CCCP (Combined Community Codec Pack) 2013-05-30

Well, except for the logo, this pack is awesome! I'm not saying that is an ugly logo, but I don't like a look-a-like communist sign. Anyway, you should not care that much about the logo, if you really want a simple and efficient codec pack to play almost every movie you want. 
It was the year 2009 when, I discovered CCCP for the first time. And I wouldn't have used it, if I didn't had to playback an mkv file (HD movie files.). After several hours spent on Google, searching about how to open those files, and trying many many codecs, none of them gave me the desired results. And as a last solution, I tried CCCP (I avoided to use it in the first place, BECAUSE OF THE LOGO!<thinking that a software with such a logo, can contain some unwanted viruses and other bad software, and their website was a bit suspicious because it's very simple and doesn't have too much info on the main page.>)... Well, I decided to take the risk, after I was sure that the pack was clean and installed it.

I have to say I was surprised! For the first time, I was able to play the mkv file, without any lag, compared with other codecs that I’ve tried. While with others the sound an image were out of sync, with CCCP pack everything worked perfectly, even for 10Gb+ files. I even realized that I could watch the movies with any other video player, without being forced to use the embedded one in the package.

The pack's main components are LAV filters, Haali Media Splitter, xy-VSFilter, and the player, the easy but powerful Media Player Classic Home Cinema. These combined, gives the best movie experience. If you have a surround sound system and you really enjoy watching full HD movies at their maximum potential, this is the right tool to use. Of course, you must set the LAV Audio mixer to 5.1 or 7.1 for your speakers setup, but that is quite easy to do. Another great feature that I really used, is the "After playback feature" , that, if selected, will give the computer a command to perform whatever you want after the playback. I use this feature to shut down the computer after the movie is finished. (you can select even to play the next file in the folder, and then to shut down the computer)

Word from the producer: "CCCP (Combined Community Codec Pack) is a filter pack specifically built for playing anime. It has been assembled by some of the most knowledgeable people in the anime world, and one of the primary design goals is to play as much possible with as little as possible. It attempts to be as unintrusive on your system as possible." I never played anime with it but it's definitely great for every movie.


App pro's: Easy to install/use, very light, loads the subtitle automatic, playback every kind of video files, can save images from the movie (press Alt+i);
App con's: The logo;

Conclusion: CCCP is a powerful codec pack, a complete solution for Full HD movies, and if you have a surround sound system (after you set up the LAV codec for your sound scheme), you will feel the true high definition term. It's the easiest pack for a basic user.