Windows 7 Update reset MCE back to live tv setup

[TomoA6]

Everything was working fine for over a year and then my mothers DVR was reset back to the default: "Live tv setup" screen, with no guide, or Live tv, after a computer reboot.

Since this was setup using EPG123 originally and working can I use "Restore" to bring back the CableCard configuration with channels numbers? If so do you have a Help Guide link as the EPG123 website troubleshoot sections are under construction?

Or do I have to run the live tv setup from scratch and skip using EPG123? Or whatever else can you advise as I'll have to guide her over the phone to fix things and she isn't computer savvy and I live very far away. Thanks.

[garyan2]

It sounds like WMC had a database recovery. Newer versions of epg123 will help with making sure your tuner configurations are carried over to the new database that is created, but the older ones did not. Not all is lost, but due to your remoteness from your mother, it might be a little challenging but not impossible.

We need to know what the previous WMC database instance number is. We might be able to assume it was '0', but that may not be the case. If you want to give a quick go at it, create a .reg file with the contents below and have her right-click it select 'Merge' to switch WMC to using the '0' version of the database. Close WMC if it was open and then open WMC to see if she has everything back to the way is was.

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Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Media Center\Service\Epg]
"EPG.instance"=dword:00000000

To know for sure which database to use, you need to look at the contents of "C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\eHome" folder and there will be multiple "mcepgX-Y.db" files. The X will either be 2 for Win7, or 3 for Win8+. The Y is the database instance. The highest number will be the current database. If you look at the date/time stamps of the files, you should be able to determine what the previous version was. You can change the value in the reg file appropriately.

After that, I suggest updating epg123 to the latest version so that it direct WMC to create backups of the tuner configurations every 5 days.

[TomoA6]

I haven’t looked but I believe the database files get rotated when the guide data uploads the new MXf file. I have scheduled to do it 3 times a week. It’s a media center auto backup thing. I don’t know how that affects tuner configuration though. I’ll have ask her to open the folder and send pictures. Unfortunately it’s a big deal for her to use the stairs to access the computer. She typically uses an Xbox 360 media extender to use the DVR from upstairs. What does the Restore feature do btw. I believe her EPG123 is at least a year old with client install if I recall correctly. Thanks

[garyan2]

The WMC database remains constant until there is a problem resulting in a database recovery. WMC will then create a new database (incrementing the instance number) and restore the tuner configurations and recording requests from the previous failed database. If WMC has not created any backup of the tuner configurations, then the result will be that there are no tuners configured. The tuner configuration backup was evidently part of the client maintenance happening every 5 days along with garbage cleanup, which I wasn't aware of until this year, so the client now forces WMC to do a backup as well now.

The restore will restore the WMC configurations that were backed up using the [Backup] button in the client. If no backup has ever been made through the epg123client, then the restore isn't going to do anything for you. If you did make a backup, you can restore to whatever the tuners were configured for from that date/time, but you will also lose any changes to your recording requests from then.

[TomoA6]

Is there a EPG Backup folder to see if I had made any backups?

I might try the reg thing if there’s an older date. As an example if the db is numbered 2 does mean this becomes dword:00000002 ?

I guess the worse case scenario is to live re-run setup outside manually as it be an easier verbal way to direct her.

[garyan2]

The location of the backups created by epg123 are in c:\programdata\garyan2\epg123\backup and the file name will start with backups_ followed by date and time when the backup was created.

If you find that the database version you want to return to is mcepg2-2, then yes the dword in the registry would be 2. If it is mcepg2-1, then it would 1. Numbering is 0-based, so the very first database created when you first installed epg123 was mcepg2-0.

And yes, it might be easier just to talk through a TV Setup again rather than change the registry. Note that with the registry path, whatever happened to the database in the first place will probably happen again in the future. Leaving as is and performing a TV Setup will at least give you a fresh database to build on. After TV Setup is complete, you will still need to import guide listings again; otherwise the guide will be empty until the next update.

I also still recommend updating epg123 to the latest so that client maintenance can be performed on a regular basis to include WMC backups.

[TomoA6]

I tried her running the live tv setup again.

It attempts to Download TV Setup Data without prompting as a a disagree choice. Note we had selected no to using Microsoft EPG Services. This download fails but allows us to continue to activate CableCard. It finds 3 HDHomerun Prime tuners but after clicking Finish it gives an error message that no channels were found.

[TomoA6]

I noticed whenever we select setup tv signal it asks for what country we live in United States and then asks for the zip code which it remembers from the old days. It seems to recall some of the old setup. For example we aren’t asked to install PlayReady as the DRM is already installed.

