EPG123 Breaks HDHomeRun Prime in WMC 7. How to Fix It.

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kbystrak

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EPG123 Breaks HDHomeRun Prime in WMC 7. How to Fix It.

#1

Post by kbystrak » Fri Nov 25, 2016 8:12 pm

I am putting this post out there to help other people who may be having the same problem I had when installing EPG123 on Media Center in windows 7 with a Silicon Dust HDHomeRun Prime tuner. I am the "caretaker" of at least 10 different WMCs with HDHomeRuns. I have begun migrating them all to EPG123 after using it on several of my own Media Centers for a few weeks. I can confirm so fat that on 7 of the 7 machines i have set it up on it has broken the WMC support for the Prime tuner. If you follow the install instructions in the PDF guide for EPG123 you will be stuck after resetting your WMC in safe mode using EPG123's Step 1: Clean Start button. When you reboot and open WMC to run the Live TV setup you will be told there are no TV tuners found. You will not be able to proceed with the setup of Live TV.

After hours of trying every possible work around and quick fix i had some success with different shortcuts of individual fixes on different WMCs. In the end, i worked up this set of instructions that has so far worked 4 times for me on the last 4 I did. From now on i am going to just do these in order from the begining:

After you have extracted EPG into a folder, rebooted and run the 1. Clean Start function:

1 . Uninstalled from Add/remove Programs: HDHomeRun software, PlayReady, DigitalCable Advisor
2. Control Panel, Turn Windows Features on or off, Media Features -> Windows Media Center (Uncheck it)
3. Reboot
4. Delete
C:\ProgramData\SiliconDust
C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\eHome
C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\PlayReady
5. Control Panel, Turn Windows Features on or off. Media Features -> Windows Media Center (check it)
6. Reboot
7. Reinstall Digital Cable Advisor.
8. Open WMC and Run Digital Cable Advisor. Close Media Center
9. Install PlayReady - https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/downloa ... px?id=5445
10. Install HDHomeRun Software and check the box at the end of the install to run the install wizard.
11. HDHomeRun Install Wizard:
A. Configuration tab, make sure it says your location united states and BDA Mode is Windows Media Center.
It should list your device with 3 tuners and it should say cablecard as the source type.
It should say status OK. Hit the Next >> button.
B. Cable Card tab, hit the Scan buton. Allow the scan to complete.
It should show channges found. Hit Next >> button.
C. Go go advanced Tab. Make sure Windows Media Center Background Channel Scan is unchecked. Hit Finish Button.
12. Reboot
13. Open Media Center and Run Live TV Setup per EPG123 Instructions. Basically, just run it saying yes to everything except for the Guide User Agreement.
When it is done you should have a LIVE TV and RECORDED TV option under the TV section in media center. Close Media Center.
14. Run the EPG123.exe by right clicking on it and choosing Run as Administrator. Follow the rest of the EPG123 Guide. Don't forget to schedule your task using the button in EPG123 GUI.


Test media center. Guide should be back and it should work.

Donate to EPG123


I hope this helps someone else!

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garyan2

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#2

Post by garyan2 » Sat Nov 26, 2016 7:57 pm

Not saying your method above doesn't work ... on the contrary, I would expect it to always work. I'm just not sure it is all necessary.

I have seen reports that the Primes are a little finicky when deleting the ehome directory/database. Some of the fix actions for those were simply to reboot the tuners and/or HTPC to get them going again. Can any other HDHR Prime users out there chime in on what issues you had and how you got it to work? Maybe we can trim the above down to only the necessary steps.

Thanks, kbystrak for posting this detailed path to success for those that may have issues. :thumbup:
- Gary
Keeping WMC alive beyond January 2020. https://garyan2.github.io

stuartm

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#3

Post by stuartm » Sun Nov 27, 2016 12:57 am

I have 4 HTPC's that use my 2 HDHR Primes. I did not need to do any of that to get my WMC working after doing the EPG123 install. It's been a while but I think I did have to reboot to get the tuners to be available. Definitely no reinstalling or anything like that.

jdlive

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#4

Post by jdlive » Wed Nov 30, 2016 9:01 pm

Same here, just needed a reboot and the tuners showed up.

captain_video

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#5

Post by captain_video » Mon Dec 05, 2016 2:49 pm

I've got three HTPCs that share a HDHR Prime and they all run EPG123 with no problems. The only issue I've ever had is with the EPG123.exe file being wiped by MSE. Once I set up the EPG123 folder and files as an exclusion in MSE it has no longer been an issue.

McGary

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#6

Post by McGary » Mon Feb 06, 2017 10:07 am

This has me a bit leery of installing EPG123, as my setup uses a pair of HD Homeruns. If you do the complete reset as outlined above (the 13 steps in the first post) do you have to re-validate your cable cards ... or will they simply be seen okay by Media Center when you re-configure it? Also, where in the process do you need to run Tuner Salad to see all of your tuners?

stuartm

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#7

Post by stuartm » Mon Feb 06, 2017 7:31 pm

McGary wrote:This has me a bit leery of installing EPG123, as my setup uses a pair of HD Homeruns. If you do the complete reset as outlined above (the 13 steps in the first post) do you have to re-validate your cable cards ... or will they simply be seen okay by Media Center when you re-configure it? Also, where in the process do you need to run Tuner Salad to see all of your tuners?
No, none of the steps require re-validaing cable cards, that is a function of the cable company pairing them which has already happened. When you go thru tuner set up you can just continue on at the step where it says to contact your cable co to validate.

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