Since I know nothing about this subject I'll take your word for it . Well I'm from India and the guy who sold me the laptop told me - "Dont use VLC" . Since then I've heard this "wisdom" from some others as well . I would like to respectfully add that I too have faced this and I dont know the cause . You can try googling "VLC damages speaker" and you'll see hundreds of threads turn up . Eg: http://www.indiastudychannel.com/experts/27429-Does-VLC-play...
From what i gather on the above thread it turns out that some sound drivers are not that smart and so it ends up damaging the speakers and its not VLCs fault .
And another one: http://superuser.com/questions/337265/vlc-sound-boosting
From what i gather on the above thread it turns out that some sound drivers are not that smart and so it ends up damaging the speakers and its not VLCs fault .