PlayReady Issues

godman114

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#61

Post by godman114 » Tue Mar 10, 2020 1:22 pm

godman114 wrote: Mon Mar 09, 2020 2:18 pm Just an update for you guys. I struggled a lot with this new mini PC (Lenovo ThinkCentre M75q-1), but finally have it working with one caveat. When I run WMC maximized on my 65" 4K, the screen goes out every few seconds, then comes back, and repeats. I have a strong feeling it's either the HDMI cable, or the refresh rate from WMC not matching up with my 4K monitor. At first, the issue was that everything in WMC looked like crap (choppy), and I realized it was the fact that when I set up 4K resolution in Windows, it defaulted to 30hz (eww). Setting it to 59hz or 60hz in Windows makes everything look smooth again.

I went through the WMC display set up and tried 59.94hz setting and 60hz setting... still struggling to get this to work. If I run WMC in windowed mode, I have absolutely no problems (but that's not acceptable, just temporary). If I run Kodi (v18), I don't seem to have an issue (yet)... feel like this could creep up on me also. I watched 4K videos over 1GB from my file server like champ. Again, either I need a new HDMI cable or I have to mess more with the refresh rates. Anyone seen this before?

To sum up my finally working setup (seriously had to do a lot of tinkering to get this to work on this model PC, namely because there are NO DRIVERS for b1511 for this model desktop). I had to play with different AMD drivers as Lenovo didn't have any drivers for b1511. I had to manually browse the driver files from device manager to get bluetooth, wifi, etc. working. Here's my current (almost fully working) setup:
Lenovo ThinkCenter M75q-1 (Ryzen 5 3400G)
HDHR Network 3-Tuner with CableCard from Verizon FIOS
Windows 10 b1511 (stop updates installed, but only enabled after WMC setup was completed)
AMD Radeon Adrenaline 2020 20.1.3
Lenovo drivers manually injected via device manager (extracted the oldest drivers from website)
HDHR 2015 setup
WMC V-13
EPG123 Guide
Digital Cable Advisor (had to be manually installed and then ran)

Caveats:
1. AMD Display driver was failing when trying to get WMC full screen working correctly (refresh rate or HDMI issues)
2. Display Driver error comes up when WMC is first launched - must maximize/minimize window every time to resolve
3. Unable to run WMC in fullscreen mode yet -- could be related to issue #1 above

I may have to live with that display driver issue forever. I remember having this problem back in the day even on Windows 7... not sure if it's related to HDCP or not.

Fingers crossed that my new HDMI cable coming in today resolves all issues (wishful thinking). I picked up a DP to HDMI 4k Cable from Amazon.
I said I'd follow up, so if anyone cares or has followed my posts, the fix for my WMC fullscreen issue was resolved with a DP to HDMI cable. It hasn't even been a full day, so not 100% sure, but before the cable swap I could not do WMC full screen with 4k 60hz (only 30hz). Now, I can. :)

Let's hope this lasts! I took an image with Macrium reflect. For those of you that have working PlayReady setups, take an image!! Macrium reflect has a free version that works well (or use whatever you like).

I'm thinking about building a few Windows 10 VMs now to see if I can get those to work (to hold onto them). I currently run WMC on two windows 7 VMs still... probably should upgrade those while I can.

jeepman

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#62

Post by jeepman » Tue Mar 10, 2020 4:02 pm

godman114 wrote: Tue Mar 10, 2020 1:22 pm
Let's hope this lasts! I took an image with Macrium reflect. For those of you that have working PlayReady setups, take an image!! Macrium reflect has a free version that works well (or use whatever you like).
So with Macrium, it is helpful, but isn't it limited to restoring on the same hardware so you don't trigger having to set up again? If you have to re-run setup, and PlayReady is gone again, then that would effectively make that backup not useful?

Don't get me wrong, I intend to do a backup, but I wonder if I want to bite the bullet and retire my 11 year old system now, and get all new parts working while I can install PlayReady, and then take an image. Before I do this though, I need to see what else is out there, and if we drop our cable TV package, then really I will have to move away from all this since I won't have a CableCard anymore.

