Problems Inserting Music

[Guest]

When I try to insert music from a file, or a cd track, it wont play on my
slide show. All my music files are saved, in an .mp3 formatt, and i can't
transfer them to .WAV, is there a setting i can change on my powerpoint? and
if not, how can i make songs play off of a Audio Cd?

 

[Sonia]

Can you give use some more information? When you say, "...it wont play on my
slide show" do you mean that you are able to insert the music file, but the
slides won't advance? Or do you mean that when you attempt to insert a music
file you get some kind of message and the file is not inserted? If the latter,
what is the message?

Or, do you mean that it inserts, but it just won't play? If that's the case,
what version of PowerPoint are you creating the presentation in and are you
trying it in Slide Show mode? Also what version of Windows are you running and
what where did the MP3's come from?

 

[Sonia]

Are you always setting the sound files to play automatically? You need to
compare the Custom Animation settings for the two MP3's - - the one that plays
and the one that doesn't. Something must be set differently. Also, PowerPoint
doesn't use Windows Media Player, so testing a file in WMP doesn't help you
much. You need to go to Start > Run and type mplay32.exe to open the MCI player
and test your file in it. A file that won't play in the MCI player will not
play in PowerPoint.

 

[Sonia]

And when you play the presentation in slide show mode, do both files work?

 

[Guest]

I am running Powerpoint 2003

I have a 50 slide presentation which I have set so each slide displays for 4
seconds then moves to next slide.

The music (attached to slide 1 - *.mp3 file) will only play if I have no
slide transitions.

I am experienced with many versions of Powerpoint and have done this before
OK with earlier versions.

 

[Sonia]

What Custom Animation settings do you have? Do you have it set to play for 51
slides or more?

If that's not the issue, have you applied the Service Pack 1?

Finally, you may need to do the following:

1. Go to Tools > Options > Edit and check the box next to "New animation
effects" at the bottom. Click OK.
2. Right click the sound icon and click on Custom Animation.
3. Click on the Multimedia Settings tab.
4. Check "Continue slide show" under "Play using animation order". Click OK.
5. When you have done this for all sound files, go to Tools > Options > Edit
and *uncheck* the box next to "New animation effects" at the bottom. Click OK.
6. Test the presentation to see if that corrects the problem.

Sonia Coleman
Microsoft PowerPoint MVP Team
Autorun Software, Templates and Tutorials

 

[Guest]

Hi Sonia,

I read through this posting but I didn't find any kind of resolution and I'm
having the same problem. I have a PowerPoint 2003 presentation that I
created on one computer where a sound file played just fine. I moved the
presentation to another computer with PP 2003 and the sound file won't play.
In addition, the second computer won't play any .WMA files but will play only
some .MP3 files.

Per your test, I tried the non-working audio files using mplay32.exe and
they all play fine on the second computer. So, what can I do? I have some
..MP3 files that work, others that don't, no .WMA files work, and yet they all
play fine using mplay32.exe.

Thanks,
Pat

 

[Sonia]

When you moved the presentation to the second computer you may have broken the
links. See:

Sounds/Movies don't play, images disappear or links break when I move or email a
presentation
http://www.rdpslides.com/pptfaq/FAQ00155.htm

 

[Guest]

Hi Sonia,

Nope. I did a bunch of additional work to the file when I moved it to the
new computer and that included up the audio link because the file wasn't in
the same place on the second computer. Even now I can try to insert audio
files into the presentation (or even a completely new presentation) and some
files work and others don't. There doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason -
audio file size seems to be irrelevant and all the files play using
mplay32.exe.

I opened PowerPoint 2003 this morning, made a one slide presentation that
had a single text box that said "test" and inserted different audio file
links into it. For each I selected "play automatically" and only some work.
In fact, when I inserted the files, I used the context sensitive menu for the
links to choose to play the file and only some work.

 

[Guest]

Does anyone have an idea as to what this problem might be?

 

[Echo S]

How long is the path to the music file?

Step 2 at http://www.echosvoice.com/tshoot_video2.htm (about path lengths)
could definitely apply to sound files as well as video files.

 

[Guest]

Wow! That appears to be the problem. At first I didn't think this could be
right since another file in the same directory plays just fine, but I move
the offending file to my desktop and it plays just fine. I also moved
another .WMA file to the desktop and it plays as well. Amazing! Thank you!!!

How long is the path to the music file?

Step 2 at http://www.echosvoice.com/tshoot_video2.htm (about path lengths)
could definitely apply to sound files as well as video files.

--
Echo [MS PPT MVP]
http://www.echosvoice.com
presenter, PPT Live '04
Oct 10-13, San Diego http://www.powerpointlive.com

Does anyone have an idea as to what this problem might be?