Organizing Recordings in WMC

[Mike88]

I know you can organize recordings by either date or by title. But is there any way to put just some recordings that you want into a group?

Sort of like Windows Explorer which can display by date yet has folders lumped together & single files separately.

I usually have recordings displayed by date so that I can watch the oldest ones first. But I want to set aside or archive some program series that I’m not sure I want to continue watching. I don’t want to delete them in case things get slow & I decide to finish out the season & watch them.

[adam1991]

http://recordedtvhd.com/

[Mike88]

Thanks for the information. I was trying not to install any additional software but guess I might have to.

Or I could temporarily just move the recordings to another folder.

[CyberSimian]

I could temporarily just move the recordings to another folder.

If you have ever used Vista, you will know that it suffers from the disadvantage that display of the "Recorded TV" folder becomes horribly slow when it contains a large number of recordings. On my system, I find that around 100 recordings is the maximum that I want to keep in "Recorded TV". So once a week I move recordings (that I am not going to watch within a day or two) from "Recorded TV" to a folder tree that resides in the "Video" folder of Media Center. You can construct this folder tree to arrange the recordings in the way that you prefer. However, there are two points to note:

(1) In "Recorded TV", when you press the OK button on the remote control, MC displays the programme info first, and a second press of OK then starts/resumes playback. In "Video", the first press of the OK button starts playback immediately. In order to see the programme info, you need to press the INFO button first, and then press OK to start playback.

(2) MC retains the resume point for all partially-viewed programmes in "Recorded TV", but only for some programmes in "Video". Specifically, it retains the resume point for those programmes for which a series recording request still exists. If you move a series of recordings into "Video" and then delete the series recording request for that series (because it has finished its run), MC will no longer remember the resume points for episodes in that series. (Yes, this is irritating, but on Vista the slow display of an overfull "Recorded TV" folder is even worse, so lack of resume point is the lesser of two evils.)

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

[CyberSimian]

One other point that I will mention: most Microsoft RC6 remote controls have dedicated buttons that take you directly to "Recorded TV", "Live TV", or "DVD". However, there are a few remotes that also have a dedicated button that takes you directly to "Video". Since my entire recordings library resides in the "Video" folder, I would not be without this dedicated button on the remote.

One remote that has a dedicated "Video" button is the Ortek (also sold under the Hama, Gmyle, and Adesso brands), but I would not recommend this remote due to its unusable "Info" button, which sends a right-mouse click instead of sending CTRL-D.

However, if you have a programmable remote control, you can define a button to perform the "Video" function. One-for-All remotes can do this (and I would expect that Logitech Harmony can too). On the One-for-All that I use, I have defined the red/green/yellow/blue colour buttons to perform the functions Recorded-TV/Live-TV/Video/DVD. Ask here if you want to know what the button codes are.

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

[Mike88]

CyberSimian -

Thanks for all the information. I'll create some sub-folders to put the questionable recordings into. I can always move them back to "Recorded TV" if I decide to watch them.

I have a Rosewill RRC-126 WMC7 remote. It does have buttons labeled Pictures, Music, Videos, & Radio in one area. And Live TV, Rec TV, DVD Menu in other areas. I don't know if I ever played with those, but I will now.

I mainly use an RCA RCRP05B remote because it lets me control the volume on my A/V receiver. It has colored buttons which I have programmed foe a few things. such as the green colored button to be a real "Green Button".

[Mike88]

CyberSimian -

Those buttons labeled Pictures, Music, Video, etc on the RRC-126 remote do take me to the various Libraries, only the Radio button does nothing. I learn something new all the time.

Thanks again for the information.

[blueiedgod]

CyberSimian -

Those buttons labeled Pictures, Music, Video, etc on the RRC-126 remote do take me to the various Libraries, only the Radio button does nothing. I learn something new all the time.

Thanks again for the information.

Install a radio tuner, and the Radio button will take you to Radio. You can Pause, rewind, record live Radio with WMC, works on the extenders too.