I am hoping Spectrum Time Warner is actually willing to lower the price during a threat to cancel, but from what I recall, they don't do that as a corporate policy. Worst case is I can cancel, lose several old "RoadRunner" email addresses that I have tied to who knows what, and then sign up as a new customer in my wife's name.

godman114

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#63

Post by godman114 » Tue Mar 10, 2020 5:04 pm

jeepman wrote: Tue Mar 10, 2020 4:02 pm
godman114 wrote: Tue Mar 10, 2020 1:22 pm
Let's hope this lasts! I took an image with Macrium reflect. For those of you that have working PlayReady setups, take an image!! Macrium reflect has a free version that works well (or use whatever you like).
So with Macrium, it is helpful, but isn't it limited to restoring on the same hardware so you don't trigger having to set up again? If you have to re-run setup, and PlayReady is gone again, then that would effectively make that backup not useful?

Don't get me wrong, I intend to do a backup, but I wonder if I want to bite the bullet and retire my 11 year old system now, and get all new parts working while I can install PlayReady, and then take an image. Before I do this though, I need to see what else is out there, and if we drop our cable TV package, then really I will have to move away from all this since I won't have a CableCard anymore.

I am hoping Spectrum Time Warner is actually willing to lower the price during a threat to cancel, but from what I recall, they don't do that as a corporate policy. Worst case is I can cancel, lose several old "RoadRunner" email addresses that I have tied to who knows what, and then sign up as a new customer in my wife's name.
The image would be restore to the same hardware, yes. I'm not sure if there's a way around rerunning setup... like I know with Acronis (when I used it), there were plugin options to allow dissimilar hardware, but if I had to guess that may still prompt a re-setup.

In any case, the point of the image is so that if WMC breaks for whatever reason, I can restore to a working setup. Let's say I accidentally updating something (driver, windows critical patch, or anything else)... then I can restore to a working date. This machine I just bought for this setup is brand new. I plan on holding into it for several years. By the time it dies, WMC and/or guides will be dead and I will have to move on anyway... Right? :)

trelf

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#64

Post by trelf » Tue Mar 10, 2020 7:21 pm

jeepman wrote: Tue Mar 10, 2020 12:29 pm
trelf wrote: Tue Mar 10, 2020 12:07 pm
Dang it. Unfortunately, this only worked for a couple days. I just hooked my machine back up to my TV, and the PlayReady issue came right back. I'm stuck right back where I was, previously, and PR won't update. Are you, by chance, still talking to the people at MS? Thanks in advance.
So I did a PlayReady install, and even a PlayReady Update in 8.1 MC at around 6PM CDT on Monday, so just about 13 hours ago based on the time of writing. I did not have to do much, except override Digital Cable Advisor because my Graphics failed the system test.

One note, I did NOT install any PlayReady standalone installer. I let Media Center's Setup TV Signal do everything after overriding DCA.
With this machine, the PlayReady issue had been resolved, but it was in a temporary location, using a temporary monitor. I was able to tune all of the channels. When I moved the PC back to its normal position, last night (3/9 around 8PM eastern), and hooked it up to my TV, the PlayReady update tripped again. I tried several times, but it would just fail back to the "PR cannot update" error.

I shut down my machine for the night. When booting my machine, this morning (3/10 around 8AM eastern), I was greeted by the same error. I tried updating, several times again, and was still met with the same error. I can maybe try running the DCA again, but I don't know if that would affect PR's update result - I've been able to switch between HDCP-capable displays w/o having to do so, before.

I'm about to head home from work. I'll give things a go, when I'm home, and I'll post my result.

trelf

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#65

Post by trelf » Fri Mar 13, 2020 9:20 pm

Yeah, as of today, 3/13 @ 5:06PM eastern, I still cannot update PlayReady. That was a very short window. :( I'm not sure where to even begin to get in contact with MS.

seang86s

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#66

Post by seang86s » Mon Mar 16, 2020 1:50 pm

Sorry I haven't been able to keep up with this recently. Life gets in the way sometimes...

