Windows Media Player 11 Library stopped working

themainburger

Hi,

I use Media Player 11 and until yesterday I had all of my music collection contained in the Media Player 11 library. I was able to browse my music via genre, artist, album etc. I also use media connect to play the same music collection thru my xbox 360. As I said, until yesterday everything has been working fine for the last 6 months at least...

Now out of nowhere yesterday, it is saying :

"there are no items in this library yet - the player is searching for digital media files in the background. Click here to add files to the library now."

The music is all still on the pc obviously, but no matter what I do now I cannot get it to display from the Media Player 11 library like it was doing all along..

When I click on "add files to the library", it brings up the Monitored Folders options window. But for some odd reason when I manually add things such as shared music folder and other music folders on the pc, then click ok, and then return into this options window, they have not saved and they are not listed even tho I just added them a moment ago and clicked ok. So essentially I can no longer manually add folders to be monitored for the library.



I also cannot configure sharing any more without it crashing media player...if I go to "tools --> options --> library --> configure sharing" it will open the Media Sharing window but as soon as I click on "settings" in here I get the "windows media player has encountered a problem and needs to close"...I have sent a load of error reports on this since the problem has begun...

Has anyone any ideas on what to do to fix this? I work in computers so I know what I am doing, I've already done any generic troubleshooting on the Microsoft site, I've rolled back to Media Player 10 (which finds the library fine btw) and then reinstalled 11 about 3 times now, I've removed media connect and re-installed that also but nothing seems to be working..

I hadn't made any major changes to my pc yesterday either, I haven't installed or removed anything and I haven't changed settings or configured any other programs either, basically everything is the same as it was before, I simply turned on the PC, went to listen to some music and found everything was gone from the library. I can still drag and drop music into the player etc. but it is not as functional as browsing the library

Any suggestions would be much appreciated

Thanks

kaimera

When you drag and drop into WMP, does it not auto add to LIB anymore?

Try creating a new folder on a seperate partition [if applicable] and add a few files to it and see if MP will save that file path.

themainburger

kaimera wrote:

When you drag and drop into WMP, does it not auto add to LIB anymore?

Try creating a new folder on a seperate partition [if applicable] and add a few files to it and see if MP will save that file path.

No it won't auto add anymore either, the option to auto-add files after listening to them is still ticked in options but it won't work..

I've also tried monitoring different folders and none of them will stay listed after clicking Ok and then returning to the menu, the monitor folders list is simply blank again like in the screenshot...

For some reason however, it is still picking up "Pictures" folders in the library, ya know the way you can look at music, pictures, video, recorded tv etc..well when I go to the pictures section it is listing all the jpegs on the pc..not much use tho as nobody uses media player to look at jpegs..

feylya

Uninstall and reinstall WiMP 11?

themainburger

kaimera wrote:

When you drag and drop into WMP, does it not auto add to LIB anymore?

Thanks for the fast reply by the way, much appreciated

Here is a screenshot of the Sharing options, if I put the tick in the box to share and then click OK it will freeze..if I click settings it will crash the player completely...

themainburger

feylya wrote:

Uninstall and reinstall WiMP 11?

Did that at least 3 times in every conceivable way. I unistalled 11 and rolled back to 10, removed any trace of 11 in add remove programs and then ran 10. The library was working fine in 10.

I then reinstalled 11 using both the upgrade option in 10, and I also got the install file manually from microsoft and tried a clean install that way..

feylya

Did you manually remove the WiMP11 keys from the registry?

kaimera

I'm tryin to recreate the problem...doesn't crash when I do the Media Sharing.

Only difference I have is the 'Add to Library' dialog I have the first radio button checked, rather than the second one. Not sure if it makes much of a difference in this case.

themainburger

kaimera wrote:

I'm tryin to recreate the problem...doesn't crash when I do the Media Sharing.

Only difference I have is the 'Add to Library' dialog I have the first radio button checked, rather than the second one. Not sure if it makes much of a difference in this case.

Cheers, appreciated...the only difference in the 2 radio buttons is that the first one only scans the documents of one single user on the pc, the second button scans all users and also the shared documents folders which is where I keep my music so it is easily accessible to other PC's on the network..

kaimera

Ah ok, I've only a single user.

Funny thing..I managed to crash xp whilst messing around. ffs. Not just MP11, everything froze.

Sorry can't be much more help. Bit of a hum_dinger alright.

sof

Any1 come up with a solution to this? seems to be a popular problem.....exactly same thing happened to me!!

Overheal

Erm if you can roll back to WMP10 (your on XP) I dont see why you wouldnt. 10 was a much nicer program. But I suppose if you want to share on your 360..

I assume youve run all available viral/spy and malware scans?

Afraid I cant say I've ever heard this one: maybe a clean nuke of XP is what will ail you.

sof

I rolled back and the library works fine. I think it's common enough, alot of sites have info on it but nothing seems to cure it. I need it for the xbox360, couldn't bear watchin films on a small 15" screen!!

kaimera

tversity for streaming to the xbox.

I had issues with WMP myself and based on a few boardsies recommending it I'm using that now.