Versatile alternative to Windows Media Player

There are few Mac applications that can compete with VLC Player when it comes to playing video but MPlayerOSX is a very decent attempt to do so.

MPlayerOSX impresses by playing virtually any video file. It also supports many native, XAnim, and Win32 DLL codecs, and enables you to watch VideoCD, SVCD, DVD, 3ivx, DivX 3/4/5 and even WMV movies, although if the latter format is your main concern, you’d be better off with Windows Media Player for Mac.

Note that this MPlayerOSX package installs both MPlayerOSX and the front-end SMPlayer, which is the same program but with a nicer looking interface. A number of useful features are included: the subtitles option for example, allows you to load subtitle files and link them to a video. MPlayerOSX also gives you many options to deinterlace, denoise and apply filters to improve the video rendering.

There a few glitches that don’t make MPlayerOSX quite as appealing as VLC, however. One is that you can’t drag and drop video folders for autoplay. Also, you can’t save or shuffle playlists or define keyboard shortcuts, while moving your cursor over any part of the main interface menu causes videos to automatically pause. Also MPlayerOSX doesn’t remember the sound volume when you close and re-open the application.

If for any reason you’re having problems with VLC or you want an alternative to Windows Media Player and RealPlayer, MPlayerOSX is a very impressive app.