Virtual Decay©, Virtual Scrap®, and Virtual Obsolescence♀♂

[sleepy]

It is now happening very fast.
The old sawhorse XP computer that could still run a decent YouTube is dead.
Just like that. Someone decided this. And now it has passed.

I cannot update XP. That is a reasonable conclusion. But FlashPlayer 15 now demands a CPU@2.33GHz. You cannot roll back to an earlier FlashPlayer. YouTube will reject it. My system P4 is a 2.4 GHz. with 2 Gb. system RAM.
It will not play in sync. And it skips. This fact has been creeping in slowly since Flash 10.

I installed XP to a different hard drive, just to see if I could sort it all out.
I needed some NVidia drivers, so I went to their site. I tried the auto-installer. It depends on Java. So I agreed to install the Java plugin for Chrome.
Except the installer warned me that the latest version of Java requires a newer OS. And the Java installer then crashed. Java was once known as 'a platform-independent language'. Not anymore.

Someone decided this. That those of us who are not cutting edge gamers or slaves of the latest workstations for our livelihood, and who only watch several YouTubes a week; that we must purchase a new system atop of the $40/Mo. that we pay for standard high speed internet.

Someone has decided that my perfectly good web browsing system is obsolete. Just like that. Just like me.

 

[sleepy]

And then, I spent about an hour using a Ubuntu Live DVD that I burned prior to installing a fresh copy of XP to a spare drive.

You would think that Linux, yes Linux, would not be jonesing with the fat cats, but nooo.
Their latest release is just as slow and bloated as the fat cats (EDIT: Yes I know. It is my computer that is slow). No salvation for the people who need a solution for the virtual obsolescence. Include the latest gee-wiz and eliminate the older files to conserve space on a DVD...

And then, it still has the same bug as the Ubuntu Live CD that I tried more than seven years ago. That version, and the latest release, both insist on changing the system clock, and this also happens when installing it. In spite of asking the user their location on a clickable map, it still reset the clock to somewhere around London time.

I know I clicked Los Angeles on the clock map during installation. Really I did...

 

[sleepy]

I left out a couple of things.
What got me going about this is, several weeks ago I bought a USB 2 DVD burner.
It came with Nero 9 Essentials (the free cheepie). It has a DVD soft player.
On a 720P monitor @ 1366 x 768 32 bit resolution it plays in 7.1 Dolby Digital sound flawlessly. The old GeForce 6200 is still up to it. It does have 500 Mb. vram.

And the other thing is, this morning while downloading apps for the current new XP test, I saw that Microsoft is claiming that Internet Explorer 8 will not run on XP.
That is funny. I had been using IE8 on my older XP system (now laid up) ever since SP2.
That system started out as a Win 98SE.

 

[StevOz]

Firefox still supports XP as far as I know and with this addon you can download any youtube clip for viewing..

https://github.com/gantt/downloadyoutube

 

[sleepy]

I haven't tried downloading the video yet. I only know that Flashplayer 15 will not play nice on my system in Firefox, IE or Chrome. But run a video in Flash 10 and everything works.
That's why I tried the fresh XP install. I could't believe that none of the current browsers and plugins will work out.

 

[StevOz]

Well with the add on I referenced they are downloaded as .mp4 files so flash is not needed, you can view them multiple times without using additional bandwidth, off line and google can't remove them.

 

[GSGregg]

The old GeForce 6200 is still up to it. It does have 500 Mb. vram.

...I saw that Microsoft is claiming that Internet Explorer 8 will not run on XP. That is funny. I had been using IE8 on my older XP system (now laid up) ever since SP2.

Nice to see vintage hardware still doing its work (like my '66 Skylark GS with 463,000 miles.....); my 6200 went back in its box when I replaced it with the Radeon HD4670 AGP8X, which to this day (about three years later) seldom syncs video to audio. Since I can't find a VCR that works for more than a few months, I now catch up on TV shows by computer instead of tape-n-tube, and can't 'watch' too closely or I get pissed off.

Maybe a GTX-umpteen-hundred GPU will recombine A and V, but what if it doesn't? $$$$!!
________________________
It's been about that same three years since I switched from IEx to Firefox, but I'm pretty sure XP held no animosity.....

 

[sleepy]

Now you got me thinking about it.
If you also have Onboard Video, make sure it's turned off.
When you first turn the system On, watch for the BIOS screen.
Some computers use the F10 key. Others use the DEL key.
That should get you to the BIOS menu.
Check there for turning off the Onboard video, if available on your mainboard.