[blueiedgod]

I could temporarily just move the recordings to another folder.

If you have ever used Vista, you will know that it suffers from the disadvantage that display of the "Recorded TV" folder becomes horribly slow when it contains a large number of recordings. On my system, I find that around 100 recordings is the maximum that I want to keep in "Recorded TV"

SSD seemed to solve all those issues. We have over 2,000 recordings in the Recorded TV.

[CyberSimian]

SSD seemed to solve all those issues. We have over 2,000 recordings in the Recorded TV.

Are you using Win7 Media Center? If you are, that may be part of the explanation, as I believe that Win7 implemented some performance improvements in this area (compared to Vista, which I still use).

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

[Mike88]

I moved some recorded programs into a sub-folder that I created in the Video folder. They all showed up in WMC7. I went to play one & it only played a few seconds & up came a small window in the center of the screen stating WMC had stopped & gave me 2 options: troubleshoot or restart WMC.

I got my wireless keyboard & restarted WMC. Then started playing the recording again. This time it went a little further & I thought everything was OK. But then up popped the same window stating WMC had stopped. So I restarted it. Then moved the recording back to the Recorded folder & it played just fine.

I'm not sure if WMC didn't like playing a recording from the Video folder or because it was in a sub-folder. I have more of the same program in the sub-folder & will try playing another one later & see what happens.

[CyberSimian]

I'm not sure if WMC didn't like playing a recording from the Video folder or because it was in a sub-folder. I have more of the same program in the sub-folder & will try playing another one later & see what happens.

Very strange. I have folders nested several levels deep within the "Videos" folder, and have never had this happen. One thought: is your "Videos" folder on the same disk as your "Recorded TV" folder? If it is on a different disk, it might indicate a disk problem of some sort.

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

[Mike88]

I tried a few more recordings that were in sub-folders in the Video folder. They all failed at some point. Sometimes at the very beginning, like a split second after starting. Sometimes at the very end.

I played a recording from the second sub-folder & it started playing OK. So I FF to the end & when it brings up the screen to delete or restart, the small error window pops up to either check for solution or restart.

So I re-tried a program that stopped at the beginning & it was now playing OK. So I FF to almost the end & then played till the end. When the delete or restart program screen came up so did that error message window.

IOW one time the error message popped at that the very beginning & another time after the same recording played out.

I tired a couple from each sub-folder & now they all had the error message after playing.

Maybe it's a difference between Vista & Windows 7. Does your Vista WMC save recordings in the dvr-ms versus the wtv format? If so maybe that's the issue. IOW maybe WMC7 does not like wtv files in the Video folder. Please let me know which file format you are using.

Thanks.

[CyberSimian]

Maybe it's a difference between Vista & Windows 7. Does your Vista WMC save recordings in the dvr-ms versus the wtv format? If so maybe that's the issue. IOW maybe WMC7 does not like wtv files in the Video folder.

Vista records TV as DVR-MS files. The WTV file type was introduced (I think) in the "TV Pack" that was available from some OEMs before Win7 became available.

I have got Win7 in another partition on my HTPC. I will record something, move it to "Videos", and see if it plays OK.

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

[CyberSimian]

Maybe it's a difference between Vista & Windows 7. Does your Vista WMC save recordings in the dvr-ms versus the wtv format? If so maybe that's the issue. IOW maybe WMC7 does not like wtv files in the Video folder.

I booted Win7 and recorded an episode of "The Simpsons". Despite the copyright date being 2008, it was a narrow screen programme (i.e. 4:3 and not 16:9).

The recording played fine from "Recorded TV". I then moved it to a folder nested two-levels down in the "Videos" folder, and it still played fine. No problems at the beginning, or part-way through, or at the end (but I did not view it from start to finish). This behaviour is what I would have expected.

My Win7 system is bog-standard, by which I mean that I have not installed any codec packs. It occurs to me that if you have installed codecs, a WTV file played from "Videos" might use a different codec from a WTV file played from "Recorded TV", and possibly the codec used in "Videos" is one that cannot decode WTV files correctly. (Codec packs are a complete mystery to me, so I have no idea whether they really could work this way.)

