Windows Media Player 11 performance with Movies

[RiverDog]

Seems to be very poor. Instead of getting a continuous picture I get a
flashing picture. What causes this and what can I do about it.

RiverDog.

 

[Cal Bear '66]

Update your video adapter drivers?

 

[RiverDog]

Yup, drivers are updated. Thanks for the reply though.

 

[Cal Bear '66]

Have you installed any "codec packs"? I have read in these groups that they can
cause problems like yours.

 

[TheEnemyWithin]

Yup, drivers are updated. Thanks for the reply though.

this is a good player you might want to try out.. plays almost anything
without the need to install codecs (free)

www.gomplayer.com

 

[Adam Albright]

Seems to be very poor. Instead of getting a continuous picture I get a
flashing picture. What causes this and what can I do about it.

RiverDog.

Assuming you have current video drivers the first thing to do is
compare playback by using other players. Three of the best,all free,
all superior to Media Player are GOM Player, XnView and VLC Media
Player.

If you still get poor playback suspect some codec conflict as a high
probability. Especially for Media Player, it can go bonkers if certain
codecs get added to your system. While these codecs may still allow
other players to work correctly they can totally mess up Media Player.

Other things can cause poor playback too. Underpowered CPU, being low
on system resources (try rebooting) badly fragmented file if you're
playing it back from your hard drive, worse if you're trying to steam
a video from the web, file encoded at too high a bitrate, etc..

What type of "movie" are you playing? There are literally over a
dozen popular file types, scores of variations within each file type,
issues with decoding, codec conflicts, all manner of things that can
go wrong including DMA issues if you're tying to play a commercial
copyright protected movie.

 

[RiverDog]

Nope, no codec packs installed.

RiverDog

Have you installed any "codec packs"? I have read in these groups that
they can cause problems like yours.

 

[TheEnemyWithin]

Nope, no codec packs installed.

this is a good player you might want to try out.. plays almost anything
without the need to install codecs (free)

www.gomplayer.com

 

[RiverDog]

Ok, I tried GOM Player. Video was smooth (although grainy) but no sound.
Tried VLC Media Player. Video was smooth but grainy and there was sound. Too
bad about Media Player 11.

RiverDog

 

[Adam Albright]

Ok, I tried GOM Player. Video was smooth (although grainy) but no sound.
Tried VLC Media Player. Video was smooth but grainy and there was sound. Too
bad about Media Player 11.

Are you sure there is a audio track to play? If a AVI or DivX file,
try opening with G-Spot, another free tool that will give you details
about codecs on your system and which ones should be capable of
playing the file.

If some or none of your video files refuse to play audio then that
suggests one or more audio codecs on your system are to blame. Are you
SURE you never installed any codecs? Just installing some software
will install a whole bunch of codecs. Once you install G-Spot, click
on View-"installed codecs" and you just may be surprised how many are
on your system you didn't know were there.

How smooth video playback is can be effected by the bitrate, (how the
video was encoded) also the size you're viewing it at. Try adjusting
the playback size to 1/2 normal and see if the graininess goes away.

On the GOM player there are in excess of a 100 options to play around
with. Some can make a noticeable improvement in video playback
quality... depending on the video you're trying to play.

The menu is sort of hidden. Click where it says GOM at the very top.
If you look close you'll see the icon gets highlighted just a bit. Now
have some fun. Click on Video on the left menu, then go to Video
Setting on the right menu that opens and try different settings.

 

[zachd [MSFT]]

You don't mention what file types are affected (WMV, MPEG, AVI?), but
flashing sounds like a poor video card driver. (I can't think of many ways
in which any shipping codec could accidentally produce that effect.) What
video card do you have?

Are you able to turn down video hardware acceleration in the Display
Settings control panel under Advanced Settings:: Troubleshoot ?
Does dxdiag.exe report any problems?

 

[RiverDog]

Thanks Zach. I am running two Nvidia 8800 GTX in SLi mode, using the 158.45
drivers. By movies I mead DVD movies that you buy or rent. Dxdiag reports no
problems. Can't turn down the video hardware acceleration and why would I,
given my rig. Windows Vista Ultimate 64. Thanks

RiverDog

 

[zachd [MSFT]]

Is it only happening for DVDs and not for the other types? That's very
relevant.

