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(FIXED) How to watch Amazon Prime Video on Windows XP


sdfox7

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A while ago I discovered that Amazon Prime Video stopped working on Windows XP. Attempting to open it in Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox fails with "Unsupported Operating System."

Additionally, spoofing the browser as Firefox 53 or newer on XP will then tell you that Firefox is missing a DRM component.

However, today I discovered that Amazon Prime Video works perfectly in SeaMonkey on Windows XP. Using SeaMonkey forces Amazon to use Silverlight, and it works flawlessly!

This is very surprising to me since Silverlight has been mostly deprecated across the web. I'm surprised Amazon Prime Video is compatible with it.

To download Silverlight 5.1.50907 (the final release), you can download it from my FTP here: http://sdfox7.com/xp/sp3/EOL/Silverlight5.1.50907.exe

To download Sea Monkey 2.49.4, you can download the full version on my FTP here: http://sdfox7.com/xp/sp3/EOL/SeaMonkey Setup 2.49.4.exe

primeuos.jpg

primesm.jpg

Edited by sdfox7
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As I'm sure you're already aware, the official Pale Moon web browser has no support whatsoever for EME and CDMs needed by Amazon Prime (and other similar services) on modern OSes and recent browser versions...

However, it includes an Amazon Prime Site-Specific-User-Agent-Override (SSUAO) to force the service to fall-back on the Silverlight NPAPI web plugin;

general.useragent.override.www.amazon.com;Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; rv:45.9) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/45.9 (Pale Moon)

It can be even simplified to

general.useragent.override.www.amazon.com;Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; rv:45.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/45.0

The @roytam1 PM forks (NM27 built on Tycho, NM28 built on UXP) carry on this same SSUAO and can be run in XP|Vista; as I have no paid access to Amazon Prime, would you be so kind as to check how NM(27|28) fare on AP on XP?

Amazon Prime site checks, among other things, the NT part of the client's UA and barfs when it's < 6.1 (= Win7); My gut feeling is that if you install a UA-changer extension on Google Chrome 49 (with Widevine installed) and fake an NT 6.1 OS, AP would work in GC+Widevine...

Likewise in FxESR 52.9.0, you should install both UAcontrol+User Agent JS Fixer addons (as Fx does not support SSUAOs) and again fake a Fx 45 on Win7 user-agent... Please post back the results of your tests... :rolleyes:

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It looks like Amazon.com has corrected or made changes to allow Silverlight to work again (it was supposed to) on Amazon.com; previously an error would be returned.

On 9/16/2018 at 2:01 PM, VistaLover said:

The @roytam1 PM forks (NM27 built on Tycho, NM28 built on UXP) carry on this same SSUAO and can be run in XP|Vista; as I have no paid access to Amazon Prime, would you be so kind as to check how NM(27|28) fare on AP on XP?

You do not need to pay to use all Amazon video content that requires DRM.  Instead of trying to watch the main video, view the trailer if it is available.  The trailer has the same requirements as the paid streaming videos.

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VistaLover said:


Likewise in FxESR 52.9.0, you should install both UAcontrol+User Agent JS Fixer addons (as Fx does not support SSUAOs)



Just wondering, when did FF stop supporting it? Or could it be it works again when using only the native prefs and disabling all UA addons?
Because in K-Meleon I noticed a very similar extension as UAcontrol was actually highjacking the native pref "general.useragents.override", rendering it completely useless, even when modified manually in aboutconfig. Which caused a lot of misunderstandings and confusion because no one realized it. About site-settings I only know the native FF-prefs (...websitehere.com) work fine in K-Meleon too.
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To clarify, FF does support the general.useragent.override pref. But Basilisk, PM, and Roytam's builds of those also support prefs of the format

general.useragent.override.www.amazon.com

... so you don't need an add-on to send a different user agent string to www.amazon.com than to everyone else. That's what VistaLover was referring to as SSUAOs.

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  • 4 months later...

I managed to get Netflix to work on XP SP3 with FF esr 52.9 by installling Silverlight

with the useragent overide instead of using 6.1 to say you got Win 7 could we not use 7.1 or 8.1 to say we have win 8 or 10

has anyone got the DRM button to appear in FF esr 52.9, i had tried to no avail

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6 hours ago, DrWho3000 said:

with the useragent overide instead of using 6.1 to say you got Win 7 could we not use 7.1 or 8.1 to say we have win 8 or 10

Microsoft's version numbers make no sense. Vista is 6.0, "7" is 6.1, "8" is 6.2, and "8.1" is 6.3.

With Win 10, they put the numbers back in sync, so 10 is indeed 10.0.

