To update my last post, disabling real-time monitoring for Defender has not helped.  Still getting the errors.

I've noticed that many (not all) of my recordings don't record completely now.  They cut-off somewhere in the middle.  Had to calm down some angry family members yesterday over it.

Needless to say, this is seriously undermining the usefulness of Vista Media Center as a DVR, unless someone can fix it fairly soon.  We can stand around blaming this or that vendor all day -- at the end of the day, it is in every vendor's interest to get this to work, if they care about the adoption of their respective products.

 

tvaterp:

I started having issues when I installed CableCards from Comcast (Chattanooga) on May 15.   I have Motorola "S-Series" cablecards (I think).   I returned the M-series cards for they would not intilize and recieve HD channels.  It looks like each day between 1-2 PM, I receive the "Restricted Content Error".    I just setup the following bat file to run each day at 2 PM:

net stop ehrecvr
net start ehrecvr

I think that this temporary fix, is all I will need to do. 

I also have Comcast and the "Restricted Content" also started on May 15.  I was recording a program and the recording terminated at 22:27.  Now, sometime every night the probem rears its ugly head and in the morning I have to execute the stop and start of ehRecvr.  To check on the repeatibility of when this occurs, I started a recording and it terminated prematurely at 22:43.  I am somewhat surprised why this event is not at the sametime (22:27) of the previous event if it is software related.

I also examined the Event Logs and in the Windows Logs System folder, there are entries created by WindowsUpdateClient.  On the two days on which I have a precise time when this problem occured "lo and behold" there is an entry at the precise time of the failure: down to the minute!  I have disabled this process to ascertain if this is the likely candidate.

yesterday the system ran fine all day and into the night.  recorded the entire Indy 500 in HD...impressive.  Overnight it quit again and would not record after 3:00 AM.....I thought I had auto updates turned off, wrong.....now I have auto updates off and will see how the system performs over night. (per the suggestion in this thread)  Yes, I could do it today but the family wants a system that works today and everything is running right now.

The recording that came on a 4:00 AM failed due to restricted content violation......so maybe (just maybe) the auto updates is causing a conflict.  Seems too basic and easy.....

Once again, this morning I reset the tuners and closed/opened Media Center.  The system suggested that I shut down Media Center and the PC....however, turning off the PC is a kiss of death that involves Comcast and an hour of reconfiguration efforts.

---

Dell 420 w/dual ATI DCT w/Comcast
Four DMA 2200 extenders
Netgear GigSwitch
WHS, My Movies, Music Browser

JesseHerrold:

Almost every post is from a Dell user.  Only one post from Sony.  No posts from HP, Velocity Media, or others.

There was a guy with a Velocity Micro with issues also


I think that Dell probably sells MANY more with DCT's VS any other company since they are much better priced.


Also, it is hard to find people that aren't having issues since they arent posing.  For example, I dont have any issues with my XPS 420 and recording.

The failure to record is saved as Warnings in the Event Table: Applications and Services Logs, Media Center folder.  There are two Warnings listed for the May 15th recording: 

Event 1:

Log Name:      Media Center
Source:        Recording
Date:          2008-05-15 22:26:40
Event ID:      8
Task Category: None
Level:         Warning
Keywords:      Classic
User:          N/A
Computer:      XPS420
Description:
Great Performances at the Met was not recorded.  Recording of this content is prohibited by the content provider.

Event 2:

Log Name:      Media Center
Source:        Recording
Date:          2008-05-15 22:26:41
Event ID:      3
Task Category: None
Level:         Warning
Keywords:      Classic
User:          N/A
Computer:      XPS420
Description:
Recording of Great Performances at the Met began as scheduled on 05/15/2008 20:00:01 and was stopped because the recording was of Copy Never content.

The programmers at MicroSoft should be able to solve this problem. Some data is coming down the pipeline from Comcast which is triggering this behavior!

prje:

I appreciate that this issue has hit your radar screen. As you can tell, the normal support route just doesn't work in for Media Center problems.

I have tested and found that the error condition occurs at 3:10AM every day. Looking through the event logs I cannot find anything that runs at that time. The problem also presents itself after a reboot.

I have found a number of ways to temporarily fix the problem (until it breaks at 3:10AM again):

1. pow....

Wow.... ummm, not sure if this is on topic or if it helps, but my old MCE2005 machine has been having a very similar problem... specifically @4:59 PM PST EVERY DAY due to a loss of audio/video data... It happens at other times as well, but most at 4:49 PM. The first such event goes back to 1/18/2008, but became much more frequent after 3/18/2008.

