Streaming Video problem

[Texas Heat]

Ok I am a techy myself, and am no novice to compters. But this problem has stumped me cold in my tracks. Heres my info

Windows XP SP1 with patches dating up to SP2
VII 100Mbs/sec NIC Adaptor
Router disabled for this problem
Pentium III 1.7 ghz processor
1 gig ram
300 gigs HD's, partitioned, 150gigs free
Windows media player 10
DSL internet connection

When tring to stream a video, any video, any web site, though to the windows media player, it doesnt connect. It tries at first then just returns to the ready option. Refreashing the page does nothing but agravate me further. So here is where I started.

First I checked my nic, ping 127.0.0.1 -t, tried the video with that running and I got complete replies to my nic, the video never came up.

Then I thought, maybe my router is going bad, I removed the router and went from extenal modem strait to pc (rebooting of course). Tried the video again, nothing.

Thats all the hardware I can test, thus I moved on to software tests. I checked windows media player. I uninstalled it, and reinstalled WMP10. Once again, nothing.

Here is a stumper and maybe a root cause, while downloading the WMP10, I noticed I was only downloading at 40k/sec. Slow for even dial up, however I'm on DSL. AND the connection status screen shows a 100Mbs/s connection. Could have been the servers I was connecting to, but it was 1:30 in the AM, so I ruled that out.

This computer has streamed video perfectly before, and I dont think its the pc, but computers do break down over time. However, I moved, and no longer have the luxary of cable internet. So I'm thinking it might be my ISP. However, with the status screen showing the 100Mbs, but only pulling 40Kbs, I am unsure. Someone PLEASE point me in the right direction.

 

[chrisds]

what at you using to encode the video with? eg, Widnows Media Encoder 9, or VLC Media player etc etc?

 

[randy_andy]

is ur OS pirate£¿if not ,undelete wmp and reinstall it.

 

[Texas Heat]

I have the following codecs, I beilieve. WMP10 codec, winamp codec, divx codec, quicktime codec. And yes my OS is pirate, however I can still uninstall and re-install WMP10, which I have already done.

 

[chrisds]

the os being pirate should not effect the streaming abilities!! how do you start your stream? what application are you using?

 

[Texas Heat]

I am serfing the web with IE6, then clicking the video and it is opening in WMP10. There are options for others, real player, quicktime, etc. I am downloading quicktime now to see if it will work, but I dont think its the player, cause my downloaded videos work fine. None the less it is worth a try. Any more suggestions would be helpful though, in case this doesnt work.

 

[Texas Heat]

Ok quicktime and realplayer also fail to load videos. So that lets me know that it isnt the software right? It has to be the ISP right?

 

[chrisds]

have you allowed the MMS ports on your router / proxy / firewall becuase if not then nothing will be able to connect, also check with your ISP what ports they allow and dono't allow!

 

[Texas Heat]

Well, my router was totally disconnected because I tought it might be the prblem. And I guess i'm in the grey area as to how the ISP port openings could affect streaming video. Would it not be logical that every ISP allow streaming video?

 

[chrisds]

it depends as to what ports the stream is using, some ISP's block pear to pear ports possible the video is falling into one of these blocked ports numbers, unsure if it would be a logical thing to ban it could be an accidental ban!