Also check the *something like* PCI Features, or "Plug and Play Features"
and make sure it is set to AGP.
With Onboard video, the option is sometimes limited to a choice between Onboard Video and PCI, this in spite of having an AGP slot.
Also look around for any AGP 4X/8X switch and set it to 8X when the card is 8X.
This feature may not be available, in which case the mainboard is either automating the switch, else it is running the card at a default 4X.

On some mainboard menus, there is also a Aperture Setting. This is for AGP.
If you have a really old AGP card or onboard AGP chip with only 32 Mb. video card memory, then you will want to set the Aperture higher, to 128 or 256 Mb. (unless you don't have a lot of system memory installed, in which case try 64 Mb.).
If you have a video card with large vram, saY 500 Mb. or more, then you might want to turn down the aperture since the card has the available memory.
The Aperture setting provides more system RAM to compensate for small cards.

I am having success with using the HTML 5 video player at YouTube, though it was messed up on my main XP system. Out of sync like current Flash 15.
I think my old XP installation has some bottlenecks in the software, but on my fresh XP install, the YouTube HTML 5 player is reasonable. If you're goin' to YouTube, you might have to request the HTML 5 player from this totally disconnected page, here, though the control is possibly buried somewhere in the YouTube User Settings. Who knows?

You don't have to request it to try it out. "Request" is the label on the button to click.
I'm not sure where to go to revert the selection though, in the event that it bombs.
You can also disable or enable Flash in the Firefox browser's Add-Ons menu (the "Three Stripes" icon at the top right corner).

https://www.youtube.com/html5

I've also had good results with the VLC Player (VideoLAN Player). With the player running, you can click Media > Open Network Stream. Enter a URL for a video on YouTube and it will play it. It also installs the player plugin for Firefox and IE, and it also promises to allow uploading of your own video streams from your device(s), but I haven't tried that yet. EDIT: But it won't play anything from crackle.com or a few of the other free online movie sites.
They still require Flash...

http://www.videolan.org/vlc/index.html

The only other things I can think to try would be to adjust the card's Quality-Performance setting in the Catalyst control panel. Performance is for slower systems. Quality is for speedy systems.
And the good old update drivers suggestion...sometimes. But use the System > Device Manager > Rollback Drivers if the latest drivers bomb.

Sometimes the videos run slow if the browser's cache of files is stuffed or there is a bad cookie there. Clearing out the cache may help, but you may need to remember all of your usernames and passwords (unless you uncheck those options first).

 

[sleepy]

About that YouTube HTML 5 player. The browser has to support HTML5 to use it,
and be sure to be logged in at YouTube before selecting the HTML 5 player, else YouTube will forget your choice.

But...if you are Not logged in at YouTube, you can try the HTML 5 player without YouTube remembering your choice later. In that case, YouTube will revert to Flash when you log in. Or you might log out before trying the HTML 5 player.

 

[GSGregg]

sleepy; Thanks for wrapping your head around this)

AGP: both the 661FX-M7 m/b's socket and the HD4670 are full 8X.

Onboard/discrete video: only one or the other. The HD4670 can't play Pro Pinball or Fulltilt! Pinball (the original Space Cadet plus two other tables), and I was alternating with Windows' VgaSave after somehow losing my onboard GPU (easier than opening the case to swap the 4670 and the 6200 when I wanted to be a Cadet); I tired of this after a few weeks, and haven't played the 'old stuff' in quite a while. I hunted drivers for a bit, but since there were no WHQL drivers for the AGP 4600-series, I soon gave up.

I do remember dinking around with the Aperture, but since the 6200 had 512MB, there was no perceivable benefit.

Video playback: Gameplay YouTube videos are much too choppy to be of any diagnostic assistance, and watching TV episodes on (call letters)-dot-com is tedious because while the audio is smooth (except when buffering), the video is always about a second behind, and occasionally the whole thing starts bottlenecking to where you can't keep track of who's doing the talking---and forget about action sequences---while the audio just continues to flow.

I have the VLC Player, but very seldom use it, and I'm not familiar with the HTML 5 player; is that strictly for YouTube?

Edit: Just saw your post #9 above.

