VLC Releases a Major Update v2.1.0

I'm glad you mentioned this. I haven't used VLC for a long time and just installed 2.1. At fist I thought there might be something wrong with my soundcard settings, but then I loaded RealPlayer and the audio quality went back up to normal. It seems strange that such a competent program has this weakness.

 

Audio quality has been a problem with VLC throughout its existance. I do not know why. First I thought that becasue it is free, so the developers had to write their own Audio engine which could not compete against the paid audio engines contained within paid media players, but then other free media players like KMPlayer do not suffer from these audio quality issues, so I do not know what is happening with VLC development.

I raised this issue because I had been eagerly waiting for this release since the time one of the developers mentioned that this release will have a completely new and redesigned audio processing engine. I thought that finally they will fix the audio quality issue, but alas, the audio quality is exactly the same.

Although the audio quality is poor, but it is still not that bad, so VLC is still my default media player, but when I listen to a media file where audio is important, I normally switch to KMPlayer.

 

I had not used VLC in a while because it opened so slowly but this latest version is very responsive. I like it...not as much as my Zoom Player but it's pretty good.

 

I only really run 3gp files & the occasional DVD so I haven't noticed if the sound quality is particularly bad. I don't notice any real difference between VLC & SMPlayer. I suppose it depends on what sort of file is being run. I have known VLC have some sound loss problems, a couple of versions ago, but that has been rectified now as far as I can tell.

 

Its not bad, it is just slightly below the quality of other free players. The problem you remember happened when they updated from v1.X to v2.x, they rewrote the audio processor at that time too and something was off. I think they fixed that within a couple of weeks.

 

I can only remember having problems with one of the 2.0 releases. I think it was 2.0.8. They fixed it in the next release however. Although it did make me look at other media players. MPC-HC was my first choice but I discovered it would stick trying to play edited 3gp files. Another one I tried did the same, although I can't actually remember what it was. SMPlayer did it perfectly. If VLC ever did disappear, change for the worse or I couldn't use it for some reason, SMPlayer would be my next choice. It is far better than QuickTime (on Windows) & alternatives like RealPlayer shouldn't be downloaded by anyone ever!

 

Does the plugins work for Comodo Dragon?

Previously I never installed the plugins as in recommended setup they were unchecked by default but now with this version the plugins are checked by default. So I installed them, both activex & Mozilla.

In Comodo Dragon, under plugin, Mozilla plugin is there, will it work?

In Internet Explorer I couldn't find the plugin under addons, where is it?

Win 7 64
Comodo Dragon 29
Internet Explorer 10
VLC 2.1.0 32 Bits

 

It works with Chrome, so Dragon should be fine. You can Google test sites, I found RealMedia and QuickTime support to be worse than Windows Media.

I had success with AVI, MP3, and probably more formats as well, forgot where I found those (usually happens when Flash or HTML5 isn't embedded). Don't know about IE, haven't tried this version's plugin yet. Will update when I get back to my computer tomorrow.

Update: On Internet Explorer 10, you have to select "All add-ons" in the "Show:" drop-down list. Although enabled, it's not verified so IE doesn't load it. An example of MP3 streaming this: ~ Removed Copyrighted MP3 Download Link ~

 

Update - Have now updated to 2.1.0, and ran into the same problem (it ignores the "always start at n% volume" setting), so apparently the problem is new to this new version. Hopefully enough feedback to them will result in an eventual fix.

My guess is that for whatever reason, they disabled this setting but forgot to remove it from the options menu.

 

I had installed activex plugin but it is not there in IE, I checked "All add-ons" from the drop-down list.

 

VLC doesn't seem to show media information although I had marked the option to collect the information during installation.

 

Well even if the plugin showed, it doesn't work cause IE can't verify and load it.