The VideoLAN Forums

Last week I uninstalled Real Alternative and found that it took my Media Player Classic with it. I then discovered that VideoLAN could play all of the same files that MPC did and without needing to install extra codecs. I decided then not to reinstall MPC and just use VLC instead.

Everything was going fine until I wanted to listening to some Old Time Radio at a website online that uses .ram files to play their music through. I found that VLC cannot play streaming real audio files.

Is VideoLAN planning to ever support streaming real audio files (.ram) in the future? I refuse to download Real Player like the OTR website suggests and I would prefer not to download MPC just to play one type of file.

I have read about file conversion online for .ram files and I haven't been able to find a method that works for converting them or capturing the source file. Most of the instructions are very badly explained and never detailed enough for the average computer user. The easiest one, opening a .ram file in Notepad and copying the url to another address bar, didn't work at all on my computer.

Please share a .ram sample.

I fixed that for VLC 2.0.2.

Please use a Nightly Build of VLC

I am still unable to get it to work, despite using your nightly build for 26 Mar 2012. I get the following error.

"Session failed:
The requested RTSP session could not be established.
Your input can't be opened:
VLC is unable to open the MRL 'rtsp://www.otr.net/28.8/jbny - The Jack Benny Show/jbny.1933.01.22_Bertha_The_Sewing_Machine_Girl.rm'. Check the log for details."

I have no idea where the log is.

I fixed that for VLC 2.0.2.

Hi

VLC won't play the rm stream.
[VLC media player 2.1.0-git Rincewind (revision 1.3.0-git-2068-gb1b423c)
Built on April 5 2012.] MPlayer will play the rm stream. VLC log is here ---> http://pastebin.com/YCdb132e
MPlayer log is here ---> http://pastebin.com/2GphsKyq

It seems mighty unfair that VLC media player can play so many things, and yet something that easily plays over Media Player Classic using Real Alternative it cannot do.

I don't understand 1/10 of the things VLC can do or what half of the files it can play are even for. I know Real Player is no longer popular, but there are still sites around that use their files.

I noticed that even Winamp isn't doing much of anything to allow users to play Real Media files. They certainly should have the capability.

Surely there must be someone out there that can get streaming Real Media files to work in VLC Media Player. You have the best player around.

I think VLC can play RAM files. What you have is not a RAM file. It's not even a file and that's the problem. it's a Real RTSP stream.