But at present there's not much reason to spoof a later version of Windows than 7, er, 6.1. That may change, though, when Win 7 EOS arrives next year :(

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  • 2 months later...

i tried doing a general.useragent.override.www.amazon.com

with Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; rv:68.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/68/0

with all the the other mods i partially get to Amazon Music but get a white splash screen saying

.......................................................

Playback Disabled

Please enable playback settings for your browser.

.........................................................

it seems Amaxon can still dig deeper into your browser/PC

i'm sure I did get onto it once before

also on prime video I getDigital Rights ErrorYour web browser is missing a digital rights component.
In your web browser's address bar, type about:addons, press Enter, and then on the left, click Plugins. For the Widevine Content Decryption Module, select Always Activate, and then refresh the video's page and try watching the video.

.

is Primetime Decryption different to Widevine ??

yet I ve the Primetime decription activated and widevine in the folder yet it is a no go

how do i get the widevine to appear in firefox addons and activated

the version I have of widevine is 1.4..8.903 and 1.4.8.1008

 

Edited by DrWho3000
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On 4/26/2019 at 6:26 PM, DrWho3000 said:

also on (Amazon) Prime video I get:

Quote

Digital Rights Error: Your web browser is missing a digital rights component.
In your web browser's address bar, type about:addons, press Enter, and then on the left, click Plugins. For the Widevine Content Decryption Module, select Always Activate, and then refresh the video's page and try watching the video.

is Primetime Decryption different to Widevine ??

yet I've the Primetime decription activated and widevine in the folder yet it is a no go

how do i get the widevine to appear in firefox addons and activated

the version I have of widevine is 1.4..8.903 and 1.4.8.1008

Amazon Prime videos use DRM (Digital Rights Management), that is full encryption of streams. 

Adobe Primetime was/is a deprecated (not valid anymore) CDM (Content Decryption Module), whose only current use is by Windows XP users to enable h264/aac (patented video+audio codecs) decoding for HTML5 media playback inside Firefox web browser. No media delivery service uses Adobe Primetime for the purposes it was originally made, that is to decrypt DRM'ed content!

99% of services that offer encrypted audiovisual content (Netflix, Amazon, Spotify and many other media portals like national TV sites all around the world) rely on the Widevine CDM (currently owned by Google) ; Widevine module is closed-source and connects in real-time (during media playback) to specialised licence servers (equally owned by Google) to acquire decryption keys.

Google updates the Widevine modules and lic servers very often and the browser vendors have to follow close; unlike Adobe Flash player plugin, which can be updated independently from the browser, a certain browser version (be it Firefox or Chrome) can only support a certain type (called "interface") of the WV CDM; this is because support for a specific "version" of widevine is coded inside the browser's own code; updated versions of the CDM can't/won't work with older browser versions. Widevine in Firefox is being updated as the browser itself is (i.e. newer versions come with updated Firefox builds); in recent Chrome versions, one can manually update the module to the latest - but still supported - version via "chrome://components" internal page...

In what concerns Widevine CDM and Windows XP, these two are indeed incompatible in the case of Mozilla-type browsers, because the CDM is coded in such a way that it only looks for (patented) decoders in the OS via Windows Media Foundation framework (WMF), a Windows feature that first appears in Windows Vista SP2; this is why the Mozilla devs have hidden the Widevine CDM from appearing inside about:plugins when the OS used is Windows XP! Even if you made it appear back (which would've required modifying the browser's code and recompiling), it would be totally useless under XP! (if Widevine were open-source, it could have been patched to look for decoders elsewhere, but, sadly for XP users, that's NOT the case!).

In the case of Widevine CDM PPAPI in Google Chrome, there the module uses the patented codecs bundled with the browser, but the versions of Widevine (1.4.6.xxxx to 1.4.8.xxxx) supported in Chrome 49 (last WinXP compatible) are now severely outdated and will be denied access by licence servers; as such, they are simply not working anymore!

As of this writing, minimum supported "version" of Widevine CDM, of any type (NPAPI/PPAPI), is 1.4.9.xxxx (version 1.4.9.1088 to be revoked at the end of May) - to my knowledge, no browser under XP has support for current valid Widevine versions!

(Under Vista, the only browser that I know of that supports WidevineCDM is @roytam1's Serpent 52.9.0 (very recent builds), thanks to a gallant effort by the Moonchild team to restore partial support for WV v1.4.9.xxxx in official Basilisk; support for the next generation of WV ("interface" 10, versions 4.10.xxxx), currently in place in Firefox Quantum, is not there yet, so at the end of May Serpent's WV support under Vista+ may become broken, too...)

