Trouble with .wav files and Vista

[gargoyle]

I have Windows 98SE, my sister has Vista. She wanted a .wav file that
I use for my new mail alert, so I sent it to her via email. She uses
Outlook 2003, I use Eudora. She saved the file I sent her to the
Documents folder.

All the sounds she already has associated with different things work,
but when we tried to use my mail2.wav file for her mail alert, it
wouldn't play. So I tried double clicking on the file to see if it
would play that way, and here's what the media player said:

"Windows media player cannot play file. The player might not support
the file or might not support the codec that was used to compress the
file."

Am I missing something here? I thought a .wav file was a .wav file.
Does Vista not allow users to use any other .wav files except for what
it comes with for things like the mail alert, exclamation, etc. ?? Is
there something I should have done that I didn't?

Any help would be greatly appreciated! So far Vista SUCKS, IMO.
<g>

 

[Mr. Arnold]

Am I missing something here? I thought a .wav file was a .wav file.
Does Vista not allow users to use any other .wav files except for what
it comes with for things like the mail alert, exclamation, etc. ?? Is
there something I should have done that I didn't?

Yeah, I would suspect that any software that made a .wav that was Vista
compatible would not have a problem in the area you speak about.

I would suspect something like a .wav file created on Win 9'x is not going
run on Vista, but don't hold me to it.

 

[zachd [MSFT]]

Additionally, she can click "Web Help" on that error dialog and get a touch
more information. What URL does it take her to?

 

[gargoyle]

On Fri, 11 May 2007 00:12:40 -0400, "Mr. Arnold" <MR.

Yeah, I would suspect that any software that made a .wav that was Vista
compatible would not have a problem in the area you speak about.

I would suspect something like a .wav file created on Win 9'x is not going
run on Vista, but don't hold me to it.

Hmmm...I guess that could be possible! I'm not sure if it was created
on Win9x or not, since the file was sent to me from a friend of mine
years ago. Thanks for replying!

 

[gargoyle]

Hi gargoyle,

Was the .wav file always a .wav file or was it converted into one from
another program? This might be why Media player can not play it. Test
this theory by using a .wav file from your 98SE's original system sounds
and playing it on the Vista system. Also, I got this message one time
before, but Media Player asked me if I wanted to play it anyway. Any
such luck for you?

Hope this helps some,
Shawn

Ah! That could be it indeed. It's a "song" of a trio of men singing
"You've got some maaaaaaaaaaaaail!" So it could have been converted
to a .wav file from some other source. I will take one of the
originial .wav files from my Win98 and see if that plays on her Vista.

Nope...Media Player did not ask me if I wanted to play it anyway. I
only got two buttons..."OK" and "Close". If I clicked OK, it just
went to the Media Player and didn't play anything, and it had a red X
by the name of the .wav file on the player's list.

Thanks for the suggestion about the Win98 .wavs!

 

[gargoyle]

Additionally, she can click "Web Help" on that error dialog and get a touch
more information. What URL does it take her to?

Ahhh...we didn't know that. I don't remember seeing "Web Help" on the
dialog box, but I'll try to play it again and look for that.

Thank you!

 

[Malke]

Ahhh...we didn't know that. I don't remember seeing "Web Help" on the
dialog box, but I'll try to play it again and look for that.

Thank you!

Just as a thought, often older .wav files don't work in other operating
systems. As an example, I have quite a few .wav files created when
Windows 95 was around and they would not play at all in any of my modern
Linux systems. The Linux systems have programs that can play regular
..wav files with no problem. I did a little research and came up with
something about how the older .wav files were actually constructed
differently than current .wav files. I realize this isn't a technical
answer and it's very vague (this was quite a while ago), but it may be
that there's nothing wrong with your friend's Vista. She might try
converting the .wav files to something else that Vista can play and then
maybe back to Vista's version of .wav. In my case, I used Audacity to
convert the old .wav files to .ogg and that worked fine, but I don't
think Vista can use .ogg for system sounds.


Malke

 

[dev]

/Malke/ said:

Just as a thought, often older .wav files don't work in other
operating systems. As an example, I have quite a few .wav files
created when Windows 95 was around and they would not play at all in
any of my modern Linux systems. The Linux systems have programs that
can play regular .wav files with no problem. I did a little research
and came up with something about how the older .wav files were
actually constructed differently than current .wav files. I realize
this isn't a technical answer and it's very vague (this was quite a
while ago), but it may be that there's nothing wrong with your
friend's Vista. She might try converting the .wav files to something
else that Vista can play and then maybe back to Vista's version of
.wav. In my case, I used Audacity to convert the old .wav files to
.ogg and that worked fine, but I don't think Vista can use .ogg for
system sounds.>

Malke

I might add that it is possible that the sample rates of some WAV files
are not what some players or apps need to see. I ran into this
recently with a WAV editor, and used the music converter from
http://www.dbpoweramp.com/
to make the files WAV 44.100 kHz, 16 bits stereo.
Those, the WAV editor could handle.

 

[gargoyle]

If all else fails you, here's the link that you can download a new copy
of it. Scroll down a bit to "Mail28.wav" :

'_http://www.ilovewavs.com/Events/GotMail/GotMail.htm_'
(http://www.ilovewavs.com/Events/GotMail/GotMail.htm)

Hope that's the one you have,
Shawn

YAY! That did it, Shawn! And that IS the one I have!
Thank you!!

 

[Cal Bear '66]

Yeah, much thanks!
Great event sounds.
Thanks again for the link.