UMPlayer 0.98.2

Overview

The UMPlayer is an open-source Media Player created by Ori Rejwan.The advantage of this application is that it includes hundreds of codecs for audio and video files, also including radio and TV streams. Universal Media Player has included a lot of media formats: MP3, MP4, MPEG, WAV, WMA, WMW, AAC, AC3, ASF, FLV, MOV, XVID, RealMedia, DIVX, Matroska. Audi CDs, DVDs, SHOUTcast Radio streams and the possibility to search for a video file on Youtube.

Installation

The Universal Media Player is compatible with all operating systems, from Windows XP to Apple Mac or Linux. The application is lightweight and in full installation takes up around to 75 MB. It is a small application, it doesn’t need to make use of any type of codec in order to render the multimedia files because these codecs are included, from this point of view being very similar to KMPlayer. Being a very simple and useful software, the installation will first pop up a window which download the necessary files in the shortest time, then you have to accept the End User License Agreement.

Interface

The interface of Universal Media Player is clean and simple, and it also comes with theme support, which means its appearance can be customized using downloadable packages. For users who have talent, on the official website you can create your own skin. This process is so easy and sharing your artwork can be a rewarding experience. If you wish to create your own skin, you must visit the UMPlayer’s website where you can find a guide.

The main menu is located in the upper part, in this menu you can find only the important buttons and options, as Open Filse, DVD from Drive, Screenshots, Find Subtitles and Settings. Of course, you can put the UMPlayer on full screen, you can minimize or leave it by common buttons.

Pros

Perhaps the main advantage of this software is that you will not need to download any codecs, being an important feature for people that have limited time. The possibility to search for a video file on Youtube or to search for a radio stream is another plus.

Another gem is the fact that when you are forced to close a movie, the application will resume from that exact point the next time you open it.

Cons

The main disadvantage of the UMPlayer is that videos from Youtube are loading a little slower compared to a browser. Therefore, if you only want to use it to search for a video file on Youtube, you might reconsider. We hope that this feature will receive some improvement in future releases.

Alternatives

Probably the main competitior is the K-Media Player (KMPlayer). Similar to the UMPlayer, the KMPlayer includes most of the audio and video codecs, however, the interface is a bit more attractive. Also on this list we can put Media Player Classic and SMPlayer..

Conclusion

Overall the experience with the UMPlayer is good. It's a powerful media player that will simplify your media watching experience. For the moment UMPlayer is one of the best apps in the media players category so you should give it a try because you won’t regret it!