MPlayer OSX Extended - rev12

This product would be PERFECT if it weren't for the 20 second font cache rebuild every other time you use it.

Also, some newer WMV encodings (H264?) seem to stutter badly.

I hope both of these issues are seen to shortly. I am currently using VLC 1.0.0, and it has played every format I have without a hitch or hiccup. Both of these programs are highly recommended for your video playback arsenal!

Sorry this isn't a review or minireview or anything but is a Loop feature available anywhere in the interface or prefs?

I can't say that I understand the rave reviews here. MPlayer does some things better than VLC, but overall, it's nowhere near as capable. I threw a couple of AVIs that befuddled VLC and Quicktime Player (with Perian) at MPlayer. It managed to play them, although the first time I dropped one of those videos onto MPlayer's dock icon, the app immediately locked up and I needed to force quit. That's great. But compared to VLC, MPlayer lacks a lot of features and is also un-Maclike in many ways. For one thing, there's no "Open recent..." submenu like most Mac apps have. Finish playing a video and it disappears from the playlist, so if you want to play it again, you have to go find it again. There's no control over audio sync, so if your audio doesn't match perfectly, you're out of luck. Go through the menus for a little too long (about 15 seconds) and the playback freezes. And there is no quick jumping through the video. With VLC, I can make short, medium, long and extra long jumps through video at the press of a key combination (actually at the press of a key on my wonderfully programmable Belkin Nostromo N52 Speedpad). That's very useful if I'm searching for a specific point in a video or I miss a line of dialog and want to jump back. Press a key and I've jumped back 10 seconds. Press another and I can jump 5 minutes forward instantly. No such luck with MPlayer. It has barely more controls than Quicktime Player. I use VLC's extremely configurable prefs to set the audio volume to very fine grain control, another option not available in MPlayer.

MPlayer is a useful addition to my video arsenal for files that won't play back any other way. But use it as my primary player? No, thanks. MPlayer is more of a basic tool, while VLC is a power tool.

This player now has a great looking OSX GUI and I agree with a previous poster, it seems to handle files more smoothly than VLC. I will keep using it over VLC for a while.

While it's always been nice to have VLC around, it's always felt like a port. And MPlayer has been a nice program for the Mac, but it's not under very consistent development, I'd have to say.

This version, though not 'official', has a great feel and plays everything I've thrown at it thus far. The scrubbing through the progress bar is smoother and more accurate than I've gotten from VLC and I appreciate the aesthetic touches added.

Thanks a LOT.