Well, i’ve downloaded pretty much every program that will play AVI files and i get no picture but i get sound, everytime i go to play it says “missing codec” or something and it wont' even try to download codecs...or it gives a message saying that the codec isn’t available 
Use one of the diagnostic tools to find out what codec you need
http://www.moviecodec.com/questions/neededcodec.html
http://www.2shared.com/file/R6t9_ZN_/decoders_HDshowFilters_v1012.html
record error can’t open . I’ve trnyig setting the format to both wav and mp3 but it still doesn’t work. does the codec only work for a pc? please help.