Archive through August 14, 2002
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TV ClubHouse: Archive: USA 2002: All Things Technical for BB 2002 (computer stuff): RealPlayer 8 suddenly asks for password and won't log in?: Archive through August 14, 2002

Justin42

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 08:09 am EditMoveDeleteIP
Hi all-- before I go grovelling to Real for help, maybe someone's seen this. My dad and I are both huge BB3 addicts, and yesterday, all of our machines (mine at work and home, and his at home) said we had to log in to access BB3 feeds.

Both of my computers took my password fine and I've had no trouble with the feeds, but his computer sends him into an endless loop -- he logs in, the password is accepted, then he gets the same screen that you have to log in to access BB3.

We've checked and his account is fine (paid up, etc).. has anyone seen this, and how do you fix it?

(this is using RealPlayer 8 Gold on Windows 2000)

Thanks!

Flyonthwall

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 10:40 am EditMoveDeleteIP
I'm in that same loop too!

Started yesterday again today.

I'm on Real 8 and Win/ME

Paid for feeds too!

Let me know what you find out please!

FLy

Flyonthwall

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 10:52 am EditMoveDeleteIP
okay I forgot what Draheid said about clearing out the cookies on Real.

Go to Tools/preferences/ from that window click on the "clear history" button.

Then close it.

Then restart Real
I had to hit the stop button during the loop to get that sign on screen.
From there I clicked already a subscriber.
It opened a new box where I could sign in.

I signed in and then restarted Real.
It worked.

This took me several times.

Draheid...If you have any tips here or if I'm saying this wrong will you correct me?

Thanks, and hope this helps you too Justin!
FLy

Justin42

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 10:53 am EditMoveDeleteIP
Well, I sent an email on his behalf to Real tech support. What is so strange is that both my machines are using RP8 with no problems-- must be something that got corrupted somewhere.

I was going to try uninstalling and reinstalling RP8 when I go over there to do more troubleshooting-- have you tried that?

Marie

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 12:10 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
ME TOO!!!!
Don't uninstall/reinstall, save your energy! I'm in the SAME endless loop and have been in it for five days. I posted on another thread about it a couple of days ago

../10972/1039357.html?1029298316

I have already tried all the generic solutions (clear cache, files, etc.) My brand-new install of Real One isn't corrupted and I still can't maneuver past that sign-in loop.

I, too, have emailed Real One but all they send back are the generic solutions, the ones that start "Make sure you are connected to the internet..." They won't answer the question.

Yesterday my ISP, Comcast, sent me a new modem by UPS because they are upgrading their modems and I had a very old one. (This is part of their modem-upgrade program and had NOTHING to do with me asking for one, or anything like that! This was due to happen anyway!) I thought FOR SURE that the new modem would eliminate my troubles, but after I installed it, BB feeds still could not be reached because of that endless sign-in loop that brings me nowhere.

While I'm sorry for your Dad, I'm kind of glad to find someone else with the same problem. Maybe we can work together. As I said, Comcast is my ISP, what is your Dad's? (I called them but they don't have the foggiest idea what I'm talking about). I live in Maryland, how about your Dad? Maybe if we can find something in common we can figure this out.

I'll share anything I can find out with you.

Draheid

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 12:17 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
I'm sorry folks. I can't seem to duplicate the problem. I just this minute loaded all 5 feeds and got the streams almost immediately.

Here's a thought. Try loading RealPlayer, then load explorer or netscape and go to the Real.com website and log in ... THEN go into RealPlayer and try to get one of the links I posted in the other thread.

Maybe you just experienced momentary glitch with the authentication servers, Fly. Not sure. As I said, I can't duplicate the problem so I don't know what to say...

Marie

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 12:33 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
I can't log in, period.
This is what's been happening for the last days (seems like weeks): Maybe the info about the Real window, below, will tell you something.

When I try to get in directly from RealPlayer or the Real site, I get the endless loop.
When I try to enter it from the CBS site, I (sometimes, not all the time) get a small file download idenified as "account" or "signin". Then it puts up a small Real window with an arrow moving back and forth to simulate action. It says "Contacting RealNetworks to continue setup..." Then the next window says "Service Unavailable. We're sorry. RealOne Service is temporarily unable to sign you in. Click "Retry" below to attempt to sign in again or "Cancel" to start using your RealOne Player. Please note that premium features and services are not available if you have not signed into RealOne."

