Viewing videos problem

[Blues&twos]

Just over the last couple of days, if I try to watch a Y o u t u b e video in the normal way, I get a blank, black window and no user controls available (play, pause etc), rest of the site and thumbnails display OK.

I can watch the news videos as usual on the BBC website.

I did try rebooting the PC, refreshing the page and downloading the latest Flash player version. I stopped the Flashplayer download as it was taking absolutely forever and therefore it never got onto the actual installation. Is it normal to take ages? Any idea how long Flash normally takes to download?? I'd have been here all night!

Cheers

[boguing]

I had a Flash upgrade notice this morning. OK'd it but it failed. Seemed to work on attempt two, and no problems since then.

Perhaps try another restart and let it take its' time if the nag box reappears?

[Blues&twos]

Thanks boguing

I'll give that a try tonight. I was not feeling so good last night and decided to go to bed rather than wrestle with Flash antil the early hours....

I'll post back when I've sorted it out. Looks like other people have had a similar problems too, so hopefully it'll be a simple download.

[green granite]

In addblock options there is a tick box to ban ads in you tube videos, check that it is unticked.

[AnthonyGA]

The difficulty in watching YouTube combined with the difficulty in completing a download of the latest Flash player together imply a network problem. Maybe your ISP has issues, or maybe your own connection has a problem. Check your modem parameters and see if the line is running at full speed, if you have any tools that allow that.

I had some trouble with my line a few weeks ago with symptoms very similar to yours. A bad connection may continually drop individual sessions and may function at extremely slow speed, producing problems with anything that requires high data rates. If it doesn't clear up in a few days, or if you see indications of problems with the line (abnormally low connection speeds for the DSL or cable modem, noise on a voice line, etc.), contact your provider.

[Mike-Bracknell]

Highly unlikely to be network issues if Flash is having install problems and the majority of Y o u t u b e (which plays videos over Flash) loads correctly.

Flash should take less than 30 seconds to download and install, and the trouble you're having with it indicates this is the root cause.

Try uninstalling it, reboot, then reinstall it.

[Blues&twos]

Right, latest report.

I did nothing except switch it off, go to bed and boot it up again this evening, and now it's working perfectly again.

The wonders of computing.

For those who are interested, I was having no other problems associated with internet usage, speed was apparently normal. Other videos (presumably not using Flash) played perfectly. The weird thing was that the YT thumbnails/stills would display fine, but when clicked-on, the user controls which are normally available underneath it the YT screen (play, pause etc) did not appear. The screen stayed black.

Thanks for the suggestions!

[Pelikal]

I've been having the same (apparent at least) issue as the OP. If I click on a thumbnail on the YT home page, the video plays fine. All the iplayer stuff plays fine on the major channels.

If I do a search, like a did for Concorde, I see the thumbnails but when I click I just get a black screen with no controls. So can this be a solely Flash issue? Happens with Chrome and FF. Why just on a video I find through search?

Silly question but do I have to have an account with YT to use search? Used search before with no issues.

Many thanks.