• Get Assistance!
• Help with Orders, Shipping
• FAQ
• ATLAS.ti version 4
• Troubleshooting
  • Problems with Multimedia Documents
• Reporting a Bug
• Support Center

Problems with Multimedia Documents

Last changes: June 24, 2004

Problem: Unable to Assign or Play certain Audio/Video Primary Documents

Version: The information in this article applies to: ATLAS.ti 4.2.61 and ATLAS.ti 5.0

SYMPTOMS

• Certain multimedia files are not listed when assigning primary documents.
• Multimedia documents can be assigned to a hermeneutic unit but when you attempt to play a file or any quotation referring to parts thereof (e.g., .qt, .mov, .mpg, .au, .snd, or .mp3), you may receive an MCI related error messages: (e.g., MMSYSTEM281) instead

BASICS

ATLAS.ti uses the Multimedia Control Interface (MCI) to play audio or video files. MCI is an integral part of the Windows operating system. Microsoft's PowerPoint uses the same technology when embedding audio or video files in a PowerPoint presentation. Note, that the Windows Media Player (WMP) is a different type of software. If an audio or video file plays fine with WMP, it does not need to play with software relying on the MCI technology

CAUSE

The problem occurs if either MCI support is not available for the type of files you want to process, or if the installation of a third-party party program, such as Apple QuickTime for Windows, DVD player, Video editing software makes modifications to the [mci extensions] section in the Win.ini file. These modifications are sometimes done very carelessly and overwrite settings other programs are dependent on (ATLAS.ti, MS PowerPoint 2000, etc) . The [mci extensions] section determines the driver that the audio/movie file format uses. The media player built into ATLAS.ti uses MPEGVideo, which itself uses a "driver" named mciqtz.drv (or mciqtz32.dll on Windows XP or Windows 2000). If this driver is not available as a file, or any setting relating to this driver has changed, the problems occur.

There is an easy way to determine whether the problem you experience is indeed related to insufficient MCI support:

1. Click the Windows Start menu, choose Run
2. Enter MPLAYER or MPLAY32.EXE and click OK
3. Load the file in question into the MCI based media player which will open

If MPLAY has the same problems you are on the right track.

To solve this problem for Windows 9x or Me, follow these steps (steps for Windows XP or Windows 2000 follow):

1. Click the Windows Start menu, select Run.
2. Enter Sysedit to open the System Configuration Editor.

Note that you have to make any modifications with greatest care or you might not be able to start Windows again (in the worst case)!

3. Select the System.ini window, go to the [mci] section, and then look for the following lines of information:

[mci]
AVIVideo=mciavi.drv
MPEGVideo=mciqtz.drv

4. If any of the lines are missing, type the line as shown.
5. Select the Win.ini windows, go to the [mci extensions] section, and then look for the following lines of information:

[mci extensions]
avi=AVIVideo
qt=MPEGVideo
mov=MPEGVideo
mpg=MPEGVideo
mp3=MPEGVideo
au=MPEGVideo
snd=MPEGVideo

6. If any of the lines are missing, type the line as shown.
7. Click Save on the File menu, and then close the System Configuration Editor. You need to restart Windows in order to apply these changes.

If all the references are correct in the System.ini and the Win.ini files, you can assign and play an audio/movie primary document correctly within ATLAS.ti.

To solve this problem for Windows XP or Windows 2000:

XP and Windows 2000 do not make use of the old INI files anymore. All such settings reside in the central database for all Windows related functionality, the System Registry.

1. Click the Windows Start menu, click Run.
2. Run Regedit to open the Registry Editor.

Note, that changes to the registry, if not done with greatest care, may corrupt your Windows installation!

3. Before making any changes to the following keys, save these keys via the Export menu function.

The corresponding key in the system registry for defing the association between the driver alias name and the actual driver is HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\MCI32

Entries under this key resemble very much the entries in the SYSTEM.INI file described above for Windows 9x.

It is very unlikely that you need to add an entry here. Driver alias MPEGVideo or MPEGVideo2 should already be listed and refer to the driver file mciqtz32.dll

The corresponding key for defing the association between a multimedia file extension and the driver alias is HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\MCI Extensions

Entries here resemble the entries in the WIN.INI file as described above for Windows 9x.

If there is a file type missing for which you need MCI support, e.g., a Quicktime "mov" or "qt" file, all you need to do is to create a new entry under this key and enter the appropriate values.

1. Open the context menu on the MCI Extension key and select New -> String Value
2. Rename the newly created value name to "mov" (without the quotes)
3. Double-click the new entry to enter the actual value: MPEGVideo (or another alias associated with driver mciqtz32.dll)

If you have done everything correctly you should be able to assign and play the newly entered file type in ATLAS.ti (which you need to restart after those changes to the registry).

Note: you may still not be able to play the files, as there are more "variables" to be tuned for multimedia files. One is teh issue of so called "codecs" (compression/decompression drivers) which determine how such files are correctlly processed. If you received the multimedia documents from someone else, it is not guaranteed that your computer has the neccessary codecs installed.

Please refer to this excellent article about PowerPoint handling multimedia which matches the way ATLAS.ti handles such files: http://www.soniacoleman.com/Tutorials/PowerPoint/multimedia.htm#How