I've seen that window 500 times since Saturday. Sometimes I can be in the loop and not see it, if I start from the Real page. I've been through the loop 1000 times. Maybe more.

Draheid, you are so great trying to help with this thankless task!

Marie

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 12:42 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
Flyonthewall says "it opened a new box where I could sign in." That box is what ISN'T opening for me, THAT BOX IS THE KEY! Probably what Justin42's Dad can't reach/open, too.

Instead it opens the "Service Unavailable" box as described above.

Draheid

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 12:46 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
Marie: A couple of things.
1st, Have you tried to connect to any of the other content on Real with your player?
2nd, Have you tried requesting your login/password be sent to you to verify your login.
3rd, Do you, by any chance, have some sort of proxy setting that SHOULDN'T be there? (Check the internet settings, proxy settings, etc. to see if maybe something is incorrectly checked that shouldn't be.)

Let me know.

(I'll be checking this thread for a while until we get SOMETHING working! :) )

Choopyaz

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 01:07 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
I am getting the same thing with RealPlayer 8 on a Macintosh. boot real player, get a splash screen that asks me to log in, log in is succesful and real player shows same log in screen again. since this is happening on both macs and windows i'm thinking real.com has something wrong at their end, n'est pas?

Draheid

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 01:16 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
Choopyaz: Unfortunately, I'm on Windows/XP so I can't speak of the Mac. I did go into Real and sign out just to see if I could sign back in and it went through just fine for me. I am still stumped with this, but I'm sure we'll work it out somehow.

Have you tried some of the suggestions above, Choopyaz?

Marie

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 02:18 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
LONG-DISTANCE CALL TO REAL TECHNICAL HELP FIXED MINE............

I'm hearing mine now thanks to a 25-minute phone call with RealOne technical help. Just got off. While I'm convinced it is a problem they caused, the fix had to be done on my end. He led me through many places, even a visit to the dreaded Registry. Whatever this problem is, you won't be able to fix it yourself by the usual tricks because it resides deep inside places we don't usually go.

I was trying hard to keep up with him so I forget everything we did, but it took a long, long time. He knew what he was doing, but I could tell they haven't had many complaints of this nature. Because his first reaction wasn't "Oh yeah, this again, here's what we do..." And it wasn't "Oh we've been having trouble with the server..." (Don't let anyone tell you they are having trouble with the server, because they're not.)

So for me, the solution was their Technical Help people. You will have to pay for the phone call, though. Their area code is 206, which is Seattle. But it was worth it for me, there was simply no other way out. Even though they're okay for now, I'm afraid to turn them off, fearing I won't get back on and will be lost in that migraine-inducing loop again. They must have done SOMETHING on their end to have caused this among our little group, but I'd advise not just waiting them out. They're not fixing anything on their end, servers are not down, etc.

Justin42

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 02:41 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
Marie-- did you have to change anything in the registry? Or did you just have to read them info? I have been digging around on my dad's computer (I do network administration for a living, so these are places I go on a daily basis :) and had some leads but nothing that I could tweak to work. ANYTHING you remember could help. Was it "only" changing something in the registry that fixed it? Was it a number, or a filename, or ?? (not trying to bug you, but hopefully jar something in your memory)

My dad's on Road Runner (which I am too at home, and our university network at work). So the ISP doesn't appear to be the problem.

hrrm... anyone else with the problem (who's actually in front of the computer with the problem) want to call their tech support and stall them enough you can write really detailed notes? ;) I'm glad to hear it's fixable, though!

Marie

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 03:07 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
I jotted down a couple of notes as he talked...Hang on, let me see if I can reconstruct....I'll be back!

Marie

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 03:50 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
I did not actually change any Registry values by hand, he had me doing things, then checking to see if they were showing up in the Registry. First thing I did was backup the Registry.

