I just came across a fix for a problem that happens every now and then with Windows Media Player. Here's the setup:

One of the computers I have here in my office has Windows Media Player 9. When I install a 599CD course on it, the video plays just fine, but there's no sound.

Of course, knowing me, I've tried EVERYTHING I can think of to fix the problem... updated the sound drivers, check the volume settings, install new CODECs, remove and reinstall Windows Media Player, the works. It hasn't really been a big problem for me, because hardly any of my customers have complained about it... only one or two here and there.

Well, just a few days ago, my daughter wanted to learn some Photoshop, so she installed PS101 on her machine. Same problem! So now I have to figure out how to fix it.

So after hours of searching the Web for other people with this problem, I finally came across a fix. I'm not exactly sure what the CAUSE of the problem is, but I did find a fix for it.

Here's the fix: there are a couple of registry keys that can be edited to make Windows Media Player play the audio properly. Again, I'm not sure why, but I'll list them below. Now, I'm not going to tell you here how to EDIT your registry values. If you're a computer novice, you really shouldn't mess around with the registry. If you're an advanced user (like some of my Access, VB, or Web students) and you know how to edit registry keys, I'll list them here.

Under the registry folder:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MediaPlayer\NodeCLSIDs
You will find several very long keys with wierd names like {13A7995E-7D8F-45B4-9C77-819265225763}. In each of these keys, there is a value called AutoInsert. You need to change that value to the ones shown here:

{13A7995E-7D8F-45B4-9C77-819265225763} 0
{95037DA1-6ED9-4B27-8CFF-9AD3DFB0B2F2} 0
{974BF3BF-C9AE-4476-8003-5FE544DF458C} 1
{B2DBA270-9F49-4513-AC13-76496D6EBA3A} 0
{D01BC8E2-70AD-4976-9612-21B37ED5C8E8} 0
{D7E9C0B4-0E4D-46B4-BC46-1D0222F92C6F} 1
{E5A8C40E-654B-44D4-ACBB-DBE6D3B3333B} 0
{FB02E8EF-ACFE-4CC0-96DF-8B5C7098272C} 1

Restart Windows Media Player and everything should be OK. If not, let me know.

Now for you computer novices out there, DO NOT go playing with your registry. If you have this problem, Email Me and I will help you. If enough people complain, I can actually make a little program to set these registry values automagically.

I'm just posting this here for the <1% of my customers who might actually run into this problem.

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