NOTE: Being an MCE2005 machine, it's obviously not a Cable Card rig. Expanded Basic HRC Cable by Time Warner/SoCal. Custom Built AMD Athlon64 3000+, Asus K8N4E-Dlx GF6600.

---

New System: Vista/AthlonX2BE/GigabyteGA-MA69G-S3H/HD3450/(2) M780/3GB Ram/320GB&750GB Drive/Westy 32 LCD via HDMI/

Old System: MCE/ Athlon3000+/Asus K8NE Deluxe/vBox Catseye 150/NVTV Dual SD/2GB RAM/250GB HD/Ahanix DVine 4/Westy 32 LCD/

Joe:

My "Restricted Content" problems also continue. Though the start/stop of the ehRecvr service helps, I usually have to walk thru the TV Signal setup to get *both* tuners to work. This is NOT a *Record* issue for me; the tuners fail to provide any signal at all.  Seems strange that if I reboot after start/stop of the ehRecvr service, the problem returns.

My witching hour seems to be 1:48am PDT

(BTW, any chance MC can be upgraded to remember the "Region information" it downloads in TVSetup? It takes 2 minutes to come down, and doing it every day is a drag. )

The RC problem started while I had the 1.16 firmware; 1.17 is now installed.

My system was flaky for 3 months before, with the "tuner not found" error happening every couple days, requiring a reboot. A Dell engineer told me SCards were better than MCards for these DCTs, so I begged for a swap and ended up with one of each.  I'm with Cox Cable in San Diego. The system was much better for the 3 weeks prior to the RC fiasco.

--BH

Dell XPS 420, Bios A03, dual ATI DCTs
2.4 Ghz Quad-core, 3GB RAM
2 drives, 1TB + .5TB
NVidia GeForce 8800GT
32-bit Vista Home Premium SP1 with latest updates
AVG Antivirus
Windows Firewall & Defender enabled

Abyss mentioned that he saw WindowClientUpdate messages in the Event log at the same time that his recordings failed.

I also see WindowsClientUpdate messages in my logs at the same time that my recordings fail.

So I disabled Automatic Updates completely to see if it helps.  Will post results later.

 

From following all the threads here's my distillation of what's been posted:

1. The firmware version of the ATI DCT does not seem to matter.  I am using 1.15 just fine while others have 1.16h and others 1.17.
2. Video cards differ amongst us all as well as driver versions.
3. Some people reported seeing an ATI DCT update listed in WU on 5/14, others report it as disappearing after seeing it (myself included), and others never saw it.
4. The problems have all started on 5/14 with the latest MS updates. 
1. however, even those who do NOT auto update are experiencing the problem
5. The problem exists with single, dual, and triple tuners
6. The problem exists for both viewing and recording of all content
7. Most of the systems seem to be Dell XPS420's however an AverMedia system was also reported.
8. Many different methods are used to recover.  The most prevalent seems to be to restart the WMC Receiver service.  Others reflash the DCT's, others go through a sophisticated reboot process.  With others it just seems to start working again.  It would be very nice if we all could try a single method and report on the results.
9. Many claim the problem occurs on a regular time schedule, while others are not as sure.  The verdict is out on my system as I have seen both instances.
10. The problem is across all media providers and types of service across the country.  However, to my knowledge, I have not seen a post from Direct TV or Dish user.

Hopefully Microsoft is creating some sort of database to sort out all the details from all the posters on the various forums reporting the problem. 

 

---

Jon
Carrollton, TX

Dell XPS420, 2.4GHz Quad Core
3GB 800MHz RAM, 320GB 7200rpm HD
NVidia 9600GT 1GB w/Display Port
BD Drive + DVD-RW, ATI DCT
Dell 3008 WFP 30" 2560x1600 Monitor/TV

I am having a love hate relationship with my Dell XPS 420 w/ Dual DCTs.  I love it when it works, but I have lost complete confidence.  The only way this whole setup will work is that you could for example, call a representative of ComCast (or your favorite provider) and actually talk to someone who only deals with Media Cener Computers or at least the Vendor, Dell, ATI would have a direct link to someone who actually cares whether or not the Vista MC is successful.  What happens when this problem is resolved?   3 Months from now?  What happens when your XPS support runs out?  What happens in ComCast decides to not support the DCTs?

