What is MFPlat.dll and why are my programs bitching about it for the first time ever?

[Katie Boundary]

Even when using the same programs and filters as I was 20 years ago, on a fresh XP installation, I'm getting an error message I've never seen before, complaining about an MFplat.dll

What's up with that?

[gonca]

I believe that MFPlat.dll is a Media Foundation platform dll. (This was introduced in Vista)
Something on your system is behaving like it thinks it is on Vista or higher