WMP11 stops playing files that played fine in wmp10

I had some MP3 files > Converted them to WMA VBR using Plus! Audio Converter
> Resulting files played fine in WMP 10 > Strange characteristic is that when
I mouse over the file in windows explorer they have a crazy 8123kbps or some
other such odd bit rate but when I look at it in Media Library > right click
> properties > 102kbps or some other plausible number in the 80 - 160kbps
range.

Now those files don't play in WMP11. The codec is Windows Media Audio 9.1
VBR Quality 50, 44 kHz, stereo 1-pass VBR. Some files have nothing in the
codec space.

Any idea what is going on? Please ask questions if you need more details.

Could you provide an URL to a sample broken file? That would be pretty
helpful... =\

-Zach
--
Windows Media Development Team (speaking for myself only)
See http://zachd.com/pss/pss.html for some helpful WMP info.
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
Now Playing: "Fiesta Forever" by "Abraham Bandwagon" in WMP11.
--

"Mangal Singh" <MangalSingh@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:E6C1E9EC-41A1-4E23-A8A2-05CE03C68F70@microsoft.com...
>I had some MP3 files > Converted them to WMA VBR using Plus! Audio
>Converter
>> Resulting files played fine in WMP 10 > Strange characteristic is that
>> when
> I mouse over the file in windows explorer they have a crazy 8123kbps or
> some
> other such odd bit rate but when I look at it in Media Library > right
> click
>> properties > 102kbps or some other plausible number in the 80 - 160kbps
> range.
>
> Now those files don't play in WMP11. The codec is Windows Media Audio 9.1
> VBR Quality 50, 44 kHz, stereo 1-pass VBR. Some files have nothing in the
> codec space.
>
> Any idea what is going on? Please ask questions if you need more details.

http://users.altec.org/~msingh/music/

Here are 3 example files. Let me know when you have downloaded them so that
I can take them offline.

Thank you, you can pull them now.

I did not encounter any playback errors on my machine running the current
builds of Vista and Polaris. Do they work on a friend's/anyone else's
machine with WMP11... ?

I see the "8mbps" setting when looking at the files in an ASF (WMA)
inspection tool - that appears to be an artifact of file creation(?)

I'm amused that I've got ~65 Moby albums (504 songs) and one of your sample
clips was a remix of his that I hadn't heard. =)

I should have mentioned this earlier but I'm running WinXP Pro SP2 IE7(latest
build). I have .NET 1.1 and 2.0 (if that is of any relevance). This symptom
has occured on two machines. My Dell Laptop and my Optiplex work machine.

When I say it doesn't play I mean that the file starts to progress in the
seek bar for 5 seconds and then stops and moves to the next track. There is
no audio for this 5 seconds. Although I did use one of the tools prescribed
in the codecs help page to see if there was a missing codec. That tool said
that rendering was okay according to directdraw or something.

I hope I have given you enough helpful information. And oh btw I have just
around 12 Moby remixes that I got from my roommate. I guess those are the
ones you don't have :)

Hm - I tried this again (see sig) on my home computer and it again worked
fine.

Do both machines have IE7... ? I would be curious if this happens for
anybody *not* running IE7... I wouldn't think IE would interfere here, but
that's the chief difference right now between my machine and yours.

How old is your Dell? Dell shipped various buggy sound card drivers at one
point, so you may want to check your sound card manufacturer from an
update - that fixed my Dell last year after I bought it. =\

Does dxdiag.exe report any errors... ?

Yes both my machines have the same software configuration but the hardware is
different. The home Dell Inspiron 8200 is over 3 years old but dxdiag gave no
errors. The office Optiplex GX280 is less than a year old. Some more
information -

In 2004 I converted my entire media library using the Plus! audio converter
to WMA to save space. Those files play fine. The problem occurs with the
files that I have converted in the last one year using the Plus! audio
converter after Plus! was updated. The 8mbps bitrate is a result of that
conversion. The older files were all constant bit rate. The newer conversion
was from fixed mp3 to WMA variable bit rate. I do that because I have come to
realize through experience that VBR is just a more optimal way to encode your
music. The files that I ripped directly from a CD using WMA VBR also play
fine. And yes I tried uninstalling WMP11 and IE7 from my Optiplex and then
reinstalled WMP11 to get the same result. So it happens with IE6 also. I
think there is something special in the file format itself.

Thanks for following up on this problem for so long.

Mangal

"zachd [MSFT]" wrote:

>
> Hm - I tried this again (see sig) on my home computer and it again worked
> fine.
>
> Do both machines have IE7... ? I would be curious if this happens for
> anybody *not* running IE7... I wouldn't think IE would interfere here, but
> that's the chief difference right now between my machine and yours.
>
> How old is your Dell? Dell shipped various buggy sound card drivers at one
> point, so you may want to check your sound card manufacturer from an
> update - that fixed my Dell last year after I bought it. =\
>
> Does dxdiag.exe report any errors... ?
>
> -Zach
> --
> Windows Media Development Team (speaking for myself only)
> See http://zachd.com/pss/pss.html for some helpful WMP info.
> This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
> Now Playing: "Moby - Bittersweet Symphony (new Remix) - for Mangal in
> wmplayer" in WMP11.
>

I am having the exact same problem - songs I converted to WMA variable bit
rate using Plus audio converter won't play in WMP11. I also noticed when
right clicking on a song and choosing properties in the library that the
Audio Codec is not listed.

That's very interesting. Could both of you open WMP's Help:About menu, then
select "Technical Support Information", and then paste or other make
available the HTML/list you get there? I'm curious if you have something
loaded here that is stepping in the way of WMP working properly.

Here is what I did, and it worked, no clue why though...
1) delete all media library entries, not the actual files.
2) select "file" - "add to library"
3) make sure the 2 selections "add files previously deleted..." AND "add
volume leveling values..." are checked.
4) sit back and relax cause it takes FOREVER to search and add, but now,
they all play just fine.