# Are there any players that will play .ra files other than RealPlayer?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-players-that-will-play-ra-files-other-than-realplayer/280241>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [December 17, 2004, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-players-that-will-play-ra-files-other-than-realplayer/280241 "2004-12-17T00:34:18Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 7\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Weirddave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/919ad9/32.png) [@Weirddave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Weirddave)\
**Post date:** [December 17, 2004, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-players-that-will-play-ra-files-other-than-realplayer/280241/1 "2004-12-17T00:34:18Z")

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I hate RealPlayer. It’s a damn intrusive program, and I don’t like having it on my computer. The problem is when I come across .ra files. Is there any other player that will play them, or am I going to have to break down and install _&%_&^% RealPlayer?

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**Author:** ![Garfield226](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Garfield226](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Garfield226)\
**Post date:** [December 17, 2004, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-players-that-will-play-ra-files-other-than-realplayer/280241/2 "2004-12-17T00:57:04Z")

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There are a few plugins for winamp that will allow you to do this.

They’re kind of hit-and-miss, though IME, and it’s not seamless: I had to right-click the link, copy link location, switch to Winamp, click “add URL to playlist” paste the URL, press play, and hope it worked (which, as I said, it didn’t all the time).

[Here’s one](http://www.winamp.com/plugins/details.php?id=22143). It says “make sure you have all of realplayers componets installed” though, so that might be a requirement of all of them.

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**Author:** ![rabbit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/919ad9/32.png) [@rabbit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rabbit)\
**Post date:** [December 17, 2004, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-players-that-will-play-ra-files-other-than-realplayer/280241/3 "2004-12-17T01:05:03Z")

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I use Real Alternative. Havent had a single problem w/it so far, hasn’t tripped any antivirus or spyware detector and with the single exception that it won’t automatically open streaming media (I have to open the URL from the file menu) its managed every single .ra file Ive had.  
you can download it here [http://www.free-codecs.com/download/Real\_Alternative.htm](http://www.free-codecs.com/download/Real_Alternative.htm)

or just Google for “real alternative” (I think its at version 1.29)

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**Author:** ![rabbit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/919ad9/32.png) [@rabbit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rabbit)\
**Post date:** [December 17, 2004, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-players-that-will-play-ra-files-other-than-realplayer/280241/4 "2004-12-17T01:06:15Z")

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sorry, that should say it won’t open the streaming media at cbc.ca  
Handles the BBC and Reuters sites fine.

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**Author:** ![CynicalGabe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3e96dc/32.png) [@CynicalGabe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CynicalGabe)\
**Post date:** [December 17, 2004, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-players-that-will-play-ra-files-other-than-realplayer/280241/5 "2004-12-17T01:08:36Z")

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Try VLC - Video Lan Client

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**Author:** ![jmizzou](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/edb3f5/32.png) [@jmizzou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jmizzou)\
**Post date:** [December 17, 2004, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-players-that-will-play-ra-files-other-than-realplayer/280241/6 "2004-12-17T03:22:14Z")

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I second RealAlternative. I’ve been using it for quite some time, and I’ve never had a problem with it.

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**Author:** ![Reeder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c6cbf5/32.png) [@Reeder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reeder)\
**Post date:** [December 17, 2004, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-players-that-will-play-ra-files-other-than-realplayer/280241/7 "2004-12-17T03:46:58Z")

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IMHO realplayer is not as intrusive as it once was.

I use it to watch dvd’s…mp4’s…just about everything I watch.