After inserting a DVD into your Windows computer, what you plan is to watch the DVD with Windows Media Player. However, sometimes thing goes beyond your expectation that Windows Media Player won’t play the DVD.
Your Windows Media Player won’t play your DVD for no reason. To help you play a DVD, today, I will tell you the reasons and solutions for your Windows Media Player not playing a DVD.
Hopefully, my suggestions below can get you out of trouble and you can enjoy DVDs on your Windows computer.
Fixes for Windows Media Player not playing DVD:
Method 1: Uninstall and Reinstall Windows Media Player
If your Windows Media Player was capable of playing DVDs and it suddenly goes wrong, try a re-installation. It’s not worthy of wasting time to locate an error specifically.
Follow these:
Step 1
Right-click on the desktop and choose Control Panel. Choose Category from the pull-down list.
Step 2
On Control Panel, locate Programs. Hit Uninstall a program under the Programs tab.
Step 3
Under Programs and Features, click on Turn Windows features on or off. On the new windows, scroll down and find Media Features. Click it and uncheck the Windows Media Player option from the pull-down list. Hit Yes to confirm.
Restart your computer. In this way, Windows Media Player is complete removed from your computer. Then, we may re-install a new one onto your Windows PC. Keep on reading.
Step 4
After the restart, launch Control Panel and repeat the above steps. This time, you should check the Windows Media Player option instead.
Then, Windows will start to download the latest Windows Media Player software onto your PC.
Wait for the download. Once complete, insert the DVD and open Windows Media Player to play the DVD. It should run well.
Method 2: Try another DVD player program
Why Windows Media Player cannot play DVD on Windows 10?
Windows Media Player can play local files, CDs, and DVDs. However, as DVD gradually steps out of our life, Microsoft starts to remove the DVD codecs from WMP on Windows 10 to reduce cost.
As a result, people using Windows 10 complain about Windows Media Player not playing a DVD since Windows Media Player cannot find the right codec from its database to read and play a DVD.
In this case, the easiest solution is to use another media player program to play DVD.
We can find so many media player software in cyberspace, like the famous and popular VLC, PotPlayer, 5K Player. Here, you can use the recommended Aiseesoft Blu-ray Player.
Aiseesoft Blu-ray Player is a universal player software to play DVD, Blu-ray, CD, local files, and ISO files on computers.
- It’s much better than Windows Media Player.
You can only use WMP to play some local files (limited formats), some DVDs (commercial DVDs limited), and CDs. Blu-ray discs and some commercial DVDs can hardly play on Windows Media Player.
But with Aiseesoft Blu-ray Player, such playback failure will never happen to you again.
- Aiseesoft Blu-ray Player aims to deliver you devilishly great video and audio quality.
Supporting 4K/1080P/720P/480p and Dolby 7.1/DTS-HD/Dolby TrueHD, you can watch your DVD, Blu-ray disc, and local movies with HD image quality and crystal clear sound.
- You can play any video and audio files as you wish.
Except for the basic Blu-ray, DVD, and CD playback, Aiseesoft Blu-ray Player can act as your default player software to play local videos and music. Any video formats, such as MP4, H.264/AVC, H265/HEVC, MPG, TS, M4V, AVI, WMV, F4V, MKV, MOV, VOC, are all supported.
- You’re available to build your personalized movie and music playlist.
Similar to Windows Media Player, Aiseesoft offers users the chance to create a personalized playlist for media files, DVDs, and Blu-ray discs. You’ll not be lost on your movie and music collection anymore.
Found it a perfect alternative to Windows Media Player? Click the button below and start to play the DVD on your computer.
Method 3: Update drives on Windows
The outdated DVD, video, and audio drives on your computer may lead to the Windows Media Player DVD playback failure as well. Let’s try to update all these drives on your computer to make it work.
This is how to:
Step 1
On your computer, search and open Device Manager.