So that driver:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/winvista_x64_158.45.html
appears to be in beta... ? Versus the 24, which appears to be
release/WHQLd--
http://www.nvidia.com/object/winvista_x64_158.24.html

Video is generally an incredibly hard field to get perfect, so being
counterintuitive and turning off something that doesn't seem like you would
want/need to turn off just is good logical processing of an issue.

Under WMP's Help:About:Technical Support Information, which DVD and MPEG
codecs are listed? I suspect I know that answer, but it's still of
interest.

The only tweaking you can do with WMP here that I'm aware of is with WMP's
Tools:Optionserformance, which has a couple of options there.

Does the same exact thing happen with
c:\program files\windows media player\wmplayer.exe
-- the 64bit version of WMP?

 

[Adam Albright]

Is it only happening for DVDs and not for the other types? That's very
relevant.

So that driver:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/winvista_x64_158.45.html
appears to be in beta... ? Versus the 24, which appears to be
release/WHQLd--
http://www.nvidia.com/object/winvista_x64_158.24.html

Video is generally an incredibly hard field to get perfect, so being
counterintuitive and turning off something that doesn't seem like you would
want/need to turn off just is good logical processing of an issue.

Media Player is just poorly written and very klunky. For example, just
today I was messing around and downloaded a few videos off the web for
kicks. One was 486 MB .VOB with a standard MPEG-2 video stream and a
AC3 audio steam. It started up in Media Player which said it was 26
seconds in length. Media Player started to play it, got to 26 seconds,
then the scrubber control stopped and just stayed pinned at the right
end, but the video continued to play much longer. So just for fun I
used XnView to extract this video frame by frame converting it to a
series of .JPG files.

When done, I had 25,897 still images. Next I used Sony's Vegas to
convert these still image captures back into video format. Guess
what... the actual length of the video wasn't 26 seconds like Media
Player claimed, it was nine minutes and 34 seconds. No apparent file
corruption, just the usual Media Player getting confused like it does
constantly. Amazing that Media Player did manage to play it all the
way through.

The point being I'm sick and tired of Windows version after version
coming out with the world's most crappy media player. Yes, Microsoft
keeps adding some nice features, but it fails miserably in it's BASIC
function, playing your damn videos and half the time also fails even
playing even simply audio files.

This is odd, since I have over a dozen other players, rarely do any of
them stumble with them all easily playing nearly every file type I
throw at them while Media Player just keeps stumbling. Makes no sense
that Microsoft can't get it's act together considering Windows has
more or less had the ability to play multimedia files for oh about 20
years and still can't get the job done right much of the time.

 

[zachd [MSFT]]

Media Player is just poorly written and very klunky. For example, just
today I was messing around and downloaded a few videos off the web for
kicks. One was 486 MB .VOB with a standard MPEG-2 video stream and a
AC3 audio steam. It started up in Media Player which said it was 26
seconds in length.

What is the bitrate specified in the sequence header? filesize / ( bitrate
bytes/sec ) =~ duration.

Sounds like you have a bogus/badly encoded file... ?

The point being I'm sick and tired of Windows version after version
coming out with the world's most crappy media player.

And given specifics, maybe I can help push improvements in specific areas.

This is odd, since I have over a dozen other players, rarely do any of
them stumble with them all easily playing nearly every file type I
throw at them while Media Player just keeps stumbling. Makes no sense
that Microsoft can't get it's act together considering Windows has
more or less had the ability to play multimedia files for oh about 20
years and still can't get the job done right much of the time.

Correspondingly, it's not like a lot of the rules for video playback have
changed much. As far as I'm aware, the above duration math hasn't changed
much / ever, and typically has been reviewed and rereviewed and the given
implementation has usually stood the test of time. You *could* do alternate
implementations, and that's every vendor's right. But the way that Windows
Media/DirectShow/VfW works shouldn't be a surprise to anyone at this point.

-Zach

 

[Adam Albright]

What is the bitrate specified in the sequence header? filesize / ( bitrate
bytes/sec ) =~ duration.

Sounds like you have a bogus/badly encoded file... ?

Weren't you the guy that just went to lengths to tell us Media Player
is designed NOT to play such files? You want it both ways. You asked
for an example in the video group, how Media Player messes up, now I
give you one here, and you can't explain why on one hand you say Media
Player shouldn't play a "corrupted" file, (not Microsoft's way) then
given an example where something obviously had to be corrupt in the
header causing Media Player's scrubber to stop at 26 seconds, yet it
continued to play the video for more than nine minutes longer totally
ignoring whatever the problem was that caused the scrubber to stop at
26 seconds.

