Featured Freeware: GOM Media Player

Along with VLC and the KMPlayer, GOM Media Player's support for a wide range of file formats has helped it stand out as a firm favorite. A pop-out playlist can save and organize your various media files, though the limited sort modes--two--hardly makes it a champ.

More impressive are the customizable settings on the control panel. Here you can adjust a video's image brightness, hue, and saturation. There's no preview window, and changes occur as the video runs, so unless you care for a rousing session of trial and error, be sure to tweak the settings after clicking "play." There's also a built-in screen-capture feature that includes zooming and panning, customizable themes, hot keys, a host of preset and adjustable audio controls, and the patented ability to play broken AVI files.

GOM is weakest when you're looking for help documentation and trying to tweak Save settings, but overall it's a strong player worth at least a supporting role in your video-watching habits, if not top billing.