An alternative is CCCP, which includes both MPC-HC and ffdshow (and some other commonly used components) in one simple isntallable package with relatively little configuration needed. If you happen to download a lot of anime (where the encoding and subbing communities have very high quality standards), CCCP is highly recommended.
VLC is good purely for its breadth of compatability. As VLC uses its own internal filters/decoders, it will not mess with other players and it is fine to use VLC together with CCCP (MPC-HC + ffdshow). VLC can, however, consume a bit more CPU than MPC-HC + ffdshow (depending on situation).
I personally wouldn't recommend CoreAVC unless absolutely necessary. It can help speed up H.264 decoding (if you don't have a very good CPU), but often at expense of picture quality. It might be different now with the latest versions, but I think it's still a pretty hard sell with good, free alternatives widely available.