mpegs won't play in WMP

[wicasa]

Sorry it's a bit of a long post but all the information I have is included.

Media Player will not play mpegs. WMP will play wmvs and avis. I can play mpegs with Nero Show Time, WMP Classic, Power DVD and Quick Time, the same files that WMP won't, so the files are okay. Gspot tells me the codecs needed for these files are installed and okay. WMP error code C00D11CD: Unknown error, which I know is a difficult one to track down. Motion DV Studio and Movie maker will also not recognise these mpegs.

Gspot tells me the following are a problem:

DSH DivXAntiFreeze {79A00187-F159-4B89-981B-F81D51504201} 0x00800001 ** File Missing:

ACM Base MSACM.CEGSM ** Missing file:

mobilev.acm ACM Base msacm.l3codecp ** Missing file:

DSH PCM Morgan Stream Switcher {D3CD7858-971A-4838-ACEC-40CA5D529DC8} 0x00800003 ** File Missing:

DSH Stream Subtitle Parser {52780691-D7F8-4335-B38E-EC40280EDC57} 0x00600000 ** File
Missing:

DSH Text Subtitle Dest {E2BD78F2-79A2-413D-A052-EE2E91B9D821} 0x00200000 ** File Missing:

DSH YUY2 Subtitle Mixer {00A95963-3BE5-48C0-AD9F-3356D67EA09D} 0x0080000a ** File
Missing:

DSH YUY2 Bicubic Video Resizer {AA59CBFA-F731-49E9-BE78-08665F339EFC} 0x00800002 ** File Missing:

DSH YV12 Nero Digital AVC Video Enc {426F6A6F-FEF8-4A5B-8DDC-099E7499EF50} 0x00200000 ** File Missing:

Other strange and I suspect connected events:

I tried to play a DVD with Cyberlink Home Cinema after this happened and had to reset the Region Code.
When I opened an mpeg file with Cyberlink Power DVD an icon for Itunes default playlist appeared on the desktop and this happened every time.

Action so far:

I've tried system restore.
I've updated Directx and WMP (v.10), without any change.
I ran sfc/scannow
I've uninstalled Itunes.
I reinstalled DivX.

Questions:

What action should I take to address the gspot report?
Should I uninstall/reinstall Power DVD?
Should I uninstall/reinstall Nero as gspot says files are missing?
I'm considering running a reg cleaner. Is this wise or best avoided?

Any possible answer short of formatting? A repair install has been suggested but my PC (WXP Home SP2) came with a restore disc and a recovery partition on the HD not a WXP OS disc, so I'm not sure if a repair install is possible. I do have a WXP Pro SP1 disc for my laptop. Could I perform a repair install with that using the key from my PC, or do similar with a borrowed WXP SP2 disc or would it cause me even more grief?

Thanks in hope. Appreciate any help at all.

[Krispy Kritter]

sounds like you mpeg2 codec is not properly registered or corrupt. Uninstalling/reinstalling PowerDVD should correct its issues.

For codec cleaning, try codec sniper

[wicasa]

Thanks Krispy. I shall try it. I will probably wait until the weekend in case things go badly wrong. One more thing I noticed today. When I do a search for all videos on the drive, it finds them all okay but only display thumbnails for wmvs and avis and the mpgs are shown as WMP icons. Windows seems not to recognise the file type but I can still open them with a players such as I mentioned above. I was wondering if Nero needed to be reinstalled as gspot shows a nero file missing.

Thank again.

[Krispy Kritter]

Windows uses the codecs to create thumbnails for all files properly registered with WMP.

[wicasa]

Come on guys, there must be a multi media genius out there that can help. Since the last post, I’ve run a repair install, installed the Microsoft MPEG2 decoder utility, uninstalled and reinstalled Power DVD and run some codec checkers. It has not made any difference.

When trying to open MPEG1 files in Moviemaker, Moviemaker reports: ‘MPEG could not be imported. The selected file is not valid or is corrupted’. The same files will open in Power DVD, Nero Show, WMP Classic so they are not corrupted and are supported. Opening them with Gspot tells me they are mepg1 and that the codecs needed are installed.

AVIcodec says everything is okay and all installed codecs are enabled.

Running a codec check with Sherlock I get: ‘Warning the following codecs were found broken.
Audio codec: Morgan Stream Switcher
Video codec: Bicubic Video Resizer, Subtitle Mixer.

Would this be the problem as I can play the mpegs okay with the other programs?

I have done everything I can think of. Please someone help!!

[Krispy Kritter]

Sounds like you need to uninstall and reinstall Moviemaker. That should correct whichever files it is trying to use to read mpeg1 files, since obviously they are working in your other apps.

[wicasa]

Thanks Krispy

I'll give it a go.

