Real Alternative 2.0.2 reviews

I have been using this a few years now, after I got fed up with Real Player always adding it processes to startup, and always trying to make connections even when specially disabled all those options.

Anyway this is a must have program, and is a great way of getting MPC on top. Works with every Real media file I have used, so no problems there.

I note that Real Player has now got into bed with AOL so I have had to look at Alternative to rid myself off the infernal AOL advertisement that Real Player now supports

@ETPhHm

LOL what a bummer for you with the hassle heh heh heh. interesting that you do mention about your experience with K-Lite Mega Codec Pack installation but you know, K-Lite Mega Codec Pack has already had Real Alternative integrated onto its core components and it was mentioned on wikipedia.org as well. you dont need Real Alternative at all if you had K-Lite Mega Codec Pack installed on your computer. but again this only applies for version Mega Codec Pack of K-Lite. others are not.

I can't give it a 5-star rating because when you install it, if you have RealPlayer already installed, it will tell you that you should uninstall it before proceeding and then asks you if you want to uninstall it now?

When you click yes, it fails to remove all the garbage left over by RealPlayer, and then after it proceeds to the installation of Real Alternative, it fails to install the core components. Now some would argue that it uses RP's uninstall data so it isn't RA's fault. But I say then why does it check for things that RP leaves behind? Version 1.90 does not.

They either should not check or do the final bit of house cleaning of RP trash before attempting to install. Not a good install routine on 2.02. The following was my journey to resolve this on my own:

I am running Windows XP SP3. I have been using Real Alternative for years and never trusted RealPlayer after I saw how horrible it takes over your system.

About 4 or 5 months ago, I installed Google Chrome because IE v.9 does not support XP and v.8 is buggy. Chrome installed RealPlayer as a BHO while I was asleep at the wheel and then I started having problems playing .smi .rp and .rm files from my computer.

I uninstalled RealPlayer (BHO my @$$, RP had installed the whole program), but it left a lot of stuff behind after the uninstall (d@mn those people, Real jerks). My MPC wouldn't play Real files at all (MPC - "unable to render file").

I uninstalled MPC and tried to reinstall Real Alternative 2.02, but it wouldn't allow me to select the core components for RealPlayer during installation.

After searching a bit on the internet, I found advice that directed me to go into my Program Files and Documents and Settings folders and delete the subfolders associated with RealPlayer, and also use a registry cleaner to try cleaning up what RealPlayer left behind. This did not work for me either and I was still unable to install the core components for Real Alternative 2.02.

The only solution I have found was to install K-Lite Mega Pack 7.8 and install the MPC Home Cinema v.1.5, then intall Real Alternative 1.90 into the same folder where Home Cinema is located, but I unchecked the MPC player during the install and just let the drivers install into the MPC Home Cinema folder. Apparently, version 1.9 of Real Alternative does not look for RealPlayer garbage left behind as 2.02 does. But that wasn't all...

Then I had to go into MPC Home Cinema "options" and install the external filters for RealAudio, RealMedia, and RealVideo. Finally, I had to associate the formats with the MPC player. All that works and I can play Real files now, but I just can't install the updated core components in RA version 2.02.

Anyone else experiencing this issue? I am sure there is some RealPlayer crap hiding somewhere on my computer but so far I am unable to find it. There is a registry entry that some have found by searching "WoW64" which is thought to be a leftover by RealPlayer after an uninstall, but this value or key is not in my registry.

UPDATE: I was using jv16 Power Tools and used its Registry Manager which has an Add/Remove menu utility... I scanned down the list in that and saw RealPlayer 12.0 still showing up there, so I deleted it and voila! I can now select the core components on the Real Alternative 2.02 installation. That alone probably wouldn't have solved the problem but along with all the other housekeeping I had to do to get RealPlayer off my system, it all finally worked.

This absolutely will not play .rm files for me, I re-downloaded the one I was trying to watch and downloaded 4 others from just to check. It simply will not work. All it will say is "Connection to server could not be established. You may be experiencing network problems."

