Ancestral Quest - audio file stopped working, help please?

[Elizajb]

Hi All,

A few days ago I realised that I could attach audio files to the slideshow for individuals. So, I tried it out and attached a music clip to each of four individuals to play in the background of their slideshows. It worked beautifully and I was chuffed to bits with it - until this morning.

For some reason I cannot work out, a couple of the audio files have stopped working and I get an error message saying "MCI Error. Cannot find the specified file. Make sure the path and file name are correct." Also another message when the audio file does not play saying "No device".

I have checked the pathways for the files and there does not seem to be anything wrong with them. I can go to the file location on my PC and open and play the files - but, as soon as I try to play them from the slideshow, I get the messages described.

One of my audio files attached to an individual is absolutely fine and playing as expected on a slideshow but some of them just won't connect for some reason.

Has anyone else had this problem before? Or, does anyone know what might be causing this?

I have sent a message to Ancestral Quest, but am also posting here in hopes that the tech minded forum members may know what the problem is. All were working fine yesterday.

Many thanks if you can help,
Regards Eliza.

[Elizajb]

OK - I'm pleased to say that I managed to figure it out for myself after much mucking about. The answer was simple in the end. I have some sound clips in a folder on my computer and some of the ones which I had attached to slideshows I had re-named by adding the name of the relative I had attached it to.

What I found in effect was that the pathways had become too long (possibly something to do with AQ, not sure) and the links would not work. Any pathway that I had not added many more characters to would work as expected, but where my additions (I had also added lifespans to the re-named clips) were a bit long, the soundclip would not play in AQ.

The same soundclips could be played successfully from my  sound clips folder on my PC, but not from AQ.

Another little puzzle unravelled!

Eliza.

[Elizajb]

Last but not least - AQ have replied and said that I could try re-starting my computer (had done so) and that I could also tell the programme which device to use.

So - have now become much more familiar with my tools menu and found that under 'Preferences'  - 'Scrapbook' I can tell the programme to use external players (in my case windows media player) as default player for sound and video.

Now that I have sorted out why I had the problem playing from within AQ, I don't need to change to using the external player but it was good to see that I could do so.

I have updated this post as I can see that it has been read by other 'chatters' so may be of use to others with AQ.

Eliza.