He had me uninstall/reinstall Real One without going through the Add/Remove programs and without doing a new download. I know how I started (pasted the Setup file from the RealOne Player folder (in the Real folder) to the desktop) but I can't remember the exact steps and order of everything else I did. I just remember snippets. It involved going back and forth between what I was doing on my computer to the Log-in Here! page at RealNetworks...he kept me awfully busy for the full 25 minutes.

Let me try to reconstruct it in my mind again...just didn't want you to think I wasn't worried about your Dad! I'll be back.

Draheid

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 03:52 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
...tapping toes, waiting for this oh-so-valuable information so that I might interpret it and pass it along as needed! Meanwhile, jumping for joy as that Marie is again watching the hamster race! :)

Justin42

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 07:20 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
Hi all...

Well, not much new on this end. I am in front of my dad's computer trying to figure this out and not thinking the tech support staff working at 7:30PM are worth trying to call. Plus, I am using RealPlayer 8 (RealONE hosed his computer pretty bad!) and I doubt they would 'allow' me to get tech support for that.

To clarify, I *DO* get a screen that lets me type in his username and password-- and it accepts it and re-launches RP as expected! but instead of watching dancing hamsters, it throws up the "you must be a member" thing again.

I did a *VERY* thorough uninstall and went crazy finding any last piece of Real that was left over anywhere (registry, etc).

There must be some corrupted registry key that doesn't have an obvious name that whatever steps the tech led Marie through reset.

Marie-- did he have you type anything? Or was it just clicking around, installing, changing settings, etc? Or were you at a DOS-type prompt? (Sorry if I am being pestering, I just am really confused by this one)

I guess if worst comes to worst I can try the RealONE install again and have him call support in the morning.

Marie

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 07:47 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
I've got to warn you, I'm sure this does not follow the steps in order that he led me through. But looking back, I cut out all the "dead ends" we found. This is how I'd summarize what we did. You have to get rid of the corrupt Registry stuff. Not fun, I know. The way I figure it though, the worst you can do is have to restore your Registry (back it up first!!, see below for how to do that). I almost hate to post this.....

What this method did was get rid of old, corrupt Registry entries, reinstall RealOne player and give me another shot at reaching the sought-after log in page during setup. He had me first do the usual of disabling Norton Internet Security, and deleting temp files. Don't do the delete from IE. Do it this way:
Start-Find-Files and Folders - "Temp" (no quotes) It will produce a long list, the one you want should be right at the top, a folder named TEMP, located in just plain C:\WINDOWS. Never mind about any other temp files, that's the one to delete for this. (Right click it, select, Delete.)

Okay, here we go: (BE SURE, I'm NO expert!)

1.) Copy setup icon from within Real Player folder, (which is inside Real folder in Program Files) by right-clicking on it, selecting Copy and paste it to your desktop by right clicking on your desktop and clicking Paste. The setup box icon should now be ON your desktop.

2.) Open Registry by clicking Start-Run-type "regedit" (without the quotation marks) The Registry Editor will open.

3.) Backup Registry (select Edit-Export Registry, name it Backup, and save it. It saves to My Documents by default.

4.) Expand the + sign in front of the first thing on the list, HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT

5.) You now want to Delete RealOne: To do this, scroll down to Software open Software by clicking the + sign, then highlight RealNetworks, then delete it. Click OK or whatever it asks you to confirm the deletion. Close Registry Editor.

6.) Now you want to Reinstall RealOne: Return to desktop and click the Setup icon. You will be reinstalling the whole Player again. You'll have to decide about the preference things to decide what level of installation you want - Express or Custom. If you chose Express and don't like it you can always fix things later the way you want them.

7.) Proceed through their Wizard. The LAST TWO STEPS are the IMPORTANT ones where it connects to RealNetworks and opens the log-in window. This is the window that always said Sorry, Service temporarily unavailable. Now it SHOULD open. And you can log on there. Then go to the Big Brother "subscribers Log in here" thing on the Real One Home page and click it. If all went according to plan, this should do it.....I'm so sorry if it doesn't.......

..........If it doesn't, and you want to get things back the way you had them before, go to My Documents and find the little icon that says Backup Registry. It's blue and looks like a bunch of little squares all stacked up together. Double click it. Something may come up asking you if you want to restore that Registry, say OK, and you'll be back where you were before you started reading this post.

