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1. The "VO: Comment: Requires ROOT privileges" is apparently for information only,

I don't even get that line. I just get "killed" I use gentoo, frequently updated

Are you using the -v flag to get verbose messages? Without that, the "VO: Comment..." message won't appear. You can also use "mplayer -v -v" to get extremely detailed messages. As long as I'm writing again, I meant to mention one other difference between RH7 and RH8 in my last message: In RH8, I get the following two lines: libdha: DHA kernelhelper failed: No such file or directory libdha: DHA kernelhelper failed: No such file or directory These don't appear on RH7. Doing some searches on this list, these messages seem to appear for other people during successful playback, so I'm not sure it has anything to do with my problem, but it's one more difference between RH 7 and 8. -- Damian Increasing The Entropy Of The Universe Since 1972