Windows Media Center pretty much completely broken and ehRec.exe taking 50% of CPU
My windows media center is broken. Part, but probably not all, of the problem is that ehRec.exe is using up 50% of the CPU, which means that it's completely CPU bound because I have a dual core machine.Scheduled recordings don't record. Sometimes I can't even get into media center. It becomes non-responsive. Usually right after a reboot I can get into it (which will start the recording if one was pending) but not if I do other things first. It seems like my media center has just gone kaput.I got the following incomprehensible message in the event application logThe description for Event ID ( 0 ) in Source ( Media Center Scheduler ) cannot be found. The local computer may not have the necessary registry information or message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer. You may be able to use the /AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this description; see Help and Support for details. The following information is part of the event: Failed to write backup file..There are no other log entries of interest, except for the ones that say I started a recording while the show was in progress. I get these now when I start media center right after rebooting because it wasn't already recording when it should have.Sometimes ehRec.exe stops looping. Not this time. It was looping when I started writing this and it's looping still.Is there a way to completely reinstall media center? I have tried running though the setup, but this blocks half the time with ehRec.exe pounding away at the CPU. I see that other people are having the ehRec.exe problem (starting around mid-August), but there doesn't seem to be a real solution to this problem.
December 1st, 2010 9:28pm

Hi fneske,1. Did you make any changes prior to the issue?You cannot reinstall Windows Media Center. Try the following steps and check if the issue persists.Step 1: Run sfc (system file checker) scan to find and fix missing filesa. Click Start, click Run, type cmd and click ok.b. On the command prompt, type sfc /scannow and hit enter.Note: You will be prompted to insert the Windows XP disc if any file is missing.For more information, see Description of Windows XP System File Checker (Sfc.exe)Step 2: Check if any non Microsoft program is causing this issuea. Open the article: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310353b. Under Method 2, follow Steps 1 and 2 and restart the computer to see if the issue persists.c. If the issue does not persist in clean boot, then follow step 3 and step 4 to find out that's causing the issue and once you've found the culprit, uninstall the program and check the result.Note: Do not forget to follow steps under "Steps to configure Windows to use a Normal startup state"Visit our Microsoft Answers Feedback Forum and let us know what you think.
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December 2nd, 2010 10:02am

I found out about not being able to reinstall Windows Media Center the hard way. Thanks for the warning, though.1. It turns out that my last recording was on 10/28. I guess I haven't been watching much lately because I just began to notice the problem recently. I actually only noticed the problem by looking at the task manager performance. I may have had a virus. I installed Norton anti-virus about that time, replacing a different ineffective anti-virus I got from my cable provider.Step1: I ran sfc, and it says files that are required for Windows to run properly must be copied from the DLL cache. Insert your Windows XP Professional Service Pack 3 CD now.I have Windows Media Center Edition with all the latest updates. My "Installation CD" in on a different partition on my hard drive. What do I do about the missing files?Step2: If I use step2, I won't have anti-virus protection. Also, for step 2.b it is real difficult (e.g. time consuming) for me to see if the problem persists because I'd have to schedule a recording and see whether that works or not. Can we fix the problems in step1 first?
December 2nd, 2010 10:37am

Hi fneske,We need correct XP disc to complete sfc scan.Set Windows Media Center Receiver Service to local only (if available)a. Click Start, type services.msc and hit enter.b. From the list of services, double click on "Windows Media Center Receiver Service"c. Change the startup type to Automatic and click Start.d. Click Log On tab; select "Local system account"e. Click ok to apply the changes and restart the computer.f. Check if the issue persists.Also see, Recording may stop before it is completed in Windows XP Media CenterVisit our Microsoft Answers Feedback Forum and let us know what you think.
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December 2nd, 2010 10:50am

Hi Syed,The media center recording settings were already set per your specifications, so this part didn't help.How do I get "correct XP disk"? My installation media is on my hard disk. Do I somehow need to enable the hidden partition it's in to make it visible somehow?
December 2nd, 2010 11:08am

Hi fneske,XP discs are no more available. You might be having recovery partition, to enable this, please get in touch with the system manufacturer for better assistance.Note: Recovery partition is used to restore the computer to its factory settings.We suggest you to restore the computer to an earlier time and check if the issue persists.See How to restore Windows XP to a previous stateVisit our Microsoft Answers Feedback Forum and let us know what you think.
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December 2nd, 2010 1:07pm

Hi Syed,I tried step 2 and it didn't work. It looked like it might have at first (after going back to the default configuration) but the ehRec loop symptoms are still there and media center hung when I tried to start it this morning.Also, FYI, the clean boot by itself did not fix the problem. Media Center just hung when I started it. After going to the "optional step to disable features" I got the message "application generated exception that could not be handled. Process id = 0x6b4 (1716) Thread id = 0x6b8 (1720)" This message probably helps you as much as it does me.I contacted my system manufacturer. Because of the problems I'm having with sfc, they are sending me a new XP disk. This will be media edition rather than XP professional, because that's what I purchased. I am very pleased with the service I received from my vendor. Since they support my old machine (to some extent) even when it's out of warranty, they will be my vendor for my next machine. Good service gets repeat customers, in both the hardware and software business.I'm hoping that sfc will be able to recover files even if they have been updated since the installation disk was created. I'm not sure exactly what level the installation disk will be, but my restore partition doesn't even have SP1 installed. It's a 2005 machine. The disk will arrive in a few days to a week. We'll see how it goes.
December 4th, 2010 11:35am