For those that may want to read more on the WV subject:

https://github.com/Feodor2/Mypal/issues/26#issuecomment-456969027

https://github.com/MoonchildProductions/UXP/issues/962

Edited by VistaLover
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damn I was hoping there just "might or maybe" a way of installin widevine cdm or have WMF reckonised

i have got in FF browser already there

media.decoder-doctor.notifications-allowed;  string

MediaWMFNeeded,MediaWidevineNoWMFNoSilverlight,MediaCannotInitializePulseAudio,MediaCannotPlayNoDecoders,MediaUnsupportedLibavcodec

media.gmp-widevinecdm.enabled;true      boolean

media.gmp-widevinecdm.visible;true        boolean

all set to default

i did try to initialise the webGL but no go, (unless this is for these 3d graphics cards)

I did hope in some way there would be a round this

thanks for clarifying this, so stuck with Primetime decryption

going here https://www.youtube.com/html5

i got all the ticks in blue so have 264 html5 webm etc

I have shockwave/flashplayer ,, shockwave for Director ,, silverlight ,, Windows Presentation Foundation ...Microsoft® DRM ..

Windows Media Player Plug-in Dynamic Link Library ...  OpenH264 Video Codec provided by Cisco Systems, Inc.

as plugins

can Directshow be used instead of WMF ???

Edited by DrWho3000
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On 4/26/2019 at 11:22 PM, DrWho3000 said:

can Directshow be used instead of WMF ???

NO, as far as the WidevineCDM (or, in fact, the browser itself) is concerned; I thought it was clear in my detailed analysis...

Stock Firefox browser (on XP or other Win OS) can't access media codecs via Direct Show (which is intended for a subset of Media Players); had that been the case, you wouldn't need going through hoops while installing and enabling Adobe Primetime CDM to achieve HTML5 MP4 playback on XP...

And in the very remote possibility someone patched the browser to give it access to Direct Show filters/codecs, as stated, the WidevineCDM would still NOT WORK!

I kindly ask that the "XP" people quit beating the dead horse that is Widevine on XP -_-; I empathise totally; pretty soon, us - very few - still on Vista will be in the same boat... :( In any case, if anything new crops up, I'm sure it will be shared...

Edited by VistaLover
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4 hours ago, VistaLover said:

As of this writing, minimum supported "version" of Widevine CDM, of any type (NPAPI/PPAPI), is 1.4.9.xxxx (version 1.4.9.1088 to be revoked at the end of May) - to my knowledge, no browser under XP has support for current valid Widevine versions!

(Under Vista, the only browser that I know of that supports WidevineCDM is @roytam1's Serpent 52.9.0 (very recent builds), thanks to a gallant effort by the Moonchild team to restore partial support for WV v1.4.9.xxxx in official Basilisk; support for the next generation of WV ("interface" 10, versions 4.10.xxxx), currently in place in Firefox Quantum, is not there yet, so at the end of May Serpent's WV support under Vista+ may become broken, too...)

The above applies even on Windows 7, if one's favorite browser happens to be Basilisk (or @roytam1's Serpent. You may recall I switched from Basilisk to Serpent - even on 7 - when MCP removed all WE support from Basilisk and we persuaded roytam1 to retain that support in Serpent).

If MCP fails to pull off another miracle with Widevine 4.10 in the next five weeks, Vista users will presumably, like XP users, have to fall back to reliance on Silverlight. Windows 7 users do have other browser options, but it's annoying to have to change browsers, or to use different browsers for different Web sites.

So here's hoping MCP does it again.

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  • 2 years later...
  • 2 years later...
On 8/16/2021 at 1:37 PM, xp128bit said:

Doesn't seem to work in seamonkey anymore, this error edit: works on my main pc for some reason

Screenshot 2021-08-16 133613.jpg

Update 2024:

Prime video no longer supports Silverlight and says your browser is unsupported if you run it on the old version of Seamonkey or any browser that doesn't support the necessary HTML5 video and DRM. 

Netflix dropped support for Silverlight back in September 2023, they made a post about it here https://help.netflix.com/en/node/2090

Amazon prime video hasn't made any official announcement but they haven't been that well known for using Silverlight anyway compared to Netflix.

I can confirm that Prime video worked with Silverlight back in 2021, the reason it didn't work in my previous post initially is because I ran it on Windows XP integral edition. It is a modified version of XP so I guess it messed up Silverlight in some way. It worked perfectly fine in a clean XP build that was manually updated and on Windows 10 on my main PC back then.

 

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