flash issues with Mint [SOLVED]

[gn2]

It might not be installed, seems it's not part of a default Mint 8 installation.
My mentioning it was because of experience with an older version, things seem to have progressed.

[dsimpson]

Hi
I removed pulseaudio, tried an embedded video and it played through, went to youtube and tried the same video and it played for about 48 seconds restarted and it played for 1:12 then stopped again. I then went back to the webpage that hosted the embedded video and it failed at 48 seconds and just sat there with the buffering circle going. after about 5 minutes which I let it sit there was still no video. Video I viewed was on the Jorge Cruise website and is the first page that comes up. Am at a loss again.
Some things of note, I was able to view the video once when I first removed pulseaudio and rebooted firefox, I then did an install in firefox of downloadhelper (an addon) and rebooted the whole system (not just firefox) after which it was back to where it was before. Just tried again to make sure and it failed at 50 seconds time.

[dsimpson]

I agree that it is a problem, but I hope it won't truly always be one, and until then I will continue to attempt to get a working system. I really don't like spending hours trying to get flash to work, but the alternative (Windows,Mac) doesn't appeal to me at all. I left windows about 6 years ago and haven't regretted it at all with the exception of some problems, most of which I have been able to find a fix for from someone in the forums, which is one reason that I wouldn't go back to windows. I think that I must have a different interpretation of "success" and windows and mac can keep their success, I am happy with Linux. Besides, I don't think that all the problems experienced in Linux is a fault with Linux, but attributable to Firefox/Mozilla code being slanted towards MS & Mac with only limited support for Linux.
Oh well, I am patient, maybe the answer will come for my system and my flash problems. Thank you.

[rich_roast]

Besides, I don't think that all the problems experienced in Linux is a fault with Linux, but attributable to Firefox/Mozilla code being slanted towards MS & Mac with only limited support for Linux.
Oh well, I am patient, maybe the answer will come for my system and my flash problems. Thank you.

Just to clarify, problems regarding the flash plug-in lie firmly on the shoulders of Adobe, the corporation responsible for it, and who do not release sources. Mozilla foundation release their source code and support GNU/Linux in a way that Adobe never will, and I'm also not convinced that the code they release is optimised for any particular OS, although I'd be interested if you've heard contrary.

On a side note there is an open source project called gnash which is a standalone and plug-in sfw player, but it's still pretty sorely lacking in functionality and will probably always trail Flash.

As an aside, it's almost doable to go without Flash. If anything the absence of garish advertising is a benefit (also achievable through domain blocking, I know, but actually removing the software entirely nails the advertising with no margin of error, of course); videos may be downloaded quite readily from major suppliers like Youtube and Google (here's hoping they don't move to stop that); Flash games are terrible and quite replaceable by decent local ones all available through synaptic (kidding a bit here, if you like Kongregate or whatnot I suppose that is a downer)... Well, OK, I realise that there are circumstances where you just need Flash to enjoy a given website's embedded media or uploader plugin, but fwiw I've always felt that Flash and its massive and quite unnecessary popularity, propagated in large part of course by web developers rather than web viewers, have been a canker to the Interwebs. Bit of a rant, I know, but I've never liked Macromedia, Adobe, or their buggy player.

[dsimpson]

Thank you rich_roast for your input. You mentioned gnash, I don't have that installed or enabled, and also had questions about swfdec-gnome, which is a stand alone viewer, and swfdec-mozilla which is a plugin for Macromedia Flash animations. What are the functions of these programs and can they be installed and tried alongside flash plugin free and adobe flash or will any or all of these programs cause a conflict in one or more of the others? I have tried downloading flash video but it is a pain when it goes right and my preference would be to view embedded video on the site. As I stated I also have problems viewing youtube videos on their website, so until the videos are playable I will continue my quest for a resolution.

[rich_roast]

so until the videos are playable I will continue my quest for a resolution.

That's the spirit!

I think gnash and its plugin can be installed alongside flash; you then just pick which one to disable from Firefox's addons menu. This is the first I've heard of swfdec, so all I can advise is to try them out, checking with Synaptic revealed that none of these actions will remove Flash. I know that gnash works with Youtube, but performance may not be as good as with Flash (as I recall, the video controls were a bit funky when I last tried it).

[dsimpson]

Yeah, guess I will play around with them this evening, all that can happen is that I will have to remove them again, but it is worth the try. If I had the money to put into it, I would maybe try a newer Nvidia graphics card to see if that might work. Really hard to justify putting good money into my old computer, so that will be the last thing I might try.

[dsimpson]

Made all the changes I was going to try, swfdec mozilla and swfdec gnome, plus gnash but nothing seems to have helped, am still at the same place I was before. What is the best way to download flash video for viewing in mplayer or movie player, I need to be able to see some of the videos someway. Flash still dies out after a couple of minutes and won't play any longer and I have tried video downloader resources (from firefox exten's) and that didn't work, the format of some videos was wrong, swf or something like that as it was saved by the download program. Still need help.

[gn2]

I use this for downloading net videos:
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/8189

[dsimpson]

Thanks gn2, downloaded and found out it isn't compatible with firefox 3.5.5, so am back to square 1 again. The other video download add-ons don't seem to work well, will download and then stop, I have to click pause, then resume to finish downloads, many times more than once, but will continue looking and experimenting.

[gn2]

Strange, I have Media Converter 1.0.3 working fine with FF 3.5.5.

[Missed]

Has anyone seen this?

http://flavio.tordini.org/minitube

It may be a solution to the problem. It is a stand alone downloader and player.

Another option could be Miro.

