QuickTime 7 comes with increased quality in the form of the H.264 video format, the industry-standard codec for 3GPP (mobile multimedia), MPEG-4 HD-DVD and Blu-ray.

H.264 offers high quality video at much smaller file sizes than previously available, and can handle mobile multimedia and high-definition playback.

Upgrade to the Pro version and you can create your own H.264, MPEG-4, 3GPP and 3GPP2 content which, combined with its impressive open source server, offers functionality that's hard to beat.

The interface has changed little in version 7, but there is a new Favourites menu that provides quick access to your favourite movies.

There is also a new feature known as 'instant on' which eliminates the short delay before a stream starts, and it does work. Also, you can now scroll backwards and forwards through a movie.

All the previous media types are supported, including AVI, Mpeg, BMP and Flash 5.

Note: Mac OS X version available to download from the Apple QuickTime website.