[RSS]

Only happens when watching video in media center recorder or live tv.

Screen goes black get a lovely 2sec random noise out of the speakers. The HTPC seems to still be operating via the chassis light but no output of any kind. Watched TV/DVD's via other pieces of software and never had the problem only in MC so that leads me to believe its MC related not video card or TV tuner driver related. Needs to be manually restarted 3 finger salute does not revive it.

Any Ideas.

System Info.
Processor AMD Athlon™ II X2 250
Motherboard Asus M4A88T-M/USB3
Graphics ATI Radeon HD 5450
Memory Kingston 4GB
Hard Drive 500G SATA II
Chassis Antec Fusion Black
TV Tuner Card Hauppauge HVR-2250
Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit

 

[hugh]

Could be a myriad of reasons. My guess is that its your video card. I would check for new drivers for all your equipment. what happens when it crashes? do you get any dialog boxes, What about when you boot up, do you get any message.

 

[Bob_Mtl]

If all drivers are up to date as mention by Hugh. I would then think a corruption of the ehshell file or other eh file that are use by MC for indexation of video files. You could try a repair of the system from the windows dvd.

 

[ScaryBob]

Could also be a codec related issue. I would check to see which codecs are installed and/or in use at the time of the lockup. Updating or reinstalling WMP might help.

 

[RSS]

No dialog boxes or anything the system locks up fully no picture just black screen followed by a 2 second buzz and then the only thing working is the system light on the case.

Tried updating the drivers a while ago when i first incountered the problems all where up to date. Just wondering why only media center has problems when i can run fine in other programs.

Hard to check codecs as the whole system is locked and the lock ups seem to be random 10 min into a program 40 min in recorded or live tv sometimes on DVD's (Not as often it seems) so its difficult to prepare for one.

 

[hugh]

Have you tried playback in other software? Does it happen all the time or just some shows.

As I said, it could be one of many issues. The only way to begin to resolve the issue is to duplicate it consistently and track what was going on when it happened.

 

[RSS]

Well got some time to work on this again and i now want to throw the computer in the garbage.

I am now locking up playing dvd's in both WMC and in PowerDVD and much more frequently.

Looked up new drivers for the video card and downloaded the new one released in Feb this ended badly could not even get into windows upon reboot not even in safe mode. Ended up removing video card and playing with the bios to get it back up and running.

Not much of anything is showing up in event viewer as the computer just shuts off not BSOD. I do get errors involving CLBSTOR.SYS and after reading some peopel are saying that powerDVD and windows 7 don't get along to well. Is anybody else running powerDVD for there blu-ray as this is not available in WMC?

Also never locks up while playing recorded TV but will lock up playing live TV

If this keeps up it might be time for a linux swap and XBMC as i am growing very tired of windows products not working.

any ideas would be appriciated

thx

 

[Michael DeAbreu]

When I'm being logical (right!) I look at these things

Software first. Did I install anything , were there any automatic updates to any of my software. Usually, restoring the computer to an earlier date solves a lot of my problems. Codecs. I hate Codec and Codec packages. They have screwed up my system more than once.

Video Card: For me it's video cards that fail. Since you have on-board graphices. I'd remove the ATI 5450, all of its drivers and re-install the MB drivers and re-enable the on-board graphics.

Hard Disk: HDD are the second most failure prone components. Download the manufactuters testing utility and check the SMART status of the drive. I used WDDIAG to check my Western Digital drives.

Power Supply: Power supply. I've only had one fail, but possible if it is a cheap case/psu.

Memory: Not ever a problem for me. I've wasted lots of time running MEMTEST. Start pulling modules.

BIOS: Only a problem when adding/replacing hardware. But worth resetting if all else fails

Good Luck!

 

[Tedfroop]

and cleaning...

Could be an overheating issue as well, symptoms seem to match what I just had happen when an almost new case fan failed last week.

 

[RSS]

I have monitored the temps while watching video and i don't even break the 50C mark so i can't see that being the issue also i don't have any overclocking going on.

Finally found a new video card driver that i coudl get to work also upgraded the bios and so far last night it worked well.

I will wait for the next failure and then uninstall powerDVD and maybe switch to the onboard video card.

But it was nice to watch a full program with no interuptions

 

[cwerling]

Having Same Problem

RSS... We have an HP Media PC that I upgraded to Windows 7 (from Windows Vista) last September. It is a high-end HP desktop media computer that is constantly tied to our living room TV, but I forget what model. I have HDMI out to our receiver which then goes to the TV. (I tested all of this with the PC also tied to a regular monitor that doesn't go through the receiver - same results)

Everything has been working beautifully since the Win7 upgrade until literally the last couple of days. Now tonight whenever I try to play a Recorded TV show, it plays for maybe 10 minutes or so then does exactly what you're talking about - I just get a black screen with the lights on the computer showing that it is on and running. In fact, the hard drive seems to spin quite a bit right after the screen blacks out, as if it was doing a dump or something, but no dump is shown. We have to hard restart the computer by holding down the power button. Then after a few times, now it is starting to do it when we are only a minute or two into the program.

I also have isolated it to Media Center, but within MC, it is ONLY happening with Recorded TV. When we watch "Internet TV", play Music, etc. all within MC, it's fine. Only Recorded TV causes this problem for us, and it doesn't matter which program - they all do it. We don't watch Live TV hardly ever, so I don't know if that causes us problems. I just turned it on for a while to test it, and it works so far.

