i need help playing video on my computer. i need this in laymans terms.

my prob;
when i try and download video, say of a preview of ghost recon, off of IGN.com, it wont play properly, i can hear sound, but the video is choppy to the point of being useless. i currently use some version of realplayer. i am willing to delete this and start over. i am using Windows 2000 Professional. someone pls walk me thru the necessary steps to get this fixed. BTW, some video plays fine(porn, not that i ever watch it, honest), but anything large, seems to have problems.

Open RealPlayer and on the top menu (or right-click on the RealPlayer screen) and hit "tools", then "preferences". There should be a white box list of categories on the left, and the right side changes depending on what category you hit on.

For general file playing, first hit "hardware" in the left-hand box, set the Playback Performance and Video Card Compatability sliders all the way to the right (if they aren't there already).

For choppy web-based movies, make sure "chache on-demand streams" and TurboPlay is checked, and at the bottom is "More options", where you set your buffering time. Set it to some-longer-amount-of time. Mine is set on 30 seconds for example.

Also you might try to update RealPlayer, if your copy is old.
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I would start by uninstalling Realplayer and install Real Alternative.  I can't stand Realplayer.  It's too fat and too invasive.  Personal preference, of course.

www.codecguide.com/download_real.htm