We can easily install every Codec under the sun , but there are downsides to this, so its not really recommended.

What’s the point in installing a complete codec pak and then only using 2% of them?

Apart from simple things such as a waste if system resources, not every codec works well together in fact some of them cause system issues with Windows XP and Vista.

For example one of the side effects includes the loss of thumbnails from movie files, which can be annoying especially if you have a computer setup as a media centre pc, where presentation of files icons can be important rather than them all looking the same boring icon.

Its understandable why many of us simply install complete a complete codec pak, especially when using WMP or Windows Media Player, go to run a video file, WMP does not have the correct codecs install, so it tries to download it, but of course it never or hardly ever is able to do this, and we get the usual unable to download codecs message.

Only Installing the Codecs Needed

One of the easiest ways to only ever install which ever codecs you need is to firstly download a free media player such as Crystal Media player.

Once downloaded > Install > Run Player
Now open the video or media file you want to run, Crystal will download the required codec needed, once your happy that the file is playing ok quit the application.

Now launch WMP and try to open the file, as Crystal has already installed the required codec WMP should now pick this up.

Usually we encounter loads of media files, but most of them are in the same formats, so you may need to use Crystal media player to download the codecs for a few media types rather than all codecs .

There are many other ways to find the required ones rather than all codecs , such as using a media analyzing application called g-spot which analyzes media files and advises which codecs are required, but this a more hands on approach and does require a certain amount of manual web searching to find the relevant codecs.

The reason the Crystal media player approach works so well is the ease of use, its a very easy and quick way to only install exactly what is needed, which then reduces the chances of getting any of the codec related issues as specified earlier in this article.

This article was aimed primarily at using WMP to play media files, which generally has to be the default media application to any one using XP or Vista media centre, but if not using either Crystal or VLC media players offer good alternatives.

computer adviser all codecs article