I don't know why I didn't post here sooner, but this problem is absolutely driving me crazy in search of a solution. If you can solve it, I would be indebted to you! :)

Windows Media Player will not play streams for me. For instance, nasa.gov will let you play NASA tv but it won't work with the WMP plugin. No matter what I try, it won't work. And recently I signed up for CNN pipeline that uses WMP to view video and nothing works in that too.

I've rolled back, unistalled, reinstalled, attempted to install, about a dozen times various things. I've tried about three different versions of WMP, now I can't even reinstall the WMP 11 Beta that I had been using because there's some error during installation that says it requires an online installation and that I need to connect to the internet. Well, I am connected; my cable connection is always-on. The CNN player I've installed about 3 times, I've also uninstalled it so that it will launch a web browser plugin version. No luck. I'm going insane here trying fix it.

The problem is, there's no crash or anything. It behaves like it's not being asked to do anything. Just sits there. The closest I get to an error message is that it says it can't play the file....a file specifically designed for it. This absolutely has to be on my end because these services default to these programs and if they didn't work for others, the providers would know about it. I can't figure it out though. I've got all my stuff updated. I'm running a new browser, etc. I've disabled my firewall, hoping that will allow it to work. Nothing.

I even set a restore point so I could edit the registry (on the advice of a friend), deleting Media Player from several spots. This seems to have had little effect on the system. Clicking on WMP in the start menu brings up the installation wizard for WMP 10, which seems to be embedded in the system beyond my meager attempts to get rid of it. Clicking on the installation file of WMP 11 (the version I actually want installed) results in the same problem...it fails to connect to the internet during installation and won't finish installing. Again, no crash. Just a simple statement saying why it won't work. Even if I could install it, I don't think that would solve my initial problem of playing video streams....though maybe they're connected? I find it bizarre that I had previously been able to install WMP 11. I can't think of anything I did to my system that would prevent subsequent installation attempts.

I'm sorry I've gone on so long. I wanted to describe in detail my problem so that it would, hopefully, be easier to troubleshoot.

I'm running Windows XP SP2, by the way.

Can anyone help me? I need to figure this out.

If my understanding is correct, this may have to do with the recent lawsuit loss that Microsoft had concerning browser plugins. Suppositly the system they used (and every other browser) for plugins violated some obscure patent. During one of MS's updates, they changed the plugin system so it wouldn't violate the patent. But this also "broke" many websites. Not sure if there a fix that an enduser can do but try Googling something like ms browser plugin patent for more info.

I am fairly confident that this is not the case. My problem wasn't familiar to the website tech guy at NASA and this is consistent across any site that tries to stream to WMP or it's plugin....sites that I know others can view. For instance, people are watching the Christies auction of Star Trek stuff right this moment at history.com, whilst I'm unable to.

Can you think of a solution to the WMP 11 installation problem I'm having?