AVI files won't play in anything

[3do]

I've been trying to play some AVI files that up untill today have worked fine. The problem is not matter how many different AVI files i try and how many different media players i try playing them in i always get the same erro rmessage as below. Most other file type like mpg and mkv all still work its just AVI's that have problems.
http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p83/killinglonelinesshim/AVIerror.jpg

Cheers

[alphagamer]

do you have a codec pack installed? try re-installing it.

[3do]

i've got as many codecs as i need installed and i did have the files working yesterday and the only thing i've done since then is install Visual Basic express, C# express and XNA.

FLV's do the same as the AVI's but everything else works just fine in all my media players.

[Alchy]

Instead of using windows media player, try VLC.

[3do]

tried VLC, Media player classic with the k-lite codec pack, real player quicktime and all give me this error.

Just trying to get updated VLC and see what that does.

[Alchy]

If your players are that varied it's hard to imagine what could be causing the problem. Try uninstalling your codec pack... hard to see how that would affect VLC though, it deals with codecs internally. There might be some DirectShow filter that is screwing everything up, but I'm getting a bit out of my depth here.

I guess the next step is to uninstall each of those SDKs one by one and see if it makes a difference. If that doesn't work, you could try running system restore to yesterday, provided you haven't disabled it.

[Taemos]

If you wanted to be thorough you could run a RAM test. I've seen weird problems like that caused by bad memory. That's not to say that I think that's what it is though.. because I have no idea. :p

[SilverBull]

If you wanted to be thorough you could run a RAM test. I've seen weird problems like that caused by bad memory. That's not to say that I think that's what it is though.. because I have no idea. :p Not that unlikely as you think. Granted, I had memory errors on multiple boards, but crashes due to them were never reproducible like what 3do described; however, if there was a memory fault, its better fix it sooner than later. After all, it could explain what's happening, depending on which memory location is affected.


If your players are that varied it's hard to imagine what could be causing the problem. Try uninstalling your codec pack... hard to see how that would affect VLC though, it deals with codecs internally. There might be some DirectShow filter that is screwing everything up, but I'm getting a bit out of my depth here. +1. Check any recently installed codecs, codec packs (I've never used them, because I always read how unreliable they are :evil:), players (as they generally install their own codecs, which then get used by other applications, too :banghead:) and drivers in general. Did you recently update your graphics/sound card or some drivers? What about automatic MS/Windows updates?
If you want to check for bad DirectShow filters, try running graphedt (or ksstudio), which should both be available in the latest MS Platform SDK. You shouldn't need to install the complete SDK, though; just try to download it, then extract the necessary files. You can find some additional information on these programs here (including the names of required DLLs): http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa906848.aspx

In GraphEdt, use File\Render Media File to let the system create a DirectShow pipeline, the use Graph\Play to display the file. If you can reproduce the crash this way, you could then try to change individual parts of the pipeline until you find the faulty filter (I vote that its either the video or audio decoder).

[3do]

cheers for the suggestions, still got the same error.

The only thing i've done within the last few weeks was install XNA, Visual basic express and c# express and that was only on tuesday.

*Edit* installed the lastest VLC and it plays them fine so now will try and unistall/re-install everything else to see if i can get it working in players other than VLC