[Tapeworm] Media player won't play with me :-(

[David Woods]

> Ok, I upgraded my backend to .19, now Tapeworm finds the 
> programs ok, but when I try to watch something, MS Media 
> player complains that it can't play the file.
> 
> I have installed the recommended Stinky's MPEG-2 codec.
> 
> Suggestions??

Two suggestions.

1.  Make sure you're making the Samba connection properly.  Make sure you
can get to the videos on your MythTV box through Network Neighborhood.
(This is probably not the problem, based on your description, but is worth
checking.)

2.  See what format your videos are in.  Mine are in MPEG-2 files encoded by
a Hauppauge PVR-150, which WMP can handle fine.  If you use a different
encoding or have transcoding set up and have NUV files or MPEG-4 files or
something like that, you'll need to get the appropriate codec and perhaps
use a different media player.  If you are using NUV format, the DSMyth
driver (http://dsmyth.sourceforge.net) might help.  You may also have better
luck with the VideoLan Client than with Windows Media Player.  Zoom Player
also might be worth looking at.  

If you've located your MythTV video directory in Network Neighborhood, try
double-clicking one of the video files.  Does it play?  I'm betting not.  In
that case, you have a Windows Media Player / codec problem.  TapeWorm just
passes the video filename as you launch the media player you've configured
it to use.  If the media player doesn't work, there's nothing TapeWorm can
do to fix it.  That needs to occur at the OS level.

Hope that helps.  If not, let me know what format your videos are in.  If
you're not sure, AVICodec and the G-Spot codec information appliance are
shareware programs that provide information about codecs and video encoding
and can help you figure it out.  (You'll have to Google them, I don't have
the URLs at my fingertips at the moment.)

David