How to get rid of the annoying POPUP about Jan 2020 Guide going away

[Starflare5]

Has anyone here had the issue where the "Switch To An Alternate TV Program Guide Provider" keeps annoyingly popping up over and over even after switching to EPG123 and Schedules Direct?

[Moderator note: post moved to this thread]

[schnortz]

Thank you for the link... I will try it later. I was not using the right combination of words in my search to hit upon the specific topic.

[jriker1]

DIdn't see an answer to this in the thread so may have missed it but how do you stop these alerts? I have been on another provider for years after getting tired of Microsoft's outages and the warning means nothing to me. There has to be a registry entry or something I can change to stop the warnings.

[Moderator note: post moved to this thread]

[pqitln]

All: I believe I successfully installed EPG123 and removed my native Windows 7 MC guide BUT Im still getting the windows popup indicating they will stop providing the guide.

Is this expected? Do you still get this popup even though you are no longer using the former guide OR is something installed incorrectly?

[unclebun]

Yes, the popup still appears. It doesn't know you have switched to another guide source.

[Paint]

I'm also still receiving the annoying message. Win 8. WMC. Using EPG123. Was really hoping that it would go away after doing the clean setup with EPG and going through the live tv setup wizard where I did NOT accept the terms for the offered program guide. But it's still happening.

Switch to an alternate TV program guide provider
Starting in January 2020, Microsoft is retiring its Electronic Program Guide Service. To continue receiving TV Program Guide information on your Windows Media Center, you may configure an alternate TV listing provider.

I've clicked both the OK and the Learn More buttons, no change.
I've verified in Tasks -> Settings -> TV -> Guide -> About Guide Listings that it actually does say EPG123 and not Rovi anymore.
One weird thing is that when I click on Guide Terms of Service, it claims that there is no Internet service.

Any ideas? Any registry settings or anything to get rid of this stupid message?

My post here fixes the problem: viewtopic.php?p=137001#p137001

Specifically, KB4525251 is the problem. Its definitely the KB that has the notification for ehShell.exe

Run this command to remove it and resolve the notification issue:

Code: Select all

wusa /uninstall /kb:4530734 /norestart
wusa /uninstall /kb:4525251 /norestart

[kc8emd]

Hi All, yesterday this pop-up returned and I have already migrated to Epg123 and removed KB4493132.

Is there a registry setting I can change to disable this?

[Paint]

Hi All, yesterday this pop-up returned and I have already migrated to Epg123 and removed KB4493132.

Is there a registry setting I can change to disable this?

Please read my posts in the thread. I have found the fix to this issue.

[mikedWMC]

FWIW,

The constant popup on my WMC host machine stopped today.

All Windows monthly security updates are still installed, including KB4530734 and KB4525251.

So, it's annoying and frustrating and random maybe?

[Paint]

FWIW,

The constant popup on my WMC host machine stopped today.

All Windows monthly security updates are still installed, including KB4530734 and KB4525251.

So, it's annoying and frustrating and random maybe?

Please read my posts to correct in this thread

[dougsmith]

I suggested this a while back, but nobody acknowledged trying it...

uncheck 'Settings > General > Automatic Download Options > Automatically download Windows Media Center data...' & save.

I did it when I switched to epg123 & I have never seen this nag, but that option seems to me like just the sort of thing to trigger it. Worth a shot? YMMV

I think this is important. I installed EPG123 back on Jan 1, but did not change that setting. Two days ago, the dreaded popup appeared. I looked for the security updates people mentioned, but none of those had been installed (although one of them was pending, and I declined the installation). I changed setting to stop automatic downloads on WMC7 guide data yesterday. There was no change in the popup immediately, but today after the scheduled EPG123 guide data update, the popup disappeared.

[Paint]

If anyone wants to remove these pop-ups, please read the thread before posting and listen to my instructions

[glorp]

I'm fairly sure kb4525251 is also not the only patch that will cause the problem. More than likely many people will have kb4525235 instead. kb4525251 was the November monthly security quality rollup preview. It was pushed as optional and many people would never install it. It was replaced on November patch Tuesday (November 19) by kb4525235 which was the regular monthly security quality rollup and was marked Important. I had neither kb4530734 nor kb4525251 installed and still got the popup yesterday. I did have kb4525235 and have uninstalled it now. Both kb4525235 and kb4525251 have ehshell.exe in them. After uninstalling kb4525235 I confirmed that the reg key you mentioned, epgDeprecationNoticeTimeLastSeen, can be deleted and will not return when launching WMC. I'll be watching now to see if this solves things as I left kb4525235 on another one of my Win7 WMCs.

Two other comments; these patches are specific to Win7. Win8 will be different numbers and if you do uninstall kb4525235/kb4525251 you'll also uninstall the November security patches. You can fix that by installing kb4525233 from the MS Update Catalog. I confirmed that kb4525233 does not contain ehshell.exe and once installed does not cause the epgDeprecationNoticeTimeLastSeen reg key to reappear after starting WMC.

