MPCStar Simple media player with basic codecs
If you want to play some of the most popular types of video files on the Internet but you don't need a ton of features in your media player, MPCStar offers support for some of the most popular codecs around without bogging you down with the extras.
The 20-megabyte program fits on a memory stick and contains FFDShow, RealPlayer, QuickTime, VSFilter and Media Player Classic codecs. That's pretty much all that you'll need for 90 percent of the videos on the Internet. Supported formats include AVI, MKV, MP4, QT, SWF, 3GP, MKV, MPEG, WMV and much more.
The simple interface of the program includes play, fast forward, rewind, pause and stop buttons, but not much else. That's part of the appeal of MPCStar, however. You don't get excessive subtitle support or any of the other stuff that bogs down bigger media players. Instead, you get an extremely light, low-resource media player that you can easily use on a netbook or other low-power PC.
MPCStar also supports a number of hotkeys, which means that you can control the media player with your keyboard. There's a nice popup blocker, too, and overall it's an extremely simple program that should appeal to a decent number of PC users.
The simplicity of MPCStar is also its main disadvantage, however. You can't automatically update your codecs and you don't get any of the advanced features of players like VLC Media Player. Still, MPCStar is an excellent low-resource option for playing a wide assortment of media files.
MPCStar is a basic, essential video player. MPCStar is designed to be able to play most video formats of films that have been downloaded from the Internet.
On the plus side, MPCStar is very simple to use. In many ways, it is perfect for nearly everyone who wants a basic video player. In addition, MPCStar contains only the essential codecs. It also has a popup blocker.
On the negative side of things, MPCStar does by design lack many advanced features. However, and has been noted, this is an essential video player intended to lack confusing and even unnecessary bells and whistles.
