Macromedia Flash v7 Does Not Load

[Morris Penny]

Problem: Macromedia Flash Player data does not load Right clicking on the
area where the flash data should be displays the message: "movie not
loaded". The problem is independent of the browser (i. e. IE, Firefox and
Opera all have the same problem). Had problem under SP1 and SP2.

OS is Windows XP, Home Edition; browser is IE V 6.xx with SP 1 and other
fixes up to date. SP 2 is installed.

Have attempted the following to date:

1. Based on the Macromedia support info
a. downloaded and utilized the flash uninstaller; downloaded Flash
Player; still did not work
b. Performed manual uninstall per Macromedia instruction; this included
removing a compatibility flag from the registry; downloaded Flasher
Player;still did not work
c. Uninstalled Flash Player, downloaded the Flash Player V 7 installer;
and loaded Flash Player; still did not work.
2. Using third party software was able to
a. Verify the presence of Flash Player v 7
b. Successfully tested the installation.
3. IE Tools/Internet Options/General/Settings/View Objects indicates the
browser thinks the plug-ins (ActiveX Controls and Shockwave Flash) are
installed. Also, Firefox and Opera think the flash files are installed.
4. Manually verified flash files are in the correct location
5. Disabling the third party SW firewall does not change the results.
6. Macromedia Flash works fine when system booted up in Safe Mode
7. In browser all security options are set to either enable or prompt;
permissions are set to medium, and privacy is set to medium.
8. Have no problem running ActiveX controls and loading flash data on a
companion platform running Windows 2000 Professional and same
security/privacy settings as used in the XP OS.
9. Flash files work fine when accessed directly from the harddrive.
10. Macromedia support forums provided no help

Problem appears to occur when connected to the internet.

 

[Jon Kennedy]

Are you running some sort of pop-up blocker, ad blocker or other
helper/toolbar app? Some of those have setting that disable Flash. Firefox
& Mozilla also have ad/Flash blockers:
http://adblock.mozdev.org/ http://flashblock.mozdev.org/ - ever use those?

Registry setting involved:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\ActiveX
Compatibility\{D27CDB6E-AE6D-11CF-96B8-444553540000}
"Compatibility Flags"=dword:00000400 ==>remove this entry

WAG: In IE go to Tools...Internet Options...Advanced tab, Multimedia
section - make sure all the entries that start with Play or Show are
checked.

You report that Flash works in Safe Mode - so that would leave one to
believe that something else is running on your system that is interfering -

How to perform a clean boot in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;310353
How to perform advanced clean-boot troubleshooting in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;316434

Could also be spyware/malware:

Use Ad-Aware and/or Spybot Search & Destroy to remove it.

Ad-Aware: http://www.lavasoftusa.com/
Spybot: http://www.safer-networking.org/en/index.html
Good sites on how to install and use Spybot -
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/tutorial/index.html
http://tomcoyote.com/SPYBOT/index1.php

Also download a winsock repair tool, to have just in case cleaning up
anything found breaks it -

Winsock repair tools:
LSPFix- all versions of Windows http://www.cexx.org/lspfix.zip
Winsock2 Fix- Win98, ME
http://www.bu.edu/pcsc/internetaccess/winsock2fix.html
LavaSoft- all versions of Windows-
http://digital-solutions.co.uk/lavasoft/whndnfix.zip

More information here:
http://www.spywareinfo.com/
http://inetexplorer.mvps.org/Darnit.htm
http://www.doxdesk.com/parasite/ - runs a little script when loading page to
check for common parasites

If no joy, in IE go to Tools...Internet Options...Advanced tab, Browsing
section, uncheck "Enable third-party browser extensions", click Apply, click
Okay, reboot. If that solves your problem, then more troubleshooting is
needed to find out exactly which program, or Browser Helper Object (BHO) is
causing this problem. You don't want to leave it at that, as some BHOs are
useful or necessary - like Adobe Acrobat for reading .pdf files or an
essential component of Norton AV. Get BHODemon -
http://www.definitivesolutions.com/bhodemon.htm - read all about BHOs.
Disable all items, and then gradually replace one or two at a time to narrow
down the culprit.