Thanks for the tip. It has all the signs of being the right solution but there's more than just those two patches involved.

[Paint]

I'm fairly sure kb4525251 is also not the only patch that will cause the problem. More than likely many people will have kb4525235 instead. kb4525251 was the November monthly security quality rollup preview. It was pushed as optional and many people would never install it. It was replaced on November patch Tuesday (November 19) by kb4525235 which was the regular monthly security quality rollup and was marked Important. I had neither kb4530734 nor kb4525251 installed and still got the popup yesterday. I did have kb4525235 and have uninstalled it now. Both kb4525235 and kb4525251 have ehshell.exe in them. After uninstalling kb4525235 I confirmed that the reg key you mentioned, epgDeprecationNoticeTimeLastSeen, can be deleted and will not return when launching WMC. I'll be watching now to see if this solves things as I left kb4525235 on another one of my Win7 WMCs.

Two other comments; these patches are specific to Win7. Win8 will be different numbers and if you do uninstall kb4525235/kb4525251 you'll also uninstall the November security patches. You can fix that by installing kb4525233 from the MS Update Catalog. I confirmed that kb4525233 does not contain ehshell.exe and once installed does not cause the epgDeprecationNoticeTimeLastSeen reg key to reappear after starting WMC.

Thanks for the tip. It has all the signs of being the right solution but there's more than just those two patches involved.

Removing these two patches and rebooting, removed the notifications for me.

[wgf_bean]

I'm not sure if it's a coincidence or not, but I might have stopped the nag.

Even though I'm already using EPG123 I decided to use it's "Client Setup" -> "Clean Start". Since doing this the nag is gone.

[BuyyonPuncher]

Hi Everyone,
I just got EPG123 running on New Years day and I'm kicking myself for not doing it years ago. IT IS AWESOME. Thanks Gary!

My question is that over the last couple of days the annoying popup saying, "Switch to an alternate TV program guide provider" comes up EVERY TIME** that I go to the guide. It's REALLY annoying. Is there a registry hack or something to kill this message?

I apologize if this question has been asked previously.

I'm running EPG123 ver 1.3.4 and Windows 7.

**I've been playing with it more and it's not every time but I swear that it pops up twice in a row certain times.

Thanks,
Ben

[Moderator note: topic merged; search before posting]

[IT Troll]

I noticed in the windows media center settings in the registry that there is a key that is updated every time the notification is shown:

epgDeprecationNoticeTimeLastSeen contains a date

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Media Center\Settings\MCE.PerUserSettings]

if you delete it, it comes back next time you open windows media center (ehShell.exe). If you put 1, 0, or -1 in it, windows media center wont start. If you put a date in the past or the future, it will only update the key with the correct date once you open windows media center. Hopefully we can find a solution to this problem!

Good spot. So if you don't wan't to uninstall security updates, would a workaround be to use a daily scheduled task to set this registry setting to the current date?

[wgf_bean]

I noticed in the windows media center settings in the registry that there is a key that is updated every time the notification is shown:

epgDeprecationNoticeTimeLastSeen contains a date

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Media Center\Settings\MCE.PerUserSettings]

if you delete it, it comes back next time you open windows media center (ehShell.exe). If you put 1, 0, or -1 in it, windows media center wont start. If you put a date in the past or the future, it will only update the key with the correct date once you open windows media center. Hopefully we can find a solution to this problem!

I have this key too but I no longer have the nag. I haven't uninstalled any Windows updates. Currently the date is 3 days old.

I have a related key "hasOpenedGuide" in the same location with the value 1.

I suspect that when Microsoft came out with the update to create the nag they set a flag regardless of whether you already have an alternate guide or not. However if after getting the nag, you go through Settings->TV Signal-> Set Up TV Signal and chose to NOT agree, then the flag gets reset. This is what I did and now the nag is gone on both of my Win 7 machines.

Edit:

If someone still has the nag it would be interesting to know the value of the "hasOpenedGuide" key.

[IT Troll]

I have this key too but I no longer have the nag. I haven't uninstalled any Windows updates. Currently the date is 3 days old.

In my experience the nag repeats after a period of time. I suspect that on launch Media Center checks the date and if it is more than x days in the past displays the nag and then sets the date.

[wgf_bean]

In my experience the nag repeats after a period of time. I suspect that on launch Media Center checks the date and if it is more than x days in the past displays the nag and then sets the date.

That's how mine initially behaved when this started back in (I think) December. Maybe it was November.

But then last week it started doing it almost non stop. It would do it every time I entered WMC and even pop up again after I acknowledged it. Trying to remember the chain of events but I think it started with the high frequency nag last week sometime. Didn't go away until I went through setup and chose do not agree. Could be a coincidence but that's what I observed.