Playback of media files (mp3/wav) in Lister?

[petermad]

since at least Win7

I don't have mplayer2.exe on my Windows 7 - and I can play mp3 files natively in TC.
I do have mplayer2.exe on my Windows XP.

[Gral]

Mplayer2.exe is loader only, uses msdxm.ocx - Active X
Older Mplayer.exe (respectively Mplay32.exe on NT branch) and TC natively uses Media Control Interface (MCI)

[Dalai]

2petermad
That's not what I was getting at. Playing MP3s in TC works on Win7 OOTB, and probably also on newer versions of Windows. The idea was to use mplayer2.exe (which loads the old WMP 6.4) to try to play MP3s there, maybe revealing what is broken. WMP 6.4 uses a different method of playing files than the newer versions of WMP. But since there is no mplayer2.exe on Win7 and higher...

Regards
Dalai

[Pathduck]

If I press 4 it just falls back to 2, which is binary.

It would help if I knew what DLLs were involved, then we could compare versions and file sizes of these DLLs.

Also I've never said OS - it's on Win10 Pro x64.

[Pathduck]

OK this is interesting - it works when I use the 64-bit version of TC... I've not used this before as I don't really see the point of a 64-bit TC. Also a lot of plugins only work in 32-bit.

Do you guys use the 32-bit or 64-bit version?

I've also figured out that it uses mciqtz32.dll which is the "DirectShow MCI Driver". I've had issues with this before, in games. But I have nothing but the default install of this DLL.

I have the following files and sizes:

Code: Select all

43008   15.09.2018      09:29:21  c:\Windows\System32\mciqtz32.dll
38400   15.09.2018      09:29:31  c:\Windows\SysWOW64\mciqtz32.dll
43008   15.09.2018      09:29:21  c:\Windows\WinSxS\amd64_microsoft-windows-directshow-other_31bf3856ad364e35_10.0.17763.1_none_fe1771df38e3fc0f\mciqtz32.dll
38400   15.09.2018      09:29:31  c:\Windows\WinSxS\wow64_microsoft-windows-directshow-other_31bf3856ad364e35_10.0.17763.1_none_086c1c316d44be0a\mciqtz32.dll

The version of these are all the same: 10.0.17763.1

[petermad]

I am still on version 10.0.17134.1 of the dll files - because version 1809 of Windows 10 is not available for my locale yet.
When I get updated to 1809 I will try and see if playing mp3's are broken, which it is not with my current Windows 10 Home.

[Horst.Epp]

I am still on version 10.0.17134.1 of the dll files - because version 1809 of Windows 10 is not available for my locale yet.
When I get updated to 1809 I will try and see if playing mp3's are broken, which it is not with my current Windows 10 Home.

The DLLs on Windows x64 Version 1809 (OS Build 17763.104) are the same.
Lister without plugins doesn't play mp3
Using the mmedia version 2.6.2.1 all media is played without problems.

[petermad]

The DLLs on Windows x64 Version 1809 (OS Build 17763.104) are the same

Well, the file sizes of my mciqtz32.dll's are not the same as Pathduck reports here above.

Anyway - it might take some time before I get updated to 1809 - apparantly Microsoft has stopped the rollout temporarily: https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2018/10/09/updated-version-of-windows-10-october-2018-update-released-to-windows-insiders/#hYY7T66Swsh6D0tj.97

[Pathduck]

Thanks for the information guys. I am on W10 build 1809 but I not on the insiders builds, I just got it when I checked.

It appears Horst can also confirm the same, correct?

Also if the version Peter has is working, it would be interesting for me to test it. If you Peter could find a way to send it to me by PM, filedropper or email 'stianlund' on gmail then I could test with it. I think TC first uses a DLL located in the install directory so that would override the Win version.

[petermad]

2Pathduck
I have put the two mciqtz32.dll files up for you to download at http://madsenworld.dk/tcmd/mciqtz32.zip - notice the locale of the two file is reported as Danish.

[Pathduck]

Thank you Peter, much appreciated

I have tried it now, and verified using Process Monitor that the DLLs I placed in the TC install directory are loaded by TC when opening an mp3 with Lister. It does then not use the Windows DLLs.

However, I get the same thing. I also have tried with some really old DLLs I found (yeah, I know), and the same result. So while I know that the mciqtz32.dll is involved in mp3 playback, something else is probably failing. Most likely some codec issues, even though I am able to play mp3s in all other programs I have installed.

I will try to use the tools I have to figure out what TC is doing when opening mp3s, and where it might fail. But unless the dev is able to help out I doubt I will get much further, as I need tips to debug things.

It's too bad TC does not have any debug logging, or does it? I tried to enable logging in TC but it is very basic. I need to enable verbose logs to be able to see where things fail.

[Gral]

2Pathduck
...notice the locale of the two file is reported as Danish.

It is not - on Vista and newer MUI is used , so binaries are the same on most systems, while resources are loaded from language specific MUI files.
Binaries on my Windows 10 Home (17134.345) are identical.

[petermad]

2Gral
That is why I wrote "is reported" (in the properties box under Details) as Danish - I thought that all dll's were Language neutral in Win 10 too. Before I wrote that they were reported as Danish I had looked at the properties of some other dll's which were reported as English - but maybe if there exist a mui file for a given dll then the properties use the info from the mui file?

[Dalai]

[...] but maybe if there exist a mui file for a given dll then the properties use the info from the mui file?

Yep, normally this is what the system does.

Regards
Dalai

[Pathduck]

Should I report this as a bug, since it's clear this is related to the Win10 1809 update and there's at least one more confirmation on the same issue?