Media Player and Realplayer failure....

[Rossgr]

Quite suddenly Windows Media Player and Realjuke box are both refusing to play Mps, giving me a error message to the effect that my sound card is already in use so they cannot access it.
I have no conflicts or yellow exclaimation marks showing in Device manager. I can play CDS just not MP3s.

System is a single 400Mhz Celeron (at default speed)/ 64MBs mem in a ABIT BP6.

Yesterday, I opened up the case cleaned the fans and put some thermal grease in place of the pad that came with my heat sink. BTW, I am running about 10C cooler. If it were not for the fact that I can play CDs fine I would suspect a hardware issue but it seems that the sound card is fine. There has been no change in drivers, and I do not believe any new software has been installed, (Any way that is what my teenager tells me).

Anybody got any Ideas?

[Paleo Pete]

Only thing I can thik of is reinstall the sound card drivers, or remove it from Device Manager (in Safe Mode) and reboot, let Windows find and install it again. Safe Mode will let you see all sound devices and remove them, not just the current version.

Still might not cure it though...

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[bassvax]

Is it possible that both have been told to be the "default" media player? This work pc has both installed and there is somewhat of a battle going on in here also. I would try ensure that just one is set to default and even go as far as to disable either of them upon start-up. If both players have library list coming from the same file name (playlist) I would remove the playlist from one and disable the option where you can have the media player automatically search for all media (especially the mp3's in this case) upon opening. And the auto-play option for that player. Just a suggestion. I agree with you that it doesn't sound like a hardware problem.

[Big T]

Hello from Honolulu!!! This is my first time posting here.It sure is nice
to be on "shore duty" for a change.This problem almost seems like mine,but
mine is a little different.For the last 10 months,both my window//real
player worked until yesterday.Now only my windows media player work.My
system is defaulted to real player.My sound card is good.I checked ALL
of my settings,and all are good except for my vortex sound blaster pro
emulation,where is says--this device can't find any free IRQ resources
to use.I tried to change its settings but IT WON'T LET ME! My computer
sounds are gone.All my volume controls are sat.I am welcome to any advice.
Thank You.