP2, OGG, MP3, DivX, MP4, Raw Dirac, support for playing back zipped files, and even HD codecs.

VLC acts as a client and a streaming server.  The user is able to set up the VLC Media Player to stream media from a DVD, a file, and a different client can stream that type of media without the need to encode the file.  You will need to understand a bit about network administration to perform this type of sharing.  It may be easier to simply stream the file even though it may take up to a few hours to receive the entire thing.  Make sure to check the corect box to do away with the standard DVD menus, or you will only be streaming in the main DVD menu in a constant, unending loop.

Lastly, the best thing about the free VLC Media Player is that it is only 17MB, and it is completely auto-contained after the installation. There are no other extra codecs or installations needed for this media player.  VLC is an excellent option if you are one who has formatted their computer and still wants a DVD playback. It is as well a great program to stream any kind of media.

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