Sound and Flash issues?

Darkstrike · 09 Jul 2010

Hello all!

I have two little issues that I am driving myself crazy trying to fix...first off, I am an avid fan of the World Rally Championship, and I watch the videos on their website. Generally, I use Firefox, and I have the latest version of Flash installed...however, the videos have not loaded correctly for me in many months, nor can I get them to load on my netbook, my brother's netbook, my brother's desktop, or my mother's desktop in Firefox...is it just something I have installed on all of these computers (the WRC's site says VLC can cause issues with it's Firefox plugin, but I don't have VLC's Firefox plugin installed, just VLC itself...?), or do videos not play for anybody else when they check the site out?

( World Rally Championship - TV if somebody doesn't mind seeing if they work for them in Firefox...)

My other browser-related problem is with Internet Explorer 8. Because the videos don't work on WRC.com in Firefox, I usually watch them in IE8 with no problems...however, when I went to try it today, there is no sound for ANYTHING in IE8...Youtube, Ads, flash games, MP3s playing through the Quicktime plugin - NOTHING. Streaming videos play fine, but I cannot hear the audio. My system volume is NOT muted. IE8 isn't muted in Win7's volume mixer, nothing else is muted and ALL of my other audio works fine in all other programs. If I look in the volume mixer when playing anything with sound in IE8, I can see the green VU bar moving behind the volume slider for the IE8 application, but it doesn't move and I cannot hear it on my main volume control.

Any ideas? Like I said, nothing is muted or disabled anywhere, and sound works fine everywhere else. I have the latest version of IE8, Flash, and the latest sound drivers...? In IE8's options, "play sound from webpages" IS turned on, so I don't know what else I am missing :S

Thanks for any help!

EDIT - Also, I should mention I tried reinstalling Flash and my sound drivers.

SECOND EDIT - I let the WRC site load for about 20 minutes and the streaming flash video finally started playing...any ideas what would be causing it to take so long? It functions normally on IE8 when I load the site and starts playing almost instantaneously...?

roncerr · 10 Jul 2010

If you right-click the speaker icon and look at playback devices, does it show the device going to your speakers? Is that the same device under Sound... in Device Manager? Might you have headphones plugged into the headphone jack which cuts out the speakers?

Darkstrike · 10 Jul 2010

Hi roncerr,

Thanks for the thoughts, but unfortunately they don't help.

If I check the playback devices it lists the HDMI Audio for my video card, my "Speakers" and "Realtek Digital Output." "Speakers" are set to the default playback device like they always have been, so I haven't changed anything and IE8 worked fine for sound last week...?

It's not the same thing that is listed under Sound in Device Manager, no, but my sound has worked before with this setup, and I remember I had to set "Speakers" to the default playback device to get the audio in FRAPS to record properly.

As for the headphone jack being plugged in accidentally, nope. Impossible actually. I can hear everything else that makes audio through the speakers fine. Also, I only have one output jack, which is the jack on the on-board sound at the back, and it has a Y-splitter that goes to my speakers on one side, and my headset/mic on the other, so both my speakers and headset play the exact same audio at the exact same time.

roncerr · 11 Jul 2010

Darkstrike said:

(the WRC's site says VLC can cause issues with it's Firefox plugin, but I don't have VLC's Firefox plugin installed, just VLC itself...?)...

My other browser-related problem is with Internet Explorer 8. ...however, when I went to try it today, there is no sound for ANYTHING in IE8...It functions normally on IE8 when I load the site and starts playing almost instantaneously...?

Maybe WRC is confused about its own problem. Maybe any combo of VLC+Firefox causes problems; after all you are using Firefox and VLC is installed.

Does the red 2nd edit mean the sound is back in IE8 now?

Darkstrike · 11 Jul 2010

Nope, sorry that red second edit had meant that flash was working on the WRC site and one of the videos loaded, but it literally took 20 minutes...?

It's not my connection speed, I have Cable and all other sites are fine...and the WRC site is fine other than the videos not loading right away (and finally doing so 20 minutes later)

Still haven't solved the IE8 sound glitch :S

roncerr · 12 Jul 2010

Darkstrike said:

...sound works fine everywhere else...

If the sound problem is only in the IE8 application, you can try resetting it: Tools/Internet Options/Advanced/Reset

Darkstrike · 12 Jul 2010

Thank you sir! That got it....I didn't even know that that function existed in IE as I mostly use Firefox :)