Vusion Media Player
Frequently Asked Questions

This page is intended to provide answers to frequently asked questions about the install/un-install process, system requirements, troubleshooting and other common questions about the Vusion Media Player. If after reading this FAQ, you still have a question, please contact us.





Frequently Asked Questions

What is the Vusion Media Player?

The Vusion Media Player is a browser plug-in that significantly enhances the viewing experience of streaming video over the internet. The player enables instant-on and high quality video experience with support for full screen, detached mode and player controls for seeking and selecting subtitles. For additional details, please see why you need to install this player.
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Why do I need this new player to watch a Vusion-powered video?

The Vusion Media Player is significantly more efficient in terms of computer resource usage and provides much higher quality video at similar internet connection speed than other media players. The player also automatically selects the best video quality compatible with the current network conditions and computer resources during the video play. In addition, the player delivers an enhanced viewing experience by enabling TV-like full screen viewing experience while eliminating buffering and pausing so common with other streaming media players.
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What are the supported operating systems?

Windows XP SP2 and later, Windows Vista, Mac OS X 10.4 and later.
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What are the supported browsers?

The Vusion Media player works with most browsers, however the officially supported ones are listed in the system requirements section.
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What are the recommended system requirements?

  • Windows
    • Processor: Intel Pentium 4 or better
    • Operating System: Windows XP or Vista Variants
    • RAM: 512 MB minimum
    • Video Card: 64 MB minimum (128 MB recommended)
    • Browser: Internet Explorer 6.0 or higher, Firefox/Mozilla 2.0 or higher
    • Screen Resolution: 1024x768 or higher recommended, 24 or 32 bits (millions of colors) recommended
    • Internet Connection: Broadband/High Speed (DSL or Cable)

  • Mac OS X
    • Processor: PowerPC (greater than 1.0 GHz), Intel architectures
    • Operating System: Mac OS X 10.4 "Tiger" or higher
    • RAM: 512 MB minimum
    • Video Card: 32 MB minimum (128 MB recommended)
    • Browser: Safari 2.0 or higher, Firefox/Mozilla 2.0 or higher
    • Screen Resolution: 1024x768 or higher recommended, 24 or 32 bits (millions of colors) recommended
    • Internet Connection: Broadband/High Speed (DSL or Cable)
Note: Chrome and IE 8 are supported but with the caveat that these are still beta browsers. On some web sites, you may also need to use the compatibility mode of IE8. Back to Top 

What are the different player controls?

The Vusion Media Player controls are highly customizable, and the folowing are typically supported:

  • Play/Pause: Play and pause are performed by clicking on the same button. Once in Pause state, simply click on Play to resume the playback. The Vusion Media Player suspends the streaming shortly after pausing, thus restoring the bandwidth for other applications.
  • Timeline: Seeking back or forward is easily achieved by clicking on the timeline slider or by dragging it, and the playback will resume almost instantly. Once the time slider is released, the player may not seek to the exact selected time, but rather up to 15 seconds earlier.
  • Fullscreen: In addition to this control, double-clicking on the video will activate fullscreen. While in fullscreen mode, a simple mouse click or ESC keypress will exit this mode.
  • Volume: The volume can be muted or un-muted, and its level can also be increased or decreased by clicking on or dragging the volume slider.
  • Information area: this area indicates the length of the video currently being played as well as the current watching position. When the volume slider is dragged, it displays the current volume level, and when the timeline is being dragged, it displays the time at which the video will play if the slider is released.
In addition to these controls, the Vusion Media Player supports other features, such as; playlist navigation, language selection, subtitle selection and detached player mode.
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Does the Vusion Media Player support the multi monitor mode?

The player supports multi-monitor configuration. To display the video in fullscreen mode on a particular monitor, simply drag the browser window to the desired screen and activate the fullscreen mode either through the fullscreen player control or by double clicking on the video itself. While in fullscreen mode, a simple mouse click will exit this mode.
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Why does my firewall warn about opening ports and prompt to allow or block the player?

