The PlayReady update was incomplete

[RealCodeGuy]

After a 13 hour download for Win8 everything seemed to be going great until I received my WMC key. I installed the feature but PlayReady fails with the error in the subject line. I've tried everything including turning the firewall off thinking that maybe it can't reach MS servers. None of my recording will play and the Ceton turner won't tune into any protected channels.

Ideas anyone? Please help.

[Perx]

I've seen this happen if the media center receiver is running. You can go to Services and stop the service if it's running, then manually install Play Ready with elevated rights. Download the file from microsoft (http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download ... px?id=5445), then right-click the file and use Run as Administrator.

[RealCodeGuy]

Thanks for the reply.

I tried that. Media Center still tried to update PlayReady even after installing that file with Media Center closed. And, it fails with the same error.

[RealCodeGuy]

I followed the long lengthy instructions in this thread:

http://www.thegreenbutton.tv/forums/vie ... ?f=5&t=275

Problem solved!

[RealCodeGuy]

I followed the long lengthy instructions in this thread:

http://www.thegreenbutton.tv/forums/vie ... ?f=5&t=275

Problem solved!

I upgraded my CPU on Windows 8 and had to follow the steps in the aforementioned thread again. However, on Win8 there is not a HKLM\Software\Microsoft\DRM key. Instead, it is HKLM\Software\Microsoft\PlayReady. I thought I'd post in case someone else needs to reset their DRM on Win8.

[DC Rhino]

You all are rockstars for us non-technically inclined folk. Thanks for taking the time to not only figure out what the heck the problem is and solve it, but, more importantly, for sharing it so the rest of us can solve the problem, too. With the update for Win8 differences in the HKLM key location, this worked for me. Thanks again for your awesomeness. Rhino

[seangrimes]

I've tried this and MANY other things including tinkering with the registry. None of those methods worked for me. This is what I had to do:

Uninstall Playready from Control Panel (reboot may be necessary).
Uninstall Digital Cable Advisor from Control Panel
Open WMC
Run Digital Cable Advisor
Go through Live TV Setup

I hope this helps someone.

[seangrimes]

I've tried this and MANY other things including tinkering with the registry. None of those methods worked for me. This is what I had to do:

Uninstall Playready from Control Panel (reboot may be necessary).
Uninstall Digital Cable Advisor from Control Panel
Open WMC
Run Digital Cable Advisor
Go through Live TV Setup

I hope this helps someone.

It seems like the above fix doesn't work all the time. I have the Playready issue again and can't seem to get it fixed this time. Even reinstalling Windows didn't help!

[Crash2009]

Have you replaced the cablecard yet?

[EZEd]

This happened to me again on April 10th. It happened to me back in the fall and it was so bad that it caused me to turn off my cable tv subscription and go back to OTA for a while. This time when it did it I noticed that MS had sent out some updates that my system installed and then auto-restarted overnight. I never turn off my system and it was hosed the next morning with the update playready - playready update is incomplete cycle. So immediately I rolled the system back to 3 days before using the system restore function. Released the Ceton tuners, re-detected tuners and re-ran TV Setup. Everything came back okay. I am convinced it is Microsoft through their screwed up KB and security updates system that is messing us up. I turned off automatic updates and am keeping a watch on it. I've even worked with M$ once before with their paid online help to fix this and they couldn't do it. To be fair I was working with a heavily accented person on the other end and I'm sure they didn't have a clue what Media Center is or how it works. Not even for certain that they were in the US so I really don't know how they were supposed to help me. He was definitely working from a script and had no personal engineering knowledge of Media Center. Because they didn't solve it they had to give me my money back. So know for sure that if stuff goes wrong with your Media Center setup you are on your own except for here at TGB and AVSForum.

It may be too late for your situation because you've already messed around with the playready folders and such but check to see if you got any MS updates recently that touched your registry or security folders. If you can roll back to a time before the playready issue started and see if it fixes. From now on this is going to be my first thing to do to try and fix this issue. I have tried all known published fixes to playready...to include reloading the Media Center key and non-worked consistently every time.

I'm convinced the only true fix is to get rid of playready all together. Get rid of tuning adapters and if possible get rid of cable cards. The whole thing is just not robust enough to be dependable. If I hadn't spent so much on a Ceton ETH tuner I'd definitely go back to OTA only. I never had any issues with OTA and Media Center was always rock solid. It's just seriously unfortunate the situation with cable tv and satellite. If only it could be made to be easy and dependable it would be perfect.