The reality is having used Media Player for well over a decade there
is no rhyme or reason HOW Media Player will play any given file. It's
a total crap shoot which again points to very sloppy haphazard
programming.

And given specifics, maybe I can help push improvements in specific areas.


Correspondingly, it's not like a lot of the rules for video playback have
changed much. As far as I'm aware, the above duration math hasn't changed
much / ever, and typically has been reviewed and rereviewed and the given
implementation has usually stood the test of time. You *could* do alternate
implementations, and that's every vendor's right. But the way that Windows
Media/DirectShow/VfW works shouldn't be a surprise to anyone at this point.

-Zach

Just more of the same tired excuses. That's the Microsoft way. First
deny there is a problem. Confronted with facts then say oh, we always
did it that way. When shown other applications don't suffer the same
annoying problems you then say that isn't Microsoft's way.

I seen nothing but endless flimflam. The FACT you can't run away from
is Media Player is out performed by nearly any other video player you
can download, most of these totally free. The question I keep coming
back to is why is that? Very simple question, why can't Microsoft
after twenty plus years of trying deliver a media player that doesn't
constantly choke, sputter, stop, hang, pause, skip or just flat out
refuse to play many files other players NEVER have any trouble with.

Could ask the same kind of question about Windows Explorer. As a shell
it is out performed by just about everything else, and now in Vista
something as simple and basic as file copying/moving, even deleting is
often far slower than it was under XP. Why is that?

 

[zachd [MSFT]]

Weren't you the guy that just went to lengths to tell us Media Player
is designed NOT to play such files?

It was a question, actually: what is the bitrate specified?

There's a variety of levels of corruption, from metadata errors to
truncation to etc. If you're going to lump everything into one bucket, it's
not a rational discussion. =)

The reality is having used Media Player for well over a decade there
is no rhyme or reason HOW Media Player will play any given file. It's
a total crap shoot which again points to very sloppy haphazard
programming.

It's deterministic.

You gave a first example of some level of corrupt datastream (which requires
interpretation by the codec, which was visibly according to your own results
choking on that) and then switched over to a file properties corruption /
incorrect setting. Apples to oranges.

I could certainly teach an entire summer course on file corruption and
reaction to such simply within the multimedia sphere. If you're going to
pigeon-hole the entire arena, you do yourself a disservice.

Just more of the same tired excuses.

I have no desire to do anything than: to help you and others add value to
the Windows experience. I'm not particularly interested in defending
anyone, and it's against my moral standards to be a cheerleader for anyone.
I gave a long speech today about the early magnificence of RealPlayer.
*shrug*

The above commentary supplied in this thread is generally deterministic and
provable. It's really hard to argue with factually based commentary.

I seen nothing but endless flimflam. The FACT you can't run away from
is Media Player is out performed by nearly any other video player you
can download, most of these totally free.

That's a question that generally has no value as regards improving the
Windows experience. I have no desire to Convert people. My sole and only
interest is in Making Things Work, regardless of player. I've helped work
on other players too (probably ones you've used) in order to make those work
better and will continue to do that.

The question I keep coming back to is why is that?

Quality and the merits of implementation are discussions I would have over
nachos with a friend. If you're ever in the Pacific Northwest, you're
welcome to talk my ear off. Otherwise, my interest in the newsgroups is
solely in problem-solving. If you're genuinely interested in problem
analysis, I'll try to be here, but I find it disinteresting to bait and
switch between topics and concerns.

So, respectfully, if you want to cherry-pick specific concerns and try to
help further those, it seems like you might have the ear of a great guy to
talk to. If you're just interested in generally grousing, I think you do
yourself a disservice, and I'm never going to engage more than cursorily
since I already have eleventy thousand things to do with my time. =)

With full respect,
-Z

 

[Adam Albright]

It was a question, actually: what is the bitrate specified?

No longer know, since I converted the original file and no longer have
it.

