This is a new issue I have run into with Windows 7 RTM Media Center. It does not happen all the time but, I have noticed it 3 times so far but, got it on the last min on 2 of them.

Tonight a Series for my wife "Modern Family" on I think ABC (our local 8.1 HD channel, a QAM channel) @ 9pm. It is a series setup for only new episodes on 1 channel (8.1). I checked the guide, this show's orginal air date matched with todays date (10/28) so it would be a new episide. If I go into it, my options are to record or cancel series. Even though this is a new episode, Media Center does not see it as one and did not have it scheduled to record.

During the show (the last time I saw it), I notice in the schedule shows, that the next weeks episode was scheduled to record and if I canceled the series and put it back in, it would start recording the episode.

This happend, 2 weeks ago on "the biggest loser" on NBC (30.1 local) and Law & Order: SVU (30.1) last week.

Has anyone one else seen this bug/issue ? ehome team, do you know about this and any fix in the works ? (do you need logs or anything to help ?)

I have never seen this issue on any previous version of Media Center.

This happened to me last week, I believe with NCIS:LA.  I did notice, however, that the synopsis of the show was the same as the previous week's.  (The previous week's was wrong/premature).  I scrolled ahead, and only that one recording was going to be missed.  I chalked it up to MCE being too smart for it's own good and thinking it already recorded that episode, even though it was marked as "new".

No problems with SVU recording so far this season here (11.1/Baltimore).

 

 I'm having the exact same issue. Happened maybe 3 or 4 times so far. Paranoid now so am constantly checking the guide to make sure everything is setup to record.

Sort of defeats the object of having the feature.

Can't say i can remember what shows it did this on but maybe we should make notes, maybe its the guide data somehow that has incorrect flags marking them as repeats when in fact they are new.

I do know though when this happens the original aired date is not old and is current for the time the show should be flagged to record.

 Mark

 

As posted above it's my understanding that Media Center will skip recording shows that it thinks it has already recorded on a series event regardless if they are flagged as new or a repeat.  That is how it seems to work for me.

I noticed this in the past with Sesame Street.  I had it set as a series to record all new and repeat episodes on a certain channel around 7am.  Sesame Street is on daily and they show the same episodes over and over.  So after a certain episode is recorded once, the next time the same episode comes up, it doesn't record.

So if the guide data is incorrect and the show description or whatever logic Microsoft is using to determine if a show is the same, the show won't record.  You will also notice this on some NBC shows that are new say on Wednesday but are shown again the same week or the next week on Saturday.  They won't record twice.

The only way to override this is to go the specific episode you want it to record and 'force it' by selecting the record episode option.

I noticed, and I put this down to a failure of the UI, that if the previously recorded (supposed duplicate) show is still around, the guide displays a message to the effect "this show will not record because it was previously recorded".  However, if the prreviously recorded show has been deleted, the guide doesnt give any kind of warning at all that it isnt going to record the show.

OK, this happened to me today.  All the CBS shows were set to "not recording due to user request", which is NOT correct.  The only correlation I can think of is that I did cancel them all 2 weeks ago from football running late by so much and added a number of manual recordings instead.  Next week's shows look normal with the 3-red-dot Series icon.

I'm in "check every day" mode now as well.  Misery loves company, right?

Does anyone have any instances of this happening in the future?  where a series is set to record but its missing a new episode?  If i have something to look at in the future i can look into it.

I'll need your postal code, signal type, signal provider, and channel this is happening on.

-joel

 

Yep

ZIp 06339

Channel: 30.1 (NBC)

Comcast clear QAM

The show " The biggest loser", 2 weeks in a row, MC is up and running, the show is set as a series (New, One channel), We'll be watching something on the MC (another channel) and we check, and it's not recording, it claimed it was scheduled the day before but, it never recorded the show.

Just had this happen last night.

 Zip:  92011

Channel: NBC

Time Warner clear QAM

The show Trauma was missing from the series recording list. Had to add it manually. Going through the upcoming recordings its there in the schedule for next week as normal.

