Ive been unable to use WMP for 6 months now trying to fix it on my own, still no luck so maybe one of you can help. I used to have an older version of Real Player and also Windows Media Player 7.1, so all was fine, than I downloaded upgraded to "Real One" player, which didnt work, but WMP did, I than later on upgraded to WMP 9, and I was prompted that to continue I had to installa KB###### update which would also not allow some sort of future system restore, skeptically i said yes well installation finished, all of a sudden "Real One" started working WMP didnt. I have uninstalled multiple times, and reinstalled every version of WMP an none would work, so I reinstalled WMP9, again, didnt work. I have just uninstalled it again and installed WMP 7.1 again. When I start it it searches forever and never plays, I then click stop and it gets stuck on "please wait..aborting", then i have to ctrl-alt-del to try to force it to close, when i do, system crashes and i have to restart. Actually has been crashing alot anyways. I am not sure if these files are necessary since i dont have them in the system folder : mspmspsv.dll, qasf.dll, wmerror.dll, wmpshell.dll, wmpstub.exe? I have version 8 of wmpshell and version 9 of qasf and wmerror on my desktop. I run Windows ME , IE ver 5.5 Please someone help, or set me up on a starting point, since streaming these days is almost all WMP (ugh) thx ;)

Try working through the pointers on the homepage link on this response and see how it is. If it's no better, although I seldome recommend it, I would reinstall Windows with the version of Media Player that came with it. You will see full instructions for reinstalling Windows in the homepage link.

thx, I will try those suggestions, nice link btw, very thorough. Before i reinstall windows, ill save my money and buy a mac or redhat system ;) I only use this one b/c it was free from my old job, im tired of Windows and the Win ME was the worst upgrade I ever made, Windows 98SE a million times better. I'm also going to try to insert those three files from WMP into the system folder, and see if that has any effect. I forgot to mention that I also use Netscape 7.1 (not sure if thats relevant but hey u never know :) ) Thanks again :)

Another recent observation, quicktime, doesn't work either (which I don't really care about much tho) But, even more interesting, the few stations that use the "Broadcast Urban" player by "surfer Networks", which opens up like a morphed WMP with their own skin, DOES play audio fine?? Interesting, since no other "morphed" WMP players like streamaudio, or liquid compass seem to work. Could this also be some sort of codec issue? HMM. Hopefully this helps ;) Ill still keep up the search :)

I recently upgraded from 98 to ME, and also had loads of trouble with internet explorer and most programs on the system. Most of them were incompatible to the upgrade. I uninstalled every other software on the computer appart from ME and re-installed them using the install/uninstall utility in the control panel. And it is all working really well since. I recommend you give it a try. hey

OK i just updated IE Explorer to ver 6 and reinstalled windowsa 6.4, all wmp codecs, and then upgraded to WMP7.1 with the browser embedded option. I tried using plugins for .asf files in Winamp, didnt work. WMA files will also not play in any mediaplayers, I have, WMP, RealOne, VLC, MediaPlayerClassic, Winamp. If i had the money i would just save to buy a new computer since all I really use it for is Internet, and especially Internet Radio/TV Streaming. Very frustrated. I deleted a trojan. Downloaded AVG Virus Check, Spybot Search and Desroy, a Spybot blocker. All i do is keep downloading. Downloaded DXMan and Gspot, for some reason tho, even tho I downloaded three times the WMP codecs from microsoft.com, They are still not listed. All mp3, mpeg, and .pls files run fine. avi, asf, asx, wmv, wma, anything windows related crashes. Tho WMP cannot play mp3, mpeg, or .pls either, it still crashes. I have tried Version 6.4, 7.1, and 9 and every version is the same. Please help... Must have streaming radio ;).