Windows Media Center Blank Screen

PROBLEM:

• Widows Media Center comes up with a blank screen, especially when trying to view live TV, but you can hear audio
• You are using Windows Vista or Windows 7
• None of the recommended hotfixes or service packs fix the problem

SOLUTION THAT WORKED FOR ME:

This issue seems to be caused by the interaction of Windows and the computer's video and/or TV card. It mostly happens with NVidia cards but can also happen with ATI and others.

As a first port of call, try updating your video card driver to the very latest, stable version. Alternately, roll back to the previous version if you have recently installed an update.

If the above doesn't work:

• Close down Media Center. Note: if you have opened Media Center in full screen and can't close it, hit CTRL + ALT + DEL and select "Start task manager" then click on Windows Media Centre in the Applications tab and click End Task.
• End / shutdown windows explorer:

1. Right click the task bar and select "Task Manager", right click on explorer.exe in the Processes tab and select "End Process".
2. Keep task manager open and go to the Applications tab. Click "New Task", type explorer.exe and click OK. Note: If you accidentally closed task manager after step 1 and don't know how to get it back, hit CTRL + ALT + DEL and select "Start task manager"

• Explorer should re-start. Open Windows Media Centre again to see if the problem has resolved itself.

If re-starting explorer doesn't work, try re-starting the computer.


OTHER POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS:
In no particular order:

• If you have two monitors installed, try moving the Media Center program to the other monitor to see if it works on that.
• If you have two monitors installed, ensure both are connected via either VGA or DVI, rather than having one connected via VGA and the other via DVI. Reboot the computer after you have re-connected the monitors.
• Try opening Media Center under a different username:

1. For Vista users, you will need to install "ShellRunas" from Microsoft Sysinternals to give you the ability to easily do this. Shellrunas is a free download available here: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/cc300361.aspx.
2. Close down Media Center. Note: if you have opened Media Center in full screen, press ALT + ENTER to go back to windowed mode. If that doesn't work, hit CTRL + ALT + DEL, click "Start task manager", click on Windows Media Centre in the applications list and click End Task.
3. Right click on the Media Center link (either in the start menu or on the desktop) and select "Run as different user".
4. You should then be able to close WMC and open under a regular user

• Try opening Media Center as an Administrator:

1. Close down Media Center. Note: if you have opened Media Center in full screen, press ALT + ENTER to go back to windowed mode. If that doesn't work, hit CTRL + ALT + DEL, click "Start task manager", click on Windows Media Centre in the applications list and click End Task.
2. Open Media Center in Administrator mode - right click on the Media Center link (either in the start menu or on the desktop) and select "Run as administrator".
3. You should then be able to close WMC and open under a regular user

• Open and leave WMC for about 15 minutes
• Hit CTRL+ALT+DEL then Cancel to go back to the desktop
• Try installing this hotfix: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/935901/en-us/
• If the blank screen only appears for few minutes when changing channels, try http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2430365
• If the blank screen only appears when pausing and rewinding, try deleting the following registry keys and reboot the computer, as mentioned here: http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/archive/1723936

1. [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Media Center\Extensibility\Entry Points\{7e7a8710-9e4a-40a3-824a-7b0baf38abcf}]
2. [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Media Center\Extensibility\Applications\{a0cd8951-e5b6-4662-9c9c-d56c5b38ca59}]

• Ensure you have the latest Windows service pack
• Give up altogether and try one of the following alternatives to Windows Media Center.  A review of the first four is available here: http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/cool-windows-media-center-alternatives/

1. Media Portal - www.team-mediaportal.com
2. TVersity - tversity.com
3. MythTV - www.mythtv.org
4. GB-PVR - www.gbpvr.com
5. XBMC - xbmc.org
6. Freevo - freevo.sourceforge.net

• If you have a remote control that came with your TV card, hit the power button on the remote to turn Media Center off, then back on again.
• Find a media file such as a video on your computer and open using Media Centre: right click the file, select "Open With" and choose Windows Media Centre. The file will probably not open, but it may jolt Media Center back into action.
• Check the compatibility of installed Video codecs on your machine by using the Windows XP Video Decoder Checkup Utility here: http://bit.ly/avJQR8 (note: this also works for Vista and Windows 7) as mentioned in this blog post http://berryjooks.blogspot.com/2008/06/windows-media-center-black-screen.html. If you read the comments on that site, it suggests installing a codec pack found on Cnet. Some do not think installing codec packs is a wise idea due to the unknown quality however if you made it this far and tried everything else, it can't hurt.
• If none of these work, call Microsoft Support as it could be some hitherto unknown thing that will commit you to an insane asylum if you try and figure it out alone.