Macs not media friendly out of the box?

OK, first off this isn't meant to be flame bait or anything like that. I like Macs and own 2 at home, but I occasionally forget some things about the OS that annoy me.

This morning I got a call from a friend who was playing with his new Mac and was having trouble playing some video files that kept trying to open up in Quicktime, but wouldn't play there. I told him to download VLC and everything would be good, he's not too technically savvy though and doesn't like having to download programs off the net. One of the main reasons he ended up getting a Mac was because "they just work" and are supposed to be good for media stuff. All he really wants to do with his computer is download video clips, listen to music, and browse the internet.

So I walk him through downloading VLC, get it set-up and working, about 15 minutes later I get a call back from him that it is still trying to open Quicktime to play these files. Which reminded me of what a hard time I had trying to get Quicktime to never, ever try to open ANYTHING on the Mac. No matter what I did for the longest time any time I would just try to open a video file it would promptly open in Quicktime and tell me that Quicktime couldn't read this file. Even though I had set multiple times VLC to be the default player. I finally came across some hack that sort of uninstalls/disables Quicktime that seems to have done the trick and lets me watch videos finally...but it wasn't easy.

So while all of this is happening I'm remembering a conversation I had with my friend last week about how Netflix is allowing unlimited streaming of movies...I hadn't thought about it at the time, because I'm not really into watching movies on my PC..but my friend is, and it won't work on a Mac...same thing for Amazon Unbox.

While I know these all aren't entirely Apple's fault...it sure doesn't make the Mac OS the easiest to view most internet video available (at least not as it is configured out of the box). Compare this to Windows and WMP that plays just about everything right off the bat, no tweaking required.

Anyway, no real point to this. Just trying to avoid real work this morning and so thought I would share what was running through my head and hear your thoughts.

 

One of the first things I was told to do when I first got my Macbook Pro about 3 months ago was to download Perian, which is a nice codec package for Quicktime. Seems to work fine, never had any issues playing video in Quicktime.

http://perian.org/

 

QuickTime + Perian + Flip4Mac works very well. So does VLC.

You can change the default file association so that movies open with VLC. Select a file, right-click, Get Info, Open With, choose VLC, and click Change All.

 

WMP does play almost everthing, I wish it came with more .AVI codecs

 

I had done this originally with my Macbook, but for whatever reason the setting never stuck. I've had my friend do the same thing, and am hoping he will have better luck than I did.

I downloaded Flip4Mac, but never really used it. I use VLC on the PC side, and whenever possible I like to use the same programs crossplatform, makes switching between the two less confusing.

 

Yeah, Windows Media Player is great, but you still have to install codecs such as XviD, DivX, and AC3 that are included in packages like the K-Lite Codec Pack. And some Windows users still prefer Media Player Classic or VLC. VLC does have the codecs built-in and Media Player Classic has some advanced features.

 

I am sorry but Windows is NO better. Luckily for Windows alot of stuff out there is .wmv which is WMP native format. Out of the box WMP wont play, divix, mpeg2, quicktime and many.....many other formats.

For windows I usually download Quicktime, Divix and CCCP codecs to get it so I can open almost anything, still some junk out there wont open.

For Apple, like has been posted, Flip4Mac, Perian and I install the Divx for OS X. Perian is like the CCCP for OS X.

The problem for OS X and Windows is there are WAY more video formats that Audio formats. Also there is no dominant format like .mp3 for audio in the video world. It needs to be something that is NOT owned by MS or Apple like Divx.

 

Yeah, WMP isn't perfect, but it took me a lot longer to come across video that it couldn't play (without installing additional codecs) then it did on the Mac side (which seemed that 90% of what I downloaded couldn't play).

Mostly I think Apple doesn't handle the situation very well either. When Quicktime can't play something like a WMV file it directs you to a page with a bunch of different codecs, and no real idea of what you need to do. I'd like it to behave more like when you have to install Flash, where you follow a link to a plug-in that installs fairly seamlessly in the background and then you continue on your merry way...no need to know what you're doing or installing.

 

Besides, with codec packs on Windows you have to be careful about spyware/adware.

DivX on Mac also installs a bunch of totally unnecessary programs behind your back, of course.

 

I think you just went to places that supported .wmv the most. WMP does NOT support alot of video codecs out the box. You have to install just as many codecs to WMP as you do with QT.

Does WMP player prompt you to download a codec when it cant play something....NOPE. It just tells you it cant, at least QT sends you to a web site that talks about codecs.

 

The full typical install of Divx on Windows or Mac will install a bunch of crap. On both platforms I do a custom install and ONLY install the codec. If it still installs the player and other crap I uninstall those pieces or just delete them.

 

WMP out of box support...

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/316992

Quicktime out of the box....

http://www.apple.com/quicktime/player/specs.html

Call me crazy but I think they are about the same or even Quicktime has more or supports more open formats.

 

Yeah, I'd say use Quicktime with Perian and Flip4Mac, or VLC .

 

If anything installing codecs in osx is beter, just because you just need to get perian.

In windows, theres a lotta different types of codec packs, and yea some of them contain spyware.

 

All you need is VLC for mac and MPC/ffdshow for Windows. No messy codec packs necessary.

 

Hmm, thanks for the links. I had thought that WMP played MPEG-2 files fine with no additional codecs needed. I know that I was playing plenty of things with the file extension .mpg, including files transferred from a TiVo which are definitely mpeg-2, without installing anything for WMP that I was aware of. This was on a clean install of Windows using Bootcamp...I did install TiVo Desktop right away...maybe that installs codecs for WMP?