I'm rating this as "awful" since the only reason I downloaded Real Alternative was to play these files on Media Player Classic and it is not preforming it's only task.

the only problem i have is the one with the previous real player. how can i find the registry key, and how can i get rid of the 'rpshell.ddl' file in there, as it's refusing to let me delete it

First, excellent program.

Second, for those who can't select RealMedia core components when installing v2.0.2:

If your system is 64-bit, you installed RealPlayer and then uninstalled it. Just like Steve said in the previous post, RealPlayer left some registry entries so that Real Alternative will be blocked.

I used Process Monitor to see which registry entries are checked when installing Real Alternative 2.0.2, there is only one registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\RealPlayer 12.0

RealPlayer seems forget to delete the WoW64 uninstall registry key. Just delete the "RealPlayer 12.0" key, and Real Alternative 2.0.2 will function correctly.

(Real Alternative actually also checked "RealPlayer 6.0" an "RealPlayer 10.5".)

So there is no need to use a registry cleaner like Free Window Registry Repair (I don't mean Free Window Registry Repair is not good, just because there will be hundreds of errors after scanning, I don't know whether all of them can be deleted.)

Installing Real Alternative 1.90 is another solution, but v2.0.2 has a much better performance, so personally I don't recommend it.

BTW, RealPlayer is the worst software I've used. After installing RealPlayer, you can't use other player to play .rmvb files, there will be no audio. (There is a "cook.dll" trick to solve this problem.)

What "surprising" me most is that when RealPlayer is playing .rmvb file, the video is so pixelated, just like a piece of sh*t.

Not to mention the bad UI design and the commercials on it.


It took me a whole afternoon to figure out the solution of the problem. I've installed and unistalled RealPlayer, K-Lite Mega/x64, Real Alternative several times before I found that Real Alternative DIDN'T select the RealMedia core components when installing...

And I swear I will never ever install and use RealPlayer again, it's like a nightmare.

Excellent codecs, but one of the problems I had when installing this on a second PC was that the Real Alternative 2.02 installer would not install the core components.

The reason for this is because I had previously installed realplayer on that PC. Even though realplayer was already uninstalled, the registry entries were still there and blocked 2.02 from installing correctly.

There are two workarounds for this issue:

1. Use a registry cleaner and clean your registry of realplayer entries. I used free windows registry repair from regsoft, and after the 2nd sweep was able to installed 2.02 correctly.

2. The second workaround involves installing the previous version of real alternative (1.9 I believe)

For anyone who is also having this issue, I hope this helps.

excellent program this thing works great. i use only firefox as my browser and have detected no problems so far.
Forget the REAL real player, it $uck$ because of that extra crap and commercials.

Excellent program. I found only one glitch. It won't self terminate with Replay Radio at the end of a broadcast. Otherwise it streams just fine and works beautifully.

Still running this most excellent project after 3 years.
Not only is it light and easy, but Media Player Classic has turned out to be a most useful alternative to VLC for those weird flv and avi muxes that just won't run nicely in VLC.

Updates may be installed over existing installs; the installer detects all settings very well.

Final note: Media Player Classic running in XP SP3 has been listed as vulnerable to the MS DLL Hijack vulnerability - via the iacenc.dll (an intel system32 library) through .mka or .ra or .ram extensions.
http://www.exploit-db .com/exploits/14788/

Watch out if you have that library in your system32 directory. Don't run such media from, for example, untrusted web sites.

Uninstalled it once, can't reinstall the core components the option in the setup stays gray and can't select it pls help

@Doug Mounter

Microsoft made the 32-bit version of WMP the default on Windows x64 for a good reason: compatibility.

Same applies to MPC. The 32-bit version is the recommended one, even on x64 version of Windows.

There is no 64-bit version of Real Alternative.

Alternative decoders for RealMedia (as found in for example K-Lite Codec Pack x64) can only handle the video. There is no 64-bit decoder for COOK audio available yet on Windows.

Doesn't seem to work with the 64 bit versions of Windows Media Player or Media Player Classic - Home Cinema x64.

Is there a 64 bit compatable version?

Excellent program. I found only one glitch. It won't self terminate with Replay Radio at the end of a broadcast. Otherwise it streams just fine and works beautifully