I received the installation media from my vendor (shipped priority overnight no less). This CD is labeled: "Reinstallation DVD Microsoft(R) Windows(R) XP Media Center Version 2005 with update rollup 2."With that installation disk already loaded, I ran sfc /scannow again. Even though the installation disk was present it asked for several files. This time I pressed retry twice for each, then cancel. In the event log there is a list of the files (one by one) that made it unhappy. I got these messages in the system event log:The system file c:\program files\windows media player\mplayer2.exe could not be copied into the DLL cache. The specific error code is 0x800b0100 [No signature was present in the subject.]. This file is necessary to maintain system stability.For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.For brevity, for this message I'll just list the associated file and error code:c:\program files\windows media player\npdsplay.dll, 0x800b0100c:\program files\windows media player\npwmsdrm.dll, 0x800b0100c:\program files\windows media player\npdrmv2.dll, 0x800b0100c:\program files\windows media player\wmpns.dll, 0x800b0100Application popup: Windows File Protection : Possible reasons for this problem:• You have inserted the wrong CD. (i.e., a different Windows product CD than the version installed)• The CD-ROM drive in your system is not functioning.c:\windows\ehome\ehcircl.dll, 0x000004c7c:\windows\ehome\zh-chs\ehepgdat.resources.dll, 0x800b0100c:\windows\ehome\de\ehepgdat.resources.dll, 0x800b0100c:\windows\ehome\fr\ehepgdat.resources.dll, 0x000004c7c:\windows\ehome\ja\ehepgdat.resources.dll, 0x800b0100c:\windows\ehome\ko\ehepgdat.resources.dll, 0x800b0100c:\windows\ehome\ehiepg.dll, 0x000004c7c:\windows\ehome\ehituner.dll, 0x000004c7c:\windows\ehome\snchk.exe, 0x000004c7Windows File Protection file scan completed successfully.For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.Additional info: I now have a USB disk which is on drive D:, so my CD is in E:. However, SFC did not give me any option to choose where to look for the files.I tried re-running sfc without the disk inserted to start. I got the message: The CD you provided is the wrong CD. Please insert the Windows XP Professional Service Pack 3 CD into your CD-ROM drive. This happened much earlier on in the process. Since the only way I got service pack 3 (or 2 for that matter) was over the internet, this is clearly not possible.Apparently it's easy enough to reinstall media player but not so much media center. (I get these two mixed up sometimes because the names are so similar.)Please advise me how to proceed.
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December 6th, 2010 1:17pm

Hi fneske,We recommend you to use the CD and check if you get an option to repair install. If yes, then we suggest to repair install Windows. To do this, try the steps from the following article:See Perform a Repair InstallationOnce you've completed repair install, check if Windows Media Center works fine.Visit our Microsoft Answers Feedback Forum and let us know what you think.
December 7th, 2010 6:01am

OK, I completed a repair installation. That destroyed my Windows system. I got errors "ngen.exe entry point not found. The procedure entry point GetRequestedRuntimeVersion could not be located in the DLL mscoree.dll" and C:\windows\microsoft.net\Framework V4.0.30319\mscorwks.dll could not be located." This repeated several times. After reboot, I got a message saying "please wait." I waited overnight but there was no change and no disk activity, so the repair installation turned out to be a destroy installation.After than, I attempted a completely new installation from the install disks my vendor sent. Unfortunately my software vendor did not see fit to include a MPEG-2 codec. and media center won't record or play TV without one. I tried to go back and install from the restore image on my disk, but the installation from the recovery disk wiped out the master boot record. I used Norton Ghost to restore the master boot record and the recovery partition but the recovery partition would not run. It would run for a bit but then reboot before restoring the factory image. I was able to extract the factory image from the recovery partition, but could not find a way to install it.With Norton Ghost, I restored my system to it's prior unstable state, with ehRec.exe looping. Then I found the ffdshow codec, and installed it. Microsoft's error checking tool says that it's not compatible with media player, but media player works fine with it anyway. So I went back to the restore from scratch procedure and installed the ffdshow codec. This worked OK for a while and TV shows would record. So I went ahead with the microsoft recursive update procedure and began reinstalling all the missing software that got deleted. It seemed to work ok until I installed TweakMCE. It's not possible to be entirely sure exactly when the system broke again, but at this point broken it is.Right now ehRec.exe is STILL LOOPING on my computer, even after a fresh windows reinstall. I have the same symptoms I had earlier, but have only reinstalled about 15% of the software that was on it before. Not only that, but I get a message that "Windows Messenger is not installed on my system" even though it is. I installed Windows Live Messenger and get the same message.So, can we address the ehRec.exe problem? It still loops even after a complete reinstall from scratch. I have spent well over 80 hours trying to get this to work and my Media Center today is worse than it was before I started this whole process because it now also (erroneously) complains about Windows Messenger missing. It didn't do that before.
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December 20th, 2010 1:09am