I've also read that Quicktime handles MPEG-2 differently than pretty much everything else out there...and that can cause some conflicts with some files. I'm obviously not very knowledgeable about these things, this is just what I read awhile back when I was trying to get some things to work in Quicktime.

Anyway, VLC does work for a lot of stuff out there, but Mac users are still pretty much out of luck for downloading licensed content from anywhere except for iTunes. The three services that I have some experience with are Netflix, Unbox, and Vuze and most of this content can still not be played on the mac at all. I guess this is because they chose to use some sort of WM DRM solution. This doesn't bother me, as I don't like watching stuff on a laptop, but my friend watches everything on his computer...so he won't be so happy.

 

wow thx i didn't know about perian, quickest install yet!

 

the solution to these "problems" are quite simply luckily enough. and for the record no OS will play every type of video file out of the box.

and those files that were still opening with Quicktime after you downloaded VLC, it is just a simple matter of opening those files WITH VLC, just drag them to the VLC icon in the dock, or right click them and go to open with, or, set VLC to be the defualt application to open those type of files, or download the proper codecs to playback the videos right in quicktime<<< this has nothing to do with ease of use or operating systems, it is just how video works, all video is compressed in some way or stored in some type of package, it all needs the correct codec to play back, with 100's out there, you can't really expect or really want an OS to ship with them all.

you should really encourage your friend to get more comfortable with software off of the internet.

 

Nowhere was I expecting either media player to play all video codecs...especially out of the box, but I disagree that it is unreasonable to expect them to play "most" video available, since I expect that 90% of the video that is available uses one of only a few formats.

Looking through my video downloads I have .avi, .mpg, and .wmv files. I realize that there are licensing issues and whatnot that make it difficult for some of these files to be cross platform, and that this isn't always Apple's fault...but as a user I don't necessarily care if there are reasons I just want things to work.

It is kind of like people who try Firefox or Safari and then come across a web page that doesn't work/look right in their new browser. Telling them that this is because Microsoft IE doesn't conform to web standards and so web designers design their web pages to just look good in IE and not any other browser doesn't necessarily matter to them...they don't care about the reason they just want things to work. (I say this as a Phoenix/Firebird user since the 0.5 release.)

As for the fact that my media files kept defaulting to Quicktime, even though I would check the "always use this program to open files of this type" message when using VLC...well even my Mac expert friend couldn't figure that one out. He was the one that did a bit of research and found someone else who had a similar problem and basically disabled the Quicktime app to keep it from running...that seems to work fine and now VLC opens up everything by default...of course every file I open in VLC gives me an error message...but at least is still plays.

 

personally, i think that mac's not being available to drm music and video stores is a good thing.

 

All the other posters were correct on recommendations for the software to play those weird codecs but the OP needs to be fair, out of the box Windows isn't ready for everything either. The one BIG thing I like about Macs is they are PDF based and out of the box I can read all PDF's without any additional software.
Windows requires you to visit Adobe's website for the Reader software and you have to be slave to Adobe's updates and email spam just to use Reader. When you buy a new computer you have to set it up, it's unreasonable to expect it to need nothing but what's installed. The developers will go broke if we didn't need anything from them.
I think it's great that Apple leaves room for 3rd party software it will increase support on the Mac.

 

Well it's not really required that you use Adobe Reader... I use Foxit.

 

The whole Netflix thing should be resolved soon.

But as others have said, it all depends on what containers and codecs you need.

Nothing plays my video files out of the box unfortunately...although I have to admit Windows does it slightly better than OSX, at least in terms of updates.

Err...you need to use Adobe's software for OSX too if your files have a lot of digital signatures and other security stuff. Adobe alternatives (Preview, etc.) don't read them properly

 

Yes, but I think you and Taelrak understand my point. You still had to download Foxit on Windows, it isn't already built into the Windows OS.

And yes, I'm sure there are certain digital sigs that Preview cannot handle but for most PDF's Preview handles them out of the box.

So my whole point is the OP's topic is a bit on the overreacting side. You have to download certain softwares on ANY computer. He's targeting Macs not being media friendly out of the box. Windows is the same. Just download what you need and be done with it. He's expecting it to be perfect because it's Apple and that's not realistic.
His topic would be more on point if there were no available codecs and if Apple had control on that.

 

are you kidding me!? WMP sucks. Media Player Classic on the other hand is awesome, and its a shame there is no mac version.

for OSX I would recommend:

Quicktime + Perian (however you do have to wait for it to buffer the movie)

VLC (however it does not handle softsubs very well)

and MPlayer (what I use most often however I've run across a few videos that it would not play correctly)

 

The stock media players for both OSes aren't very good. VLC is where it's at.

 

you cannot be blaming anyone for the way you have collected or encoded your own files, if you have downloaded many .wmv's off of the internet, created by people all over the world, you should not expect them to be completely ok with a base system.

OS X is completely ready to go out of the box to create all types of content in very efficient and easy to use ways, like a good operating system should.

the video world is one that is ruled by third parties, if you have 100 .avi files, it is entirely possible that each one of them is using a different codec, the same goes for basically every type of video file out there.

ALSO, as far as your Mac expert friend,

all you have to do to set the default Application for a file type is:

click on a file of the specific type (for example, a .mov, .avi, .mpg, etc.),

next, either control/right click (or just press Cmd+I) to open the Get Info window for that specific file

go to the Open With: section and simply select the application you would like to use, then press the Change All button, simple as that, all files with that specific extension will open with that App.



I have done this with multiple file types and applications and never had any issues with it.

 

...like the iTunes store?