Tech Forum: Media Player Problems?

by rbowen
2 replies
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Hi!

I'm not very technical, and I was wondering whether anyone knows of a good forum where you could ask technical questions and get reliable answers?

This is what I'm (currently) stumped on: Basically, no matter what player I use, I can't play (what apparently are) "newer" video files: I hear the sound but I don't see any video pictures.

I've got a 5 year old Compaq Pressario laptop running Windows XP with Mozilla's FireFox.

I had problems playing .wmv files a months ago - sound, but no video pictures - so I upgraded my Windows Video/Media Player, and that worked ... for a while.

I then started having the same problems playing VLC (.avi) files, so I downloaded and installed the VLC Media Player ... but that didn't fix it.

I just downloaded and installed RealPlayer 11.1 ... but that didn't fix it either.

I even went so far as to use Windows Movie Maker to edit (trim) the VLC (.avi) video file, creating a Windows Media file ... but RP 11.1 only plays the sound, no visuals.

So, I'm stuck. I've read a lot of stuff about it but, again, I'm not technical. One thing I read seemed to suggest that it might be due to my video card not being compatible with these newer video file types.

Any suggestions .. hopefully not very technical ones - or expensive ones?


Thanx a lot,
Richard
  • Profile picture of the author Paul1234
    It could be that the codecs you have installed may need to be updated so they can decode the video files correctly. A codec pack I've used (which contains the most essential decoders) is the free basic version of the K-Lite Codec Pack .

    One of my PCs is about 9 years old but can still play anything I throw at it.
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    Paul Turner

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    • Profile picture of the author rbowen
      Pual -

      Thanks so much!

      Interesting you should recommend K-Lite. The last article I read (on Top Windows Tutorials - Free Windows Tutorials for Everybody ... see a TinyURL & the longer Google-search link below, to get to the article directly) before turning in for the night recommended two alternatives: either using one of the two "universal codec pack" (one of which was K-Lite), or using a software utility like GSpot to determine what type of file the difficult-to-play video was and therefore what codec to Google, download and install. But I decided to pause at that point, because there was an ominous warning quoted by some 'codec guru', and I wasn't sure which of the two alternative aspproaches (mentioned above) to pursue. Here's a little exert:

      " The Combined Community Codec Pack and the K-Lite Codec Pack. The K-Lite pack comes in standard and mega varieties, the mega pack containing some lesser used codecs. We also recommend choosing one or the other of these packs but not both, in order to avoid conflicts.

      What are the disadvantages of installing codec packs? Blight, lead developer of Zoom Player, a popular and extremely powerful Windows Media Player alternative, had this to say about codec packs on the official Zoom Player forums:-

      "Codec packs are evil, they can take over your system, install multiple version of decoders which can conflict and even install bad filters which can cause your image to vertically flip, your audio to crackle or even stop working and other nasty side-effects."

      This post sparked a great deal of debate and we feel that calling codec packs evil is perhaps a little over the top. Use only our recommended codec packs and you should be fine, but if that has put you off codec packs, we'll explore the alternative method below. "

      Like I said, I wasn't sure what to make of that, so I thought I'd reach out to people via forums.

      Again, thanks for your help.

      Hope this helps you (& others?), too!

      Richard

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      Google Image Result for http://www.top-windows-tutorials.com/images/WMP-SoundNoPicture.jpg


      Google-Search Link: ... in case TinyURL doesn't work?!

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