MPC-HC 32-bit (x86) to the Rescue

Okay, you may be thinking "Really Larry, MPC-HC hasn't been updated since v1.7 in 2017!"  I understand though, especially if you were only checking mpc-hc.org.  That's no longer the official project page, however, as it's moved to GitHub.  

Now with that out of the way, I'd like to point out that MPC-HC uses the very same Libavformat and Libavcodec libraries as VLC and FFmpeg.  This means it should be able to play everything VLC and FFmpeg can, plus it supports DirectShow better than VLC, in my experience.

32-bit vs. 64-bit Version & Why

Because I said so.  Are we still discussing this?  Just kidding, there's a very valid reason why you may want to use the 32-bit version of MPC-HC and that is because every proprietary multimedia codec I've encountered in my 25+ years of processing DME, has been for the 32-bit platform and applications.  In other words, if you install the x64 player, then install a proprietary DirectShow codec or Codec Pak, the x64 version of the player will not see the 32-bit codecs you just installed.  Therefore, I use the 32-bit (x86) version of MPC-HC as my default player, typically.

You may be thinking, "Hey, doesn't VideoLAN provide a 32-bit version of VLC too?" Yes, they do, but it doesn't seem to handle proprietary DirectShow filters as well as MPC-HC (VLC often exhibits issues like the entire video is flipped upside down, improperly decoded frames, etc.).

Other Players

I use several different multimedia players for different reasons.  First and foremost, it's important to understand that many are built on/for a specific multimedia framework, such as Windows Media Player and Apple QuickTime player.  I still use both of those players along with MPC-HC and VLC. 

As I always tell my students, it's important to understand the strengths & weaknesses of any tool we use in a forensic workflow.  It's even more important when it comes to multimedia applications, as there are more variables with multimedia than any other type of digital evidence.