Review: Telestream Switch

“Since this is a discontinued piece of software and Apple is actively deprecating QuickTime with each new version of Mac OS X, it stands to reason that at some point QuickTime Player Pro will cease to function. Telestream – maker of the highly-regarded Episode encoder – plans to be ready with Switch.

Switch will run on Mac and Windows platforms and has steadily gained features since its product launch. (It is currently in version 1.6.) Switch is a multi-function media player that comes in three versions: Switch Player – a free, multi-format media player with file inspection capabilities; Switch Plus – to play, inspect, and fix media file issues; and, Switch Pro – a comprehensive file encoder. All Switch versions will play a wide range of media file formats and allow you to inspect the file properties, but only the Plus and Pro paid versions include encoding.

Building on its knowledge in developing Episode and its tight relationship with Apple, Telestream hopes to make Switch the all-purpose encoder of choice for most editors. The intent is for editors to use Switch where they would normally have used QuickTime Player Pro in the past. Unlike other open source media players, Telestream can play many professional media formats (like MXF), display embedded captions and subtitles, and properly encode to advanced file formats (like Apple ProRes). Since Switch Plus and Pro are designed for single-file processing, instead of batch encoding like Episode, their prices are also lower than that of Episode.” – Oliver Peters

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