I have a strong feeling that it isn't the video card. My guess is that it is software related or hard drive related. I am thinking of just calling Microsoft and paying them $35 per incident to figure this out, if they can, and if that is how much it costs these days as it used to. I have a 4-year top of the line warranty & support from HP. However, we upgraded to Win7, and vendors try to use that as an excuse not to provide support. Maybe I'll try them first anyways.

Very Frustrating Indeed!!!

 

[RSS]

Well so far over the last week or so i have only had one crash and i believe it was my front face (imon) program trying to update as when i got the computer up and running again it started right away.

Cwerling try a video card driver update and a Bios update like i did and see if it fixes it for you. Or if you have some other software to watch your tv shows on give that a go to see if the problem happens in another program not just WMC.

 

[ScaryBob]

I also have isolated it to Media Center, but within MC, it is ONLY happening with Recorded TV.

That points to the CODEC used for playing the TV files. What happens if you uninstall all the TV card software?

never locks up while playing recorded TV but will lock up playing live TV

Uninstall the Hauppauge software and CODECS. Test it. Then uninstall the driver and pull the card. If the crashes in WMC stop, at either step, that's the problem.

The RAM is also worth a look. Pulling one module can isolate a bad one. I've also seen cases where a type of RAM was incompatible with a particular make/model of motherboard. Mismatched RAM modules can also cause problems with some motherboards.

I've seen symptoms like this caused by a bad power supply. Here is what happens:
1. Video starts to play.
2. Power drawn by video card increases.
3. Power supply gets overloaded.
4. System voltages start to drop or fluctuate due to overload.
5. Unstable system voltages cause system crash.

It's also possible that the combination of video card and TV card are causing a proble. I suspect a problem with the TV card, its driver or its software though.

System Info.
Processor AMD Athlon™ II X2 250
Motherboard Asus M4A88T-M/USB3
Graphics ATI Radeon HD 5450
Memory Kingston 4GB
Hard Drive 500G SATA II
Chassis Antec Fusion Black
TV Tuner Card Hauppauge HVR-2250
Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit

Judging by the hardware, I would not expect the power supply to be the problem. OTOH, you could have a dud. Substituting another power supply is the best way to test this. You don't need to pull the old power supply. Simply obtain another PS and swap the power cables only.

Finally, to isolate bad software, it is sometimes necessary to do a clean install. I would also pull the TV card first. Make an image of the system drive for possible restoration. Auslogics has good, free drive image software. Then, do a clean install and install Windows updates only. Then thoroughly test the system under conditions that cause the current problems. I also use a program called Heavyload to check for performance under extreme conditions. If the system still crashes, it's likely a hardware issue. If it is fine, make a system drive image and install another piece of software or hardware plus software/drivers. Then test, make an image and proceed to the next piece of hardware/software. Repeat until the symptoms reappear. Once the problem is found, either restore the previous image or use Windows system restore to revert to a stable system.

 

[j0dest3r]

Error checking on the hard drive?

I'd do that first before anything else.

 

[ScaryBob]

I see that the Antec Fusion uses an iMon display and remote. I have run into conflicts between the iMon driver/software and some other hardware drivers. In my case, it was with an M-Audio sound card driver and the VFD display software.

 

[RSS]

Well back to having failures had 2 over the weekend. Once playing live TV and one playing Recorded TV

Event viewer came up with more Cyberlink issues probably going to uninstall the power DVD software.

Scarybob you seem to lean toward the TV card but how would that be effecting DVD playback (Codecs?)

 

[ScaryBob]

The TV card installation does a couple of things that could affect DVD playback. It installs CODECs that could affect playback in other software and it installs a driver that could interact with other software or hardware. It could also set up PCI bus resource conflicts just by the fact it is installed. I'm not saying it is the cause but it's definitely worth eliminating.

Other playback software could cause similar issues. I would uninstall all DVD playback software and any installed codecs. Then I would do fresh install of the required software. If that fails, an audited fresh install of Windows (as described earlier) may be the best bet.

 

[Bob_Mtl]

It is now over a month you are on this issue and I am surprised you didn't throw your pc through the window yet

MAybe you should go for a fresh and clean install of Windows as suggested by Scarybob. Create an image of the current set up and then reformat your disc and reinstall Windows. All you need to record tv, play DVDs, music, compressed video, etc is accessible through Media Center. If the system is stable after a week you can start adding the application you need to have the system the way you want it.

The problem can also be something stupid, the last time I had problem with Media Center it was cause by an mp4 file that was containing an error. I deleted the file and since then Media center is running for weeks without a glich. The file was causing MC to shut down even when I was not accessing the file. The file was located in one of the scanning folder. It was not a virus as I created the mp4 myself from a tv recording.

 

[RSS]

Well i have removed all of Cyberlinks software and am running TMT and so far so good will report on how it goes.

 

[RSS]

Well i have to say TMT works perfectly I can play BRay - DVDs - Recorded TV programs - All video files and all this with no lock ups.

Can't say the same for WMC it crashes while watching live TV and recorded TV and i no longer have the cyberlink error i am getting this error on my event viewer.

The log scan number (200:96:1) passed to log scan in database 'master' is not valid. This error may indicate data corruption or that the log file (.ldf) does not match the data file (.mdf). If this error occurred during replication, re-create the publication. Otherwise, restore from backup if the problem results in a failure during startup.

The SQL Server (MSSMLBIZ) service terminated with service-specific error WARNING: You have until SQL Server (MSSMLBIZ) to logoff. If you have not logged off at this time, your session will be disconnected, and any open files or devices you have open may lose data..

I am not familure with SQL Server stuff so any ideas would be appriciated but atleast this problem is easy to replicate as it happens pretty much 5 min into any recorded program i am trying to watch.