 

[Isaac Sauvage]

steve's solution sounds good. as a bonus, you don't have to view the ads or wait for caching.

anyway i guess it's just an XP thing. this AMD laptop runs less than 2.3ghz and still plays youtube stuff fine in FF with winblows7. altho absolute ghz is kind of an obsolete measure, i think.

 

[sleepy]

Actually, I think it's a DirectX 10 (Vista and up) + Flash 15 issue. XP is stuck on version 9c as the last version for XP.

I had Win 7 installed so I could try the Win 10 preview, but I forgot to check the video response!

The HTML 5 player is a standard feature of the HTML 5 internet programming language, though that does not guarantee cooperative results from any one browser brand. It should, but the browsers are often snobby about the standards.
It is working well on Firefox.

 

[sleepy]

The Flash plugin for IE8 seems to be working. Firefox is still lagging the video behind the sound. This old man's brain can't take the lagging.
I tried watching Sports Jeopardy in IE 8. The Jack ad is still out of sync, but the program runs fine, as did a movie I tried.

http://www.crackle.com/c/sports-jeopardy

You cannot imagine the relief that this brings after tying in vain to watch Miami Vice: The Movie at Crackle.
But Miami Vice: the tv show is running fine at Hulu on Firefox So maybe try updating the Flash plugin for Firefox?

http://www.hulu.com/watch/14837

http://www.adobe.com/software/flash/about/

 

[sleepy]

I did get some lag in Firefox by the Part 2 episode in full screen,
but I reverted to the normal size player on page window and it straightened out.

 

[sleepy]

Just Wow!
I searched for Sports Jeopardy reviews, just to see how it is doing, and I ran across this guy. The last post on the page.
Naw. I am not stalking him.
It just Blows my Mind that, in the whole of the world wide Internet, that I would perchance cross his path at all. But you know what?
I think this is the third time that I've ran across him in other places while looking up topics that interest me.
Maybe it's somebody else??

http://www.reddit.com/r/Jeopardy/comments/2hc6i7/review_sports_jeopardy/

 

[sleepy]

Hey..Guess what?
My fresh XP install was SP2. C_S mentioned that SP3 may not be recommended.
Well he is Right!
I updated to SP3 tonight and I lost all of the sync. The videos stuttered and lagged like crazy. Just like my former SP3 installation.
So I Uninstalled SP3. It put the system back to XP SP2.
The videos are once again playing nice, or close to it EDIT: in IE 8.
Firefox is now lagging, but that might require a reinstall.

I upgraded to SP3 because my ISP (Time Warner) today upgraded the standard ISP speed in my area from 15 Mbits/1 Mbits to 50 Mbits/5Mbits. I thought the SP3 would help things.

NOOOP...

The thing to know (GS?) is that third party programs might break if installed after 'upgrading' to SP3. And some of them out there demand SP3 before they will install.
So take note before uninstalling SP3 of any potential conflicts with your favorite other programs when running SP2. And of course the security issues are back with SP2.
I think...this sucks...

EDIT: Maybe stick with SP2 and install Avast antivirus, or whatever will work on SP2 without breaking things.

EDIT#2: Oh yeah. I also 'upgraded' to SP3 because Windows Update requires it for those security hotfixes.
Without SP3, the Update function at the Microsoft website and the Auto-Update on the Taskbar, both refuse to work.

EDIT#3: You can uninstall SP3/rollback to SP2 by going to the Control Panel > Add/Remove Programs. It's in the list, but make sure your favorite other programs are not dependent on SP3. You can download and reinstall SP3 from here
Choose Wisely, And May God Help You!

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/322389

 

[GSGregg]

Hey..Guess what?

I updated to SP3 tonight and I lost all of the sync. The videos stuttered and lagged like crazy. Just like my former SP3 installation.
So I Uninstalled SP3. It put the system back to XP SP2.
The videos are once again playing nice, or close to it

The thing to know (GS?) is.....

Ver-r-r-y interesting; however, this computer already had SP3 when I got it, and after a bad DIMM scrambled a harddrive in Feb 2011, part of the resurrection was the immediate re-downloading of SP3. Wonder what it is in SP3 that fucks up video?

EDIT: Maybe stick with SP2 and install Avast antivirus, or whatever will work on SP2 without breaking things.

Eight months into the deadzone of non-support, it appears that Malwarebytes Anti-malware and eset nod32 A/V are keeping my XP alive.

Choose Wisely, And May God Help You!

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/322389

Precisely where I found it all those years (3.5) ago; thanks!

