The ability to watch DVD movies on a Windows based PC is one of the luxuries of today's computing. But do most PC's come with the ability to watch DVD movies out of the box? Unless your using a version of Windows that has Media Center installed then the answer is sadly, no. Even though you will have a version of Windows Media Player it will still not playback DVD movies because the DVD needs to be decoder first which Media Player is not. Here is a simple test to determine if a DVD Decoder is installed on your PC, just click on "start", select "run", type "dvdupgrd /detect" in the search box and click "OK". If only WMP is installed on your PC, then the result will display "no decoder detected", which will prove that your WMP is not a decoder.
There are a few different options while choosing a DVD decoder. There are Free DVD decoders but these tend not to stay updated with the latest movies and lack certain playback features. The best method is to use a supported 3rd party DVD decoder such as CinePlayer. Not only is this an inexpensive solution (around $15), but the added benefits include:
a lightweight plugin for Windows Media Player
product support and updates
full DVD playback features
Many also associate DVD Decoders as a way of copying a DVD onto your computer. However this is not the right terminology. Decoding a DVD is just a way to have it play on your computer, and ripping a DVD is the process of putting the DVD onto your PC for playback later or to copy to a disc.
The best way to think of a DVD decoder is that is is a lightweight option for DVD Playback on your PC, compared to a full blown out DVD Player app such as Cyberlink PowerDVD which is a standalone DVD playback software with tons of features.
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