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I got Vista RTM & WMP11, the music files i got are in m4a format, encoded using quicktime. In Windows XP since i got nero 6.6.1.4 installed, it install the nero digital audio decoder which plays m4a files properly in WMP11, but in Vista i have installed Nero 7.5.7.9 lite edition which doesn't come with these codecs

I don't want to install Nero 7 full, which is a big bloat. Is there any codec to play m4a files in WMP11 for vista, tagging support will be good but not required

I have used the orban codec today, but it doesn't work properly, when a file is playing & i click on another file to play, the player hangs

Winamp is another option & primary player, but if m4a player in WMP11 I will switch

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  nexus291 said:

i found a way, installing quicktime did not solved the problem, it's decoders do not work with WMP. i installed AC3filte 1.1 & m4a files are now playing. I just hope i could get tag support in WMP11 somehow.

Do the files fastword when in your library because they don't in my library BUT do when they not added to the library...it makes no sense I know.

As for Tagging Support Check this out. WMP Tag Support Extender

Note AAC and M4A are read only but if you use "Get Album Info" they show correctly but theyre not written to the file. Maybe in future release

  • 2 months later...

The tag support let me add .m4a to my media library in Windows Media Player... Playback doesn't work with AC3Filter 1.11 still :/.

I've gone through the settings for AC3Filter and don't find anything that will help enable. Any advice? I'm running Windows Vista Home Premium.

-Shad

For some reason it won't let me select Direct Sound or Wave Out as my default audio renderer.... maybe the problem is there because I know it has to work with Direct Sound in order for me to get it to work in WMP 11.

  gamestargrinder said:
The seeking problem from what I have read is due to a directshow filter, not the actual codec

wmp tag support extender should allow you to import the files like i did

Ok...any insight on a solution?

I have ffdshow installed prior to installing the AC3Filter. Could that be related?

  gamestargrinder said:
then install the k-lite codec pack with ac3 filter

Tried uninstalling every codec and just installing the k-lite codec pack rebooted a couple of times. Still no .m4a love in WMP11 :/. I ran the tweak tool and it has the line:

Description: AC3Filter

File name: c:\program files\k-lite codec pack\filters\ac3filter.ax

as a DirectShow filter.

Not sure what really else to try. About to convert all my .m4a files to .mp3 for the time being. Think I'll keep looking for a solution though. About half my library is .m4a and I want them to play in Media Center through my XBox 360. Hate to transcode the files though :/.

Thanks for your help. More help is always welcome.

-Shad

  gamestargrinder said:
my mp4 files work fine wmp11 now that i have the codecs installed and wmp tag extender to import them into the library

What are you talking about? Is it .mp4, m4p, or m4a...because they are all different :p

I'm not sure .m4p will ever play fine in WMP11 because it has apple's DRM. .m4a should work fine if the right codec is installed. For some reason that is not the case with me right now :/.

I should install Winamp and see if that will play the .m4a. If my codec is installed correctly as a DirectShow filter then Winamp should be able to play the .m4a files. Then that would leave WMP11 as the problem.

  bmaher said:
That is your answer. Works in WMP and Media Center.

Ok, I uninstalled the standard K-Lite Codec Pack and installed the "Mega" codec pack.

I am still having problems playing AC3/.m4a files in Windows Media Player 11. I am also having problems hearing audio from some xvid/divx encoded video files that have the audio encoded as an AC3 stream.

What is strange is that Media Player Classic plays back both the xvid w/ AC3 and .m4a files flawlessly. Doesn't this just work with whatever directshow has access to? I can play the xvid w/ AC3 files on my XBox 360 via transcode 360 and the sound works fine, although no .m4a playback yet. Again this points to directshow having everything installed properly but Windows Media Player 11 not wanting to corporate like the rest of the programs.

Please help!

thanks!