 

[sleepy]

Yeah. Found this Microsoft page about "video freezes and stutters".
It has a Fix-It program on it.
So I reinstalled the SP3 and tried the Fix-It.
It cleared up the lag in IE8 on SP3, but Firefox is still messed up.

http://support2.microsoft.com/mats/video_freezes_or_crashes

When I ran the Fix-It, it found the Indeo Audio Codec was a conflict and disabled it.
The Fix-It allows you the choice to decide to disable anything that it finds.

 

[sleepy]

Firefox is working at YouTube using the HTML 5 player.
I used the "HTML 5" link above to request that player, and just checked the Tonight Show clip with Daniel Radcliff. It looks good here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKdV5FvXLuI

Have you tried the Fix-It?
WARNING! You need to select the Manual option so that Fix-It doesn't do anything automatically. I'm sorry I didn't think about that.

 

[Shooby Doo]

For youtube and few other video sites, I use "Viewtube" for the Greasemonkey add-on. Just add Greasemonkey in firefox, then install the script on this page:

http://isebaro.com/viewtube/?ln=en

Now a youtube page opens with a drop-down menu that lets you choose what type of file, what resolution, no ads, and what plug-in you want to play it (including VLC player or HTML5).

I've been using it for almost a year and it makes youtube SO MUCH BETTER. No sudden stops and videos buffer the way they used to, and if you do have a problem, just choose a different format.

 

[GSGregg]

I looked at the Fix-It (as you mentioned, it appears to be IE-directed) and the View-Tube link (kinda confusing array of options). My exposure to (note that I didn't say, "knowledge of") video playback led me to assume that the source either selected a player from whatever one's computer contained, or used its own and left no other options. Plus, to what extent can lag, buffering stops, etc., be attributed to one's browser rather than CPU / GPU inadequacies?

BTW: When I put CPU-Z in my PN sig, I didn't do it correctly, so if it helps, my specs are; Celeron D-331 @2.66 GHz on 661FX-M7 with 2GB DDR800 Ram, ATI Radeon HD4670 AGP8X 1GB, running XP Media Center Edition Service Pack 3.

Apparently, the only players I have are Windows Media Player and VLC v.2.1.5. (One Microsoft and one open-source---I thought that would be sufficient) Most videos I encounter are VP- or email-related (YouTube, I reckon) or more recently, TV-network-dot-com to catch up on missed shows (If companies are going to still offer VCRs*, I wish they'd make them worth a shit. *Combos only, nowadays, apparently.

Anyway, I haven't used IE for anything in quite a while; I guess I should try it and see if the Fix-It does anything.....

 

[GSGregg]

Anyway, I haven't used IE for anything in quite a while; I guess I should try it and see if the Fix-It does anything.....

As in your case, sleepy, the Fix It detected the indeo codec. Playbeck of a TV episode in IE before disabling indeo was the same as in Firefox, but afterward neither the fullscreen button nor the pause / stop button worked. There was an upside, though---all commercials were skipped. Beats me why.....

Now to check into HTML 5.

Shooby Doo; am I correct in assuming that ViewTube will have no effect outsude of YouTube?

 

[sleepy]

Well that blows. It's probably the XP Media Edition has a different software system.
I know there are different upgrades for it that are not compatible with XP/XP Pro and visa-versa.

Sorry about that. Can you use System Restore to get it back?
There *Should Be* a Restore Point in System Restore that *Should Have Been Made* by the Fix-It when it ran. Unless M$ blew that too...

 

[GSGregg]

I don't think there is a real problem; I switched back to Firefox and everything was as it had been. The Wikipedia article said that "The Microsoft Windows implementation of the Indeo codec contains several security vulnerabilities and one should not play Indeo videos from untrusted sources. On fully patched systems the Indeo codec is partially disabled in most circumstances; there are no plans to fix the vulnerabilities as the codec is third party code." Also, the Fix-It did not remove the codec, but merely disabled it. Getting it back shouldn't be an issue, and Firefox doesn't appear to miss it.

Didn't get HTML 5 yet; been up all night and the pillow is calling.....

 

[sleepy]

I'm glad I didn't blow it too much.
The Indeo codec was initially an Intel product and was generally included in installers for the hardware that used it, and I believe Windows provided it also, but some smarty company bought the rights and now it's only available for sale.
They want $14.99 for it. Lars Mars or somebody.