[garyan2]

Not sure why it wouldn't find any channels. It recognized them as Digital Cable, correct? Does she have a TA from her cable provider? I've never dealt with CableCARDs so taking a guess. Maybe someone else can help with that. If you don't think it is hardware related, then I would suggest performing a [Client Setup] from the client and setting WMC up from scratch. Your cable pairing and DRM will still be good so no need to worry about that. If you do, then I also suggest updating epg123... the client setup is even more streamlined that it was before. https://garyan2.github.io/step1.html?se ... ent=epg123

The country and postal code are stored in the registry which is why it was available during setup.

[StinkyImp]

I don't know why anyone hasn't recommended either AnyDesk https://anydesk.com/en/downloads/windows or Jump Desktop https://www.jumpdesktop.com/ (or any number of remote desktop solutions) so you can access your Mom's computer and do the work yourself. Walking her through the client setup on her end would be fairly simple and save you a ton of headaches in the long run.

I mention these two only because I've been using them for the past few months to access a remote Win7 WMC computer with great results.

[martyHTPC]

Teamviewer is a no cost (for personal use) robust, full featured remote access program that's also worth checking out. I've been using it for years and highly recommend it. https://www.teamviewer.com/en-us/products/teamviewer/

[Gripweed]

Sorry, Marty, but I have to differ with you about Teamviewer. They are the worst. They accused me of Commercial Use twice. The first time I sent in a denial of Commercial Use and they reinstated me. The second time I did the same and never heard back from them. I'm retired and I only used it to connect my Chromebook to my Windows computer in another room in my house when I was stuck in bed with an injury. Besides the false Commercial claims they spammed me for many months on a daily basis to subscribe to their overpriced service.
After that I went with RealVNC and have never looked back. It's been years and never once a Commercial complaint. In fact, with the injury done I still prefer to lay around with the Chromebook and RealVNC to sitting in front of the computer. https://www.realvnc.com/en/connect/home/ Excellent, excellent free service.

[garyan2]

I'd have to vote for TeamViewer as well, if that is what we are doing. Used it quite a few times to help out users. What I like most is they have a truly portable package so no installation necessary. What I don't like, that has happened a few times, is it seems TeamViewer, in order to work, both sides have to be using the same version... can't just download once and use it again 6 months later when there is an updated package available.

[TomoA6]

Its funny I was already looking at realvnc home version before these replies as I had failed to get Parsec working since it’s server isn’t supported on Windows 7. Unfortunately it had to stop there. Glad to hear some have tested different remote desk apps with good success. When she is able again I’ll have a go at setting it up.

I recall having this “Downloading TV Setup Data” failure when Microsoft officially dropped the program guide before but I forget what was my workaround. I have opted out of using the EPG service but it retains running that step during setup nonetheless. The finding the 3 tuners ok but has no channels step happens during activating CableCard which ends with a “TV Setup Cannot Continue” -> TV Setup has encountered a serious problem. Select Finish to exit, then try again.

I’ll know more once I can access the machine. Thanks for the feedback guys so far.

[twegner]

I agree with Gripweed about Teamviewer. I used it for a long time, and loved it. I restricted it's use only to my home office on multiple computers, and occasionally accessed home computers when away from home. But then Teamviewer started accusing me of commercial use. The complaints got worse and worse, and no amount of explanation to the Teamviewer folks would help. For the record, while I am a geek with a bunch of computers, my use of Teamviewer was never by any stretch of imagination commercial. I don't have any sort of computer business, and I only used Teamviewer on my own computers. Finally I gave up completely, and vowed I would never use Teamviewer again, and I haven't. It is software from hell, and I not only don't recommend it, I actively discourage folks from using it. Sorry, I feel very strongly about this. The authors have no conscience at all, and just keep dishing out abuse to their non-commercial users. If it's supposed to be free for non- commercial use, make it free for non-commercial use! Having software repeatedly accusing me of cheating is a problem I don't need to have, and I won't put up with it. This severe problem is easily fixed by purging Teamviewer from every computer I use. Done, it's gone, good riddance. If you use it for non-commercial use, you have been warned!

So I started using TightVNC, which is truly free for non-commercial use. It is not as capable as Teamviewer (that is, not as capable as Teamviewer when it works, which it didn't when accusing the user of cheating), but within my home network TightVNC does the job! TightVNC was a bit fiddly to set up, but once set up, it just works. My main use case is to access my HTPC or my wife's laptop from my main computer, which in both cases are in other rooms or even different floors of my house.

[DSperber]

So as long as we're discussing remote connectivity software, pros and cons, I mention that I myself use RealVNC Enterprise (for "direct connect" from my client to remote host, but which requires port-forwarding configured in the host router, and which also needs something like DynDNS Updater to resolve symbolic remote host names to actual IP addresses) and not the newer "cloud-based" VNC Connect (which is web-facilitated and is more like TeamViewer and works everywhere and does not require any physical location or router setup). Not free, but at $55/year per "server" license it's not unreasonable. No charge for the "client" VNC Viewer software.