And by the way, I used sfc /scannow after the fresh reinstall. The instructions I've seen in this forum relating to this are BOGUS.First, you must have the disk installed in order for it to do anything. sfc /scannow ALWAYS asks for the disk to be installed.Second, sfc /scannow does not work after you upgrade. The installation disk I got from my vendor was at the SP2 level. The scan completes successfully when it is used before any updates are applied. However, after upgrading to SP3 (with absolutely nothing else done to the system) sfc /scannow (with the disk installed) reports errors in several files. sfc /scannow takes a long time to run and it is quite frustrating that it really doesn't appear to do anything useful.
December 20th, 2010 1:24am

Hello?
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December 28th, 2010 12:37pm

Remove any recent microsoft update of .net framework. I have had this problem more than once. The first time it ended up by reinstallation of entire system. Although I'd suspect the recent .net framework update was the culprit, I wasn't clever enought to remove it first. This time I search for answers elsewhere and no one really had a clue. Then I removed the .net framework 4 client update and voila, problem solved. Hopefully this will work for you, if you haven't messed around too much with other parts of system first. I tried the /sfc scannow solution, but really . . . this only works if you have the most recent operating system on disk. Many have download updates, service pack, from Microsoft and therefore, cannot provide a disk with proper files. Anyway, it isn't the solution. Apparently the manner of the download of these .net framework updates is important. I don't know the solution to a proper install of new updates, but do know that the 50% CPU problem is solved EVERY TIME, by deleting the latest update. Hope this helps someone. I have certainly spent enough time and lost enough date from microsoft's updates disabling my computer's proper functioning. Alas, it is the solutions we attempt that seal the fate of our drives. I lost 15mos of business records in my email folders in September from my stupid attempts at resolving this problem after a previous .net framework update resulted in my having to reinsall windows.
January 4th, 2011 7:19pm

My symptoms were Media Center on my Windows XP computer stopped working properly for TV (other functions seemed mostly OK).Actual symptoms were EHREC taking up all of a CPU (50% of my machine) for long periods. When I selected Recorded TV I got a 'loading' message, but it failed to deliver the list of recorded programs, sometimes you could exit this but sometimes it would hang completely. Other symptoms were that it would record ONE program, but fail to record a second. On at least one occasion it just kept on recording (using 17GB before I noticed and killed it). Curiously it would work partly in that you could view recorded programs OK and record one program, after a reboot, but eventually it would go astray again, so a reboot was resetting something although I could not figure out what. I got various error messages in the Windows event logs, none of which were helpful.The good news is that removing the .net framework V4 client fixed it for me, per the previous suggestion. On investigation the installation of that update coincided the breakage, adding to the evidence that it was the culprit.Finally I had problems with sfc as did others - it would get so far and complain that something was missing and that it needed the SP3 disk! I do not have this disk, and in any case the message was not helpful as it did not say What was missing (if we know what was missing we have a small chance of being able to locate it somewhere else if necessary) so no joy there.
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January 12th, 2011 1:38pm

Hi PeeWee,One possible solution to the sp3 problem is to go to Add or Remove Programs and remove the sp3 update, then go to update.microsoft.com and download it again. I tried the scannow etc fixes and had same problem. You might want to send a message to microsoft tech support to verify that you can download the sp3 update again. Sometimes the registry doesn't get properly cleaned out and so the microsoft update scan thinks you still have the program. There' a Microsoft installer cleanup program, msicuu.exe. I've used that in the past to clean up remnants of programs. You might also try a registry cleaner program. I bought Uniblue's registry booster some years ago. It's very good. Norton has a good program in their security suite. You need to be sure it's still included. Last one I had was 2003. Anyway, you'd best check with a tech guy before uninstalling sp3, but if you're desperate try to clean up stuff with some of the above etc. etc. and then reboot, etc. before uninstalling, after which you can hopefully reinstall using update There are microsoft sites that will let you download xp media center 205 sp3. Sometimes they don't install though without an activation code, even though you already have a copy, etc etc. It's a mess to deal with Microsoft. Sad to say. Lost drives, time, data, etc. all to this very problem, autodownload of network etc etc. Just beware asking it to repair itself without a tech guy directing. And don't reinstall the system without backing up all your document and settings files and anywhere you have messages stored. You need to specifically backup the email files. Sigh. There's more, but that the most obvious things I can think of. Good luck and my commiserations.
January 12th, 2011 6:57pm

Hallelujah, and thank you kkwriter.I removed the .net framework 4 and I am now looking at media center actually recording a program for the first time in three months. There was no need to back out anything other than .net 4. This took 5 minutes and fixed the problem 100%.It's too bad that Microsoft can't figure out that .net 4 and media center are incompatible. Thank you kkwriter for pointing this out.I had given up hope that anything useful would come out of these forums and hadn't checked my hotmail account for a while, so I'm sorry for the delay in acknowledging your VERY HELPFUL response. Your one medal shines brighter than any five Microsoft support medals combined.
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February 1st, 2011 11:53pm

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