Torrents are a good source of various audio and video media. Their popularity keeps on increasing day by day, as they provide an easy way to share large files over the internet easily. While the popular torrent downloader software – uTorrent – includes a streaming option, enabling you to start playing audio/video content whilst you are still downloading, it cannot double as a local media player as well. This drawback, or rather a limitation of uTorrent brings us in search of a player, which will not only function as a multimedia player, but will also stream files hosted on the internet, including torrents.
Rox Player is one software which has impressed me a lot. It can be used to not only play local files, but also stream torrents in real time. Given its potential to play different protocols such as IPTV, HTTP, DHT, and P2P, it can turn your PC/laptop in to a TV, allowing you to play any audio/video available either on the internet or locally.
Rox Player is currently available only for Windows operating system and comes with support for Windows XP/Vista/7/8. The current stable version at the time of writing this post is 1.480.
ROX Player is a lightweight yet powerful media player, and comes with a simple and easy to use interface. The automatic codec update feature provides you the liberty to play any media file without having the need to have specific codec installed on your system. Every time it encounters need for a new codec, it will download the same for you without any intervention.
After adding a torrent, the player starts buffering and even shows you the download rate in the top right corner, as shown below.
You can also get to see the details of the torrent pieces downloaded and the download speed chart by clicking the download speed displayed in the top right corner.
Pros:
1. Simple interface and easy to use.
2. Supports IPTV, HTTP, DHT, and P2P protocols.
3. Control on download speed.
4. Able to add multiple media to playlist.
5. Able to take snapshot of the playing media from within the player (Menu View->Create Snapshot)
6. Supports video adjustment by providing user a full control over 5 parameters.
7. Light on system resources.
8. Support for addition of subtitle to the media.
9. Able to associate with .torrent and magnet links.
10. Comes with multiple aspect ratios to support and use per your need.
Cons:
1. For reasons best known to developer, it doesn’t installs in Program files. Rather it gets installed in the location- \user\current\Local Settings\Application Data\ROX Player
2. No option to have the player minimize to system tray.
3. No offline help is available.
Conclusion
All-in-all ROX Player is a reliable, intuitive and user-friendly application that leverages its capability of playing several protocols, thereby enabling one to play the multimedia files no matter if they are stored locally on a hard disk or somewhere on the internet. It is completely Free to use and is updated frequently.
I’m sure by now you will be curious to lay your hands on Rox Player. So without holding you further, let me point you to the download page here. The installer file (install-roxplayer.msi) tests clean on Virus Total.
How to use Rox Player to stream Torrents in Real time
1. Open the player and click on File menu.
2. From the File menu, click on “Open .torrent” and select either a torrent magnet link or a torrent URL/File.
3. Once selected, the media file will start buffering and will begin streaming after appropriate amount of data is available and buffered.
Plugins available
Currently ROX Player supports two plugins namely, TopMovies Torrent Search and Yify Movies Torrent Search.
Wise Words
By default Rox Player is set to clear the downloaded data upon program restart. So should in case you want to have the downloaded/streamed file for later viewing, you must either copy the file (from ROXData folder) for later viewing, or even better disable the option “Clean downloaded data automatically on program start” from Menu->Options->Configuration->Bit Torrent tab.
Per developer, should incase you come across a “Go Premium” message while streaming torrents, it is suggested to press "Continue for free" to continue streaming without any restriction.
Do share with us (though comments) your experience with Rox Player.
Happy Streaming!!