Comments on: Why Doesn't My YouTube Work?

Question: Why Doesn't My YouTube Work?

Hanuman1960 — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 06:01:21 -0800

Why won't YouTube videos play properly on my home computer?

Hive Mind I need your help! I have checked the previous questions for this issue and didn't see anything.

All of a sudden, just since this past Friday, when we try to play a YouTube video from the Youtube site, the sound will play but the video portion won't. But, if I hit the "Pop Out" function tab, it will open a new window and the video will play properly on that!

And this only happens on the YouTube site. I can watch embedded YouTube videos on other websites without any problem. I can even copy and embed a video onto my blog and it will play properly there!

We have an older computer with Windows XP and IE for a browser. The only thing that was different that I noticed when this first started was that YouTube prompted me for my password before it would let me see the video.
My significant other swears that he didn't change any settings and while I'm a little more computer literate than he is, I am stumped as to where to begin to look for the answer.
Any help, in easy to follow instructions, would be appreciated! Thanks!

By: royalsong

royalsong — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 06:06:26 -0800

Run CCleaner and see if that clears up the problem.

Have you updated flash? If not, update it; if you have updated it, try to uninstall and reinstall flash.

which version of IE are you using? Is it in compatibility mode?

By: KogeLiz

KogeLiz — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 06:09:06 -0800

I had some issues with the new flash update in the last couple of days that screwed up youtube.
I uninstalled and installed the previous version and haven't had a problem since.

XP/Firefox

By: overeducated_alligator

overeducated_alligator — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 08:16:57 -0800

I had related Youtube problems after this flash update. I fixed it via a forum poster's suggestion:

- Go to a site that has Flash, like a banner (not a video applet). Nvidia.com has a flash-based site, that's what I used.
- Right-click on a Flash part and go to Settings
- On the leftmost tab, disable Hardware Acceleration

By: wildcrdj

wildcrdj — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 13:31:51 -0800

The only thing that was different that I noticed when this first started was that YouTube prompted me for my password before it would let me see the video.

This BTW is probably because the video was rated "racy" (13+) and we require registration to view such videos.

Which version of IE you're using (in Help->About usually) would help.

This page should list your current Flash version (will look something like "Adobe Flash Player version 10.2.152.27"). Knowing that would help too.

overeducated_alligator's suggestion might help, we've enabled some Hardware Acceleration features for certain browser/OS combos that generally should greatly help video performance but could cause issues for specific setups.

By: Hanuman1960

Hanuman1960 — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 15:56:38 -0800

Thanks overeducated_alligator! Your "fix" seems to have done the trick!

And just to let wildcrdj know, I was not looking at a racy video. I tried several different searches, none of which were racy, and it prompted me for my password each time. Thanks again everyone!