VMD-L Mailing List

From: Jerry Ebalunode (jebalunode_at_uh.edu)
Date: Tue Jul 12 2005 - 18:33:19 CDT

Hi Brian,
Ah, here is the forum page that provided the technical explanation of the
problem and how to fix it
url-->
http://www.talkroot.com/tech/index.php/t-53324_MPEG_Video_does_not_play_--_advanced.html

forum page title :MPEG Video does not play -- advanced

lifted answer from Bob

" This may or may not be your problem.. but it's worth knowing and/or
checking.

If you have an MPEG1 file that is crashing or otherwise acting funny,
particularly in mplay32, it could be the Main Concept MPEG splitter/decoder
causing the problem. There are various versions of these decoers floating
around, with various bugs.. and the unfortunate part is that tons of 3rd
party companies ship these with their own products (Sonic Foundry, Adobe,
Sorenson, Discreet....) to do MPEG decoding/encoding.

Unfortunately my experience with the Main Concept decoders is that they are
crap and cause all sorts of interesting problems that manifest themselves in
unusual ways, depending on the system. Streaming an MPEG-1 off the web for
instance can cause Media Player to crash (which was my problem) while
playing them off disk works OK. Tonight at work one of our machines was
able to play MPEG-1 files but when you tried to seek to a new position in
Media Player, it would crash.. this after installing the Sorenson 'Squeeze'
demo which came with a particular broken version of the Main Concept codecs.
Another problem on another machine was that mplay32 would crash upon opening
an MPEG-1; PowerPoint would also die... All caused by the Main Concept
decoders, this time from an Cleaner XL install.

If this sounds like you, try the following:

Do a search on your C: drive or anywhere else you have installed
applications for a few files:

mcmpgdec.dll
mcspmpeg.ax
mcdsmpeg.ax

You might find one or more copies of them depending on what applications you
have installed; As I mentioned, lots of 3rd party products come with them
(Sonic Foundry's Vegas, Discreet's Cleaner XL....) so you'll likely not just
find them in your Windows system directory, if you find them there at all.
Sometimes they are used directly by the app, but sometimes they are
registered (somewhere/somehow) into the system and will get used even just
by Media Player while playing an MPEG 1 or 2 file.

Anyway, quit all your apps, and try renaming the files (shove a - or _
before them) and then try your MPEG again and see if it works any better.
Another way to tell if your system is using these stupid decoders is to run
"mplayer2", open your MPEG-1, select File->Properties, and flip to the
Advanced tab and see if any of the Main Concept decoders or "splitter"s
appear in the list. (By the way, what genius at Microsoft decided to take
out all of this and other useful functionality/information in WMP9?)

The only caveat is that in the case of MPEG-2 files, if that is the only
decoder you have installed, then you will no longer be able to play MPEG-2
files at all since Windows doesn't come with any MPEG-2 decoder of it's
own... but it should be able to play MPEG-1 files without any 3rd-party
decoders.

Good luck."

On Tuesday 12 July 2005 05:36 pm, you wrote:
> Hello,
>
> Has anyone recently made mpg movies on linux boxes and then inserted them
> successfully into a powerpoint presentation?
>
> Up until last year this wasn't a problem, now powerpoint complains that
> the file is corrupted or that quicktime isn't install correctly.
>
> However, I can play the mpg movie with quicktime outside of office just
> fine.
>
> Ideas??
>
> Brian
>
>
> ************************************************
> Brian Bennion, Ph.D.
> Bioscience Directorate
> Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
> P.O. Box 808, L-448 bennion1_at_llnl.gov
> 7000 East Avenue phone: (925) 422-5722
> Livermore, CA 94550 fax: (925) 424-6605
> ************************************************ 

-- 
Jerry Ebalunode
Ph.D. Candidate
RM 402F Houston Science Center
Phone: 713-743-8367
Dept. of Biology and Biochemistry
University of Houston
4800 Calhoun Road
Houston, TX 77204
"No trees were killed in the posting of this message. However a large number 
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Marcos Topete