MP3 Playback irregularities - MS MP7.1

[Mac]

Have just started converting my CD collection to MP3. When songs start, after a few seconds, the pitch drops down. Sounds almost like an "wow" as if you were playing LP's on a turntable. It only occurs in Media Player and only at the beginning of the song.

The songs were encoded using the Creative Labs Play Center (SB Live 5.1) at 192Kbs. When playing back through the Creative player, no problem...just Media Player 7.1.

System basics...

Win98SE
AMD 2000XP+
512MB RAM
WD 100BB 7200RPM 100GB
Plextor UltraPLEX40 used for the RIP.

Any ideas.

This is not General Hardware related.

AnandTech Moderator

 

[Mac]

-BUMP-

I still haven't figured this out, yet. I have uninstalled and reinstalled Media Player several times without solving the problem of distorted sound when playing MP3's. I have been able to isolate that this only occurs when using Media Player and during MP3 playback. Songs encoded to WMA using MP do not exhibit the problem.

To restate, the distortion only occurs about 2 or 3 seconds into the playback of a MP3. The sound will shift down in pitch, maybe a half step or so. This is just guessing but it seems as if Media Player begins playing but hasn't locked into the encoding frequency. MP3's encoded at 128, 160 and 192 all exhibit the same problem.

I can replay the MP3's back through Creative's Jukebox and Real Player without any problems. Only in Media Player. I know that I could just uninstall MP but I really prefer using it for managing and playing music.

I don't know much about Codec's but assume I am using the correct ones. Have gone out to MS Windows update and it says my system is current. Is there any correct order for these to be in?

Help!

 

[Adrian Tung]

I don't know much about MP 7.1, but if I'm not mistaken, PlayCenter uses the same codecs as MP so *in theory* there shouldn't be any problem at all.

But since you state that there is a problem, perhaps it lies somewhere in MP rather than the codecs or the MP3 encoding itself.

A few suggestions (not sure if they'll help, though):

1) Try playing it in Winamp? Just curious how it will turn out, since Winamp uses its own DLL to play MP3 files instead of the standard codecs installed in Windows.

2) Try disabling everything in MP 7.1 - this includes visualisations, return to the default skin, etc.

3) Try queuing 2 files in MP7.1's playlist and see if the 2nd file also has the same problem. Maybe it is a "1st-time-load" thingy....

4) Try playing it in MP6.4 (although you installed MP7.1, it still resides in the Program Files\Windows Media Player\ folder as MPLAYER2.EXE).

5) Try downloading MP9 instead... not sure if it's available for Win98 though....


Hope that helps,
atwl