Windows Media Player / Realplayer Sound Problem

[waveydavey]

Hi I don't know if anybody out there can help me. I have a problem with the sound quality when playing DVDs on Windows Media Player or Realplayer. DVDs which used to play ok before have suddenly started sounding like they were recorded underwater. CDs and music MP3 tracks on my hard drive still play ok however.

If I use Power DVD the sound is still ok so I don't think it's a hardware problem. Problem happens on both legitimate and not-quite-so-legitimate DVDs all of which worked ok until last week.

I received a Realplayer update last week but I'm not certain if the start of the problem coincided with that or not.

I'm on an Acer 4710 laptop with Windows XP Pro. Windows media player is version 11.0.5721.5230 and Realplayer is 11.0.2. I use Creative external speakers.

Any of you clever folk out there have any ideas?

[LivinLOS]

Has it downgraded from 5.1 to stereo ??

Or outputting 5.1 and your only getting left and right of the 5.1 channels ??

Need a lot more info about your speaker setup etc.

[waveydavey]

Has it downgraded from 5.1 to stereo ??

Or outputting 5.1 and your only getting left and right of the 5.1 channels ??

Need a lot more info about your speaker setup etc.

Hi, Correct - After doing some more searching I finally found the advanced speaker setup options and it had changed the dialog (but not the audio!) setting from 5.1 to 'laptop speakers'. Definately nothing I've deliberately changed myself so presumably it was the Realplayer update.

Anyway, it sounds much better now. Thanks for the help, much appreciated.