There's a variety of levels of corruption, from metadata errors to
truncation to etc. If you're going to lump everything into one bucket, it's
not a rational discussion. =)

Nice cop out. Regardless what type of error you can't have your cake
and eat it to. You made a big deal over how "careful" Media Player is
suppose to be, ie it won't work with a corrupted file, so you told us,
unlike other players, then when confronted with one such file it just
went ahead anyway which sort of proves what you say was incorrect.

It's deterministic.

OK fine, based on the information I gave you, what have you determined
happened? Aside from your flowerily response that is actually empty
anything useful or factual, you haven't added a thing.

You gave a first example of some level of corrupt datastream (which requires
interpretation by the codec, which was visibly according to your own results
choking on that) and then switched over to a file properties corruption /
incorrect setting. Apples to oranges.

I could certainly teach an entire summer course on file corruption and
reaction to such simply within the multimedia sphere. If you're going to
pigeon-hole the entire arena, you do yourself a disservice.

LOL! More double talk. Just say you don't know why Media Player does
what it does and be done with it. That would be more honest.

I have no desire to do anything than: to help you and others add value to
the Windows experience. I'm not particularly interested in defending
anyone, and it's against my moral standards to be a cheerleader for anyone.
I gave a long speech today about the early magnificence of RealPlayer.
*shrug*

Now you're changing the topic... we're not discussing RealPlayer.
Remember... the topic was Media Player screwing up.

The above commentary supplied in this thread is generally deterministic and
provable. It's really hard to argue with factually based commentary.

Come on... I gave you chapter and verse for a specific case and you
still haven't provided a shred of "help" in any respect as to why
Media Player did what it did.

That's a question that generally has no value as regards improving the
Windows experience.

More double talk. Can you or can't explain WHY Media Player reacted to
the situation I detailed in the way it did?

I have no desire to Convert people. My sole and only
interest is in Making Things Work, regardless of player. I've helped work
on other players too (probably ones you've used) in order to make those work
better and will continue to do that.


Quality and the merits of implementation are discussions I would have over
nachos with a friend. If you're ever in the Pacific Northwest, you're
welcome to talk my ear off. Otherwise, my interest in the newsgroups is
solely in problem-solving

So solve the problem I gave you specifics on. Restated simply, you
said Media Player stops if it thinks it is working on a corrupted
file. I demonstrated that isn't always true in how it played the whole
file after freezing it's scrub bar at 26 seconds.

If you're genuinely interested in problem
analysis, I'll try to be here, but I find it disinteresting to bait and
switch between topics and concerns.

Funny, since you're the one trying to bait and switch dragging in
RealPlayer.

More of the same tired BS. You simply don't know. OK fine, just say so.

So, respectfully, if you want to cherry-pick specific concerns and try to
help further those, it seems like you might have the ear of a great guy to
talk to.

You just asked for specifics, I gave them to you, now you try to play
the cherry picking card. There is simply no discussion between us, you
just want to pontificate.

If you're just interested in generally grousing, I think you do
yourself a disservice, and I'm never going to engage more than cursorily
since I already have eleventy thousand things to do with my time. =)

Your surrender to my superior knowledge on the topic is duly noted. I
think you confirmed why Microsoft is seen by most as such a arrogant
company. You simply won't listen and just keep trying to pontificate a
narrow view.

 

[zachd [MSFT]]

No longer know, since I converted the original file and no longer have
it.

I can't help you or engage with you if you destroy the repro files. =)

You made a big deal over how "careful" Media Player is
suppose to be, ie it won't work with a corrupted file, so you told us,
unlike other players, then when confronted with one such file it just
went ahead anyway which sort of proves what you say was incorrect.

You went from AVI frame (?) corruption to an MPEG property field being set
improperly. Apples to oranges.

Don't worry about proving me wrong: I'm always wrong and don't know
anything. I have nothing to prove. No offense. I don't care in the
slightest about "defending" product behavior. Understanding it sure, fixing
it where possible/interesting, absolutely.

OK fine, based on the information I gave you, what have you determined
happened? Aside from your flowerily response that is actually empty
anything useful or factual, you haven't added a thing.

Yeah, the duration math was given previously.

If you're asking for a global assessment of how WMP deals with any sort of
corruption of media files, I'm bored. If you want to contract Microsoft for
me to do that job for you, contact them and see if they do that. I'm not
interested in doing generic assessments of vast fields for you. That's
something you should be able to do fine on your own. =)

Come on... I gave you chapter and verse for a specific case and you
still haven't provided a shred of "help" in any respect as to why
Media Player did what it did.

