Audio but no video

[guarro]

Hello there.

Recently my PC has been unable to play any video images. Regardless of whether the clip is using media player, real, quick time or anything else, when the clip plays there is audio but no video.

The strange thing is that the first frame of the clip is always viewable (e.g when trying to play back a video I have recoreded), but as soon as I click ‘play’ the screen goes black. The clip clearly does play, as there is audio.

This is now a real pain, as it means I can’t watch any web footage (BBC news etc.), or do any video editing (I’ve got Canopus Let’s Edit installed).

I've had the problem a few months now, but it's only now become a major issue as I want to start doing some video editing again.

I've tried changing the 'performance' options in WMP to 'some video acceleration', which does now allow some things to play in WMP, but this hasn't helped anything else.

Hope this makes sense. Any ideas what my problem might be? Many thanks.

Dave

[fink]

Hello and welcome to Virtualdr.

It could be a codec problem.. either one or more is missing or corrupted. Have you installed any codec packs?

the two we usually recommend are these..

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/win...cdownload.aspx

and this one.. (standard)

http://www.free-codecs.com/download/...Codec_Pack.htm

Also try checking your DirectX to see if it's working properly..

start/run [type] dxdiag [hit enter]

[guarro]

Thanks fink. I'd already downloaded the full pack from free-codecs.com, and this seems to have solved the WMP problem.

However I still can't play .mpg clips (in Photoshop) nor .avi files (in Let's Edit). I'm not sure what a codec is, but do these formats need special ones?

I've run the DirectX check and that seems fine.

Any other ideas?! Ta.

[fink]

I don't have and am not totally familiar with Photoshop but does it not need a plugin to pay mpegs? If so perhaps that should be reinstalled.

[ProfessorU]

Photoshop does not play mpeg files. Maybe you're thinking of Premiere by Adobe?

[TechZ]

When you installed the full codec pack did you install both the decoder and encoder part? Because if you want to edit these AVI files, you need both. By default not all the encoder/decoder boxes are checked.

[guarro]

Photoshop does not play mpeg files. Maybe you're thinking of Premiere by Adobe?

Hmm. Well it [Photoshop Elements 3.0] imports them from my camera as .mpg, and the first frame appears as a thumbnail in the organiser (with a little 'video' icon in the top right corner of the thumbnail), and when I click the thumbnail a photoshop video player window appears, and there is a (albeit brief) section in the Photopshop help entitled 'To view video clips', so I get the impression that it should play.

There is also a facility in the Photshop Editor to import frames from video. When I try this, again I get the black screen, but it definitely is playing somewhere because if I blindly grab a frame during playback the frame does import (I just don't know what the frame is going to be because I can't see anything while grabbing - does this make sense?).

Also, I did have a minor breakthrough yesterday when it played perfectly, but today it's back to square one - just the same black screen again.

[guarro]

When you installed the full codec pack did you install both the decoder and encoder part? Because if you want to edit these AVI files, you need both. By default not all the encoder/decoder boxes are checked.

Don't know I'm afraid. I just saved them to my PC and then ran when prompted. Is there something else I need to do?

[fink]

right click your desktop, select properties, then settings/advanced/troubleshoot and turn hardware acceleration off.

May help.

[ProfessorU]

Fink's idea seems to work whenever I have video issues. Re photoshop, I had no idea elements supported Mpeg, I stand corrected.

[TechZ]

Don't know I'm afraid. I just saved them to my PC and then ran when prompted. Is there something else I need to do?

You can uninstall the codec pack, and reinstall it with the both encoder/decoder parts installed. OR you can run the setup again, and this time check both encoder/decoder.

[guarro]

right click your desktop, select properties, then settings/advanced/troubleshoot and turn hardware acceleration off.

May help.

Nope - just gives me a grey screen instead of a black screen!

[guarro]

You can uninstall the codec pack, and reinstall it with the both encoder/decoder parts installed. OR you can run the setup again, and this time check both encoder/decoder.

OK, I've now re-installed both packs, and checked practically everything in the k-lite installation. I now have serious audio problems, so I'm going to have to try and uninstall.