Why can’t I watch videos on my computer?

“Why can’t I watch videos on my computer?” This is a frequently asked question recently. In some cases, every time when trying to play a movie on the computer, the users can hear the sound but cannot see an image. In other cases, some will get this error message “You need to upgrade your Adobe Flash Player to watch this video” when trying to watch some videos on YouTube. But why does this problem happen and how to view videos on the computer correctly?

When seeking an answer for “why can’t I watch videos on my computer”, first restart your computer and play the video again to see whether you can watch it correctly. If not, keep on trying the following steps.

Sometimes, some missing or corrupted system files will stop you from playing your desired videos correctly. For Windows XP computers, you can directly use the Windows built-in Windows Disk Manager tool to check for file system errors and bad sectors existing on the hard disk. To check your drives, perform the three simple steps here:
1- Double click “My Computer”, right click on drive you want to check and select Properties
2- Click Tools tab and “Check Now” under Error-checking option
3- In popping-up dialog box select the “Automatically fix file system errors” or/and “Scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors” to automatically check & fix file system errors/bad sectors

If the problem still happens and you still cannot watch some movies, you can try the following steps:
* Click on the Windows Start button and then click the “Run” option. Now, type “CMD,” and then click the “OK” button to continue. The MS DOS window should now appear with a blinking cursor.
* Type in this command: “msiexec /unregister” and then click the “Enter” key to continue.
* Type the code: msiexec /regserver followed by “Enter” one last time. Now, you can check to see whether your install job works or not; at this point, the installer should now have unregistered and registered in a work manner.

Fourthly, to fix the “why can’t I watch videos on my computer”, just take a look at the program that triggers the error and see whether it works compatibly with the computer. Also, go to the manufacturer’ website, check for available update and install them all. Sometime, the outdated version will cause the appearance of this computer error. And in some other cases, the error message will happen when there is something wrong with the program showing the error; that is, a corrupt or missing file related to program will stop it from running correctly and then display the error message. At this time, you can simply uninstall and reinstall the program on your computer. This will refresh all the associated files on the PC with brand new one and solve the problem at most of the time.

Lastly, you will fail to watch some videos when there is something wrong with the file on your computer; hence, you can easily register them. To register a specific file into the registry, you can simply perform the steps below:

* Click Start and then Run.
* In the open box, type the following command, and then click OK to continue.
RegSvr32 filename
Note: where filename is the name of the file specified in the message.

Then, you will soon receive a message stating that the file is now correctly registered. Try running your player again to see whether it is running properly. However, if you receive a message telling that the file is not registered, you can try another workarounds. But in my opinion, if you do not have enough knowledge to perform this task, do not register the file manually by yourself as it may bring in more serious problems to the computer just like openal32.dll error and other related errors. And it is best that you can download and run a computer optimization tool just like Advanced PC Tweaker to do the job for you. It will thoroughly scan your whole computer and help you register all needed files quickly within clicks.

Still cannot watch videos on the computer? Want to run your computer correctly all the time and watch your desired videos/movies without an error? Just follow the solutions here and you will be able to instantly solve this computer error by yourself.