Windows XP [Electronic resources] : Visual Quickstart Guide, Second Edition

Chris Fehily

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Getting Started with Media Player

Media Player's gee-whizzery makes for a crowded interface, as you see in

Figure 10.1 . You can hover your mouse pointer over any control for a pop-up tip, but there are wheels within wheels. The interior section changes depending on the Media Player feature that you're using; Figure 10.1 shows Now Playing.

Figure 10.1. Windows Media Player controls

[View full size image]

To start Media Player:

Choose Start > All Programs > Windows Media Player.

or

Click the Media Player icon () on the Quick Launch toolbar, located on the taskbar.

or

Double-click any associated media file.

or

Choose Start > Run; type wmplayer and then press Enter.

Associating Documents with Programs" in Chapter 6.

Figure 10.2. Double-clicking a file with any of these file types opens Media Player. Click a file-type name (not its check box) to make a description appear below the list. A dimmed box means that the file type was associated with a different player; you can double-click the box to give Media Player full ownership of that type.

The old version of Media Player, without all the clutter, is still around but hidden. To open it, choose Start > Run; type mplay32 and then press Enter.

The Media Player menu bar keeps itself out of the way until you summon it in its horizontal or vertical form.

To summon the Media Player menu bar:

Move the mouse pointer to where the menu bar

should be (Figure 10.3 ).

Figure 10.3. The menu bar springs into existence when you move your pointer above the window's top edge.

or

Press and release the Alt key.

or

Click the down-pointing triangle at the right end of the title bar.

or

Right-click anywhere on the title bar, the Features taskbar, or the area to the right of the playback controls.

Tips

Use the View > Menu Bar Options submenu to set menu-bar preferences. Press Ctrl+M to freeze the menu bar in its proper place. Ctrl+Shift+M auto-hides it again. This submenu also lets you show or hide the Features taskbar.

The controls shown in Figure 10.1 also are available in the View and Play menus. The View > Go To submenu is equivalent to the Features taskbar, for example.

Media Player is complex enough to get its own troubleshooting web site. Choose Help > Troubleshooting to open the site in your browser. If the player displays an error with an error ID (800704CF, for example), press F1 to open Media Player Help; click the Search tab; then search for

error center help.

QuickTime and Real

Media Player doesn't play a few of the most popular media formats: QuickTime, RealAudio, and RealVideo. To play these files, you can download the free QuickTime Player (