I have noticed a couple of post about ppl trying to get media players that work for linux and the web only to find they need a codecs.

As far as players go mplayer and the mplayerplug-in are extremely good and will play most anything.
The codecs for mplayer at mplayer HQ will also work for other media players such as xine.
So that leads me to believe that they should also work for others where the codecs may be missing. If a media player has a way to configure codecs locations as xine does then it should be a breeze to just configure others to the codecs directory.
If a player does not have such an option it may have a codecs directory either in its own directory or its ~/.directory (totem) where one can make sym links to the codecs in the codecs directory.
Reading HOWTOs and forums saves much headache to ppl coverting to linux.

Linux does require a bit of tweaking on several fronts for maximum performance. This lets you learn about your machine as well as enhances your ability to be your own "tech support" and that is a very good thing given the level of "non-tech support" that most corps spew out today.

Moved: This thread is more suitable in Linux-Software and has been moved accordingly to help your thread/question get the exposure it deserves.

Was this just an observation?

Not really an observation more of a short help note..
And yes I believe the move to this forum thread was good as other distro users are more likely to see it.

It was inspired by post mostly from new linux users who where having trouble with media formats both local and on line. I read ppls replies to these but some still had issues so I decided to test and experiment. Since I don't use or care much about media players working on my linux systems They had not been installed nor configured. So a download or 2, and installs I discovered a thing or two.

One of which was the above use of the mplayer essentials package (codecs) with other players.
Another I did not write about was that certain websites refuse to play their content (the text is a bit wack in mozilla so I assume they are IE only sites). Also it is likely for certain site media content on would have to point mozilla to the correct "helper" app to open the content.

Linux will play all most every media format that I could find (problem with midi files I have no midi seqer loaded) (certain tracker mods, no program loaded) (some windows based .wav, windows).

Also another reason i needed to tweak up media for linux... My husband who recently converted to linux for security and speed (he "views" LOTS of websites)...