I have had Service Pack 1 for Vista on my test machine since the beta was first launched and have also had it installed on my Samsung Q1 since it RTMed. So I thought I would update my main Media Center machine over the weekend. This was the biggest risk of any of the installs so far as it’s my main machine in the house driving 4 extenders so any downtime or missed recordings would spell trouble for me from my wife and kids.
My machine has never been offered SP1 by Windows Update so I knew something was preventing it being installed. I checked the list of know issues and I had none of the problematic drivers so started off the install manually.
The installation was just as the other devices, it took over an hour and rebooted a few times. Once it had finished everything seemed ok and I tested content playback on my Xbox 360 Extender and all was ok. Sp1 fixed a problem I have had with Windows Media Network services so I was happy, that was until I tried playing a WMV file on the PC (which I don’t do that often). On the Xbox 360 and Linksys Extender WMV files played fine but on the PC some types of WMV would not play at all.
Some files like ones created with Movie Maker worked ok and other (like downloaded from Microsoft) would not. So I updated my ATI video drivers as they were well out of date but still it would not play them.
I tried playback with Windows Media Player and found that WMV files with digital audio in them would not play and files without digital audio played fine. So I clicking on the help link in WMP and it took me to a solution: (found here)
The problem seemed to be that after installing SP1 Windows Media Player had set the audio output to use an invalid port (digital output) on my sound card and my following the instructions I selected the normal analogue audio out and now it’s all working ok.
So now everything it working ok, I can’t tell any difference apart from the Windows Media Network fix and Extender playback is exactly as it was. I did notice a slight speed improvement on my Samsung Q1 but as my Media Center machine is not stressed a lot I couldn’t feel any difference.
I presume that, because you had none of the problematic drivers, the only reason you hadn’t been offered the SP1 update automatically (by Windows Update) was a deliberate decision by Microsoft roll the update out gradually.
This is useful information because, I guess, soon we’re all going to get this update
whether we’re ready for it or not.
I’m experiencing an issue that’s somewhat related. I can play WMV files fine, but at (apparently) random times during playback, WMP will freeze, and then my whole PC freezes (mouse and everything). Ctrl+Alt+Del doesn’t work, so I have to hold down the power button and restart. It happened to me more than 5 times on different WMV files. I’d imagine it’s related to drivers somehow, but I’m pretty stumped as to what it could be. Does anyone have any suggestions?
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I presume that, because you had none of the problematic drivers, the only reason you hadn’t been offered the SP1 update automatically (by Windows Update) was a deliberate decision by Microsoft roll the update out gradually.
This is useful information because, I guess, soon we’re all going to get this update
whether we’re ready for it or not.
PingBack from http://projecthtpc.threesixty.cc/2008/03/30/vista-sp1-and-wmv-analog-audio-playback-silences-your-pc/
PingBack from http://projecthtpc.threesixty.cc/2008/03/30/links-for-2008-03-30/
I’m experiencing an issue that’s somewhat related. I can play WMV files fine, but at (apparently) random times during playback, WMP will freeze, and then my whole PC freezes (mouse and everything). Ctrl+Alt+Del doesn’t work, so I have to hold down the power button and restart. It happened to me more than 5 times on different WMV files. I’d imagine it’s related to drivers somehow, but I’m pretty stumped as to what it could be. Does anyone have any suggestions?
Buy a Mac
Been struggling with the WMV problem myself, downloaded and installed voxware_audio.zip, now ALL my video clips play faultlessly