Practical

[redheadedlawyer]

1) Is anyone going to a midnight showing of Ironman tomorrow night? I can go with my young roommate, but I feel like I haven't seen you guys in months, what with working every Saturday night

Comments

[ashanden]

i better see you at some point this weekend. i will be up friday afternoon, staying at the house until sunday afternoon. hugs.

[elektrizitat]

Now I may be wrong, but I think you should be able to download the needed windows media player updates through Microsoft Autoupdate to play streaming movies via Netflix. Do you run "Windows Update" or "Microsoft Update" to install the updates for the operating system? NOTE: I'm running Windows XP with the latest media player updates and it works surprisingly well.

[redheadedlawyer]

Yes, yes I do! But Microsoft Update is telling me there is nothing new for me for me to download!

There are no high priority updates available for your computer.

I've downloaded all the optional updates.

I've used Windows Media Player before, and never had a problem with it until I tried to use Netflix. It's telling me I need to update to WMP 11. :-(

I've gone through all the Microsoft Rollup Downloads, versions 1.1 through 3 point something.

Everytime I try to download the Windows Media Player update or Windows Media Player 11 - which I'm directed to directly from Netflix - comes back AFTER validation to say -

Unsupported Operating System. To install Windows Media Player 11, your computer must be running Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 or later.

This really shouldn't be so complicated. I'm not technically incompetent!

[psych0tron]

do you have service pack 2 installed for XP? while i don't believe that it actually requires the media center edition of windows, it very well may require the latest service pack for xp.

[redheadedlawyer]

Your computer has already been upgraded to Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2). For tips or help using it, see the SP2 support and how-tos.

Sigh.

[the_chimp_pimp]

Bugger WMP. Go and download VLC Media Player. That thing plays EVERYTHING, and it's FREE. And it's WAY more stable than Media Player, too, in my experience.

[elektrizitat]

Agreed - VLC is great... but it is not what she needs to play Netflix streaming movies.

[ratthing]

I wanna see Iron Man. (He was always my favourite super dude.)

Also voting for VLC. http://shrinkify.com/5eo

Further I’d recommend installing the “K-Lite Codec Pack” from http://shrinkify.com/5ep

That tends to solve a whole lot of video issues. It also includes Media Player Classic which can often open videos the built-in Windows Media Player can’t.

[redheadedlawyer]

Very excited about the movie! No midnight showings in Hawaii, and that's been my thing for many years. I was always at the premiers of action flicks before there was a midnight showing. I'm going with my roommate Graham - but if you want details, let me know!

I'll get this player - thanks for the recommendation - but my whole point was to watch the streaming vids from netflix. :-/

[ratthing]

Oops sorry I should’ve pointed out there’s more to just downloading those thingers - you have to enter the URL of the video you want to stream (if you can find it). But from what I’ve been reading it seems Netflix uses DRM which probably won’t work on VLC or Media Player Classic.

I think you’re outta luck - Windows Media Center is built into Vista but it won’t do anything for XP ’cuz there’s a separate “Media Center” edition of XP you’re supposed to buy if you want the Media Center jazz. Looks like it’s time to upgrade to Vista. ;)

I take it y’all are going to Point for the movie?

[redheadedlawyer]

Yup! Marcus Point!

(And dammit!)