However, if you did a clean installation of Windows 10, instead of the in-place upgrade, then you lost out, because your copy of Windows Media Centre was not detected and replaced. So, if you had a copy of Windows 7 (except the Home Basic and Starter versions) or Windows 8/8.1 Pro with Media Centre, then Windows 10 should have installed the DVD Player app automatically. However, Microsoft made the app available free to people who had had Windows Media Centre uninstalled by Windows 10. I don’t recommend this because it’s not particularly good, it only plays optical discs, and it costs £11.59 or $14.99. Microsoft filled the DVD hole in Windows 10 with the Windows DVD Player app, which you can download from the Windows Store. It was therefore designed for a 10-foot TV experience rather than a 3-foot PC experience. Windows Media Centre was originally developed for Windows XP Media Centre Edition in 2001, and appeared on boxes that could sit under TV sets.

It also let you watch and pause live TV, and it could play Netflix movies. Windows Media Centre was media player and digital video recorder with TiVo-like DVR functionality. But it did remove WMP’s built-in DVD codec.īriefly, Windows Media Player is a media player that can rip and burn audio CDs, and sync with portable devices.

Thus, when Microsoft announced that it was dropping Windows Media Centre from Windows 10, there was mass outrage from people who thought it was dropping Windows Media Player. Unfortunately, most web commenters seemed unable to distinguish between the two. Many versions of Windows included two separate video utilities: Windows Media Player and Windows Media Centre. It would have been silly to make everyone pay for it when fewer and fewer people needed it.Īlso, Microsoft probably recognised that there was even less point in paying for a DVD player when users either had one already (eg Cyberlink) or could easily download a free one. Microsoft did include a codec (video decoding software) to play DVDs in Vista Home Premium and Windows 7, but dropped it when increasing numbers of Windows laptops (not to mention tablets) shipped without DVD drives.

Download play dvd on laptop