Anyway, I just set up a new VM to test Playready activation and it worked fine for me. I'm able to view copy protected channels with this new VM. This is as of 3/16/2020 @ 9AM.

If you're using an existing VM that was previously activated, try doing one of the many fixes here such as deleting appropriate directories in the eHome folder.

6athome

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#67

Post by 6athome » Thu Sep 17, 2020 10:52 pm

seang86s wrote: Sun Mar 08, 2020 5:14 am
trelf wrote: Sat Mar 07, 2020 10:37 pm @seang86s, what wizardry was performed to achieve this?!
TL;DR, I was able to engage Microsoft to look into the issue and they fixed it.

Long version:

I opened a ticket with Microsoft Premier Support and the issue bounced around a little among their normal, level 1 folks mainly because all three major components involved here (Windows 7, Media Center and PlayReady 1.3) were all out of support. My only saving grace was Windows 8.1 still has extended support until 1/2023. I eventually got someone on their Windows Media/Home team and was able to explain the problem to them. It turns out the server(s) that handle "Silverlight PlayReady individualization" had an expired certificate. By coincidence, it happened to be within a few days after Windows 7 support ended. Since Silverlight support ends in October 2021 (see https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/hel ... of-support), they renewed the cert and Silverlight activations started working again. PlayReady uses the same servers to activate as well which indirectly solved that issue. When PlayReady and Silverlight "individualize" they contact Microsoft's servers to get their key but if the SSL cert on the server (Microsoft's end) is not valid, the client does not trust the server and the process fails. It turns out the Microsoft person helping me with this issue has a colleague that was fielding a call with a customer with Silverlight individualization issues. It probably would have been fixed without my intervention and PlayReady would have magically started working for us anyway. From what I gather, the only reason they fixed this for us was nothing to do with Windows 7, Media Center or PlayReady but because of Silverlight is still supported until October 2021. PlayReady 1.3 just so happens to use the same infrastructure as Silverlight.

It's a safe bet that this specific issue for PlayReady should not happen again until Silverlight goes out of support. Even then, it may continue to run for another two years from around this date (3/2022) since that's how long the cert is good for, but that is not guaranteed. Microsoft may bring down those servers before the cert expires. For those of you who want to continue to run WMC beyond Octoober 2021, you might want to successfully activate a few machines or VMs to keep as a backup. Remember, a hardware change (even swapping out a defective motherboard for the same model) is enough to flag PlayReady to re-individualize. Just changing the amount of memory on my working VM also caused it to want to re-individualize. If you keep your hardware spec the same, PlayReady won't attempt to contact Microsoft and theoretically, could operate for years after the Silverlight infrastructure is taken offline.

One thing we can try is a newer version of PlayReady. I don't know any of the later versions will work with Media Center. Anyone here work with PlayReady from a development standpoint?
I have two windows 8.1 WMC computers,after reading this post on 9-11-20, I tried setting playready again and it reset. OK now that playready reset I still couldn't get DRM Fox channels. This time it's cable advisor. I tried downloading the program digital advisor overide before but it failed but this time it downloaded,ran it and whala Fox DRM now working on computer one.
So now computer two to do, unlike computer one I ran the digital advisor overide frist on computer two and then playready,well now playready won't reset, I uninstalled every progtam and reinstalled with no lock. Do you know if the sever is still runnig?

Dead Mike

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#68

Post by Dead Mike » Thu Sep 24, 2020 5:09 pm

So, i have a win 7 ultimate with a cablecard and have done battle with the PlayReady update for far too long. Last December 2019 I did all I could to reinstall and update and add/remove WMC, to no avail.
Two days ago after it had been working fine since Dec 2019, it started up again. I have no idea why a static computer that only runs EPG and WMC, and gets no updates would self-modify...
After going round the mulberry bush, I tried to recall what I had done that ultimately fixed it in Dec 2019.