Or if you have IE 6 SP-2 you can do this within the browser:
How to manage Internet Explorer add-ons in Windows XP Service Pack 2
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;883256

If all the above fails, then the problem could be something new that the
spyware cleaners above don't have in their databases yet. In that case....
HijackThis direct download:
http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/files/hijackthis.zip
Tutorial on how to use HijackThis:
http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/htlogtutorial.html
Then post it's output log to the forum here for analysis and feedback by the
parasite experts:
http://www.spywareinfo.com/forums/
Or the other HijackThis Logs forums listed here:
http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/forums.html

Or try this program to get some of the most nasty malware:
CWShredder direct download:
http://aumha.org/downloads/cwshredder.zip

An alternate resource for all of this and more:
http://www.aumha.org/secure.htm

 

[Jon Kennedy]

Also, in IE, go to Tools...Internet Options...General tab, Accessibility
button and disable any custom style sheet, if present.

 

[Jon Kennedy]

Oh, and one more place in the registry where Flash can be disabled:

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000}\MiscStatus\1

If the string value of the Default key is 1024, change it to 131473

This info is from http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_tweaks.htm - line 363
on the left column.

 

[Ramesh, MS-MVP]

Thanks Jon. Just found another reference on this tip:
http://www.tweakxp.com/article139839.aspx

 

[Morris Penny]

Status to date:

1. Only pop up blocker I am running is the recently installed SP 2. Turning
it off has no effect. Had problem before SP 2 installed. Not aware of any
other pop up blockers on my system.
2. Have rerun AdWare SE, Microsoft AntiSpyware and Sypbot and found no
adware etc problems.
3. Verified that all Multimedia entries in IE 6 were checked.
4. The compatibility flag for D27CDB6E-AE6D-11CF-96B8-444553540000 was 0;
deleted the entry, but left the default entry since it had no value.
5. Found that D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000 value was already set to
131473
6. Disabling the firewall has no effect. (am running McAfee firewall,
Microsoft SP2 firewall is disabled, but had problem before SP 2 installed)
7. Reran the test of executing the sample flash files (these were
downloaded) from the Macromedia web site). Opera and Firefox will execute
the sample files from from the HD. But IE 6 will not. This is the code each
is executing

<object classid="clsid27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000"
codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=5,0,0,0"
width="800" height="600">
<param name=movie value="../swf/Jigsaw_puzzle.swf">
<param name=quality value=high>
<embed src="../swf/Jigsaw_puzzle.swf" quality=high
pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/index.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash"
type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="800" height="600">
</embed> </object> <br>8. Have briefly examined the
processes running and at first glance did not see anything that looked out
of the ordinary.
9. Am studing the clean boot process before attempting.

 

[Peter]

Just an FYI - I also run McAfee Firewall Plus and Macromedia runs fine. I
wouldn't disable your firewall for any reason!

 

[Peter]

Did you register the Shockwave when you downloaded it? Test it here:
http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/welcome/

 

[Morris Penny]

Peter:
Tested flash as suggested. Shockwave Flash appears to work fine, but Flash
will not load. So, how do I regrister it?

 

[Morris Penny]

Agreed. Was just making sure. Otherwise my firewall is always enabled.

 

[Peter]

Actually, I may be in error there. Flash loads (or should load) without any
prompts, other than to install an ActiveX component (OK) and the Yahoo
Toolbar (I chose no to that), but the Shockwave Player asks you to register
your age (Lord knows why) and then forwards you to the Macromedia Shockwave
site.
If you are having trouble downloading the Flash player go here
http://www.macromedia.com/support/flashplayer/ and see if there's an
offline installation link, in which case you could save it and install later
when you are offline.
You must have something blocking it!!

 

[Morris Penny]

I have already installed offline. You have identified the question. How do I
determine what may be blocking flash?

 

[Peter]

Hmmmm...! Try going to Internet Explorer Tools/Internet Options/Security..
set all zones to "default", then go to Privacy... set default, then to
Advanced....set to default. At the Advanced tab I always set default but
then go down to the last group on that menu and enable "Empty Temorary
Internet Files Folder when browser is closed" then I go to General, clear
all temp files (except my offline pages) and set the "days to keep" counter
at the bottom to zero. A defrag might help too.
Other than that, do you have anything like McAfee Privacy Service blocking
any images etc.?

 

[Morris Penny]

Went around the world but solved the problem. Through clean boot process
traced the problem to a start-up program. From there to McAfee Internal
Security. Had forgotton that blocking pop-ups is one of their defaults,
which I had not disabled. Turns out if one presses the CTRL key while the
web page with flash loads then flash is not blocks. Seems a bit cumbersome
to me. By the way, flash is blocked if either or both the block ads or block
pop-up entries are checked.

Thanks for the guidence.

 

[Jon Kennedy]

You're most welcome. Glad to hear your issue has been resolved. Thank YOU
for the feedback. Much appreciated and could be helpful to others who come
here in the future looking to solve a problem like yours.