Search Support

Avoid support scams. We will never ask you to call or text a phone number or share personal information. Please report suspicious activity using the “Report Abuse” option.

Learn More

Youtube not working, clean firefox, clean windows

  • 5 replies
  • 2 have this problem
  • 2 views
  • Last reply by cor-el

more options

I have clean (just installed) Windows 7 N Ultimate SP1 and only AMD display drivers and firefox installed, nothing more. No addons, no plugins, no flash, no sync activated yet, no any configuration and youtube is not working! I tested from both, normal and safe firefox work mode. Nothing. In both cases I'm getting "An error occurred. Please try again later." message (see screenshot). I had the same problem before I reinstalled Windows. Youtube actually stopped working maybe month ago. With other browser (chrome) everything was working fine. Do you have any idea why is this happening? There are some errors in web console but I'm not sure this is the problem. As I said everything is on default.

I have clean (just installed) Windows 7 N Ultimate SP1 and only AMD display drivers and firefox installed, nothing more. No addons, no plugins, no flash, no sync activated yet, no any configuration and youtube is not working! I tested from both, normal and safe firefox work mode. Nothing. In both cases I'm getting "An error occurred. Please try again later." message (see screenshot). I had the same problem before I reinstalled Windows. Youtube actually stopped working maybe month ago. With other browser (chrome) everything was working fine. Do you have any idea why is this happening? There are some errors in web console but I'm not sure this is the problem. As I said everything is on default.
Attached screenshots

All Replies (5)

more options

hello, you seem to use a windows version that is shipped without support for some media formats that firefox depends on to play-back those files - please refer to the following article & see if this helps: Fix video and audio problems on Firefox for Windows N editions

more options

So Firefox now depends on Windows codecs, is that what you're telling me? I thought this codec problem was solved with Cisco h264 implementation plugin, everything was working fine just a month ago without extra codec packs. What's changed now ? I was thinking that the point of html5 usage was to run away from third party video implementations which include drm and other closed crapware. How does it works on Linux anyway, no M$ codecs over there ? Thanks for answer anyway, but I'm not satisfied with proposed solution :(

more options

On Linux you need GStreamer support (media.gstreamer.enabled = true) to make the HTML5 media player work with MP4 files.

The OpenH264 codec is currently only used for WebRTC (Hello) and not for playing videos on web pages.

You always need native OS support to be able to play media files with the HTML5 media player. You may have used a Flash based player if it worked previously.


Clear the cache and remove cookies only from websites that cause problems.

"Clear the Cache":

  • Firefox/Tools > Options > Advanced > Network > Cached Web Content: "Clear Now"

"Remove Cookies" from sites causing problems:

  • Firefox/Tools > Options > Privacy > "Use custom settings for history" > Cookies: "Show Cookies"

Start Firefox in Safe Mode to check if one of the extensions (Firefox/Tools > Add-ons > Extensions) or if hardware acceleration is causing the problem.

  • Switch to the DEFAULT theme: Firefox/Tools > Add-ons > Appearance
  • Do NOT click the Reset button on the Safe Mode start window

Modified by cor-el

more options

@cor-el I can't agree with your about this "You always need native OS support to be able to play media files with the HTML5 media player." I just tested it with Google Chrome HTML5 player is used by default and video plays just fine. Yes I know they are including proprietary codecs and who knows what else but video is working without native OS support that's my point. If Firefox is already using proprietary but open sourced h264 plugins, why those plugins can't be used to play video without OS support as well?

Anyway on Firefox 31 ESR youtube is working without extra codec packs but only in low res. If someone interested you can get it here https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/31.7.0esr/win32/en-US/.

more options

Google Chrome comes with own built-in support to play MP4 file unlike Firefox that relies on native OS support. Google Chrome also comes with its own version of the Shockwave Flash plugin (Pepper based). So you can't compare browsers.