The answer was to reactivate windows. At the time I had bought a new activation key, altho the original one I have was prolly ok. In any case, i dug out the activation key and just reactivated it, reran the 'update playready' process in WMC (be sure to turn off the WMC receiver service first).

And voila, I'm watching TV again.

So, now, if it acts up again, I hope I remember that it's just that. Why did it deregister or need it? Is it related to the individualization process? iunno, but this absolutely, without question resolved it now, and last dec.

6athome

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#69

Post by 6athome » Fri Sep 25, 2020 12:59 am

Dead Mike wrote: Thu Sep 24, 2020 5:09 pm So, i have a win 7 ultimate with a cablecard and have done battle with the PlayReady update for far too long. Last December 2019 I did all I could to reinstall and update and add/remove WMC, to no avail.
Two days ago after it had been working fine since Dec 2019, it started up again. I have no idea why a static computer that only runs EPG and WMC, and gets no updates would self-modify...
After going round the mulberry bush, I tried to recall what I had done that ultimately fixed it in Dec 2019.

The answer was to reactivate windows. At the time I had bought a new activation key, altho the original one I have was prolly ok. In any case, i dug out the activation key and just reactivated it, reran the 'update playready' process in WMC (be sure to turn off the WMC receiver service first).

And voila, I'm watching TV again.

So, now, if it acts up again, I hope I remember that it's just that. Why did it deregister or need it? Is it related to the individualization process? iunno, but this absolutely, without question resolved it now, and last dec.
I'm glad you over came the playready issues with windows 7. I have windows 8.1 with WMC, both have keys. With no real people to talk too, I'm afraid to try my luck. The DRM channels need playready,other then that, I can watch anything that doesn't have a DRM tag.I built a windows 8.1 WMC and could not get playready working untill this month, once I got playready working, windows 8.1, has cable advisor, which alos won't work, so I found an overide program for it.
Windows has let playready severs and cable advisor severs go to crap and that's it. See my last post. What really pissed me off is that I had to pay extra for WMC on windows 8.1!

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garyan2

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#70

Post by garyan2 » Fri Sep 25, 2020 1:09 am

I had downloaded the installers for PlayReady, Digital Cable Advisor, and the ResetDRM tool a while back in case there were issues in the future. Unfortunately, I am OTA only and have never had to work with them so haven't been able to understand what is needed to correct issues like this. You can download them from http://epg123.garyan2.net/downloads/tools/ if you can't get them from MS.
- Gary
Keeping WMC alive beyond January 2020. https://garyan2.github.io

6athome

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#71

Post by 6athome » Tue Sep 29, 2020 1:09 am

garyan2 wrote: Fri Sep 25, 2020 1:09 am I had downloaded the installers for PlayReady, Digital Cable Advisor, and the ResetDRM tool a while back in case there were issues in the future. Unfortunately, I am OTA only and have never had to work with them so haven't been able to understand what is needed to correct issues like this. You can download them from http://epg123.garyan2.net/downloads/tools/ if you can't get them from MS.
Gary I also have two Windows 7 computers and have no playready issues. The Windows 8.1 WMC have two issues,one playready and cable advisor.
Every time you run TV setup it goes to cable advisor,which is shut down, then you get the message that your computer, is not digital ready.
Everyone who bought WMC should be supported as long as Windows 8.1. Two updates are needed, take digital cable out with a patch(there is no digital cable advisor with Windows 7 TV setup) get a patch or fix the dam sever for playready!!!!!!!!

artm

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#72

Post by artm » Thu Dec 03, 2020 6:22 am

Does anyone have an update on this issue?

I'm running two Win7 systems with a HDHR Prime (Prime1) in the network. I added another Prime (Prime2) and wanted to just use this for the second system (system2). For system2 I disabled Prime1, enabled only Prime2 and had to redo Playready. Now I can't access the movie channels.

