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  GOM Player v2.0

  Sudeep Naik, Aug 20, 2006 1200 hrs IST

  Today, we review the GOM Player that is supposed to be one of the best media players around.

  Loads of features and customizations, Good output quality, Built-in codecs, Extensive file support, Free.

  Slightly heavy on resources.

  Expert Rating :

  

  

Page 1 - Introduction and Features Page 2 - The Player and More Features Page 3 - Settings n Preferences Page 4 - Performance & Verdict

The Control Panel button on the main player gives quick access to advanced Video, Audio, Subtitle, and Control options.

The Video option allows you to adjust the brightness, contrast, and saturation for the video playback. Also included are options to Pan & Scan, Screen Capture, and Advanced Capture.

The Pan & Scan option gives you three stretch and three zoom modes for the video playback. Screen capture allows you to take screenshots from the video being played.

Advanced Capture option allows you to choose the image format of the captured images (JPG or BMP), choose the screenshot image quality (JPG only; from 1-255), manage the number of burst captured images (ranges from 1-999), and select the burst interval (in secs.) You can also choose to make the current screen as a desktop wallpaper.

Coming to the Audio tab of the Control Panel, it gives you 10-band equalizer and 17 EQ presets to choose from. One can also save custom EQ setting as a preset.

The Subtitle tab, gives you options to adjust the subtitle font type, size, and its physical location on the screen. It allows you to skip forward and backward and also choose between different languages for the subtitles.

The Control tab had the Time Jump, Playback Speed, and A-B repeat options. Time jump allows you to jump forward or backward either by 10 secs or 60 secs. These intervals are totally customizable i.e. you can choose any length for FF/RW funtions. Playback speeds can be adjusted from a minimum of 0.2x (slow) to a maximum of 4.0x (fast.)

The A-B repeat option lets you rerun a particular part of the video or audio file. You can choose the start and end or the section that needs to be repeated.

The player preferences give access to an even more bigger list of customizable features that are neatly arranged in tabs and can be accessed easily with minimal confusion. The Video option in the preferences menu is of far greater interest than any other. These options will make you realize how much of the player can really be configured.

You can adjust the output type by choosing the kind of rendering filter you want or select the output screen size. There's loads of options for each of these. The Aspect Ratio can also customized. Aspect ratio options include 4:3 (TV), 16:9 (HDTV), 1.85:1 (Screen), 2.35:1 (Screen). Users may also define their own aspect ratios ranging from 1.0 : 3.0 to 3.0 : 1.0. Video effects to smooth, sharpen, or to add/remove noise are available as well.

Page 1 - Introduction and Features Page 2 - The Player and More Features Page 3 - Settings n Preferences Page 4 - Performance & Verdict

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