Windows 8 Question about upgrading to Windows 8.1 and losing Media Center?

[MikeHawthorne]

Hi

As everyone here probably knows I had issues with sound when I updated to Windows 8.1.
Recently I've been running Windows 10 Technical Preview and my sound works fine.

That is until I added Windows 8.1 Media Center to it.

When I did that my sound problems returned just as they were before.
This leads my to think that it is Media Center or drivers that it installs that's causing the sound problems.

Here is my Question...

Do you think that if I use the add remove Windows features utility in control panel before I upgrade to 8.1 that I will get Windows 8.1 installed without Media Center?

I tried removing Media Center from Windows 10 after the fact but it didn't solve the problem.
I had to restore my system image to get my sound back to normal.

It's not as critical as it was since I can do my sound work in Windows 10 now but I'd like to have Windows 8.1 installed and working.

Does anyone have any suggestions for a way to really remove Media Center from Windows 8?
It is an add on to Windows and not part of the original package.

When I updated to Windows 8.1 it picked it up and updated it along with everything else.

Anyway that's where I'm at.

I welcome any ideas.

Mike

 

[ussnorway]

Hi Mike,

Not off the top of my head but---

You have vmware player yes? Install 8 on that and play around with it… you can roll it back as many times as you need.

 

[Jimbo22]

No real answer to your question Mike but for me I never really used WMC on any of my systems. I find that if you have a HTPC and used MS WMC then I see where it would be useful. Do you really use WMC that much to warrant installing it. I have my copy when it was offered for free...but only installed it once and never used it. After a clean install of 8.1, I never reinstalled it.

 

[MikeHawthorne]

Hi

I installed it because I could get it for free, like you.
I don't use it, I use Media Player some but you don't have to have Media Center to get that.

I use WinAmp for my media player and have for years.

What I'm really asking is can I uninstall it.
I didn't really look at the uninstall list to see if it's listed as something that can be uninstalled.
I'll do that, when I get back into 8.

If I can get rid of it I may be able to upgrade without messing up my sound.

I can always use my image file to get back to where I am anyway I guess.

Mike

 

[ussnorway]

Hi Mike,

I had a play around--- Media player is a service and while it can’t be un-installed, you can SAFELY turn it off.

I don’t know if that will solve your issue but it won’t do any harm to try it.

 

[MikeHawthorne]

Hi

I tried turning is off in Windows 10 after I installed it and the problem remained, probably because disabling it didn't roll back the driver.

I wish I had never added it to Windows 8, I remember when I got the offer to install it for free, so naturally I did.
But now it's a problem.

There is another possibility, my computer came with a recovery USB drive that would set my computer back to it's original configuration.

I could use that, then upgrade to 8.1 without installing Media Center.

That would require reinstalling all of my software again though.

Maybe I'll just go ahead and update, live with the distorted sound and figure I can do my sound in Windows 10.
At least I know not to install Windows Media Center in 10 when I get the real thing.

I'm sure this is really a Creative driver issue, so maybe they will eventually fix it.
But I installed the latest drivers in Windows 8 and it actually caused the problem.

What I have learned doing the Windows 10 setup is to make a system image every other day or so.
It's saved me from problems that I've encountered 3 times so far.

From now on I'll always do this when I install a new OS.

Mike

 

[Mike]

Hi Mike,

I had a play around--- Media player is a service and while it can’t be un-installed, you can SAFELY turn it off.

I don’t know if that will solve your issue but it won’t do any harm to try it.
View attachment 28399

Unfortunately, Windows Media Player is not the same as the Media Center add-on for Windows. But I believe ussnorway is close. Control Panel > Programs and Features > Turn Windows features on or off > Media Features > Windows Media Center.

If it is not there, you need to clean install or restore from backup. No way to remove it then. In Windows 8, Windows Media Center is an upgrade that uses the licensing system. It has been a long time since I've used it, Mike. Did you try this at all?

Also, you may want to consider running Windows 10 Technical Preview on a separate partition or in VMWare Workstation or Virtualbox until it is ready for prime time.

 

[ussnorway]

Unfortunately, Windows Media Player is not the same as the Media Center add-on for Windows. But I believe ussnorway is close. Control Panel > Programs and Features > Turn Windows features on or off > Media Features > Windows Media Center.

Yes, good point.

 

[MikeHawthorne]

Hi

I'm running Windows 10 on a separate drive as a clean install.
I've seldom used 8 since I installed 10.

My sound works fine in 10 as long as I don't install Media Center.

In Windows 8 my sound works fine, but if I upgrade to Windows 8.1 my sound get distorted.

I may be able to find some way to roll back the drivers to the ones I'm using now, but turning off Media Center doesn't fix the sound problem once it's there.

That's true in both Windows 8.1 and 10.

I'm sure it has to do with drivers because if I update the drivers to the latest ones from Creative, the sound problems return.

If worse comes to worse I can alway get a different sound card, I'm not the only one having these issues, and it seems that most people who are, are using the same sound card that I am.

I plan on installing Windows 10 as a clean install if that's an option, and I'll format my C:\ drive, partitions it to make it smaller and install Windows 10 on it.

Mike