Can't play WMV files with high audio bit rate

Hello there,

First-time poster here, hoping for support. Or that at least the developers see this...

I used to have the MPC-HC installed with K-Lite Codec Pack 1100 Standard. I was able to play these WMV files from a customer, originated from their custom recording equipment. All of the sudden, files from a certain date and on would just not play with MPC-HC anymore. When I opened them on WMV (Win7 machine), they would play normally.

I have just uninstalled that build and downloaded latest (1350) and installed it. Same results, though: old WMV files from my customer play whereas recent ones do not.

I used MediaInfo to inspect both an old and a new file and the only thing that stood out between the playable and non-playable files was the audio bit rate: used to be 96 kbit/s and new ones are all 706 kbit/s. Does anyone know of any limitation, either of MPC-HC or the codec it uses to decode the audio stream in the WMV file, related to high audio bit rates?

Here are the details for one of the files, in any case:

Code:

General
Complete name               : C:\Users\me\Documents\CustomerFiles\70030036.wmv
Format                      : Windows Media
File size                   : 1.41 GiB
Duration                    : 19 min 59 s
Overall bit rate            : 10.1 Mb/s
Maximum Overall bit rate    : 17.5 Mb/s
Encoded date                : UTC 1970-01-01 00:00:00.000
WM/EncodingSettings         : Lavf56.25.101

Video
ID                          : 1
Format                      : WMV1
Codec ID                    : WMV1
Codec ID/Info               : Windows Media Video 7
Description of the codec    : wmv1
Duration                    : 19 min 59 s
Bit rate                    : 8 949 kb/s
Width                       : 1 440 pixels
Height                      : 1 080 pixels
Display aspect ratio        : 4:3
Frame rate                  : 30.000 FPS
Bit depth                   : 8 bits
Bits/(Pixel*Frame)          : 0.192
Stream size                 : 1.25 GiB (89%)

Audio
ID                          : 2
Format                      : WMA
Format version              : Version 1
Codec ID                    : 160
Codec ID/Info               : Windows Media Audio
Description of the codec    : wmav1
Duration                    : 19 min 59 s
Bit rate                    : 706 kb/s
Channel(s)                  : 1 channel
Sampling rate               : 44.1 kHz
Bit depth                   : 16 bits
Stream size                 : 101 MiB (7%)

I guess for the time being I will have to keep using MS WMP to play the new files, but it would be great if someone knew what the issue was and could perhaps suggest a fix or something.

Thanks in advance,

--avionx

Try this:
MPC-HC options > Internal Filters > Enable WMV source filter

If that doesn't solve it, also enable WMA in LAV Audio decoder settings

Admin wrote:Try this:
MPC-HC options > Internal Filters > Enable WMV source filter

This solved! And I did not have to do the other suggested action.

My ignorance on this subject is such that it prevents me to even point to who could be the culprit here, but there we are. Hopefully the right person stumbles upon this and perhaps spreads it and the code ultimately gets fixed someday.

But for me, I am ok with the workaround. Thanks a lot for the help!

--avionx

By default it uses the WMV source filter from Microsoft. Normally that has the best compatibility. This is also what other DirectShow players use by default. WMP uses Media Foundation for playback in this case.