Windows can cost less than half the price and the only difference is the packaging and the inability to upgrade an existing installation of Windows 98. **For all you people that don't know about OEM purchasing, listen up. My scores are always adjusted by price, so consider that PowerDVD 7 Deluxe at $70 is almost the same price as OEM Win XP Home which can be purchased for as low as $85? I think it would be respectful to change your score and just give WMP11 what you think it deserves.
If someone makes a mistake on the version number or jumps the gun on the release date, don't trash a pretty good program, okay? This is NOT a site that Microsoft manages. This same issue can also cause Explorer (not Windows Explorer) to crash and the fix is the same.
The solution is to uninstall those codecs and use other ones, either a different ffdshow or Divx. Though not really Microsoft's fault, some codecs (ffdshow?) can cause WMP to crash.
If you have a DVD codec installed, WMP11 makes a great DVD player. I remember when earlier versions wouldn't even work properly with third party codecs.