I've tried updating several times with one time saying it passed; nope.
-Art --
Win7 Ultimate x64 (NO UPDATES!), EPG123 v1.1.19, Schedules Direct, HDHomerun Prime,
Dell 980 SFF, i5, Nvidia GT710
Dell 780 SFF, i5, HD4000

DjFourmoney

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#73

Post by DjFourmoney » Mon Dec 14, 2020 3:42 pm

I'm interested in this outcome as well as I was seriously considering upgrading from Windows 7 to Windows 8.1 Pro as I wanted to run some things in Hyper-V on my HTPC since it's one of only two modern boards I own that support IOMMU and Virtualization.

dkrom

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#74

Post by dkrom » Mon Dec 14, 2020 9:53 pm

I used this process to get playready to install/update. I found it on another post on this site and edited for what worked for me:

- STOP the "Windows Media Center Receiver Service" found in Control Panel / All Control Panel Items / Administrative Tools (NOTE: WMC can't be running when stopping the WMC Receiver Service)
- Next go to C/ProgramData/Microsoft/PlayReady and locate file "mspr.hds" and rename to something like "A-mspr.hds."
- Run WMC Set Up TV Signal again. Playready installed for me during setup.
If it doesn’t install, you’ll need to quit WMC, stop the process again, rename the file again, then relaunch WMC, go to Settings, TV Signal and this time just select "Update PlayReady." PlayReady should update and everything will now work perfectly as intended. Exit Settings and ENJOY.

artm

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#75

Post by artm » Mon Dec 14, 2020 9:57 pm

Already tried that, no good. When did you last try it? If it's been a while, it could be that MS Playready servers are no longer active.

I guess I should make a VM and start from scratch to confirm the servers are still active. Should I do that with Win7 (which I prefer), or is this a non starter - being no longer supported?
-Art --
Win7 Ultimate x64 (NO UPDATES!), EPG123 v1.1.19, Schedules Direct, HDHomerun Prime,
Dell 980 SFF, i5, Nvidia GT710
Dell 780 SFF, i5, HD4000

dkrom

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#76

Post by dkrom » Mon Dec 14, 2020 10:57 pm

I did it last week.
Already tried that, no good. When did you last try it? If it's been a while, it could be that MS Playready servers are no longer active.

I guess I should make a VM and start from scratch to confirm the servers are still active. Should I do that with Win7 (which I prefer), or is this a non starter - being no longer supported?
-Art --
Win7 Ultimate x64 (NO UPDATES!), EPG123, Schedules Direct,
HDHomerun Prime, Dell 980 SFF, i5, Nvidia GT710

artm

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#77

Post by artm » Mon Dec 14, 2020 11:03 pm

Are you running Win7?
Do you have Windows Update Service enabled? I do NOT as I do NOT want any updates unless they're mandatory.
-Art --
Win7 Ultimate x64 (NO UPDATES!), EPG123 v1.1.19, Schedules Direct, HDHomerun Prime,
Dell 980 SFF, i5, Nvidia GT710
Dell 780 SFF, i5, HD4000

6athome

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#78

Post by 6athome » Sun May 02, 2021 11:59 pm

I hope I explain this right and it helps someone, thanks Gary!
Looking at my past post you can see all the trouble I had with playready and Windows 8.1. I finally got one Windows 8.1 WMC working, the second computer was a no go, just look at my post and know my frustration!
I was so frustrated that I was going to reinstall Windows 8.1 WMC and see if that would work after trying everything posted on Green Button to get playready working.
I tried a system imagine and could get not get it to work, tried recovery again under legacy, no go, tried again and booted to a UEFI drive, this drive had my original Windows 8.1 when I went to M.2 drive and copied Windows 8.1 to it.
From recovery I booted into my original operatizing system, went to WMC and ran playready update and it worked, rebooted into my M.2 drive, and guess what playready updated and I could watch HBO.
So putting everything on the M.2 drive and booting into that made playready stop working, don't ask me how?

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