---

- Dell XPS 420, Vista Ultimate SP1
- 2 ATI DCT, Firmware 1.17.1
- 1 LG LCDTV - 47LC7DF
- 4 GB RAM
- 3 1 TB Hard Drives
- ATI 2600HD Digital Video Card
- Comcast (Atlanta, GA), Cumming GA

luke2261tgb:

What happens when this problem is resolved?   3 Months from now?  What happens when your XPS support runs out?  What happens in ComCast decides to not support the DCTs?

What happens when the sun finally burns out?
What happens when the car you are driving runs out of it's warranty?

I mean I'm as frustrated as you are about the current issue, but there will always be some issue out there.  Wether you are using a VMC with Cable Card Solution, HD Tivo, or the Cable Companies DVR.  What happens if over the next 4 day weekend your Comcast DVR dies, and you can't get it replaced until after the weekend?

There are tons of worst case scenarios, and you are going to find them everywhere.  Nothing in life is perfect or guaranteed except for death and taxes.
As for the Microsoft Rep,  is there any possibility any changes were to Media Center in the time frame our issues started showing up?  We all know you all have some maner of updatings things inside Media Center like you did with Internet TV.  Possiby a dll doing checkin's on a regular basis to download new content, or dll versions, etc.

That is where I'd look first.

-D

-D

irev210:

Also, it is hard to find people that aren't having issues since they arent posing.  For example, I dont have any issues with my XPS 420 and recording.

Just my two cents in here.  I have an XPS 420 that I haven't had any issues with either.  I have four Digital OTA tuners and two ATI DCTs (interesting enough one with an S-Card and one with an M-Card).  I got six months of HBO free and have recorded a LOT (filled my 1tb stripe set) on the DCTs and haven't missed a single show.

I always setup all my computers to ONLY download updates and let ME update them.  I currently show KB940510 (5/6/2008), KB890830 (5/15/2008) and KB905866 (5/13/2008) as needing to be installed.  The later two are Windows Malicous software removal tool and Windows Mail Junk Filter updates for May 2008.  The first is some update that enables vista to "detect software that bypasses product activation..."

 

Hi:

As I've posted, I have an XPS 420 with single DCT experiencing similar problems. I am unable to record or watch HDTV at all.

I admire all the members' perseverence in trying various remidies. I believe this effort likely contributes to the ultimate solution. Personally, I haven't had the energy to devote to various fixes that I know will inevitably be temporary. Fortunately, I have enough recorded content that I am catching up on.

I would greatly appreciate a word from jchauvin to acknowledge that work is still progressing on finding a solution to this issue. Joe, we haven't heard from you for many days. I realize you can't divulge confidential information, but I believe we would all find it comforting to know that time and attention is being devoted to this vexing problem.

Thanks, kklemme

 

With auto updates turned off over night, the same problem happened.....receiver service failure sometime between 2-5 AM.  No TV signal from the extender box this morning and an overnight recording failure.

I am running SP1 with all the latest patches.  This is a problem that MS needs to figure out with their partners as it is beyond my knowledge level.  As for now, the wife, kids and dog threw Media Center and Dad out the door. 

I'll monitor the site for updates.  I'm out of ideas other than restarting the tuners each morning......which is not acceptable.  

---

Dell 420 w/dual ATI DCT w/Comcast
Four DMA 2200 extenders
Netgear GigSwitch
WHS, My Movies, Music Browser

Turning off Automatic Updates did not fix the issue for me either.  So I turned them back on.

I have another clue however, a clue which explains why Dell customers are the primary complainers.  I went into Options in the Defender configuration.  In there, you will see 2 checkboxes under "Choose if Windows Defender should notify you about:"

I checked both those boxes.  I then scheduled a recording from 3:00-3:30am, a time when recordings always fail.  This morning, I found that the recording indeed failed at 3:07am.  I also had a Defender icon in my system tray.  I looked at it.  At precisely 3:07am, Defender alerted me that this process ran:

C:\Program Files\Dell Support Center\HWDiag\bin\PCD5SRVC.pkms

Defender gave me the option of permitting or denying this task in the future.

The above process appears to trigger Windows Update, hence why we were seeing Windows Update messages in the event log, but I think that is coincidental.

For now, I told Defender to deny the above process.  I will schedule another 3am recording for tonight. 

I would prefer not to uninstall Dell Support Center, but if it has to be, then so be it.