Windows Media Center changing

SimMike2

Platinum Member
Aug 15, 2000
2,577
1
81
In the last few weeks, WMC has been changing for me, mainly the guide listings. It used to have incredibly detailed descriptions of movies, way better than Comcast guide listings. There was also star ratings so you could easily tell the quality. Now the guide descriptions of movies are about the same as Comcast, maybe even shorter. And no star ratings.

Is the evil empire slowly crippling WMC before they kill it? And are the they doing the same thing to Windows 7?
 

SimMike2

Platinum Member
Aug 15, 2000
2,577
1
81
Thanks. I suppose I should consider myself lucky that the new WMC guide is at least working with my computers in Seattle. Other people lost their listings completely.
 

GrumpyMan

Diamond Member
May 14, 2001
5,780
266
136
It seems like MS is slowly gimping WMC so people will go ahead and upgrade to 10 and find other ways of doing what WMC used to do perfectly, but with 10.
 

bbhaag

Diamond Member
Jul 2, 2011
7,371
2,999
146
Thanks. I suppose I should consider myself lucky that the new WMC guide is at least working with my computers in Seattle. Other people lost their listings completely.

I lost mine. Totally gone and I've followed the reddit and ms links but nothing seems to help.
How did you get it to work?
 

SimMike2

Platinum Member
Aug 15, 2000
2,577
1
81
My guide never stopped working, just got lower quality. I live in Seattle with Comcast.

I have a lot of WMC files saved on multiple hard drives. I'm wondering if Win10 will even play these files, or are they lost too if you go to 10.

I'm not going to upgrade to 10. Silicon Dust HD Prime is working on a DVR and guide. Hopefully that will come out soon.
 

sathyan

Senior member
Sep 18, 2000
281
0
71
My guide never stopped working, just got lower quality. I live in Seattle with Comcast.

I have a lot of WMC files saved on multiple hard drives. I'm wondering if Win10 will even play these files, or are they lost too if you go to 10.

I'm not going to upgrade to 10. Silicon Dust HD Prime is working on a DVR and guide. Hopefully that will come out soon.
Haven't tried in the release version but in the windows 10 preview,I was able to play media center DVR recordings with Windows media player and vlc
 

bbhaag

Diamond Member
Jul 2, 2011
7,371
2,999
146
I finally got it figured out on my 8.1 setup but man was it a total pain in the ass. Whatever you do don't follow Diana's instructions on the Windows forums.
God this sucked....It rarely takes me 3 or 4 days to figure a Windows problem out but this one was challenging. I finally managed to get WMC to switch from the Zap2it guide to the new Rovi guide and in MY zip code. The zip code is the important part!

Thanks Microsoft for making this way harder than it should have been.

windows%208.1%20rovi_zpsmothre6n.png
 
Last edited:

bbhaag

Diamond Member
Jul 2, 2011
7,371
2,999
146
You should have. Before this it was hands down the BEST OTA dvr program I've used. I find it no small coincidence that it magically became a problem right around the release of 10. Didn't 10 drop support for it?
 

bbhaag

Diamond Member
Jul 2, 2011
7,371
2,999
146
I should have added that this blog led me to a successful guide update. http://blogs.catapultsystems.com/cf...in-windows-media-center-after-july-20th-2015/

I'm not sure what I did to make it happen but this guide eventually made it happen. The last thing I did in frustration was delete the firstrun.log then I reran the tv setup option in WMC and entered a known working zip code from the link above. Then I got my guide back! YA!

Anyway, read through the link and see if it helps. It did for me.

Just thought I'd throw this out there for anyone going through the same issues I did.
 
Last edited:

SimMike2

Platinum Member
Aug 15, 2000
2,577
1
81
The new guide really sucks compared to the old guide. But my HTCP DVR still works, so I hope it continues like it is for some time.
 

bbhaag

Diamond Member
Jul 2, 2011
7,371
2,999
146
Correct. You'll have to use a third party program like Kodi with 10.