Also note that DynDNS Updater is now owned by Oracle (pretty good sized company), which would lead you to believe they could support the product and resolve issues fairly quickly. However the product itself hasn't been changed in more than 2 years (not that it needed to be), but in the past 4-6 months has run across an apparent conflict or incompatibility with some new security feature in Win10 which has caused real headaches for many users. Oracle has acknowledged the problem months ago, but still has not come out with a new version of DynDNS Updater to resolve the problem... although their most recent status update says "they are in the final stages of verification". Note that there is no problem if the machine runs signed in with Administrator rights. It's only "user" machines where the problem occurs. You'd think Oracle could have fixed this by now. Anyway, I digress.

And, I also use TeamViewer (free for personal use). And of course over the years I have many times run into the false "commercial use suspected" problem, shutting down my connectivity to that host temporarily. In the old days you had to fill out an affadavit, submit it to them for review, and then eventually they would "unblock" whichever machine it was that had been wrongly suspected. Could be your own machine, could be the remote host machine. Reasons why this occurred vary, but for example if you took a laptop into an office, or some unknown WiFi location, and happened to be using that WiFi network to get out and it "appeared to be commercial", well that might get you "wrongly accused" of commercial use.

Anyway, they had gotten so many of these requests for unblocking and were spending so much time and money chasing down each one manually and then unblocking, that they devices a new "automated" web wizard to accept your data entry and initiate/perform all the background checks needed to clear you. And apparently this really does work. Three times in the past year I had to use this, and each time in under one day my request had been honored and the blockage permanently removed for that target machine... never again to reappear. So this process really has been improved, though it clearly can still occur.

And finally, I also use UltraViewer, which I discovered years ago when I was totally frustrated by TeamViewer and its more common than now false accusations of commercial use suspected. UltraViewer is completely free, and does not have any limitations about "for personal use only". Otherwise it is effectively identical to TeamViewer for the basic function of remote connection. It doesn't have all the bells and whistles (and bloatware, generally speaking) that TeamViewer also offers (to try and get you to pay for a license), but for the purpose of ordinary remote connection to a target machine UltraViewer is perfectly acceptable. Note that the author of UltraViewer is in Viet Nam, and is not a big company. So don't expect much in the way of "support" but there shouldn't be any needed. It just works perfectly.

[pungo]

Mine reverted back to live tv setup last week. I'm not sure what caused it, but there was no channels or guide.
I restored a restore point that was a week old and all was back to normal with all channels and guide working.
I have windows update turned off so I'm not sure why wmc lost all tv configurations. I assumed a corrupt file/database within wmc.
I was sweating it because this system was set up in 2017 and I've never had to reset it since then.

[TomoA6]

I finally got access to her computer using RealVNC:

I tried using the Registry hack to go back a couple of days before the major crash and it brought back the channels but uploading any new guide data causes a strange pop error that says:

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Windows Media Center Store Update Manager has stopped working... 
(mcupdate.exe)

-> Windows can check online for a solution to the problem yada yada and restart the program
-> Restart the program 

Is this the old EPG service which is dead? I am tempted to use system restore here but I will lose my remote access.

[Space]

I would wait for a response from Gary, but my inclination would be to use the "[Rebuild WMC database]" function from within EPG123.

Now that you have WMC up with the old DB, it has the proper tuners configured, if you use the rebuild function, it will first make a backup of your current configuration (including the tuner configuration), then create a new, fresh WMC DB, and then it will load the DB with the configuration that was just saved.

If the reason you were getting the "stopped working" was due to WMC DB corruption (most likely), and the backup configs do not also have that corruption (note that the backups are just of a subset of the DB, so it is likely they are fine) then I would think this procedure would work. If it doesn't work you can always use the registry trick to go back to the old DB again and try something else.

Again, I would stress to wait for a recommendation from Gary before you try this, because I am really no expert on this and my suggestion may not be the best one (or may be leaving out some important steps), and it might even be the worst one .

[garyan2]

The mcupdate failure is from epg123 trying to force a WMC backup of tuner configurations and recording requests. Getting this failure means the database is pretty corrupted. You can try to fix it by running a garbage cleanup (without backup) from a command line. If it completes successfully, you can try running a guide update again.

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START /WAIT c:\windows\ehome\mcupdate.exe -dbgc -updateTrigger

Really the best option would be to update epg123 to the latest version and perform a [Client Setup] again. After that, everything will run smoothly and client maintenance will be performed on a regular basis to avoid this situation from happening again.