Does XP need any of this stuff?
k-lite codek pack
active-x
direct-x`
I had to install the K-lite and at least one of those ___-x files. I'm
not sure if I have both or only one of the ___-x files in Win98. But I
do know I had to install K-lite. But maybe XP dont need this stuff, or
it's built in to the OS???? (I never remember which is which of those
___-x files or what they do.
Is there anything else that is an absolute need? (I got Adobe flash
player, and Foxit PDF reader).
I want to download all this stuff at a WIFI place to save time, so I may
as well make a list of needs.
Thanks
K-Lite would contain CODECs not in the OS.
Microsoft has their own video and audio standards (WMV,WMA),
and those CODECs would already be provided. A CODEC
to play a DVD should not be there (generally), as
the CODEC usage involves a licensing fee, and Microsoft
doesn't like to "give away" anything. Maybe an exception
there, would have been Windows7 (for certain versions with
Media Center capability).
The open source community has FFMPEG and libAVCodec,
which is one source of CODECs not in Windows. And
some of that is re-packaged in other CODEC packs.
The libAVCodec thing would be part of VLC as well. You might
not need quite as much of a CODEC pack, if using a
popular player like VLC, which has the CODECs built
into the executable.
When you attempt to play media, on some media players,
they consult the system at play time. They build a
filter graph (GraphEdit-like), and a chain of CODEC
components is put together in series, to play the media.
CODECs can be assigned weights, so if two CODECs exist
that do the same thing, there is a decision criteria
to pick one of them. But as far as I know, programs
like VLC, don't necessarily rely on that. Whereas,
Windows Media Player from Microsoft, would probably
try to build a filter graph in each case. So the CODEC
pack is of more help to a program like WMP.
*******
ActiveX is part of the OS. Plugins can be added to
your browser by downloading, which would be an example
of how you acquire executable content using that subsystem.
For example, Windows Update uses an ActiveX component,
as part of communicating with Microsoft, and giving
your details.
*******
DirectX includes a number of things.
Component parts might be DirectSound, Direct2D and Direct3D.
You can run "dxdiag" from Start : Run or from the Command Prompt
window, and a dialog box will appear with the details of your
current installation. If you buy and install a 3D game, for
the purposes of a WinXP user, it would install its own version
of DirectX 9c, the last version for WinXP.
And some version is already bundled in the OS. Running "dxdiag"
will give you a hint.
Downloading DirectX is a chore. DirectX 9c has been around for
a while. And newer files, all labeled DirectX 9c, would appear
at regular intervals. Each is given a date name, such as Mar 2008.
Typically, one of the differences between each dated file version, is
the addition of one specific file. Games can be written, looking for
that specific file. If you bought a game CD, usually the game includes
the specific version of DirectX it wants, which is how gamers can
have their system maintained up to date, and get those specific files
added.
Lets say I'm a gamer, and I install 3 game CDs. My DirectX file set is
kinda additive, so my installed file set looks like
Base set of DirectX 9c files...
Single file added from Mar 2008 <--- Made up dates, I didn't look these up...
Single file added from Jun 2008
Single file added from Mar 2010
DirectX installs are not intended to "go backwards". If you
have DirectX 7 installed and you install DirectX 9c, there is
no uninstall to remove it. You're at DirectX 9c and it is
backward compatible back to 7 or so. For users on really
old computers, playing really old games, you don't
update your DirectX or "you'll ruin it". For example, I
had a copy of some game with dinosaurs it in, the name I
forget, and it used something like DirectX 5 or something.
I may have updated my DirectX and when that game started,
the screen would turn black. So on absolutely ancient gamer
setups, you study the situation carefully before doing any
downloading. Games issued from the DirectX 7 era, there
is enough backward compatibility this is not an issue.
Systems at DirectX before 7, needs more research. On WinXP,
if you're a gamer, the game CD is your best source.
Also, some of the later OSes, it turns out they have an
extensive collection of stuff like that. It would seem,
for the gamer community, at least one of my Win7 or Win8
DVDs has a DirectX collection of installer files, as well
as at least some .NET, so in the future, if a person is stuck,
they can try data mining those kinds of DVDs. There's no
guarantee they're compatible with an older OS, but on the
other hand, I can't see them "updating" all those point
release files, so chances are they're still useful to people
with older OSes.
*******
You didn't ask about .NET, but I'll make a quick comment about
that. You only add .NET, if software needs it. An ATI video
card control panel, needs .NET 2.0. The .NET releases are
elements in a "stack", so .NET 3.0 is just a layer of the
stack above .NET 2.0. The release control in this case,
consists of Service Packs, such as .NET 2.0 SP1 and .NET 2.0 SP2
or the like. Those Service Packs would bring that layer up
to date. Now, when you get to .NET 4.0 or .NET 4.5, now they're
adding layers for "wedge purposes". For example, programmers will
write new programs using .NET 4.5 (for no particularly good reason),
and then the program won't run on WinXP (no 4.5). So the latest "layers"
of the cake exist, to "wedge" WinXP users. They'd do the
same thing to DirectX, except DirectX version number on
other OSes is already up to DirectX 11. (WinXP stops at 9c.)
And when new video cards come out soon, there will be no WinXP
support (DirectX 9c support) at all. All part of "wedging" WinXP
users. If you want an up-to-date video card for your WinXP system,
run don't walk to the nearest store. You would want to find
a video card *now*, with WinXP support still in it. That would
be for a serious gamer, who for some reason has just installed
a copy of WinXP. (A serious gamer wouldn't do that, but I needed
something I could use as an illustration of why.)
*******
Adobe flash player, and Foxit PDF reader would be good to have.
As would IrfanView or GIMP for photo editing. And a copy of
GhostScript to add to the machine, so GIMP can open PostScript or
PDF files. While Foxit can open a PDF file, if you want to edit
PDF pages as images, GhostScript can help with that.
http://www.irfanview.com/
http://www.gimp.org/
http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/
http://www.ghostscript.com/download/gsdnld.html
"Ghostscript 9.10 for Windows (32 bit) Ghostscript GPL Release"
For working on videos, MediaInfo or GSpot help identify what
CODEC is needed (which may not be present on the computer).
I like the latter one, which is old now. This one will even
list all the CODECs which are accessible in the system. For
example, you run this before K-Lite, it might list 110 CODECs,
and after K-Lite, it might list 150 CODECs or whatever. That
allows you to see what impact such an installation has, on the
pool of CODECs. (Even if some of the CODECs are duplicates.)
http://gspot.headbands.com/v26x/GSpot270a.zip
HTH,
Paul