ArticleManagerSuper Boss, Storm Video, Archer Player, PPlive…
A few days ago, the news of the return of the veteran music player Winamp appeared on the timeline, but for me, the memory of the music player first began with the domestic Qianqian Jinglisten, and then entered the Internet era, Kugou and Kuwo became the most commonly used music players, and as the music industry continues to turn digital, QQ and NetEase Cloud have become the mainstream today. In fact, relatively speaking, my memory of music players is actually not too much, and in contrast, I may be more impressed by video players.
When the network was not popularized and the network speed was not fast enough, many people would watch dramas through CDs and downloads, so a large number of useful domestic players appeared at that time, but with the changes of the times, streaming media quickly became the mainstream, so those players were slowly forgotten. Today’s geek choice will take an inventory of a few players we have used, and let’s find out if there is any memory of your youth.
Super Solution
Super Solver is the first third-party player I came into contact with. Around 2004, I bought the first computer at home, and the built-in software had Super Xieba, but I didn’t understand why this video player was called “Xieba” at the time, and now I look back and find that “Xieba” represents super software decoding ability.
At that time, an important use of home computers was to watch VCD discs, but the performance of computers was generally weak, and it took a lot of effort to decode VCDs in real time using the CPU, and the viewing experience was not good, and what was more difficult was that pirated CDs were rampant, and these discs with irregular encoding were difficult to be read by computers, and they would cause crashes in serious cases. In line with the principle that the hardware is not enough, the software to make up, there is such a software on the market, which not only has super software decoding capabilities, but also has developed a “super error correction” function for pirated discs, which can read VCD discs smoothly, so it is also welcomed by millions of users.
However, the golden age of VCD passed quickly, and the super solver did not advance the technology in time, so it ended in a few years.
Storm Video
Storm Video was active around 2010, was a necessary software for installation at that time, when the Windows system itself supported video formats were not comprehensive, and Storm Video had strong compatibility, not only eating all kinds of formats of video, but also playing very well. In addition, Storm Video has also launched some special functions, its “left eye button” can enhance the saturation and contrast of the picture, effectively improve the video quality. In addition, the built-in “Storm Transcoding” can transcode downloaded videos into a smaller format suitable for mobile devices such as mobile phones.
Storm Video was destroyed in advertising and commercialization, perhaps in a hurry to monetize, Storm Video later became an advertising bundler, pop-up windows continued, ads were rampant, and the experience dropped sharply, and I even specifically looked for the local version of Storm to use at that time. Later, when the VR boom came in 2016, Stormwind also had transformation actions, launched hardware products such as Storm Magic Mirror, Storm TV, and later successfully listed on the A-share market, but as the VR bubble dissipated, coupled with Storm executives suspected of crimes, Stormwind Group eventually fell apart and withdrew from people’s field of vision.
QQ Audio
QQ Video is one of the few products under Tencent with a good reputation.
When Storm Video added a large number of advertisements to reduce the user experience, QQ Video attracted many users with its refreshing and ad-free advantages. Like Storm Audio, QQ Video also supports a lot of video formats, but it does not have bloated online functions, and has launched some good services, such as if you are a QQ member, with the QQ Whirlwind download software at that time, you can achieve cloud playback.
After entering the streaming media era, QQ Video stopped for a long time, but two or three years ago, Tencent suddenly updated the corpse several times and added some new features, but under the impact of streaming media, even if QQ Video has a good experience, it is difficult to become a “must-have” software.
Shooter player
After solving the problem of decoding ability and format support, there are some players on the market that focus on content experience, shooter player is this type, it is a must-have artifact for every foreign drama lover, when you download the “raw meat” resource, the shooter player will automatically match the online Chinese subtitles, and the support behind this comes from the rich subtitle resources of the shooter network.
The shooter player has actually been popular for many years, and its rise and fall is closely related to the survival of the subtitle group. When I went to college in 2016, I had plenty of free time, and I liked to download American dramas and Japanese dramas on everyone’s video, as well as BBC’s nature documentaries, and every time the shooter player would automatically match the subtitles for me, which was very worry-free, so the shooter player became the only local player on my computer at that time.
Nowadays, film and television copyrights have been taken seriously, many subtitle groups and foreign drama film and television websites have been forced to shut down, and the shooter player has gradually faded out of people’s vision, but if you still leave some “inventory”, the shooter can still shine today.
Thunderbolt take a look
Xunlei looks at the main feature of “watching while broadcasting”, relying on the very popular Xunlei download, you will find that Xunlei look appears in the computer unconsciously. At first, my impression of Xunlei was not good, because its bundled installation method was very annoying to me, and a few years ago, the broadband speed in China was generally low, and the “watch and broadcast” function was actually of little use.
But now, I, the “Internet old man”, still developed the habit of downloading and watching dramas, although there are many Xunlei ads, but it is undeniable that its download experience is indeed good after opening a membership, coupled with today’s network speed has also been greatly improved, “watching and broadcasting” has also become a very practical function, so in this way, I slowly accepted the existence of Xunlei Look, and it has also become one of the only two players in my computer today (the other is PotPlayer).
PPLive / PPS
Both players appeared in the PC Internet era, and due to the imperfect copyright rules at that time, there was a blank in the field of live network television, so they appeared.
The main function of PPlive and PPS is “Internet TV”, that is, watching live TV on the computer. In addition, these platforms also have relatively rich foreign drama resources, I still remember that I played “Yumbius Ultraman” on demand with other friends on PPlive back then, although the network was a giant card at that time, but the picture of the Ultra brothers appearing in Yumbius still left a deep impression on me.
Now PPlive has become PPTV, mainly focusing on sports content, and PPS has been merged by iQiyi.
Quick play
Kuaibo (also known as Qvod or Q broadcast) is a multi-functional, personalized playback software based on quasi-video-on-demand kernel, different from traditional playback software, Kuaibo integrates a different playback engine, applies P2P technology and supports MKV, RMVB, MPEG, AVI, WMV and other mainstream audio and video formats.
The above content comes from Baidu Encyclopedia, and you can understand more content! (Manual dog head~)
Behind the constant changes of players, our viewing habits have also undergone a lot of changes. Nowadays, the limitation of network bandwidth is no longer there, and copyright rules are becoming more and more perfect, whether on a mobile phone or computer, you can easily find a large number of video content.
But unfortunately, I always feel that there are fewer and fewer excellent film and television content, and there are always endless advertisements and annoying pay-on-demand, in fact, sometimes, I just want to simply watch a show, I can pay for it, but I also hope to exchange for the corresponding experience, if today’s viewing experience is not as good as a few years ago, then even if the technology is powerful, there will not be much value left.
Editor-in-charge: SeaGreen
The author of this article: Liu Zongyue
This article was first published in Geek’s Choice, please contact Geekparker (ID: geekparker) for reprinting.