Step 2
Locate Audio inputs and outputs. Right-click on the first audio device from the pull-down list and choose Update driver.
Step 3
Select Search automatically for updated driver software. Windows will start to search for the latest available driver for your audio device. Install the drive then.
Step 4
Repeat the same process on the other audio devices on your computer. Then, keep updating all the drives under these tabs: Display adapters, DVD/CD-ROM drives, and Sound, video, and game controllers. The steps are the same as updating the audio driver.
After all the related drives are optimized, you can try to launch Windows Media Player and play the DVD.
Method 4: Convert the DVD as a digital file to play on Windows Media Player
Commercial DVDs have DRM (digital right management) methods to restrict unauthorized access, which is one of the reasons why your Windows Media Player cannot play DVDs.
But, your Windows Media Player cannot play a DVD and it still can play local video files like MP4 and WMV, right?
So, how about stopping to fix the error and focusing on digitalizing the DVD?
Video formats like MP4, AVI, WMV are compatible with Windows Media Player and should run well on it. So are some audio formats like MP3, AAC, WAV.
And here comes the question: How to convert a DVD into a digital file?
The answer is quite easy. We need to use the professional DVD ripper software to rip the DVD movie into your computer as a digital file.
Try this:
Step 1 Download a DVD ripper on your PC
If you have no idea how to choose one, try the popular Tipard DVD Ripper.
As a powerful DVD ripper, Tipard helps you convert any DVDs into a more compatible file to play on Windows Media Player.
For commercial DVDs, Tipard can decrypt those DRM methods and have access to the disc content. And finally, copy the DVD videos and audios and output them as digital files into your computer.
You should never worry about the quality of the output. Supporting 1:1 conversion, Tipard is capable of ripping your DVD without any quality loss at all.
Besides, you’re available to decide the output format. You can choose to convert the DVD movie as MP4, MKV, MOV, FLV, WMV, AVI, etc. As for DVD music, you’re available to choose from MP3, AAC, WAV, and several more.
No more hesitation, click the button below to get it for free on your computer. Let’s start to rip your DVD as digital files to play on Window Media Player.
Step 2 Import the DVD into Tipard
Pop the DVD into the disc tray and launch Tipard DVD Ripper on your computer. Hit the big plus icon on the interface to load the disc into the program.
Tipard will start to analyze the disc and display the main movie of the disc along with available subtitle channels and audio tracks when it completes.
Step 3 Set up for the conversion
Here, let’s focus on several options:
Full Title list:
Since Tipard will only display the main movie of the disc, you may click this option to rip the other available videos (behind-the-scene videos, bloopers, interviews, etc).
Rip All to:
Decide the output format for the DVD movies. If you have no idea how to choose a suitable format for your DVD movie, read here: What is The Best Format to Rip A DVD?
Subtitle & Audio:
Choose a subtitle channel (if there’s any) and audio track for the output.
Save to:
This is the default destination folder to save the DVD movies. You may choose another location that is easier to find.
Merge into one file:
When you rip several videos or audio clips from a DVD, you may choose to combine all the clips into one file.
Step 4 Start to rip the DVD
Once everything is set, hit Rip All to start. Tipard will work to convert your DVD into digital files.
Wait for a while and Tipard will open the output folder automatically when the process is complete. Locate and preview the movies there.
Method 5: Type in DLL codes for Windows Media Player
As Windows Media Player fails to play a DVD, you’re available to enter some DLL codes on Command Prompt to force-correct the error. Try there:
Search and open Command Prompt on your computer.
Then, on the Command Prompt:
- Type in ‘regsvr32 vbscript.dll’ right after the ‘C:\Windows\system32>’. Press Enter on your keyboard.
- New codes appear, enter ‘regsvr32 jscript.dll’ after that. Press Enter to confirm.
- The second new line appears, enter the final codes ‘regsvr32 wmp.dll’ and hit Enter to finish.
Close the panel and relaunch Windows Media Player. See if it can play your DVD or not.