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

[Mike88]

The recording played fine from "Recorded TV". I then moved it to a folder nested two-levels down in the "Videos" folder, and it still played fine. No problems at the beginning, or part-way through, or at the end (but I did not view it from start to finish). This behaviour is what I would have expected.

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

You might want to FF “The Simpsons” to the end & see what happens. Sometimes mine did not show a problem until I ran them to the end & got the screen asking to delete or restart.

I took a .wtv and converted it to .dvr-ms format using Windows 7 and put both versions into a Video sub-folder. They both started playing OK, but I hit the skip ahead button a few times & they both stopped & up popped the error message.

I played them a second time & the .wtv got the error message again after skipping ahead a bit but the .dvr-ms did not get the error until I FF and ran it all the way to the end. This is what happened the other day. It’s not consistent when it acts up, but it always does at some point.

I never intentionally installed any codec packs. I do have MPC-HC on the HTPC in order to watch an occasional video in another format such as .iso. Also have irfanview installed to view miscellaneous photos. If these installed a codec I am not aware of it.

I only have a few recordings in each of two subfolders. I'm not sure I want to continue watching these series & do not want to delete what I already have. I'll just move them back to the Recorded TV folder if/when I decide to watch.

In fact I'll copy these recordings over to my desktop PC which also has Windows 7 and see what happens when playing in WMC7.

[Mike88]

CyberSimian -

I played with 2 recordings. One I left as .wtv and one I converted to dvr-ms. They both always crashed WMC7 when played from inside the sub-folder. But when moved to the main Video folder each one crashed about half the time. I moved them back & forth several times & always got the same results.

I took the same 2 recording but the left them both as .wtv. Copied them to my desktop & tried them in the Video folder & also a sub-folder. They always played without an error.

Obviously something in the HTPC is causing a conflict. And yet the desktop with a lot more programs on it does not have a problem.

While I would like to solve the problem, the HTPC has been working great & I do not want to affect it's reliability by tampering with what I have. I don't want to re-install Windows & set up everything else just to fix a problem I never had until I sort of created it a few weeks ago. And the easy work around is to just move the recordings back to their original folder if/when I want to watch them.

I've read that WMC can be re-set or re-installed or something like that. I'll have to look into that option.

Thanks for all you help.

[CyberSimian]

Obviously something in the HTPC is causing a conflict. And yet the desktop with a lot more programs on it does not have a problem.

It is disappointing that we cannot identify the cause of your problem. Perhaps someone will read this thread in the future, recognise the symptoms, and be able to suggest a solution.

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

[Mike88]

I did a scannow and chkdsk including scanning for bad sectors.

I looked at the Event Logs, after I researched a bit in order to figure out which section to look at.
From what I could find, stage 1 of 5 stated:
0 bad file records processed, 4 EA records processed, 44 reparse records processed.
In stage 2 of 5 it stated:
“Cleaning up 6 unused index entries from index $SII on file 0x9”.
“Cleaning up 6 unused security descriptors”.

I have no idea what all the above means, but obviously something was done.

The good news is the logs also stated:
“Windows has checked the file system & found no problems.”
“0 KB in bad sectors.”

The better news is the .wtv files that I've been working with now play OK in the Video sub-folder. I have no idea what chkdsk cleaned up, but I'd have to presume whatever it did made the difference. But why would cleaning up something that was unused make a difference? While I had the keyboard out, & before I ran chkdsk, I also did some routine maintenance & updated my Avast antivirus software & definitions. But I can't see where the "old" Avast would have stopped WMC.

I previously did look in the Events Logs to perhaps find out what made WMC stop. But the Events logs have too much data for me to figure out anything. I don't even know where to begin to look. I looked at anything that might be appropriate but nothing stood out.

Anyway everything now seems OK.

Thanks again.