some wmv clips show up in psychedelic colors

I've received a couple of wmv clips recently in which the audio works just fine, but the visual component displays as a psychedelic pop art movie, for lack of a better description. I've tried opening the files with both Windows Media Player (9 series) and IrfanView, and the result is the same. The people who sent me the files say that on their computers the clips appear normally.
I have other wmv clips on my computer that work fine, so it's not a problem with that particular extension.
Any idea what might be going on?

 

Hmmmm. Saw this after I'd replied to your NTVDM issue with worldwind. I gotta wonder if you have video problems with your card (very possible) or monitor (less likely).

Do you have a built-in video or is it on a seperate card? You may need to case off to be sure.

If seperate card, try removing it, cleaning the contacts (the little golden 'fingers' with a pencil eraser, and firmly reseating the card.

Download the latest drivers for the video then replace the existing ones even if the versions are the same.

 

Hi Newt!
I assume it's built-in video, as this computer came to me as is straight from Dell. Seeing you mention the drivers has made me wonder... When I called Dell for help with re-installing my drivers (I had partitioned my hard drive and reinstalled Windows as soon as I got the computer), most of the drivers were pretty straightforward, i.e., there was only once choice listed for audio, controller, and network drivers. Under video drivers, however, there were 8 choices, and the tech support guy didn't seem real sure which to tell me to use. He/we settled on one, but in light of what's going on, maybe it wasn't the right one?

On my Dell Resource CD, the choices for Video Drivers are as follows:
ATI 128MB PCI-Express x16 (DVI/VGA/TV-out) Radeon X300 SE Rev: A01
ATI ATI RADEON X600 256MB HYPERMEMORY Rev: A00
ATI Hyper Memory PCI-Express X16 (DVI/VGA/TV out) Radeon X300 SE Rev: A01 [this is the one the Dell guy had me install]
ATI TVT1 EHome Wonder Rev:A02
ATI TVT2-DT TV Wonder Elite Rev: A04
Emuzed TVT3 Dual TV Tuner Rev: A03
Intel 945G Graphics Controller Rev: A00
nVidia 256MB PCI Express x16 GeForce 6800 Rev: A01

There's also a list of Video Diagnostics available on the Dell Resource CD:
ATI 128MB PCI-Express x16 (DVI/VGA/TV-out) Radeon X300 SE Rev:A00
ATI ATI RADEON X600 256MB HYPERMEMORY Rev: A00
ATI Hyper Memory PCI-Express X16 (DVI/VGA/TV out) Radeon X300 SE Rev: A00
ATI TVT1 EHome Wonder Rev: A00
ATI TVT2-DT TV Wonder Elite Rev: A00
nVidia 256MB PCI Express x16 GeForce 6800 Rev: A00

When I run Everest Home Edition, under PCI devices, I see:
ATI Radeon X300 (RV370) - Secondary Video Adapter
ATI Radeon X300 (RV370) Video Adapter

Nothing with any "Radeon hyper memory" (which was the driver I installed) - on the other hand, under the choices for Video Drivers on the Dell Resource CD, I don't see any mention of any "plain ol'" Radeon X300 (on the CD, both X300s are followed by "SE ")...
So how can I tell which driver should be installed on my computer? Why wouldn't Dell have been able to tell me that? Should I try calling them again?
I'll wait for some feedback on this before trying the fix in the link you suggested to me in my other post.
Thanks for your help!

 

Hmmmm. With the disclaimer that HARDWARE AIN'T MY THING I'd guess that the listing showing a PCI device would mean you had a card in a PCI slot that could be removed. Maybe.

What specific Dell model do you have? The specs on it should show if they did the lower-cost pain-in-the-hindparts thing of incorporating too much stuff into the motherboard.

Of course you could always take off the cover and see if the video cable plugs into a card or into a part of the motherboard.

As to the driver you should be using and the hypermemory question, ???? Your guess is at least as good as mine. Lucky thing we got experts on here.

 

My Dell is a Dimension 5100 - I just dug out my invoice, and it shows an entry for a "128MB ATI Hyper Memory PCI-Express X16 (DVI/VGA/TV out) Radeon X300 SE "
So it looks like the video is on a separate card (and I do have the right driver installed). When I have a little more time, I'll take the case off and try following your initial instructions here.
[I still don't understand why the off-colors only happen for SOME clips, though...]