Mark

 

 I tried this fix...

http://www.silicondust.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=7959

 

nickk from Silicondust

The current recommended workaround is to disable the background scanner.

The easiest way to do this is to run this registry file, confirm all the prompts to import, then reboot.

You can also do the same thing manually:

1) Run regedit

2) Browse to:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Media Center\Service\BackgroundScanner

3) Right click and choose New, DWORD.
Name the entry "PeriodicScanEnabled" (no quotes) and set the value to 0.

4) Restart the computer (or specifically the Windows Media Center Receiver service)

This is due to the WMC receiver service locking up while running a background channel scan. If you try to tune a channel before this happens, you will get a "no tuners available" message and the only way is to reboot to get them to work, in the History, I'll see the shows fail to record on all tuners, as it tried each one and failed.

I used this fix last week and still to this date I have not missed a show. Something I guess missed in the beta testing, but, according to NicKK, it has been reported to Microsoft and they are working to resolve this.

This is not just a HDhomerun issue, it happend on my OCUR (using QAM only) and a AverMedia A180. Anyone effected with this issue should try this work around till there is a public release about it.

Ehome team, any idea on a update to fix this issue ?

DavidinCT

Thanks for this fix.  I sometimes forget to check places other than TGB.

I also have another, perhaps related issue.  W7MC decides that "oddly" placed shows are new.  Example, Repeats of Hero's, Desperate Housewives, etc., come on on completely different channels at odd times.  W7MC schedules and records them or even schedules them on channels I don't receive (and of course then I get error messages).  Perhaps this is solved by going into the Series Options and telling it to record only on a specific channel.  It just seems odd.  Didn't happen previous to W7,

 By disabling the background channel scanner what other things will this affect / cause issues with?

The background scanner has nothing to do with this issue, i disabled the background scanne a while ago due to it locking tuners up.

This issue is more with program guide data and not recording new series recordings.

Mark

 

I have been noticing a lot of guide/timer issues as well. My main problems are with recurring sporting events. I have 2 series in particular that are causing me no end of grief: English Premier League Soccer and UEFA Champions League Soccer. Because of missed and ignored events, I have to manually check and add events as needed. Here is an example: On the 24th and 25th of November there will be 2 live matches of UEFA Champions League Soccer broadcast at 2:30 pm EST and 2 re-broadcasts at 7:30 pm EST. At the moment, W7MC only plans to record the first match on Tuesday at 2:30 pm. My timer is set to Record New and ReRun, Anytime on Any Channel but it won't include any events beyond the first airing. I have tried creating a keyword-matching event with identical results.

Re: English Premier League Soccer, I have a similar issue. There are 2-3 games weekly but W7MC sometimes lists the info as "Teams TBA". Because of that description, W7MC sometimes doesn't include the event and even though I have Anytime, New & Rerun set, it ignores future events. 

Most of the problems I am having are with SportsNet Ontario (channel 22 on Rogers Analog cable). My area code is L5N 7V8.

Another related issue is guide changes/updates on the aforementioned channel. This coming Saturday (21st) for example, English Premier League Soccer is scheduled to record at 10:00 am EST. My guide still lists the info as 'Teams TBA' even though a search on Zap2It's listings for my area code shows 'Sunderland vs. Arsenal (LIVE)'. Why is my guide not getting updated? I checked the event log and all guide updates are occurring properly every morning at 6:00 am with no errors. It appears to me that any event that is already flagged for recording doesn't get it's info updated. The same day, there is another match at 7:30 pm that a few days ago was listed as a duplicate event. Today, it shows 'Chelsea vs. Wolverhampton Wanderers' and it has been scheduled to record. Two days ago it was going to ignore this event even though according to the 'New & Rerun' setting it should have scheduled it.

 

 

recently had the same problem as the original poster mentioned with modern family... i think the second post is correct... tonights episode that didn't record was called "truth be told". I remember last week media center recorded 2 modern families, one with the correct metadata (in hd) the other in sd that had wrong guide data "truth be told"... so media center thought it had already recorded this episode. good to know... seems like the guide data has really taken a hit recently, not nearly as reliable as it had been before windows 7 came out... i never had problem until recently.