Windows Media Player 11 - Streaming Media Playing Poorly?

SUMMARY: If streaming media files in Windows Media Player 11 start and stop constantly, try this tip.

When playing streaming multimedia content, Windows Media Player 11 buffers (locally stores) a small amount of content before playing the media. As the multimedia is played, more content is downloaded in the background.

WMP buffers a few seconds of content to compensate for breaks in Internet traffic. Thus, if network congestion or other problems cause a two second break in downloading, but five seconds of content has been buffered, you should notice no break in the streaming playback. However, network congestion over 5 seconds will result in the playback stopping, restarting once downloading can ensue.

To compensate for slower Internet connections or network congestion you can increase this buffer size. However, there are two downsides:

* Windows Media Player 11 will take a longer period of time before playing streaming multimedia as it has to buffer additional content.

* Buffering content may increase Windows Media Player 11's memory and/or disk usage.

To increase the buffer size:

1. Press "Alt", "T", and then "O" to access the Options menu.

2. When the "Options" multi-tabbed dialog box appears, select the "Performance" tab.

3. Underneath "Network buffering", click the "Buffer" radio button.

4. Next to this radio button, enter your desired number of seconds Windows Media Player 11 will buffer files before playback (60 is the maximum).

5. Click "OK" to close the "Options" dialog box.