The Vusion Media Player uses the standard HTTP port 80 and additional UDP/TCP ports to stream the video over the Internet. Instructing your firewall to let the Vusion Media Player use these ports will help in delivering the best experience. These ports are solely used for video streaming. No private user information is exchanged between your machine and the streaming servers. For additional details, please see the privacy section
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Is any personally identifiable information collected?

The Vusion Media Player does not collect any personally identifiable information related to end-users and has been certified to be a Trusted Download Software by TRUSTe.
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What factors do affect the video quality?

A variety of factors may affect your experience:

  • The quality of the original source of the video.
  • The network connection speed: Please perform a bandwidth test to verify that your broadband download speed complies with the minimum recommended: 1.5Mbps for 480p videos and 2.5Mbps for 720p videos. SpeedTest (no affiliation to Vusion Media Player) is a web-based utility that measures your internet connection speed.
  • The system resources: Ensure that your computer meets the minimum hardware and software requirements
  • The screen resolution: higher screen resolution will provide you with the best experience delivered by high definition video content. These definitions will help you understand what the HD naming conventions stand for and how they are linked to your screen resolution.
  • The power management settings for the laptop computer: The power management limits the resource usage of your machine to conserve power. If a laptop computer aggressively scales down computer resource usage to conserve power, the Vusion Media Player may no longer have enough resources to play 720p video or higher.
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Can the Vusion Media Player stream through a NAT-capable firewall/router?

The Vusion Media Player is capable of streaming the videos through NAT-capable firewalls and routers. It also supports most web proxy servers configured in corporate environments.
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Can I download and watch the videos when not connected to internet?

The video delivery performed by the Vusion Media Player is based around streaming and not around the video download model. This means that watching a video requires being connected to Internet. The added benefit of streaming is that it requires limited storage capacity (see Cache) compared to the space required to download and store large high definition video files. The streaming experience provided by the Vusion Media Player enables instant-on play, instant seeking, audio/subtitle language selection, etc.
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How much storage space is used from my hard drive?

The Vusion Media Player temporarily stores video chunks on your hard drive to enhance the streaming performance, but the video is not fully downloaded to your machine. The maximum cache size defaults to 5% of the logical disk space and can be configured in the Settings Page (only available after the Vusion Media Player installation).
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How much system resource does the Vusion Media Player use?

While the Vusion Media Player resource usage for video streaming is highly optimized, video processing for high definition remains an extremely CPU and memory intensive task that includes decoding, buffering, streaming and caching the video. Once the video is paused, stopped or finished, the computer will be back to its original state. On a few PC or Mac configurations, the resource consumption may still be noticeable when the video is played in the high definition format.
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Installation and Upgrades

Installation instructions

You should be prompted to download and install the Vusion Media Player the first time you land on a web site using it. You will be asked to read and acknowledge the fact that you have read the End User License Agreement. Then, click on the Install button to proceed with the installation of the Vusion Media Player. Once the installation is completed, the video will automatically start playing. The following steps vary on your operating system and browser:

  • Windows XP and Vista - Internet Explorer
    1. Click on Run "WARPVideoInstaller_win.exe" in the File Download Dialog to proceed with downloading
    2. Click on Run in the second security warning that asks whether you "want to run this software"

  • Windows XP and Vista - Mozilla Firefox
    1. If this is the first time installing the player:
      • A yellow bar appears at the top of the browser window informing you that Firefox has prevented the web site from asking you to install the software.
      • Click on Edit Options
      • Click on Allow to add the web site to the allowed list
      • Click close
      • Click once again the Install button
    2. Click on Install Now in the Software Installation dialog
    3. Click on Restart Firefox button to complete the installation of the Vusion Media Player add-on

  • Mac OS X - Safari
    1. Double click on the icon of the downloaded Vusion Media Player installer file in the Safari Downloads window.
    2. Click on Open in the dialog box that mentions that the WARPVideoInstaller.dmg file contains an application downloaded from the Internet.