One more thing. It has been suggested I install a codec pack such as K-Lite to solve this and to be honest I'm just about ready for anyhing. I've read of problems with these. What's your view on it?

[guns1inger]

Back away from the codec pack with your hands where they can be seen.

Honestly, while some swear by them, they are a risky proposition. They install a lot of things you don't need, often contain contradictory settings, strange configurations, and half-assed uninstallers. This raises two large issues

1. If something goes wrong, it is almost impossible to determine what and why because so much has been installed at once, and

2. They almost never uninstall and restore your system to what you had before.

In some cases, the only solution is to rebuild windows from scratch.

[mats.hogberg]

...And: WMP is no loss - For eveything that WMP does, there's a better (mostly free) alternative. My WMP hasn't played anything for a couple of years ("Unexpected error" and closes down) - The only problem I have with it, is that i still have it associated with some file types. Must i add that I'm not missing it?

/Mats

[drewzor]

if you download deccheck from microsoft you can manage your registered mpeg decoders..
also you might want to re-install the defaults ones click here to learn how to do that..

also you might wanna have a look at what codecs already registered click here to find out how

Codec packs are evil IMO.. they register and de-register and root your registry AND in my experience cause dramatic loss of processing power after their introduction to a pc.

[wicasa]

Thanks for the sugestions. I will give these a try. It will probably have to wait un til the weekend as time is short at the moment. One more suggestion has been made and that was reregistering quartz.dll, as in:

Start > Run > regsvr32 quartz.dll
Start > Run > regsvr32 mpg2splt.ax

Does this sound like a good move as I have no idea what damage if any it could do.

Thanks again.

[drewzor]

do a backup before that, you are dealing with directX with those commands. An essential part of your computers hardware and software, personally I would rather download the latest DirectX (which you have already done) and install it then muck around with its registry components..

For interest sake install these if you at a loss to an end:
Here is an ac3 decomp Read carefully on how to install!

should have this but not important

mpeg2 decoder paser this one is good because you can de-register it from its own install file

AND FINALLY
FFDSHOW handles everything else Just be carefull uninstalling this one because like the codec packs it sometime removes more then what you bargan for - refer to my previous post for instructions to install default codecs.

[drewzor]

just found this in regards to your last post click here

[oldandinthe way]

I had similar problems when I loaded Cyberlink Power Producer. It skunked WMP.

I got around this by loading the latest fixes to PowerDVD from their site and installing. It appears that Cyberlink distributed some bad codecs with a variety of their products. Perhaps Cyberlink Home Cinema was included.

Cyberlink suggested the upgrade but would not acknowledge any fault.

[wicasa]

Thanks very much for the suggestions. There's a few things there I haven't tried. I do suspect Cyberlink is involved somewhere.

I'll let you know what happens.

[wicasa]

I am about to download and install ffdshow to try and solve this long running problem. Can someone tell me which version I should use. There are SSE and MMX versions, both of which mean nothing to me. I also understand that there was a problem with version: 20060803-rev2546.exe. In that the uninstaller deletes Windows' codec and audio registry. There is a later version out now, 23.9.2006. Does anyone know if this problem has been resolved?

Thanks

I was going to try the re-registering of quartz.dll but read some horror stories where it had gone wrong. Does anyone have a view on whether I should try that first?

[drewzor]

Use this program here to identify your cpu as mmx etc.

AND
Use this program here to determine your installed mpeg decoder in working correctly

[wicasa]

Thanks drewzor

I'll gve them a try. I am proceeding cautiously as I am in uncharted territory for me and I don't want to turn an irritation into a major disaster.

Thanks for your help.

[wicasa]

Hi drewzor

The preferred encoder is shown as working and compatible:
Cyberlink video sp decoder CL VSD.ax

There are one or two others listed as not compatible though but I assume if they are not set as the preferred encoder they are doing no harm.

The other link you provided takes me to a main site but I can't see the program you are directing me to re. determining MMS or SSE CPU. Can you help with another link or let me know what the program is called?

Thanks.

[wicasa]

Just to add that the problem lies with playing any mpeg file on WMP, including mpeg1, not just mpeg2. You'll see from above I've done just about everything I can think of that should have made it possible to play mpeg1 files. The files are okay as I've said in earlier posts, as I can play them with other players and gspot says the codec needed is installed. Something is not right. Is it that quartz.dll needs to be re-registered? Is there a way to check? Is it a risky thing to do or pretty straightforward?

Grateful for any suggestions.

[wicasa]

One final bit of info. The encoder checker shows Nero Video Decoder Ne Video.ax with two red crosses, ie. not compatible with MP10 or Windows Media Centre. I wonder if this could be part of it. I did have to reset the region code on my DVD player at the same time as I dicovered this mpeg problem, suggesting the two things were connected and whatever corrupted the one caused the other problem.

Just a thought. Doesn't help me get any further I'm afraid.