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List:       ms-wmtalk
Subject:    Re: WMV9 FAQ resources
From:       Kon Wilms <kon () DATACAST ! BIZ>
Date:       2005-08-23 20:31:06
Message-ID: 1124829066.22361.164.camel () localhost ! localdomain
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On Tue, 2005-08-23 at 12:43 -0700, Paul Clark wrote:
> The complaints range from "weird psychedelic patterns that shift  
> around" to "stops playing after a few seconds and no buffering message".

Ahh the joy that is directshow and filter merits (or missing filters)
(or combinations of all of the above). Install a new decoder or demux
filter and you can easily mess up your decoder chain. From your
description it sounds like a foreign demuxer has inserted itself into
the decoder chain. 

I had the same problem with the outdated and lame Microsoft 'Quicktime'
decoder trying to demux MP4 files (which it can't do). Result: graph
breaks, and when it does decode it decodes junk.

> Although my suggestions of re-installing WMV player and checking the  
> network connection may seem no-brainer, I'm wondering if they are the  
> best suggestions.

I ended up writing my own media player for one of our applications. The
only solution to ensure that every client could decode the video was to
include the directshow demux and decoder filters with the installation,
check and register them manually on application startup, build the
filtergraph manually, and provide a mechanism to automatically submit
decoder reports via the web so further issues could be troubleshooted.
Incidentally the content is MP4 transports, the decoders are all open
source (mp4 demuxer, ffdshow, etc.), but the same principle applies.

Unfortunately Media player doesn't really provide any of this
functionality, so when things don't work you're stuck. 

Cheers
Kon

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