 

Rebecca, go into your graphics properties (right click on desktop and Properties>Settings>Advanced) on the Adaptor tab you will see your hardware details, probably listed simply as a Radeon X300 Series. http://www.ati.com/products/radeonx300/radeonx300series/index.html

On the Troubleshoot tab try moving the slider to the left to reduce hardware acceleration, then try playing your .wma files again. If that does not cure the problem then open the DirectX Diagnostic Tool (type dxdiag.exe in the run box) and on the Display tab try disabling the acceleration features. This should almost certainly let you play your files. You can re-enable the features afterwards.

Just thought, if you reinstalled XP then perhaps you did not also reinstall the ATI control panel, so your tabs in the properties box will be different to what I described. You will only have the simple Windows panel, but you should still find the hardware acceleration slider.

For a more permanent solution you need to check you have the latest codecs installed.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/9series/codecs/video.aspx
Perhaps update your version of DirectX
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/directx/default.aspx
And if needed update your X300 drivers with the latest from ATI
http://www.ati.com/products/catalyst/index.html

All ATI Radeon drivers come in a single package called "˜Catalyst’ during the install it will detect your card and use the correct drivers for your hardware. The latest Catalyst version is 5.10

The only thing I’m not sure about is if there is a separate version for onboard graphics. You will need to find out if you have onboard or a separate graphics card and then download the relevant catalyst pack.

 

Holy moly, McTavish, you're good! Reducing the hardware acceleration did the trick! There are six little tick marks on the scale - I think the "arrow" was originally on the far right; I moved it to tick mark #3, and both the wmv files that were psychedelic before are now normal! Thanks a million for identifying such a miraculously simple solution for me!
Just out of curiosity: can you tell me why the visual display problem was only have been occurring with some of the clips?
Thank you, thank you, thank you!!! (You too, Newt, although I'm glad I didn't have to resort to taking the case off my computer!)

 

He is good and I am always happy we have folks posting on here who know their way around hardware.

You may have to take the case off before it's all over though. A decent video subsystem (and yours is) on a good PC (and yours is) should be able to run at full hardware acceleration without giving you problems. The fact that reducing yours helped indicates the video components aren't working up to their potential. Heavy-hitter graphics will suffer from being slowed down. Worldwind, for instance, isn't likely to work real well.

More expert comments on this may help but in general, a good 128Mb (that is lots of memory dedicated to video) card should be able to really scream along without any wobbles.

 

LOL……it’s been a long time since a woman told me I was good at anything! That’s cheered me up no end.

I’m no graphics or media files expert Rebecca, just someone who has seen the same problem "“ except it has been with .avi files. My guess would be that your troublesome files are of an updated type. The boffins are always trying to improve the compression of media files so that they are smaller for transferring across the internet. The greater the compression the more processing power required to uncompress and decode and play them. The codecs on you machine are what does all this, so getting the latest fully compatible codecs from Microsoft is the first move. Reducing the hardware acceleration will reduce the quality of some of your graphics, which I don’t know but think allows more resources for the codecs to do their job.

 

I've still got more homework to do on the subject, I know, but this computer came with SP2 included, so shouldn't the video codecs automatically be up-to-date? (http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;899113)
I ran "GSpot Codec Information Appliance ", and found 31 video codecs on my computer. What do I do with that information? Look up the driver file for each one and see if I can find the most recent versions?? Gulp!!!

 

SP2 is well old now, but thinking about it, if you use Windows auto-updates and let Media Player connect to the net then you may already have the latest codecs. No reason however you still can’t download and try to install the latest codec pack. One good thing about these codec packs from Microsoft is that they will inspect your system first and only install new codecs if you don’t already have them.

If it’s not codecs then I’d say check your version of DirectX and get the latest if need be. New codecs are designed to work best with the latest DirectX. The current version is 9.0c

Failing than then it’s the graphics drivers. These as well are written to work best with the latest version of DirectX. It’s like a chain and you need all the links. You may also need the latest version of Media Player.

As I said I’m no expert but just talking form experience of what has worked for me.

 

I went back to the Windows Updates page, and noticed there were 7 optional software updates outstanding (I'd just been clicking on "express" and getting the critical updates until now). I started with Windows Media Player 10 (and that's actually the only one of the 7 I've installed so far), and lo and behold, even with my hardware acceleration set back to max, the formerly psychedelic .wmv files are now okay!
Hopefully, Newt, this gives me another reprieve from having to take the case off!
Won't be able to work on the computer again until tomorrow, but I'm going to install some of the other software updates, and then give WindWorld installation another go (and if that still fails, I'll follow your instructions in that post, Newt).
McTavish - thanks for the repeated mention of the word "latest" version; it made me dig deeper into the Update page!