  • Mac OS X - Mozilla Firefox
    1. Click on the Vusion Media Player installer icon in the installer window.
    2. Click on Open in the dialog box that mentions that the WARPVideoInstaller.dmg file contains an application downloaded from the Internet.
    3. Installer starts installing the player.
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Un-installation instructions

The uninstall procedure varies based on your operating system and browser. Please use the procedure listed for your specific configuration.

  • Windows XP - Internet Explorer
    1. Open the Start menu
    2. Select "Control Panel"
    3. Double-click "Add or Remove Programs"
    4. Find the "WARP Video 2" list item
    5. Click the "Change/Remove" button

  • Windows Vista - Internet Explorer
    1. Open the Start menu
    2. Select "Control Panel"
    3. Under the "Programs" heading, click on "Uninstall a program"
    4. Find the "WARP Video 2" list item
    5. Click on "Uninstall/Change"

  • Windows XP and Vista - Mozilla Firefox
    1. Open the Firefox browser
    2. Click on the "Tools" menu
    3. Select "Add-ons"
    4. Select the "Plug-ins" tab
    5. Click on the "WARP Video 2" listing
    6. Click on "Uninstall"

  • Mac OS X
    1. Open a Finder window.
    2. Click the Home icon (usually has your account name by it) in the Finder window.
    3. Click on Library
    4. Click on Vusion
    5. Click on the uninstallWARPVideo application to uninstall

Upgrade instructions

When a newer version of the Vusion Media Player than the current version installed on your system is available, you may be prompted to upgrade. The upgrade instructions are mostly the same as the installation ones except for the following differences:

  • Non-admin users must have Administrator account access on Windows to uninstall or upgrade the pre-final release, otherwise upgrade may fail when initiated from Firefox.
If you encounter any issue on upgrade, use the following work around:
  • Ensure that all your browsers are closed
  • Perform the uninstall
  • Return to the web site to start a new installation
For detailed instructions on forced upgrade, please refer to WARPVideo2Upgrade.pdf. Back to Top 

Troubleshooting

The video playback is choppy and/or stalling. What can I do to fix it?

Please refer to the factors that affect the video quality.
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The video does not automatically play after install.

In rare circumstances, you may have to refresh the web page just after the install or upgrade to get the video to start playing. If it does not resolve your problem, you may have an antivirus, firewall or proxy that is preventing the download of the video content. Please temporarily turn off these services and try again if you are having problems in the video playback after the install. The Vusion Media Player works with most security applications (anti-virus, personal firewalls, anti-spyware etc) installed on your computer and also web proxies, but certain personalized settings can block video streaming.
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The Vusion Media Player is not displayed on the web page.

The Vusion Media Player uses Javascript, so please make sure that Javascript is enabled in your browser (which is the default). In addition, some versions of the Vusion Media Player rely on Flash and some ad-blocking software may prevent the player from displaying.
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The video plays but not the audio.

Please ensure that the system volume is not muted or at a very low level, and that your speakers are turned on. Setting the player volume control to 100% will at most set the volume to the current system level volume.
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I uninstalled the player but I still see an instance in Firefox.

The player is fully uninstalled once the Firefox browser is restarted.
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The video appears pixelated.

While the Vusion Media Player enables watching high quality video on a standard PC/Mac over a standard Internet connection, there are several factors that can affect the video quality including the quality of the original source, your system configuration, etc.
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Artifacts are shown across the video.

If you see any strange artifacts appear in the video, this may be related to a video driver issue. Please try rebooting your computer so that your video driver gets restarted in a stable state. To prevent any further inconvenience, please also consider upgrading to the latest available stable version of the installed video driver.
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When scrolling the web page, the video area displays elements intermittent from the web page.

Artifacts when scrolling the web page may appear in the video display area. This is typically attributed to the older versions of video drivers and related driver issues on certain operating systems and computers. This issue disappears on a multi monitor set-up. In a few occurrences, getting the latest video driver also fixes the issue.
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