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I have quicktime X what if I download quicktime 7?
- Thread starter adelaye
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According to Wikipedia: "QuickTime 7 may still be required to support older formats on Snow Leopard such as QTVR, interactive QuickTime movies, and MIDI files."
There is a common misunderstanding here. There are two layers that bear the name "QuickTime" and people get very confused when reading things because they don't undersstand that there are those two layers:
Layer 1) The "Player" applications: these are the things that live in your /Applications directory and provide a GUI with the window and play buttons. There is a "QuickTime 7 Player" and a "QuickTime X Player". On SnowLeopard the "QuickTime X Player" is installed by default, whereas the "QuickTime 7 Player" is not. Note that the "QuickTime X Player" only has some very rudimentary editing abilities, whereas the "QuickTime 7 Player" when used with a "QuickTime Pro" license has more editing abilities.
Layer 2) The "Framework" layer: these are the actual code that allows playback (and some editing) of the media files. These bits live in /System/Library/Frameworks (and are therefore not to be tinkered with). On SnowLeopard both "QuickTime 7" and "QuickTime X" frameworks are always installed. The "QuickTime X Framework" is very fast, streamlined, modern, and can in some cases use hardware acceleration. However, it is limited in the number of codecs that is supports. The "QuickTime 7 Framework" is a pile of loosely associated codecs built on a framework that is more than a decade old using a plugin system. While it is very flexible, there is not a lot of optimization.
Now comes the actual tricky part: the QuickTime X Player will happily use the QuickTime 7 Framework to playback content that the "QuickTime X Framework" can not play, but it does not know how to use the full editing system that is in place in "QuickTime 7 Framework".
So if you need to edit things AND have a QuickTime 7 Pro license, then you need to install the QuickTime 7 Player, otherwise you have no need of it (which is why it is not installed by default).
Layer 1) The "Player" applications: these are the things that live in your /Applications directory and provide a GUI with the window and play buttons. There is a "QuickTime 7 Player" and a "QuickTime X Player". On SnowLeopard the "QuickTime X Player" is installed by default, whereas the "QuickTime 7 Player" is not. Note that the "QuickTime X Player" only has some very rudimentary editing abilities, whereas the "QuickTime 7 Player" when used with a "QuickTime Pro" license has more editing abilities.
Layer 2) The "Framework" layer: these are the actual code that allows playback (and some editing) of the media files. These bits live in /System/Library/Frameworks (and are therefore not to be tinkered with). On SnowLeopard both "QuickTime 7" and "QuickTime X" frameworks are always installed. The "QuickTime X Framework" is very fast, streamlined, modern, and can in some cases use hardware acceleration. However, it is limited in the number of codecs that is supports. The "QuickTime 7 Framework" is a pile of loosely associated codecs built on a framework that is more than a decade old using a plugin system. While it is very flexible, there is not a lot of optimization.
Now comes the actual tricky part: the QuickTime X Player will happily use the QuickTime 7 Framework to playback content that the "QuickTime X Framework" can not play, but it does not know how to use the full editing system that is in place in "QuickTime 7 Framework".
So if you need to edit things AND have a QuickTime 7 Pro license, then you need to install the QuickTime 7 Player, otherwise you have no need of it (which is why it is not installed by default).
Right. I figured that the QTX player and QT7 player both use the same underlying framework (apart from QT7 not being able to use the QTX-specific frameworks). Hence my question. But I guess HellHammer answered that one.