[Crash2009]

A few of us were playing around with what it takes to disable updates on Win 7. Should be able to do something similar with 8 if necessary.

http://www.thegreenbutton.tv/forums/vie ... 777#p69777

I'm about done with this PlayReady crap too. Looks like the grass is greener on the other side of the fence.

[seangrimes]

It seems like the above fix doesn't work all the time. I have the Playready issue again and can't seem to get it fixed this time. Even reinstalling Windows didn't help!

Couldn't edit my initial post, but I found a fix that may help someone.

I've had this issue more than a few times with 3 PC's in my house and none of the fixes mentioned ANYWHERE online have ever helped me. It seems that Playready was broken on the 3 PC's after an update for Windows 8.1. Here is a simple fix that I figured out on my own that worked for me:

Wait 3 days (lol)
Uninstall playready from control panel (choose option that requires restart if promoted)
Uninstall digital cable advisor from control panel
Uninstall TV tuner drivers from control panel
Restart computer
Install digital cable advisor from WMC
Close WMC and reinstall TV tuner drivers
Restart computer
Go through live TV setup

Not sure why this works, but it does so I'm not complaining. Screwing with the registry and deleting files and folders seems to make things worse so I definitely prefer this method over any other method. When this happened a previous time, I was simply able to uninstall the Digital Cable Advisor, reinstall it and then go through Live TV setup. However, that didn't work after the Windows update killed my Playready!

Something else I must add. I have the Ceton Infinitv 6 eth and I've found that if I don't perform the steps as outlined above after a fresh install of Windows 8, WMC won't detect all of my network tuners, or it will detect all of them, but may only give me access to a few of them.

Hope this helps someone.

[kodi08]

For me I ran in to this situation.

I have a Media Center with a Ceton InfiniTV 4 PCI
I bought a Ceton InfiniTV 6 ETH
Comcast could not get my card activated correctly on the ETH 6 and broke the validation on my original PCI CableCard
Ceton worked with Comcast to fix both CableCards

I removed my Ceton InfiniTV 4 PCI as I no longer needed it and started to get the PlayReady errors

I tried all the suggestions listed above including resetting DRM, Trying to stop the service when running the update, and rebuilding the Media Center and to no avail I still got the PlayReady errors even on the newly build Media Center.

I decided to reboot the Ceton InfiniTV 6 ETH and after that point I no longer received the PlayReady errors

[EZEd]

I just recently confirmed what kodi08 said above. My playready will spontaneously go out on my 2 desktop machines (most recent episode it did not go out on the main htpc rig). None of the fixes work except to wait a few days and then hard reboot the ETH6. I then flush the tuners in software, rediscover and rerun tv setup, then all is good. I was thinking that based on the 3 day wait period seangrimes mentions above that it might have had something to do with windows activation. But this time I even reset my activation and reinstated playready but it had no effect. Only after the wait period and cold reboot the ceton tuner did it finally allow playready update. Next time it happens I will try going directly to tuner reboot to see if that is truly the cause. If so then there must be a network or firewall issue that is causing it by way of the ceton tuner. Will have to wait for the next spontaneous playready fail to find out. Here's hoping to that as being never again.

[seangrimes]

[quote="kodi08"

I decided to reboot the Ceton InfiniTV 6 ETH and after that point I no longer received the PlayReady errors[/quote]

I forgot about this thread. If I hadn't have forgot it, I would have stated that rebooting the device always works for me.

Glad to got it fixed.

[seangrimes]

I must also add that my Infinitv 6eth gives me a very pleasant experience now although it was a nightmare for me for a while.

The 3 things that I learned are:
1. Do NOT use tuner pooling if more than one PC will be using the tuners! Only use tuner pooling if ONE PC is tied to multiple extenders!
2. Make sure your signal is good. For me 38 + on the SNR and -4 to +4 for my signal strength is adequate.
3. Lastly, unplugging your Ceton device and tuning device should fix any problems you may have accessing tuners although sometimes even rebooting your PC will work too.

[evident]

A windows update from a few days back totally screwed up my WMC. I had the "This video driver can't display protected content" error where i had to minimize WMC and bring it back up to get any Live TV to work. banged my head on my day off for 4 hours till i just said F it and did a system restore to a week ago. Boom, just like that, works perfectly