Video wont work, please help!

[Guest]

Im trying to get visualizations to play in the background behind my audio in
my powerpoint slide.

Ive read that if you insert>movies and sounds>sound from file, and select
the playlist, it should play the sound and visualization.

However, for me I get an error message that states "Powerpoint couldn't
insert a sound from the selected file".

Im running Powerpoint 03 on windows XP prof.

What am I doing wrong and how can I get my audio to play in powerpoint with
visualizations! =(

Thanks!

 

[Bill Dilworth]

Hey LnC,

You are 99.3% correct, just one small thing you forgot (I suspect).

Follow this sequence:
Insert => Movies & Sounds => Movie from File... => Change 'Files of type'
to 'Windows Media Files' and navigate to your saved Playlist. Then select
auto or whatnot.

I suspect you forgot to change the file type and so it was trying to open
the playlist as a movie.

Post back if this does not work and we'll talk about path lengths.


--
Bill Dilworth
A proud member of the Microsoft PPT MVP Team
Users helping fellow users.
billdilworth.mvps.org
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yahoo2@ Please read the PowerPoint
yahoo. FAQ pages. They answer most
com of our questions.
www.pptfaq.com
..
..

 

[Guest]

Thanks for the quick response!

I tried inserting "video file" instead of "audio file"

Two problems arose. First of all, I cant select "Windows Media Files" as a
file type, only "movie file" and "all".

Second, when I try to open a playlist from this angle, I get the error
"Powerpoint couldnt insert a movie from the selected file.Either the file is
non-standard, or Quicktime is not installed properly". Quicktime is most
deffinitely installed properly =P.

I suspect the problem is the Powerpoint is trying to open Quicktime movies,
when the playlist is generated from WMP?

Please help from here =/

 

[Bill Dilworth]

You have:
PowerPoint 2003
Windows XP Pro

What version of Windows Media Player are you running?

Do you have Windows Media Encoder installed?


--
Bill Dilworth
A proud member of the Microsoft PPT MVP Team
Users helping fellow users.
billdilworth.mvps.org
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
yahoo2@ Please read the PowerPoint
yahoo. FAQ pages. They answer most
com of our questions.
www.pptfaq.com
..
..

 

[Guest]

I have the latest version of Windows Media Player installed (10)

I do not have this encoder thingy you speak of installed.

Is that the solution? =/

 

[Guest]

Update: I downloaded the encoder thingy, and nothing has changed.

Ive been doing everything I can think of to get this to work, and along the
way I noticed something...

In the powerpoint "open audio" menu, if I right-click a playlist and click
"play", WMP opens up, but the playlist does not. If I right-click it however
and hit "open with - WMP", it plays just fine. In addition, double clicking
or rightclick-playing from any other window (outside of powerpoint) does not
have any problems.

How strange!! I really hope theres a solution to this =/

 

[Echo S]

What file type are you trying to play?

Since you want the visualizations in the back, I assume you want a Windows
Media Player object to appear on your slide?

If that's the case, then try using Insert/Object/From File instead of
Insert/Movies and Sounds. The (general) difference is that Insert/Object
should play the file in whatever Windows has specified as your default
player for that file type. Insert/Movies and Sounds plays the file within
PPT itself by calling up the antiquated MCI Media Player, and you don't see
any player "skin" like you would if you used Insert/Object.

 

[Guest]

Im trying to play mp3s, and the mp3 playlists are .wpl files (default windows
media player playlists).

My goal is to have mp3s and playlists both play with the visualizations in
the background.

When I do the insert object method, I can insert "windows media player", but
not a specific playlist/song, which is no good.

Also, I tried the "insert sound/movie" method with a .wpl file on my frinds
computer (Powerpoint 03, Windows XP Media Center), and the same error popped
up.

There must be *something* im missing...please assist

 

[Echo S]

I don't know anything at all, really, about playing WPL playlists in PPT.

FWIW, though, using Insert/Movies and Sounds/Sound from File, switching to
"all files" as Bill D described, and choosing a WPL file did indeed insert
the playlist here and play the sounds with the visualizations.

So yeah, it can work.

I don't know how to troubleshoot this, though. Usually, if a file won't play
in the MCI Media Player, it won't play in PPT. But I just tried the WPL here
in the MCI Media Player to see what would happen, and the file doesn't play
(as I expected) in the MCI Media Player (even though it does play in PPT).
So that isn't a good test in this situation. However, I think you should
still check your MCI registry settings -- see the screenshots at
http://www.soniacoleman.com/Tutorials/PowerPoint/multimedia.htm (section 3).
I'd just make 'em all match, even though you'd think that the only important
ones would be WPL=MPEGVideo and MPEGVideo=mciqtz32.dll.

Oh, and just to be on the safe side, try putting your presentation and the
WPL file in a folder on your C drive proper. Call it C:\Test or something.
Let's just make *sure* that this isn't an issue with the length to the path
to the WPL file.

 

[Guest]

I tried everything you said, and nothing worked.

Everywhere I looked said it should be as easy as click-click-click..

How irritating =/ Please advice any further steps to fix this problem.

 

[Guest]

Update:

I made a very big mistake.

I just looked at my disk, and its not powerpoint 03, its part of the Office
XP suite, so it must be Powerpoint 02. I dont know if that makes a big
difference, or if PP 02 even works with wpls, but I *just* noticed the
version diffrence.

So sorry!!! Please advice based on new info =/

 

[Echo S]

Nuts. I don't know, then.

I wonder if Austin's PFCMedia add-in does playlists? http://www.pfcmedia.com

Otherwise, the only thing I know to do is call Microsoft support.

 

[Echo S]

I don't have PPT 2002 (aka PPT XP) installed here, so I can't try it.

I can tell you that PPT 2000 doesn't, though, because I *do* have that
version installed. What worries me is that I get the exact same error
message when inserting into 2000 as you get when trying to insert into 2002
("Powerpoint couldn't insert a sound from the selected file"). So that makes
me wonder if 2002 doesn't support WPL.

Hopefully someone here will be able to test this in PPT 2002 for you.

 

[Bill Dilworth]

Bingo!

This is new to 2003. And not available in XP.

Sorry for the delay, weekends tend to be a busy time for me.


--
Bill Dilworth
A proud member of the Microsoft PPT MVP Team
Users helping fellow users.
billdilworth.mvps.org
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
yahoo2@ Please read the PowerPoint
yahoo. FAQ pages. They answer most
com of our questions.
www.pptfaq.com
..
..

I don't have PPT 2002 (aka PPT XP) installed here, so I can't try it.

I can tell you that PPT 2000 doesn't, though, because I *do* have that
version installed. What worries me is that I get the exact same error
message when inserting into 2000 as you get when trying to insert into
2002
("Powerpoint couldn't insert a sound from the selected file"). So that
makes
me wonder if 2002 doesn't support WPL.

Hopefully someone here will be able to test this in PPT 2002 for you.

--
Echo [MS PPT MVP]
http://www.echosvoice.com

Update:

I made a very big mistake.

I just looked at my disk, and its not powerpoint 03, its part of the Office
XP suite, so it must be Powerpoint 02. I dont know if that makes a big
difference, or if PP 02 even works with wpls, but I *just* noticed the
version diffrence.

So sorry!!! Please advice based on new info =/