Question OC ...

OC:

When you go to page 33 and click on one of the video covers in the ad, do the previews play?

Please let us know, this may help us get to the bottom of your problem!

No Luck

Thanks for coming to my rescue Joe. I went to page 33 and clicked on several of the ads and got the same error message: "Acrobat has encountered an error while playing this media clip." Congratulations on a great magazine, Joe, and thanks for the help. Standing by...Tom Lee.

Okay, next question ...

Okay, next question.

If you click this link, does the video play?

It Plays

Good morning Joe. Yes it plays using Quicktime. A Great video, by the way.

Okay ... that tells us what we need to know

Okay, then the problem is something to do with Javascript security settings in Adobe Reader. The problem with Adobe is when their software has problems, they squelch it and it's like pulling teeth to get any info on the issue or any possible fixes.

We're finding the rich media in Adobe Reader either works great - or for it few people it is completely buggy and unreliable. Out of almost 15,000 downloads now, we've heard from maybe 50 people with problems. And then there's the 78 MB download that's a total put-off to dial up folks.

So for the light version that we're working on, we'll set it up so all the media will play through a browser - since that seems to solve most of the Adobe problems. The Lite Edition should also be much more dial up friendly at 19 MB instead of 78 MB.

In short, if you are on Broadband, you can try the Premium Edition of the magazine and it will probably work for you. But if it doesn't, the Lite Edition almost certainly will because we'll use the browser for all the rich media part.

Also, the Lite Edition will be the one you'll need to download if you're on Mac OS 10.5 or Linux, since it only will require Adobe Reader 7+.

Thanks for your help OC. We should have a Lite Edition that works for you and everyone else who can benefit from this option by next week.

Thank You!

Thanks for the personal attention, Joe, I appreciate your help. This is a great product and I'm eager to see the February edition! Tom Lee

Joe, I have similar problems

Joe,

I have similar problems on my laptop -

Windows XP service pack 3 - complete new installatinon just a month ago

Inter Celeron M 1,4 GHz, 504 Mb RAM

I have the latest version of Flash. Using Firefox 3.0.5.

Have deleted the norwegian version (9.0.0) of Adobe Reader and installed the english 9.0.0 without any changes.

I get a black first page, grey videos on page 10 and 99, but do hear the sound, and yes, the videos on page 33 is ok, so is the quicktime 3d spins.

I will send you some schreenshots when I just get to downsizing these pictures a bit so I am able to send them to you.

But else the MRH is great!

Similar Problems

Knut,
I first read the November MRH newsletter on my laptop, a Toshiba Satellite P4-3.06GHZ 512MB RAM, ATI graphics, running Windows XP PRO w/SP3, using Firefox 3.05, Adobe Reader 9.0 and Adobe Flash Player 10.0.12.36.
The newsletter worked perfectly and was a good read.

Then suddenly it didn't work any more.

To make a long story a bit shorter, at Joes request I wiped my system clean and started from scratch, installing the absolute minimum software to view MRH on my system.  To my dismay the newsletter still didn't work and December didn't work either.

I checked version numbers to be sure I had the right software installed, even though I'd just finished doing it...after all the Rich Media Newsletter HAD WORKED on this computer already!
Everything was as it should have been.

Because I had installed the downloadable software from my own downloads on the backup partition on the laptop's HDD...  I always download files to my storage drive if I can so I have the installer handy if I need it.  New versions get grand fathered in, so to speak.  I decided I needed to verify the integrity of the installs I had used.

So I started from scratch again and began downloading all new versions of the minimum FREE software required to run MRH smoothly.

Then I started testing installations again.  

To again make a long story a bit shorter.  What I discovered was the install file I had for Adobe Flash 10, while the right version and proven working with some other flash on the web, would not play the rich media content in the newsletter.  The new version of Adobe flash 10.0.12.36 that I downloaded and installed played the newsletters flawlessly, the same newsletters on my storage drive that wouldn't work before.

I can only say the installer was faulty, IMO.  Joe seemed to agree that it was possible.

The main thing is.  Unless you start from scratch it is in my opinion, very hard to "un-install" a windows program and have it actually be GONE, unless you are using system cleaners registry cleaners etc.  And even then... so I don't prescribe to the uninstall re-install idea when it comes to system changes.

It's hard to say where your issue lies.  It's likely that something you have downloaded for free is conflicting or perhaps like me one of the downloaded and installed programs was not 100% so it caused an issue?

The only real answer or solution lies in starting with the bare minimum, loading only what you need to view the newsletter and verify that your system can view the newsletter at that point, if it can't then perhaps there is something about the hardware/software interaction that is at the root of the problem?  At that point your guess is as good as mine.

 On a robust properly configured system I know now that MRH works just fine.  I installed all of my software that was originally installed and I am reading MRH without a problem other than the Dallas and Alchem ads were a bit glitchy, but I got them to play, as I believe they were intended.

Jeff solved the problem

Jeff had a simple solution that solved my problem

Thank you all for your kind help

Jeff's fix

Yes I saw that too.  If I run into problems again I'll try that first for sure. 

Thanks.

It Works!

Jeff's solution worked for me too. I downloaded Flash Player using IE instead of Firefox and that fixed the problem. Thanks Guys. Tom.