VLC Beta out on Google Play Store, use at your own risk!

VLC, a very popular media player for the PC has landed on the Google Play Store. This particular version is designed to work for handsets and tablets that feature an ARMv7 CPU with the NEON decoding chip. If you are certain that your device has this particular chipset, then go ahead and download it from here, else it’s best to stick with Moboplayer for now. The reason for this caution comes from the description left by the developers on the Play Store which goes something like this, “VLC is a free and open source cross-platform multimedia player that plays most multimedia files as well as discs, devices, and network streaming protocols. This is a BETA version of the port to the Android™ platform. It is intended for power users and hackers. This version is NOT stable and is slower than the final version. It might kill your kitten, destroy your house and start the mayan apocalypse. Use it at your own risk. Have Fun! :)”

Finally hits the Play Store

This is not the most reassuring of descriptions we’ve seen for apps but at least someone in the team has a sense of humour. VLC for Android plays most local video and audio files, as well as network streams, like the desktop version of VLC. VLC for Android has a media library for audio and video files and allows you to browse folders directly. There’s support for multi-track audio and subtitles built-in as well. It supports auto-rotation, aspect-ratio adjustments and gestures to control volume. It also includes a widget for audio control, supports audio headsets control, covert art and a complete audio media library. We tried this version on a Galaxy S III and for some reason it refuses to read the files off the microSD card.

Some of the features that are missing from this release include:

• Performance improvements are missing   
• Some audio issues might occur
• Hardware decoding works only with a limited set of hardware
• Other unknown issues
• Do give it a try and let us know what you think of it, if you dare.