DirectRT 2006 (I know, I know) videos not playing properly (case 12379)

[overbeck]

Hi--
I'm trying to run a directRT input file in 2006. The file includes 14 embedded .avi videos; I've confirmed in Windows Media Player that these play fine. However, in DRT (whether launched through MediaLab, as intended, or directly in DRT), the instruction (~) line appears on the screen consistently but the video just flashes briefly either at the start or at the end of the instruction presentation. The video is supposed to play for several seconds but almost looks like a barely-supraliminal flash.

We have confirmed that this problem occurs on multiple computers.

I'm supposed to run this in 2 hours!! Help?

Will attach .csv. Apparently I can't attach the .avi though, so not sure you can test properly?

Thanks,
Jeninstructions.txtPlease enter your UnID..txtsosens_input_modified.csv

[jason_reed]

Hi overbeck,

Could you send me a copy of the dxdiag file for the computer having this issue? If you have never made it before, click the Start button on the desktop, type dxdiag in the Search box, run the dxdiag.exe program and save a copy of the dxdiag.txt file it produces.

[jason_reed]

You should also try to put all of your video files into a folder named stim that you put in the same place as the rest of your DirectRT files. You would then change the way you reference the videos in your input file from _videos/EMWfemale18happy.avi(288x288) to EMFfemale18happy (288X288). In other words, you should try your input file by getting rid of the the videos/ folder and the .avi references whenever trying to call up the movie files.

[overbeck]

Jason, here is the file. I'm also trying your other suggestion right now. Thanks.

Hi overbeck,

Could you send me a copy of the dxdiag file for the computer having this issue? If you have never made it before, click the Start button on the desktop, type dxdiag in the Search box, run the dxdiag.exe program and save a copy of the dxdiag.txt file it produces.

[overbeck]

Hi again.
I thought I'd figured this one out, but it appears not. When I launch my DRT program, the first screen should be instructions. Last time I tested this, a) we had to set screen resolution to 800 x 640 to get anything to happen; b) about half the time, the screen that should have been instructions was blank. I would go in and reset the position parameters from 0,0,1 to .2,.2,1 and try it; it would fail again; I'd set it back to 0,0,1 and then it would run. But only for a couple of trials and then it would fail again.

Today, I'm not even getting that, but most of the time the first screen simply has the phrase "instructions.txt" appearing in the middle of the screen. It will respond to a spacebar pres, which is the keystroke programmed for the instructions line in the input file.

Note that I have changed the videos folder to a stim folder as you suggested, and I've changed the video file names in the input file to remove the .avi and the folder path reference. However, I retained the "_" because without it, DRT treated those file references as .bmps. Having made these changes, now I see no evidence of the videos at all--no flash, as I saw before; just nothing.

Help!!!

[overbeck]

It is awfully difficult to try to debug--I don't know whether to expect a reply or not and I have limited access to this lab...

[jason_reed]

As a next step, I would suggest that you install a trial copy of DirectRT 2012 on one of the computers to see if that works. It could very well be that a computer running Windows 7 may not be the most compatible with the 2006 version of DirectRT; have you had problems similar to this using DirectRT 2006 on a machine with Windows 7? You can download a copy and send for the license code as normal, but be sure to ask for a free 21-day trial code in the email to service@empirisoft.com

Also, are the other machines with the same problem also Dell Optiplex 790 computers with Radeon brand video cards?