video codecs for windows

The other day I must have downloaded a faulty video, because no matter what I tried, I couldn’t get it to play. I thought I needed to install video codecs, which of course turned out to be unnecessary, but now that I went through the process, I thought there may be others trying to do the same thing. Any google search will get you to the same place, but here are the links that helped me the most:

• ffdshow - DirectShow and VFW codec for decoding/encoding many video and audio formats
• updatexp - and here, you can follow their guide to get codecs for the divx & xvid, & avi formats
• chris’s blog - where you’ll find a concise guide for getting g-spot, software that will analyze your video for you to give you the code that will determine the codec needed
• fourcc - with a list of codes to determine what codec your video needs
• xvid movies - with a faq to help you troubleshoot
• directX - codec from Microsoft