Vista video problems

[Xstr8guy]

I just had a new member using Windows Vista email us and claim that he couldn't watch any videos on the site. Even downloaded .wmv's wouldn't play in Windows Media Player. He claimed to have also contact Vista support and they said there was no way to resolve his problem.

What's up with that? Is this true?! If it is true, is there any kind of a fix that can be done?

Is anyone here currently using Vista? I'll give any regular GWW member using Windows Vista a free 1 month pass to UKNM if you would help me troubleshoot the problem.

[chadknowslaw]

I just got a Vista computer. On Tuesday [every Tuesday I guess] it downloads updates. One of those updates -- or a few of them -- did "stuff" and I had to download new drivers for my sound card and printer. I went to the manufacturer websites for the sound card and printer and the latest updated drivers did the trick.

Try downloading updated drivers -- for me the HP Printer driver I downloaded was updated March 20 2007 and the sound card driver was last updated April 7 2007.

Apparently Vista needs the latest updates for drivers and programs-- I even had to re-download ICQ after Tuesday's automatic updates.

[Xstr8guy]

Care to take a peek at my member's area Chad to see if the videos play for you?

[HotMaleVideos]

I have a fresh Vista installation on another hard drive if you need extra help. I'm relatively decent at troubleshooting random stuff like this if I experience it.

[Xstr8guy]

Thanks Mike!

PM sent.

[wnc]

If you would like an additional tester Jim for those UKNM videos, shoot me a PM.

As of April 3rd I have been using a brand new HP, with Vista and Windows Media Player 11.

[Xstr8guy]

If you would like an additional tester Jim for those UKNM videos, shoot me a PM.

As of April 3rd I have been using a brand new HP, with Vista and Windows Media Player 11.

Ah, your password has expired? I'll PM you another one.

That sounds like a similar configuration of the member that is having the problems.

[wnc]

I think I was a perfect candidate for the testing, since the computer is new to me. I love the Vista graphical interface and the 2GB of ram.

Using IE7, I first clicked on "Justin the Beast" video page. Similar to a Google toolbar popup warning, there was a statement that "the website wants to run the following add-on "Windows Media Player Extension". I allowed the "ActiveX Control" to be loaded. I then selected the best option and the 720x540 streamed video was extremely sharp.

I closed down IE7, then entered UKNM a second time and the add-on did not need to be loaded again.

I then tested with FoxFire-2.0.0.3 and experienced some problems.
The index page of UKNM required the Adobe Flash Player plugin. The automatic install failed and a manual install was requested. I decided to skip that step and signed in as a subscriber. This time I selected "Vince" as the test video. Foxfire announced that a plugin was needed. Clicking on that icon it loaded a Microsoft page, wanting to download the Windows Media Player 11, which of course I have fully functional.

Since I use FoxFire only occassional to view certain sites and do not wish to have conflicting or multiple versions of similar software, I will conclude that there is a major problem with Vista/FoxFire for a normal computer user.

I have not yet loaded Opera.

Hope this information is of assistance Jim.

[Xstr8guy]

PERFECT! This is exactly what I wanted to know!

[WEGRuth]

Not sure if it's the same thing, but when I got Vista I could no longer get files from Youtube or other Flash type files to load properly on my machine.

The issue was with Adobe, and they also have a fix..

I installed Windows Vista Ultimate last weekend, and like many I found that the flash player did not work on many sites including YouTube etc.

Well, the good news is I think I have the fix that many of you have been looking for:

I navigated my way to:

C:\Windows\System32\Macromed\Flash

Then right clicked over both 'Flash9b.ocx' and 'FlashUtil9b.exe', and chose properties.

In properties choose the 'security' tab > Click on the 'everyone' account, and the button called 'edit' and then tick the box called 'allow full control' and also choose your own Windows local account name.

Once you have done this for both files run the FlashUtil9b.exe and it should install and update and tell you to restart. Do so and you should find that YouTube and other sites that use flash now work.

Link to above fix - adobe.com/cfusion/webforums/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=184&threadid=1243464

Since I did that I've had no problems viewing movies in my browser.

[Chilihost]

Yikes, this sounds like problems...Jim can you please keep us informed.

thanks,
Luke

[HotMaleVideos]

Hello from Vista... Once you customize the hell out of it, it's tolerable. It's a bit too much of a UI leap for me. It's like some kind of bastardized Apple-Windows hybrid that isn't finished cooking yet.

Anyway, IE7:

When first getting to the site it prompts to install an Active X plugin... Flash I believe it was. I accepted, and the site works fine. Streamed videos and downloads all work. I can't find any problems.

Firefox 2:

FF wants to install Flash. It goes through. When I click on Justin the Beast (or any page with a video), it wants to install another plugin, but when I click to install it, it doesn't know what plugin to install. "No suitable plugins found." I'm given the options to Cancel or "Install Manually." The Manual option takes me to a generic Microsoft Download page for Windows Media. Not sure what to do here.

WMV file downloads from both browsers work fine for me. The member says he's having problems with those too? Odd.

BTW, the instruction page for FF/Mozilla/Opera browsers doesn't seem to apply to Vista. I did a hard drive search and couldn't find "npds play.dll" anywhere, with or without the space. I even selected to find system/hidden files as well. I'm not sure if that's a Vista-specific thing or a Windows Media 11 thing, though. The file might or might not be missing entirely from WMP11. I haven't checked back to XP yet.

[HotMaleVideos]

FYI: For me, FireFox never really liked windows media/active X plugins. That's a potential culprit.

[Xstr8guy]

Mark & Martin, thank so much for taking the time to test UKNM with Vista! I really appreciate it. But why did you test the 'Justin the Beast' video? It isn't our best video... by far! Lol. Most of the other videos are far better.

So anyways... it sounds like Vista works ok with IE7 and embedded .wmv's, correct? Other than some requests to install Flash and Windows Media plugins which seem to install ok and don't need to reinstalled?

Firefox sounds like a total bust used in combination with Vista. Is that correct? Is there another way to embed Windows Media Player in a web page without using ActiveX? I've always embedded video in this way.

BTW, the instruction page for FF/Mozilla/Opera browsers doesn't seem to apply to Vista. I did a hard drive search and couldn't find "npds play.dll" anywhere, with or without the space. I even selected to find system/hidden files as well. I'm not sure if that's a Vista-specific thing or a Windows Media 11 thing, though. The file might or might not be missing entirely from WMP11. I haven't checked back to XP yet.

You are talking about the Firefox video fix that I link to in the member's area, right? That is a recent fix that Dzinerbear suggested when I had members with a Firefox/XP/WMV problems. And the fix works wonderfully with XP. But I suppose I need to clarify that the fix won't work for Vista users.

[Xstr8guy]

Any other brave Vista users out there that would like to do a brief test?