QuickTime And iTunes Replacements

Apple QuickTime and iTunes are real resource hogs on a Windows PC. If gobbling up precious PC resources is not bad enough, malware authors also heavily target them. It is imperative to get the latest versions of these two popular programs to secure the integrity of your computer. Constantly updating vulnerable software is highly encouraged by security pundits, and rightly so, but another solution is to replace these two programs with other software of similar functionality.

After quite some time of searching and trying other software, I have settled, for the time being, on two programs that have met my requirements. The first one is a good replacement for QuickTime. It is an open source program called "VLC Media Player", and it can be downloaded for free by clicking the following link:

VLC Media Player

VLC plays just about any media format, whether video or audio, and makes a great replacement for playing MP4 video, the popular iPod format. VLC is available for Windows 2000 and higher, Mac OS X, and several Linux distributions. Viewing MP4 video was the only reason I used QuickTime, so I was very happy to find this software.

If you do not want to install VLC on your computer, but you want to view MP4 videos, then a codec package can be downloaded to enable Windows Media Player to handle MP4 as well. Click on the following link to download the basic, standard, or full version of the K-Lite codec package:

K-Lite Codec Pack 5.1.0

The iTunes replacement is "CopyTrans Manager", and is also an open source program available for free. It fully supports the iPod without the need to install any other drivers. It also supports the iTouch and iPhone, but drivers for both are required. CopyTrans Manager does not require installation. Just unzip the package, locate and double-click the executable. The program will not provide you with direct access to the Apple Store for downloading music, but you can fire up your browser to handle that chore. CopyTrans Manager is available for download by clicking the following link:

CopyTrans Manager

CopyTrans Manager is designed to run on Windows XP, Vista, and Windows 7.

If you know of other good replacements for QuickTime and iTunes, please share them with us. They may be better than these alternatives.