Windows Media Player: How to tell the version?

[famousdavis]

I have an iPAQ 1910 which didn't come with WMP pre-installed on the limited ROM. So, I loaded WMP from the accompanying CDROM into the PPC's RAM.

Unlike most every other piece of software, I can't tell what version of WMP I'm using. I know I can't upgrade to the latest version WMP 9, since that's available only for Windows Mobile 2003 users (and the 1910 isn't upgradeable, not that I would if I could).

There's nothing wrong with my WMP, but if there were a later version that offers a few more features than what I'm working with, so much the better.

Your thoughts?

[Dave Beauvais]

Windows Media Player on my Pocket PC 2002 h5455 has an "About" item on the Tools menu that shows I'm running "Windows Media Player for Pocket PC Version 8.5 Build 12177." Do you not have that menu item?

--Dave

[famousdavis]

Oh, yeah, now I see it! I've got version 8.0. Every other software has a Help, About -- not a Tools, About (with About at the top of the heap instead of the bottom of the heap). Yes, excuses, excuses -- but then, that's the beauty of this forum! :-)

Is there any appreciable differences between 8.0 and 8.5? Is it a download from Microsoft to get to the 8.5 version?

[Janak Parekh]

WMP 8.5 has some performance improvements. However, I don't believe it's available for the 1910. :cry: It isn't that major, but it's nevertheless annoying that HP didn't bother to release an updated version for the 1910.

--janak

[Dave Beauvais]

The biggest addition to v8.5 is support for Windows Media Audio 9. (WM Video 9 support is in the Windows Media Player in Windows Mobile 2003.) v8.5 also improves performance for video playback and background playback of audio.

--Dave

[famousdavis]

Dave wrote:

The biggest addition to v8.5 is support for Windows Media Audio 9.

This is both interesting and puzzling, then: I ripped my audio CD into WMA VBR files using my desktop WMP 9. Then I moved them to my PPC's storage card, and guess what?

My HP1910 plays those files! When I click on the song properties on my 1910, I can see that the codec is "Windows Media Audio 9". So although I have an 8.0 version of WMP on my HP1910, I can somehow listen to audio content created from WMP 9.

Now I did see one oddity in all this: The bitrate shown on my PPC for each song is somewhat higher than the bitrate shown for the corresponding songs in my desktop WMP. Maybe it has something to do with whether you're counting a kilobit as 1000 bits, or 1024 bits (which is why a 256MB storage card only shows up as a 240+ MB card through an Explorer-type program on the PPC)?