[dsimpson]

Thanks you for the suggestion, downloaded and installed minitube but can't get it to play on my computer. It loads the thumbnails but won't run. It was worth a try though.

[dsimpson]

Okay, the ideas have seemed to stop flowing, so I will throw out this question. Could my flash issues be somehow tied to a failing graphics card? I have one that is going out now, the print and graphics causes lines to run across the screen leaving shadows of dark areas against the white or light background. I was just wondering if somehow this might have a negative effect on my flash download issue? Any thoughts on this or has anyone experienced something similar.

[rich_roast]

Graphics card / driver issues will certainly have a detrimental effect on Flash performance and quality; because of compositing issues with the radeon driver + compiz I get flickery overlays streaming video using embedded flash players (bits of the menu will flicker in and out of the video), and flash can sometimes take a while to get going generally. Performance varies from site to site, the old stalwarts Youtube and Google are least problematic, whilst sites with modded flash players prove more troublesome. As for games, some just don't run well enough to be playable.

Of course, none of this should affect merely downloading data of any sort, including audio/visual media.

[dsimpson]

thanks for the information. Now, to go off topic. I am in need of a new graphics card, and got GForce 8400 nvidea card but it didn't fit the AGP slot, I guess my motherboard is too old, a Pentium 3 Intel. My old graphic card fits into the agp slot and is divided into 5 basic group of contacts with slots between each, the new one I purchased has 3 groupings without all the slots to line up the card and cannot be inserted into my agp slot. I am wondering if my older P3 can be fitted with a newer agp card? Is this a type 1 AGP card? I did have a ATI RAGE 128 VR AGP card in another old computer, it is working and allows me to get online to post and do any other browsing but is also very limited and I wanted to upgrade to be able to use the advance graphics to run compiz effects and such. The vga card is listed as NV10 Nvidea, the mother board is Intel 82840 840 [carmel] . Any ideas on what graphics card might work in this system?

[rich_roast]

thanks for the information. Now, to go off topic. I am in need of a new graphics card, and got GForce 8400 nvidea card but it didn't fit the AGP slot, I guess my motherboard is too old, a Pentium 3 Intel. My old graphic card fits into the agp slot and is divided into 5 basic group of contacts with slots between each, the new one I purchased has 3 groupings without all the slots to line up the card and cannot be inserted into my agp slot. I am wondering if my older P3 can be fitted with a newer agp card? Is this a type 1 AGP card? I did have a ATI RAGE 128 VR AGP card in another old computer, it is working and allows me to get online to post and do any other browsing but is also very limited and I wanted to upgrade to be able to use the advance graphics to run compiz effects and such. The vga card is listed as NV10 Nvidea, the mother board is Intel 82840 840 [carmel] . Any ideas on what graphics card might work in this system?

The card you purchased is PCI-E, or PCI Express. I should know because I fell into the same trap backasswards a while back, when I upgraded a mainboard and processor, hoping to salvage the AGP card from my old system only to find it wouldn't fit in the new slot.

I doubt there are any northbridge P3 boards with PCI-E slots, but Google is your friend in this instance.

That's the limit of my knowledge. When I last upgraded mainboard and processor the expense was just about absorbable into my student's account. (Well, it took some creative double book keeping but it got done.) I'd advise this route if possible, you'll want the newer kit to complement your shiny GPU.

Happy New Year, what ever happens -hic-

RR

[dsimpson]

I will take that all into consideration on my next shopping trip, I live about 120 miles from the nearest large city so have to plan out my trips to the city. But yeah, thanks for the happy new year expression, it is always a great year when we have helpful people posting on these forums, so Happy New Year to you also, even though I celebrate mine later than you do.

[dsimpson]

Hi everyone,
thanks to all who helped with information, I really appreciated that. I have finally gotten the issue solved, thought I would tell what was causing the problem. I have been going through the possible causes, it didn't respond to any of the software changes or tweaks, next checked out the OS and nothing there, video card and finally started to check out the modem and router. Modem speed was as it should be so went back to my old router to give that a try and everything works right now. I had installed a newer router, a Belkin-N and when I contacted my satellite provider they said that some Belkin routers had problems with the way they handled the information packets, and suggested that I try bypassing the router. That seemed to work so I thought I would try my older router, a Belkin54G and when I plugged that in everything worked fine again. It has taken a long time to resolve this, mainly because of my lack of knowledge but also because I worked at it very systematically and slowly to make sure that I understood what I was changing and how it was all working. Anyway, I finally have a working system, and thanks to all again. Duane

[rich_roast]

Hi everyone,
[...] a Belkin-N and when I contacted my satellite provider they said that some Belkin routers had problems with the way they handled the information packets, and suggested that I try bypassing the router. That seemed to work so I thought I would try my older router, a Belkin54G and when I plugged that in everything worked fine again. It has taken a long time to resolve this, mainly because of my lack of knowledge but also because I worked at it very systematically and slowly to make sure that I understood what I was changing and how it was all working. Anyway, I finally have a working system, and thanks to all again. Duane

Good going!

Thanks for the heads up regarding possible problems with Belkin-N, I have a 54G myself which I've been quite happy with and was planning an upgrade and, while I don't have a satellite connection, so might not be affected, I might still think again and research what others have had to say about it. This sort of information is good to share, thank you.

Also, I think that's the right way of going about debugging, as much patience as it might require. A lot of the time people want a quick, direct fix without necessarily understanding what it is they are changing or what other parts of their system they might be affecting. It is better to be systematic, rule out possible causes in a logical manner and learn about your system while you do, in the long run.

Congratulations!