Using WMC + EyeTV One

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Thought it best to start a new thread rather than HJ.

My W7 machine in fact has windows media center (WMC) already installed. Today I picked up a unused eyeTV one in the original box, never opened.

Problem is getting them to work and recognize each other. So far, no joy. Perhaps I'm missing something?

Plugged in EyeTV tuner using USB. Attached OTA antenna coax. W7 recognized it, found a driver, 1.20122.122.202 dated 11/11/2009, tells me "the device is working properly". Verify no yellow exclamation marks in Device Manager.

Assuming WMC can scan for TV tuners and find them, I boot WMC > Tasks > Settings > TV > Set up TV Signal > Region > US > type in zip code > Prog. Guide ToS Ver. 5, dated Oct 2008 > agree > MS PlayReady PC runtime EULA > agree (though I have no cable/sat only OTA) > Install Playready > error..."not be able to watch or record premium TV. Error Info: Element not found (exception from HRESULT: 0X80070490).

If problem persists try later from Tasks > Settings > Gen > WMC setup > Install Playready. I go this route and find no joy.

"Element not found" indicates just that...so where is it found? Is PR necessary when cable/sat won't be used? Or is it a necessary hurdle for WMC to check all of it's boxes before continuing?

Next, I load the eyeTV disc. After selecting eyeTV one, it offers to install the same driver W7 previously found...that's it. No user manual, no application SW, no quick start guide...nothing.

So I look over the box language again: EyeTV 3 SW for Mac, driver for W7, PDF product manual. Interesting that....so out comes my MB running 10.6.8, in goes the disk, and soon appears the pdf product manual + eyeTV SW! Obviously this product contains all you need for a Mac, but despite the verbige on the box, on the W7 driver!

The Mac info is nowhere to be found when browsing the disc from W7.

I note a single card in the box directing me to elgato.com/gettvsoftware "if I wish to dwnld ETV3 rather than use the disk". I'm xnsfrd to geniatech.eu, which evidently bought ETV.

So I dwnld the ETV3 owners manual and nowhere in its 60 pages does it mention Windows...at all. It's all OS X.

On the packaging, it mentions "Works with WMC..ETV One is compatible with W7 and works with WMC". Really? How? Perhaps this is why ETV is Tango Uniform??

I discover THC is avail. for Windows. Not sure what THC stands for. Current dwnld time is 29m (87.3Mb).

Further mousing-around reveals this:



Not sure what the diff. is between the two, but "Total" is even larger at > 90MB....

Found this interesting. Perhaps will run on one of my two old PPC iMacs:


Two Q's:
1. How to remove the roadblock from WMC so it will work. Is it presently stuck because RP isn't found?
2. Given I have the driver for ETV One, is that all I need from them/ETV/Geniatec/etc? I'd prefer to use WMC rather than either THC or Total. Obviously I won't be using ETV3 on W7....

Advice? Suggestions? Any WMC users out there?
 
If you have VLC media player see if your tuner shows up under its options.
 
well.. if that tuner is DOA/FUBAR/etc, I have my old HTPC sitting around unused...
been a few years since I used WMC, but when i had it set up right, I loved it.
mine worked fine with the 2 tuner cards i had.(that are still sitting in it)
one is a...Pinacle? i think?.... the other is an ATI dual Tuner card.

keep looking for a cheap video card to resurrect that PC with something like Kodibuntu or somesuch...
but i might be persuaded to part it out...heck i think I still have the ATI box...
 
Still cranking away at it...

I dwnld'd PlayReady PC runtime V1.3. Installed. Restarted WMC. It no longer asks for eula confirmation.

I also discovered I can skip "Update TV Setup Data" for now as it appears Tango Uniform. After clicking NO, WMC did detect the ATSC ETV tuner! So at least now it's seeing it.


However, it fails the next step "TV setup has encountered a serious problem".

So I began nosing around in Task Manager, looking for WMC services. Found:

1. Mcx2Svc...media center extender srvc....stopped
2. ehRecvr....WMC Receiver Srvc...running
3. ehSched....WMC Scheduler Srvc...stopped
4. WMPNetworkSvc....WMP Ntwrk Sharing Srvc....stopped (might need to be turned on later...)

So I skipped over to Admin. Tools > Services for a closer look. Some of these were set on MANUAL. I reset to AUTOMATIC. I started those that were stopped.

Time to restart....
 
As if WMC wasn't enough of a frustration, I've lately been noticing some very odd, random confuser behavior lately.
  • All restore points are now gone!
  • Only two desktop icons remain whereas last night there were about a dozen.
  • "Quota options were not changed" or something to that effect when accessing properties on the documents partition.
  • I installed an "important" Win7 update last night + a new Win Defend. definition. Not sure if this caused problems or not. I was about to restore system to an earlier point around 8pm last night. I know this restore point was there because I looked it up. Today it's gone???
  • I ran chkdsk a week ago upon boot and it indicated several sectors were problematic. Indicates more thorough testing is required. Recommendations? The OS partition C is about 18% fragmented. Before I leave today, I'm going to schedule CCleaner, chkdsk, then defrag., then backup.

    On to WMC....after spending hours into the wee morning on this I found no joy. WMC no longer gets to the window where the tuner is recognized. This might be due to me digging around in the services, "logging on" and changing the receiver service owner/user/account. Unable to restore to an earlier point due to above.

    I read that MS switch EPG providers recently which appears to be the root locus of the many "unable to download TV guide" issues that plague WMC users. It appears the program is waiting for an answer at the wrong door and/or confusion exists between MS and the guides servers. Personally I use TitanTV as my OTA guide.

    I'm giving up on WMC for now. Since no users of this have chimed in, I'm lost. There is something screwy going on under the covers. I just don't know enough about the innards of W7's networking, services, permissions, users, processes, "log ons", accounts, etc. to trace where the hang up is.

    I'm confused about the differences between Local System, Local Service & Network Service in the "log on as" column.
 
Anyone +?

Back to figure out this issue now that the failing W7 Hd has been replaced with a working one...

I tried this again and it stopped on the same place...trying to download the guide.

So I removed the eyeone TV USB card, plugged it into the Alien M17x LT, installed the card drivers from the CD, Device manager says "OK", booted WMC in Vista (first time), ran through the set-up step-by-step, got to the SAME point as in W7 "dwnld'ng guide" and HUNG....WUWT?

So now I have both W7 & Vista on two separate machines giving me the same error??? I'm a bit out of my league here trying to figure out what's going on under the hood. I've spent the past few hours searching. Odd that most hits are 6, 7 or 8 yrs old. WMC no longer being used?? Noted some W10 users have successfully installed it. Many others report to still be using it. I'm a bit lost here.
 
I finally figured it out! Not trivial by any means. Last night I watched OTA TV on an Apple widescreen monitor in HDTV and it looked marvelous! I even paused live TV to fetch a glass of wine. I have room on the new HD for a dedicated video recording partition.

Hopefully the hard part is now over....
 
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