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Windows Media Player asks for lower resolution
Whenever I put a DVD in the drive and click on it to run it WMP says
Windows Media Player cannot play DVD video. You might need to adjust your Windows display settings. Open display settings in Control Panel, and then try lowering your screen resolution and color quality settings.
Well, lowering it to 16 bit 800x600 and 256 colours (the lowest possible) does nothing, you still get the same error.
Microsoft Web Help advises updating the video driver, an Intel one, so I did, from Dells site. Still the same.
Others symptoms (although not necessarily related)
* Cant Autoplay/run anything CD, DVD, Data, Photos, Apps
I can play a DVD in any number of other apps so its not the codecs
I have another (not Dell) laptop with identical software that just plays a DVD in WMP when you stick it in, why cant the Dell do this?
System
Dell Inspiron 1520
1Gb Ram
Vista Home Basic
ians1
3 Posts
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April 6th, 2008 03:00
About Windows Media Player reveals
Version 11.0.6001.7000
How can this be a display issue when I can play DVDs in other apps like VLC media player and Divx player?
ian
Balaji Ramanath
1.8K Posts
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April 6th, 2008 03:00
bacillus
14.4K Posts
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April 6th, 2008 08:00
go to the run box and type in dxdiag then look under display. are all the accelerations enabled?
ians1
3 Posts
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April 6th, 2008 11:00
I checked the accelerators like you said and there are 3 enabled
Directdraw
Direct3D
AGP Texture
I tried uninstalling Media Direct 3.3 which was one of the things I updated (amongst many others) and that did nothing so I reinstalled it.
The problem was eventually resolved by removing the DVD decoder software (which Microsofts website says may be a problem) and installing another DVD decoder from a different manufacturer.
I can say the Sonic Cineplayer DVD decoder is NOT compatible with the Mobile Intel 965 Chipset display adapter. The Cyberlink DVD decoder IS compatible but I still had to download it from Cyberlink because Dell do not appear to provide it as a download and its not in the Media Direct 3.3 install either or it did not install on this system.
So, that just leaves the Autoplay non functioning but that seems to be an ongoing problem with more than just this particular Dell, it seems to point to a BIOS problem and Dell dont seem to be saying much about it. And yes. I even updated the BIOS even though it said it was up to date and the DVD drive firmware as well just for good measure!
It should be noted that Media Direct was never working on this system out of the box, it was only in the course of looking at the WMP stuff I noticed people were saying "what about your Media Direct?" and I tried using it and had to reinstall it. In reading Dells write up they say you needed to create a partition to install it (which would have meant wiping Vista) but I found that by installing a utility called Acronis Disk Director I could create/alter partitions as required WITHOUT removing Vista. There WAS a Mediadirect partition but it was only about 350Mb, Dell said it should be 2Gb minimum, so I increased it to that.
I now have Media Direct working (plus numerous 3rd party DVD players downloaded in the course of troubleshooting) AND WMP 11 and a list of codecs as long as your arm!
It has been quite educational, but I could have done without having to fork out nearly £20 for software thats supposed to come bundled with the laptop.
ian