Problem with MPEG-4

[sacred ff]

I just formatted my computor's hard drive and reinstalled windows xp, so I lost all my codecs.

I just encoded an AVI file to MPEG SVCD. When I play the AVI, it's fine. But when I play the encoded MPG file with windows media 9 series, it tries downloading the codec, but it fails. The movie starts fine, but windows media player crashes.

I have Cyberlink PowerDVD, so I'm guessing I have the MPEG-4 codec (Though I installed PowerDVD AFTER I encoded...). Also, I installed DivX.

Why doesn't my MPG work?

(I don't think mentioning this will help, but you never know: I was encoding 3 episodes of an anime at the same time, in other words, TMPGenc was open 3 times and encoding one episode each)

[sacred ff]

I also opened them up in VCD Easy. When I loaded them in the Chapters section, the same problem occured.

I tried a SVCD Mpg that I had encoded previously (before I formatted my hard drive), and windows media player still couldn't download the codecs. Funny thing is that it didn't crash*. Usually, with the 3 that I just encoded, it plays for 3 seconds and media player crashes. Do I have the re-encode the 3 episodes that I just encoded?

*Media player plays it, but it fails to download the codecs, so in the "now playing" section, the title of the movie is in orange and has a "!" symbol before it. That means there's still some error with the player or my codecs. Even if I have to re-encode the 3 episodes I just encoded, can anyone help me get a codec for MPEG-4?

[Suntan]

Here is the best MPEG4 playback filter (imo)

-Suntan

[sacred ff]

I just installed WinDVD. When I open up the movie file in WinDVD, it works perfectly. Thn, I tried opening it up in Windows Media Player.....
This time, it doesn't search the internet for a codec...... but it STILL crashes after it plays for 3 seconds.

(To Suntan: I just downloaded what you told me to download, but I'm going to try it after I try re-installing Windows Media Player. If Windows Media Player works, then everything's fine, so I won't need it. Thnx, tho)

[sacred ff]

Everything's solved. I just re-installed windows media player 9 sreies and it worked. (I guess it's because I had the version 10 beta and rolled it back to 9--it f*cked up my player..... I guess)

Thanks again Suntan... even though I didn't use FFdshow......

[Suntan]

WMP is a directshow based player. If you do not have an MPEG4 directshow filter then WMP will not play it. Also, that filter is much better than anything WMP will download for you. It is capable of very good postprocesing like denoising and sharpening filters.

Finally, get rid of WMP, it is a piece of junk. Try Zoomplayer, it is a much better Directshow Player.

-Suntan