News - VLC 1.1 media player arrives with hardware acceleration in tow

[chuckskull]

MPC is very good, just like VLC. Generally speaking I've found if one can't do something, the other can, hence using both; have a look for yourself http://mpc-hc.sourceforge.net/media-...-features.html

[Faiakes]

Actually, MPC has been having problems with ATI drivers recently.

It does accelerate but there is some blocking, on my system.

[99x]

I think the issue (previously) with hardware acceleration for HD video is that it just isn't easy for the average user to; A - configure, B - even know about in the first place.

Although VLC only currently supports Nvidia atleast it's making a step toward it being easier, i.e. just ticking a box.

For anyone not using GPU acceleration (unless you have a decent CPU) it is definitely worth it, for me using an old Pentium D and an ati 4830, 1080p video plays flawlessly with shaders - with CPU usage <8%.

This has to be good in terms of saving power as well because the graphics cards can churn the video out without breaking a sweat.

[Terbinator]

MPC has it turned on during installation and tels you what it is, if you don't want to read the wall of text it even says "(recommended)" next too the tick box.

[crossy]

Was about to come on here and say "Can someone explain to me, who has not used VLC before, why I should?"

If you're using Linux, VLC is a darned good (stable and handles most formats) general media player, (along with MPlayer). On Windows I mainly use VLC on my office system as a small, quick-to-launch audio player. (When you've got an XP system hosting one or more Linux/Solaris VM's the last thing you want is a bloated behemoth like iTunes hosing up all the resources). I've also used it on my home XP box as a media player for those files that WMP baulks at.

Here's a crazy idea, use standards. Code once, run everywhere.

So is there a cross-platform (Windows and Linux) standard that allows you to use GPU acceleration on ATI, NVidia and Intel GPU's? (That'd be interesting for a couple of projects that could be coming up soon for me).

Bob