Video playback is choppy, audio is fine, intermittent problem

[motoxchic]

I hope someone can help me. I have a Toshiba Satellite A25 laptop. After reformatting (on several occassions) I loose my video playback ability. The video is delayed and choppy (but clear) and the audio plays fine.

I download an XP codec pack and then it worked.

The next time I try to play (any common file type, mpg, wmv, etc) from the DVD, online video or an email attachment, it's back to choppy again. It's like it lost the codec necessary to play it. Doesn't matter which program I use either, if WMP doesnt work, nothing else will either (Quicktime, WinDVD, the online Yahoo Movie player, etc). The source of the video does not matter either (DVD, Hard drive, online file, email attachment).

I have Gspot downloaded to check codecs, etc. The second time I downloaded and installed WinDVD 7 trial version, and it fixed the problem all the way around. Then today I tried to play videos I have played previously, and it is choppy again. This time I downloaded Quicktime, rebooted, check video in Gspot and then it played.

It is getting very frustrating. I am never sure if I will be able to play a video or not! If anyone has any suggestions, I would be eternally grateful! I have spent HOURS on the web searching generically and toshiba specific.

[Krispy Kritter]

I expect you are having codec issues (as you've surmised already). Most likely something else you are doing or program you are using is corrupting them or changing the associations and/or priority.

You can use a program such as codec sniper, to search through your existing codecs and remove any that are unneeded or corrupt.

Next, whenever you come across a video that doesnt play properly or doesn't play at all, load the file into Gspot to see which codec(s) is required. Then download and install the needed codec. Try to avoid codec packs, they often create more issues than they solve.

As an alternative, you could switch to a different player that installs and uses its own codecs, such as MPC or VLC.