I have resisted as long as I could but finally installed Windows Media Player 9 on my system. Now, I am at
least able to liten to audio sample on music sites such as www.puretracks.com.

I am still using WMP 6.4 as my default video player, so I have it associated with most video file types, including .mpg .asf .wmv

In the past, when I clicked on a video file with one of these extensions on a web site, the player window opened imediately and after a few seconds of buffering, the clip started playing. This allowed me to get a quick glimpse before deciding to proceed or stop.

Since I installed WMP 9, however, this behavior has changed. The player window will not open and the clip will not start playing before the whole clip has been downloaded. I have thus lost the quick preview capability. No amount of toying with options either in WMP 6.4 or WMP 9 seems able to change that.

When I try to make WMP 9 the default player and click on the same file, I get the message that WMP 9 can't find the file. and then, I can't even download it through IE or a download manager (Flashget)

A sample file can be found here:

http://www.pocketmovies.net/detail_294.html

Click the Download button, then click the picture on the next page to start the download. What happens in your case?

Is there a way to have the movie start playing without having to wait for a complete download? This behavior does not seem normal to me especially with .asf and .wmv files that are streamable by definition.

I should also add that when the video is "imbedded" in the web site through a javascript window (not downloadable, only streamable), I do not have this problem. There is a few seconds of buffering and then the video starts playing.

Thanks for any suggestions.