media player codecs

why oh why does my windows media player 9 (latest version) still insist on connecting to codec server (i know it does because im always online) yet never succeeds to download codec i always get "error downloading codec" message and then the selected mp3 or mpeg plays with an orange title and a great big orange ! before it.

why dont media player dowload necessary codecs, have tried other players but want to stay with media 9

tools/options are...
automatic updates once a week & download codecs automatically
today i selected, connect to the internet (overrides other commands) is this necessary as media 9 connected beforehand and this option dont seem to make a difference, if this command overrides others i dont want media 9 to select copy protect music, have checked and it dont look as if it has but you never know what windows means when it sez overrides other commands

 

There are a lot of codecs that Microsoft does not support and will not be downloaded.

If you download all the codecs available from MS at once, you'll have those at least and there will be no more codecs available for download from MS, so you may as well turn that off.

http://www.soft32.com/download_2592.html

Then, for a package of codecs that should play just about anything else you find, I suggest ffdshow:

http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/ffdshow/ffdshow-20020617.exe?download

 

verdi--There are many other codec download sites, but the official WMP site is
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/format/codecdownload.aspx

 

Note to Welshjim:

The Soft32 site is linked to many Microsoft pages now. When updating visualizations or skins for WMP9, the MS page redirects to Soft32, so there must be some business relationship there. They appear to be an "official" download site.

 

Abraxas--Thanks for the info.