Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Apple Quicktime Bug in Win7 64-bit

This is topic Apple Quicktime Bug in Win7 64-bit in forum Film-Yak at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

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Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 07-19-2011, 06:45 PM:

Using my new notebook computer I've run into a problem trying to get the Apple Quicktime player to work with certain web sites, like Apple's iTunes movie trailers web page. I click the link to download/stream a 1080p HD-quality movie trailer. Nothing appears to happen. However a small error box appears under the active browser window with the following message:

Error 47: Invalid URL. ()

Doing some quick web searching a number of discussion threads appear in various forums, including some at Apple. None of the comments I've seen about the bug offer a solution to the problem. Has anyone here run into this issue?

FYI, I'm using a Dell XP5 L502 notebook, Core i7 2720QM CPU, 8GB of RAM and Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit. I've tried using 32-bit versions of Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox and Internet Explorer. The same thing happens in all browsers.

The puny "automatic"/480p quality trailers will launch on the given movie trailer page. The larger HD quality movie trailers refuse to launch the Quicktime player and stream the trailers.

BTW, YouTube typically has most new movie trailers uploaded in HD quality, either from the movie studio or via others doing copycat uploads. Those are in the Flash Video format Steve Jobs loves to hate. This crap with Quicktime just seems to be yet another thing making me think the whole HTML 5 deal is an unattainable fantasy.

Edit: One work-around I found was right-clicking the HD trailer link and opening it in a new tab. But the URL must end with the ".mov" thing to work.

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 07-19-2011, 11:08 PM:

Can you post a link for me to try?

Also, Apple isn't very good at programming and/or fixing bugs. In fact, HOW DARE YOU not be happy with what you are given from Apple. Yes, that is really how they think.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 07-20-2011, 12:06 AM:

Any of the movie trailers at Apple's iTunes movie trailers web page will show the Error 47 thing. Just go to the given movie's trailer page and click the "watch now" button for the fly-out menu of streaming/download choices. To be clear, the ones that fail are the HD quality links under the "download" section.

I don't know how many Windows 7 systems are affected by this bug, but it seems to be pretty common. Some people are lucky and have Quicktime working normally. Others have the Error 47 thing pop up out of nowhere after running Quicktime successfully previously. My Quicktime installation has been showing the Error 47 glitch from the start.

Posted by Frank Cox (Member # 6258) on 07-20-2011, 01:32 AM:

Maybe VLC will work? I believe it will play most stuff on most platforms.

I don't use it so I can't tell you much about its capabilities other than what's on the webpage. I actually use Totem myself, but that won't be of any value to you.

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 07-20-2011, 04:13 AM:

I'm not sure where "Apple iTunes Movie Trailers" are located. I went to Apple and went to the iTunes page. I do not see any movie trailers. What would movie trailers have to do with iTunes anyway?

Posted by Frank Cox (Member # 6258) on 07-20-2011, 11:25 AM:

Itunes Movie Trailers

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 07-20-2011, 11:47 AM:

That's weird. When I click watch now it plays fine in 480p in Quicktime 7. When I click the 1080p, it instead opens up the gawdawful Quicktime X which is every bit as shitty if not more so than Final Cut X. Quicktime X has absolutely no right whatsoever to exist.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 07-20-2011, 03:44 PM:

I assume you're testing it on a Windows 7 computer, correct? If so, the Quicktime installation on your computer must not affected by the bug.

The Quicktime player app isn't perfect. But it does have a couple of nice things I don't see in Flash Video players. For instance, I can use the arrow keys to step frame by frame (or close to it) through a trailer. Using the arrow keys on a Flash Video window jumps forward or back by several or more seconds. That sucks if you're trying to look closely at certain details in things like effects sequences.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 07-20-2011, 10:47 PM:

Here's a confusing wrinkle to the Error 47: Invalid URL story. The Quicktime movie trailers hosted at the movies section of the Yahoo site behave correctly (for the most part). I click one of the HD choices. It downloads a file named "qtlHD.qtl" Running the file opens the standalone Quicktime player and it downloads/streams the video. As I write this I'm downloading the teaser trailer for the remake-reboot-rehash-regurge of Spiderman.

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 07-20-2011, 11:17 PM:

At least then you can save it, right?

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 07-21-2011, 03:07 PM:

Nope. Gotta spend $30 to upgrade to Quicktime Pro (as if I even need that; I already have far better video editing software).

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 07-21-2011, 05:26 PM:

Quicktime Pro isn't video editing software. Find a way to get the pro version. Being able to save and export and all of that nonsense is great. Granted, if you rarely use Quicktime, it probably is not worth it. As a Mac user it is essential. Fortunately it comes with Final Cut Studio.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 07-21-2011, 08:14 PM:

Some the grayed out features in the Quicktime app suggest it can do a few rudimentary editing things (cut, paste, trim to selection, add to movie). The biggest feature is simply being able to save the downloaded file to the hard disc.

One of the few perks you can do with the free, basic Quicktime player is copy movie frames to the clipboard and paste them into Photoshop. But that's not as interesting as being able to play with the video.

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 07-22-2011, 02:54 PM:

Here's what you do:

-Copy each frame and paste it into Photoshop or After Effects.

-Record the audio as the Quicktime plays to a WAV file.

-Marry the frame sequence to the WAV file.

-Save as a shitty WMV file. Or better yet, MP4 because WMV sucks so much ass. Seriously, it deletes a lot of visual detail even at the highest quality setting. MP4 has this detail intact at even lower bitrate settings.