-shadrack

Edit: it makes sense to me that the .m4a wouldn't work on my xbox 360 yet... the Media Center is tightly tied to Windows Media Player. However, transcode 360 re-encodes both the video and audio through directshow into a windows media format that the xbox can handle. If I open up Media Center on my PC neither video w/ AC3 or .m4a files play.

If you installed K-Lite Mega, please be sure:

* You didn't accidentally install Voxware

* You didn't accidentally install the Morgan Multimedia Stream Switcher

* You have the up-to-date versions of FFDShow, DIVX, and XVID (if it installed those)

I just went through the top Vista crashes in multimedia playback, and the above covers most all of it (which should be stunning to you), and a lot of the crashes very specifically identified K-Lite as the fault. K-Lite often registers the filters in its own path, which means that you get NO benefits of version checking. (And also lets me specifically identify K-Lite as the bad installer.) Any later vendor security patches for anything it installs may or may not take affect as a result. It's just horribly badly written/designed software.

You don't want K-Lite. It's not well written. It's warez, it contains badly crashing software (Voxware frees random memory and makes your computer randomly go boom)... zzzz.

Stop it. K-Lite is horrible software and if you're smart enough to find NeoWin you should be smart enough to know about that badness by now. Get the codecs or filters you need directly from the vendor and your system will be much happier as a result.

This:

http://zachd.com/pss/pss.html#mpeg4

is my previous write-up on getting MPEG4 to play in WMP.

  zachdms said:
If you installed K-Lite Mega, please be sure:

* You didn't accidentally install Voxware

* You didn't accidentally install the Morgan Multimedia Stream Switcher

* You have the up-to-date versions of FFDShow, DIVX, and XVID (if it installed those)

I just went through the top Vista crashes in multimedia playback, and the above covers most all of it (which should be stunning to you), and a lot of the crashes very specifically identified K-Lite as the fault. K-Lite often registers the filters in its own path, which means that you get NO benefits of version checking. (And also lets me specifically identify K-Lite as the bad installer.) Any later vendor security patches for anything it installs may or may not take affect as a result. It's just horribly badly written/designed software.

You don't want K-Lite. It's not well written. It's warez, it contains badly crashing software (Voxware frees random memory and makes your computer randomly go boom)... zzzz.

Stop it. K-Lite is horrible software and if you're smart enough to find NeoWin you should be smart enough to know about that badness by now. Get the codecs or filters you need directly from the vendor and your system will be much happier as a result.

This:

http://zachd.com/pss/pss.html#mpeg4

is my previous write-up on getting MPEG4 to play in WMP.

Honestly, I knew K-Lite codec pack wasn't a good option. But I hit a point where I just wanted to get my .m4a playback to work and was hitting a wall. In reality all that I should really need installed is ffdshow and DivX (I actually have purchase Pro...but now that isn't installed...sigh). If I have any problems I'll uninstall or format/reinstall windows right away.

Thanks for the warning though.

I have uninstalled the k-lite mega media codec pack (fingers-crossed, anyway) and have just installed FFDShow. My .m4a files are playing just fine now. I think that they were fixed after a windows update and the problem was not with having FFDShow installed incorrectly before.

It would probably be to everyones benefit if someone on a fresh install of Vista will confirm that all you need is FFDShow installed to get AC3 playback and .m4a file playback in WMP11 and Windows Media Center. FFDShow is suppose to support AC3 streams so I don't know why you would need anything else.

Edit: Double negative needed correcting.

Edited by Shadrack
  • 1 month later...
  Co_Co said:
Do the files fastword when in your library because they don't in my library BUT do when they not added to the library...it makes no sense I know.

As for Tagging Support Check this out. WMP Tag Support Extender

Note AAC and M4A are read only but if you use "Get Album Info" they show correctly but theyre not written to the file. Maybe in future release

Has anyone got this tag Support extender to work? I can't seem to get it working in Vista.

EDIT: Well I guess it works, but the tag support for .ogg is kinda weird. For gladiator I have to search for "The battle" and just not gladiator.

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