Live With The Black Quicktime Progress Bar

Since I use the x64 version of Vista, I am plagued with Quicktime's black bar, like everyone else out there on x64. I just find it ridiculous that after more than a year, this bug still remains. Makes me wonder if they may have even purposely put it there because I'm sure they aren't making any effort in fixing it. The only way that I know of to be able to see the bar is by running the browser in compatibility mode for Windows XP. I would do that, but the problem is that Vista then changes the Aero to Basic until the browser is closed. So you either:

1. Live with the black Quicktime progress bar.
2. Run the browser in compatibility mode and live with a changing theme (and if you already use the Basic theme by default, you're lucky)

Now, I know there's a program called Quicktime Alternative(QA) that basically provides the core functions of Quicktime, while letting you watch most anything that's in a Quicktime format through Media Player Classic. Question is, since I have to uninstall the original Quicktime to use QA, would it affect my iTunes? Do you guys know if QA can also do Quicktime's virtual tours and 360* views?

I also have the Vista Codecs installed, and for those of you that don't know, there's a Quicktime codec in there. While I get a better balance of colors in WMP than in Quicktime, the volume of the audio is too loud and distorts (not distorts the speakers, but the audio itself). So I don't know what else I can do... I am open to anything that doesn't involve changing themes or black bars...