You say you destroyed the sample. Regardless, this visibly seems how WMP
(DirectShow) always deals with MPEG with incorrectly set duration
properties. Given my theory, it should be child's play for you to test that
out if you actually care.

So if that really was your question, you should now know what caused it and
how to fix it. =)

So solve the problem I gave you specifics on. Restated simply, you
said Media Player stops if it thinks it is working on a corrupted
file.

We talked about an AVI file, you shifted to MPEG files. Apples to oranges.

And no, I wouldn't resummarize like that. It's too big of a field to
pigeon-hole. Again, this isn't a quick discussion and could not possibly be
dismissed as such.

If you want to add value, I can potentially help with that. That's about
it.

Cheers,
-Z

 

[Adam Albright]

I can't help you or engage with you if you destroy the repro files. =)

I didn't ask for your help, I asked you to explain Media Player's odd
behavior. If you can't, just say you can't instead of coming up with
all these silly excuses in some effort to try to save face.

You went from AVI frame (?) corruption to an MPEG property field being set
improperly. Apples to oranges.

You keep dodging the issue. If you invested half as much time in
trying to find out WHY Media Player screws up instead of spending most
of your time defending all the lame things it does we may be able to
lurch forward a bit.

Don't worry about proving me wrong: I'm always wrong and don't know
anything. I have nothing to prove. No offense. I don't care in the
slightest about "defending" product behavior. Understanding it sure, fixing
it where possible/interesting, absolutely.

OK fine then, another chance for you at the same question. Explain WHY
Media Player said the file was only 26 seconds in length, but kept
playing for over 9 minutes. Remember you're the guy that claimed Media
Player flat out refuses to play a "broken" file and is designed to
stop because you claim further Microsoft is so fussy and has
standards. Facts suggest otherwise. I'm simply asking.

Yeah, the duration math was given previously.

That's just another excuse. If Media Player was using some duration
math you haven't explained why if it determined the file to be just 26
seconds in length it somehow still managed to play it for over 9
minutes after the scrubber bar reached it's maximum right position and
just stopped, yet the video played on and on.

If you're asking for a global assessment of how WMP deals with any sort of
corruption of media files, I'm bored.

You mean you got painted into a corner again and don't have any
answer. That's fine, just say so instead of throwing out all the same
lame excuses like you did the last time we had a conversation which
ended in your usual ploys, you claim you're bored, can't comment,
because that's against Microsoft policy or finally you just plonk
people that ask you questions Microsoft employees rather not address
because the answers may get a bit too embarrassing regarding how
poorly some Microsoft software is designed.

If you want to contract Microsoft for
me to do that job for you, contact them and see if they do that. I'm not
interested in doing generic assessments of vast fields for you. That's
something you should be able to do fine on your own. =)

Again with the excuses.

You say you destroyed the sample.

Would you keep a file as-is when Media Player's scrubber only controls
less than 2% of the file's length? I did what you'd expect, fixed the
problem. The question always comes back to WHY should I have had to?

Regardless, this visibly seems how WMP
(DirectShow) always deals with MPEG with incorrectly set duration
properties. Given my theory, it should be child's play for you to test that
out if you actually care.

So if that really was your question, you should now know what caused it and
how to fix it. =)

Damn you're so dense. Nobody asked you to "fix" the problem. I'm more
than capable of fixing such problems. The question remains why is
Media Player so poorly written that it constantly malfunctions? You
never answer that do you, or even more laughable you try to justify
the manfunction as a "feature". Priceless!

We talked about an AVI file, you shifted to MPEG files. Apples to oranges.

No, the conversation started with AVI, you asked for an example, I
gave you one concerning a VOB file which you should know has a MPEG
video stream. I'm beginning to think the real problem is way too many
Microsoft software engineer at the core have a very limited
understanding of video file structure, hence, Media Player stumbles
constantly for no good reason.

And no, I wouldn't resummarize like that. It's too big of a field to
pigeon-hole. Again, this isn't a quick discussion and could not possibly be
dismissed as such.

If you want to add value, I can potentially help with that. That's about
it.

Yep, that is about it. You managed to spew your typical circular
reasoning, offered up the same lame excuses and now you're about to
run from the thread. Same things you did last time we had a chat in
the video newsgroups. LOL!