Desktop computer suddenly refuses to play videos

[JDgreen227]

Yesterday my Dell 530 quit playing YouTube videos...it might show ten or 15 seconds of a video and then lock up and freeze, or it won't play one at all. It works fine otherwise, and the signal it is getting from the wireless DSL router is 48 to 54 mbps. My laptop indicates a signal of 54 mbps and plays videos just fine although it has integrated graphics, while the desktop has a dedicated video card. Any ideas? Thanks.

[MossRoad]

Do you ever do any maintenance to that computer, like disk cleanup or defragmenting the hard drive?

[Soundguy]

i'd check video drivers as well.

[boggen]

would look at the video player, quick time, flash, vlc, media player, you have some program installed that allows videos to be played within your browser. firefox and IE, if ya click around the top on the menu bar. to get to "options" then there should be a tab that displays "applications" or some such, that will list a bunch of file types, and what program plays what. example .pdf files are normally assigned to adobe reader, wmv might be assigned to media player. i honestly do not know what file type youtube likes to use.

clear the cache of your internet browser, and restart computer, and see about getting updates to drivers, and to any video applications you might have.

[DFB]

I had that problem before too...clearing the cache and then a restart straightened it back out. One time I kept getting a prompt that it woudnt recognize flash player so I reloaded flash.

Whats really getting me nowadays is Sony music having the rights to so many videos, has blocked them and you cant see them anymore here in the US!

[orezok]

How full is your hard drive? If it is close to capacity, it will "hang".

[JDgreen227]

Thanks for the replies...do have some answers: Memory is maxed out at 4GB, Hard drive is 320 GB and not even 15% full, I always clear the cache and browsing history before shutting the computer off. I never store anything except digipics and being the only user, I know there isn't a lot of useless junk stored on it from another person. I run disk cleanup about every other month but there is almost never any space gained.

Thanks to all for the suggestions....I will check to learn if there is a driver update for the video card (1 GB Geforce 9500) next and see what results from that.

Umm, Cigar Face....saw your tip after posting this. Have Kaspersky ISS installed and it runs regular scans and they always come up clean. Thanks for the heads up, I should have mentioned the ISS sooner.

[edlegault]

De-install Flash and then download current version and re-install.

[kw22614]

i'd check video drivers as well.

De-install Flash and then download current version and re-install.

I agree, try these 1st.

[JDgreen227]

I agree, try these 1st.

Reinstalled both Flash and Video drivers today...no fix....grrrr.