Having problems when I go into my recordings

[Randyored]

Hi All.

Having problems when I go into my "Recorded TV" the shows no pictures . I tend to keep allot of my shows when I record them. The last 2 weeks and beyond now do not have any pictures. I just the gray fill presented. 2 weeks ago I had the avatars for each show. Now nothing. I went into "epg 123 . exe" and set it with settings. It didn't work.

Any help with any details?

[sgbroimp]

I see this occasionally. Generally they come back when I do a full shutdown of the PC for 3-4 minutes, then restart, open recorded TV and allow a few seconds for them to come up. Someone said this can occur due to recording errors, but not sure.

[Space]

This is often due to a corrupted recording that the WMC thumbnail generator is choking on which causes it to stop generating thumbnails for all subsequent recordings.

https://www.thegreenbutton.tv/viewtopic ... 4&p=112707

[DSperber]

Also can happen if the recordings are copy-protected and encrypted from your provider, which triggers DRM in WMC, which is based on use of a DATE/TIME-BASED decryption key that is tied to the current machine configuration and currently installed Win7 system that actually created the recording AND THE DATE OF THE RECORDINGS.

So if you then either hardware upgrade your machine significantly (e.g. change motherboard, CPU, etc.), or if you reinstall Win7 and/or WMC, or if you RESTORE A SYSTEM IMAGE THAT IS OLDER THAN THE DATE THESE PROBLEM RECORDINGS WERE RECORDED, then the old encryption key used to "understand" the encrypted recordings is replaced with a new one, based on the new hardware configuration and/or installed Win7/WMC. This in turn prevents successful playback of these previously recorded/encrypted WTV files. And it also prevents producing the thumbnails for these recordings.

Note that for sure if you just upgrade/replace storage drives this does not constitute "significant hardware upgrade". Also, in theory if you just add memory that should also not cause the regeneration of a new DRM key for WMC (although in my experience this is a "maybe", so if you have added memory at least be aware it might invalidate the old recordings... which can be resolved by removing the newly added memory and going back to your old hardware configuration). Also, if you simply reconfigure My Recordings library and/or MOVE the WTV files to secondary/added foldrs this does not constitute significant change.

But if any of this "significant change" is at play here which resulted in a new DRM key getting built, then not only should those thumbnails not be generated on the recordings list but you should also not be able to actually play the recordings.

So: is your symptom merely that you don't see the thumbnails, but you CAN actually play those recordings? Or have you actually also lost the ability to play the recordings?

(who is your cable provider, and is a cablecard involved, and is a Tuning Adapter involved for SDV-delivered channels, and does your cable provider deliver both copy-freely and copy-protected content for some/all channels, etc.)

[Space]

Just a small clarification... The reason why restoring an image from an older date than the recordings were made will result in those recordings not being able to be played is due to the "C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\PlayReady\mspr.hds" file not containing the license for those recordings.

If you save a copy of the "mspr.hds" file (or already have a backup of this file that was made after the recordings were made) and then do an image restore of the system from a date prior to the recordings being made and then copy the "mspr.hds" file back to the restored image, you WILL be able to play back those recordings.

So the date that the image was backed up is not relevant, it just has to be an image that has the same Playready system signature as the system had when the recording was made. What is important is that you have the license for that recording. Whenever a DRM protected recording is made, the license for that recording is added to the "mspr.hds" file. So you need to have this file, with the appropriate license whenever you want to play back the protected recording.

So all you really need to do is make a single image of your system drive (I use Macrium Reflect free version) and then you technically never need to make another image again, as long as you are backing up the mspr.hds file on a regular basis you can restore your old system image and then copy over the latest mspr.hds to the restored image and be able to play back every DRM protected recording made after the image was made.

[DSperber]

You're absolutely correct. The secret sauce is MSPR.HDS, so if you have preserved the current copy of that file, and then restore it after you've restored some older image backup (i.e. from Macrium) which otherwise would have made all those newer recordings whose content in the restored older MSPR.HDS is not present, then absolutely those newer recordings will in fact be 100% playable and usable and the thumbnails will be correctly generated. I actually boot to "safe mode" first after the restore, in order to copy my saved up-to-the-minute latest version of MSPR.HDS back into C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Playready (thus replacing the restored older version) without WMC being active. Once that's done now I reboot normally, thus seeing the effect of the restored older system image with the very latest MSPR.HDS that provides access to ALL of my "newer" recordings.

I was actually trying to inquire as to whether or not anything had been done to the machine hardware, or the Win7/WMC environment, that might explain the mystery of why the thumbnails for these recordings were no longer being generated. If in fact the subset of recordings which are not playable also are the same subset of recordings with no thumbnails getting generated (and preserving/copying MPSR.HDS had not been done, which of course would result in this symptom had an older system image been restored) then that story would be an understandable and expected result and explanation. If not this scenario, then some other cause and explanation must be true.

Still waiting for some feedback from OP as to whether or not he's resolved the mystery and if so how, or if it still is present.