I'm crossing my fingers.....

Choopyaz

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 07:49 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
I just tried downloading realone for mac OSX and trying it, as opposed to realplayer 8. i have a partitioned disk with OSX and all its native apps and guess what? it does the same this as the realplayer 8 version. i can't see how it can be a corrupted file in two totally separate pieces of software using completely different operating systems. real.com is messed up somewhere.

Marie

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 08:02 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
That's exactly what I thought because I had downloaded a brand new Real Player two days ago for this problem. And it still gave me the loop. I did the uninstall through Windows the way you're supposed to. Whatever was corrupt remained in the Regsitry, and the new one glommed onto the same corruptness when I installed it. Today the guy told me I had to first get rid of the remnant that was in there before I could install "clean".

Marie

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 08:05 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
Here's a thought, not sure what difference it makes with a partition. In Program Files, go to Common Files and make sure there's NOT a folder in there for Real. Delete it if there is and try the reinstall again.

Justin42

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 08:07 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
Marie-- thank you VERY much for posting all that. Sorry to report that I followed it to a T and it's still not working. :( :(

I wonder if Choopyaz is right and a bunch of accounts got corrupted to various degrees-- and when people call to complain, they reset something on their end while giving you a runaround while it takes effect.

What is *very* strange is this computer works fine accessing the CNN NewsPass and other subscription-only things. It seems like something is REALLY whacked out somewhere.

Fuddyduddy

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 08:28 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
Justin, don't know if this is revelant to your problem (or rather your Dad's) at all, but here goes...

I downloaded Realone for my Mac (OS X) back in July, but was having lots of problems. Finally called tech support the other day to complain and he told me some "things" had been fixed to make the beta version work better. Told me to go to CBS.com and sign into BB3 there.......it now works like a charm!!!!! (Evidently the urls I had been using were for the PC's!)

You have the buttons available to you on the browser and you just click the camera feed you want, and it opens up in Realone........(the buttons will not appear on your Realone screen)

I complained to him (after profusely thanking him for helping me get everything working) that altho I had gone to the help site and tech support online, that I never found instructions on how to make my version work. That they should put something up on their site to explain this.

Hope this helps!!!!!

Justin42

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 08:30 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
Ok, here's some more info:

I booted the system into safe mode and pulled out EVERY file that RealPlayer installs. I then put back the files from a backup from early July (from slightly before BB3 started), and nothing changes. Granted, this didn't change my registry at all, but since I had purged it 2-3 times of Real entries tonight, I don't think that's a big deal.

I have a feeling some of our accounts got tweaked in the last 48-72 hours, and it may take slightly different steps to clear us up. I am a bit concerned about calling tech support and telling them I am trying to use RP8, I am SURE they will blame it on that.

Did anyone else have to re-log in earlier this week but it WORKED? (I am trying to figure out what is different between my account and my dad's, except his is out of free trial and mine is still in trial [I called up about another issue and they added time which expires next week])

Marie

Wednesday, August 14, 2002 - 08:32 pm EditMoveDeleteIP
Justin42, as long as it didn't HURT anything! That's what I was really worried about. Well, plus all the time you wasted. That is very suspicious that the other subscription pass things work fine. Disturbing, really. BB 24/7 is all I have, and it's the first time I've had them, so I don't know anything about getting subscription video from Real. Nothing seemed right about this crazy loop stuff from the very beginning, and even more so now. Choopyaz has even a more impossible situation, it seems. I don't know what to think anymore. I STILL haven't seen a log-in screen since the first run of the new install. I put them on my Real Favorites list this afternoon. I open Real Player, click Favorites, and pick a camera. I STILL don't know if I'll get shut out and not be be able to get a log-in screen. I've NEVER seen a log-in screen the ENTIRE time I've been viewing feeds, even when these worked fine the first time around I accessed them by just clicking on Favorites. Is that normal???

Do you go through a log-in procedure each time when you view the feeds?

I know the hell I went through these last five days so I know how sick to death of it you must be. Your poor Dad!