[MPlayer-cygwin] Basic help needed...

[Lostgallifreyan]

Hello. I'd been Reading TFM till my brain goes mushy and my eyes want to bleed, but to no avail. I can code audio (a fully fledged multitimbral phase modulation synthesizer, no less) for Win32 API, using C, but driving this 'car' is harder than making my own! I really need some help to get basic stuff done.

Please let me know how (if) the following can be done:

Remember in a config file, the last volume setting.
Set specific audio output ports (for an Echo Layla device), again remembered in a config file.
Use CTRL or ALT keys to extend the available keys to bind to commands.
Load a file for playback, but always pause it immediately until I am ready to start it.

Mplayer looks like being wonderful for doing things other things can't, but when reading the manual, or even finding which of the bewildering variations and compiles to try, and which manuals to read, is harder than almost any compuer related task I have ever done in fifteen YEARS, there is a definite problem here! By metaphor: I want to find the gate from field to country lane, and I find myself dumped in the New York underground with no light, and having to navigate by the roaring in my ears. This really is no fun at all...

One extra question:
Is there a guaranteed way to prevent the occasional green-screen seizure at close of Mplayer? This is much rarer than it used to be in Mplayer several years ago, but sometimes still happens. As the result is ABSOLUTE freeze, not even pointer movement or response to Ctrl+Alt+Del, there is no possible diagnostic, only hardware reset or power cycling to restore any passable resemblence to 'computer' as opposed to 'brick'. :) Whatever the cause, it seems to have never really been solved, and while the odds are better than they have ever been, I'd like to eliminate the risk so I can use Mplayer without having to avoid all critical work on the system in any session in which Mplayer is used.