Decoder trouble

[Theophilus7]

Hi,

I thought there might be a computer whiz somewhere on this forum who may be able to point me in the right direction with this problem:

My computer has suddenly stopped playing DVDs (though it will still
open them and run normal CDs). It seems the decoder is to blame - at least, InterActual says it can't find it.

Error PL4007: InterActual Player is unable to initialize your DVD decoder
for playback. Click "Help Online" (bottom button on the left) for
information that will help you properly configure your system for DVD
playback.

I'm running Windows XP. Not sure what the decoder is, or where it is - the computer came with PowerDVD (so I guess the decoder is somewhere in that package?).

Any ideas?

Cheers.

 

[JordanF]

The decoder decompresses the DVD content, since uncompressed DVD content would be too big to fit on a DVD! You need an MPEG-2 codec.
Try reinstalling InterActual player, but you can also do this to see if you have a codec installed:

Open start > run
Type cmd and press enter
Type 'dvdupgrd /detect' and press enter
This will tell you which (or if any) codec is installed

 

[Theophilus7]

The decoder decompresses the DVD content, since uncompressed DVD content would be too big to fit on a DVD! You need an MPEG-2 codec.
Try reinstalling InterActual player, but you can also do this to see if you have a codec installed:

Open start > run
Type cmd and press enter
Type 'dvdupgrd /detect' and press enter
This will tell you which (or if any) codec is installed

Thanks for the reply.

A box popped up saying

DShow SW:
Name: "clvsd.ax"
Company name: "Cyberlink Corp."
Version. 3.0.0.0.0
Product Version: 3.0.0.0
CRC32: 0xe944b9
VID:2
W2k Upgrade = no
Win 9x Upgrade = yes
LCID = 0809

So it would appear the decoder is still there. Any ideas what to do next?

Cheers.

 

[JordanF]

Try playing the DVD with Windows Media Player or PowerDVD.

 

[Theophilus7]

Hi,

Try playing the DVD with Windows Media Player or PowerDVD.

I have tried all my players - including those two. It seems that the decoder (which they will all rely upon) has stopped functioning.

 

[Qyöt27]

Try VLC Player and see if it can play the DVD. Everything is built-in, so you only have to install the player itself (not to mention that VLC is available completely free of charge, which is another plus). I seem to remember that the only thing that the Cyberlink decoder did was descramble the content, and relies on a separate MPEG-2 decoder to do the actual grunt work.

I could be wrong, but I know that in some codec packs (codec packs = evil, by the way) Cyberlink's decoder is packaged along with MainConcept's MPEG-2 decoder, which would lead me to believe that Cyberlink's only provides the players with the ability to play the content correctly, but not to actually play the content.