I have had my computer with Vista Media Center (factory installed) for over a year.

Up until last week I have had no problems with Media Center, everything worked great,

then suddenly a few days ago Media Center locks up & crashes anytime i try to watch live TV, or a pre-recorded show.

I get this error message after shutting down Media Center via task manager...

Problem signature:
  Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
  Application Name: ehRecvr.exe
  Application Version: 6.0.6001.18000
  Application Timestamp: 47919381
  Fault Module Name: xvid.dll_unloaded
  Fault Module Version: 0.0.0.0
  Fault Module Timestamp: 3e59fd1e
  Exception Code: c0000096
  Exception Offset: 010d2a3b
  OS Version: 6.0.6002.2.2.0.768.3
  Locale ID: 1033
  Additional Information 1: 73f6
  Additional Information 2: 98cc53095db31377c38aa173d9364d38
  Additional Information 3: ac5c
  Additional Information 4: f49c2b1d252bab6e22329b5da1c0e537

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I also get this error message...

Windows Media Center Receiver Service has stopped working.

forgot to add I have installed all updates to Vista & Media Center.

Jasta:

forgot to add I have installed all updates to Vista & Media Center.

 That might well be your problem right there.  I have been experiencing  trouble with various aspect of MCE and thought I had found some solution(s) but the problems are recurring, albeit somewhat a little different every time, yet critical errors lead to total breakdown and finally [last time] to instant crash upon starting MCE as you mentioned in your post.

I am convinced this has something to do with some update but have yet to pinpoint which one for sure as it seems that it doesn't happen right away or is caused by a combination of things.

 Here's a list of the causes I have found and rectified so far:

- Removed faulty hardware [a defective built-in card reader]

- Removed extra memory [had 6Gb installed and found the max allowed to be 4Gb in the litterature]

- they were other software and codec issues that I fixed previously, that seemed to bring relief (MCE worked fine again), but now seemed to be irrelevant, as it was only temporary (about a month).

  Still trying to isolate the offending update.

 From a clean install (factory settings recovery) MCE works just fine up until the latest updates.

tip: you can back-up your TV schedule and settings:

Richard A Miller:

mceBackup 2.0

http://thedigitallifestyle.com/cs/media/p/1586.aspx

 

jcinvan:

  Still trying to isolate the offending update.

 From a clean install (factory settings recovery) MCE works just fine up until the latest updates.

 It took me three attempts but I have all updates installed except 3 optional updates for TV card, graphics card and display driver.  I had a couple of odd things happen today but MC is still working fine.  Will post again when I know more.

 ehshell.exe is the Media Center application

 I too have Vista Home Premium 32.  Ehrecvr.exe crashes each time I use WMC  for Live TV (No CPU activity).  It crashes at unpredictable times, in a session of Live TV. I get the message "No TV Signal Detected".  It does NOT crash if I use it to Record TV; that recording can be watched later, in its entirety.

But, if I watch a previously-recorded TV program, WHILE recording another TV program, Ehrecvr crashes and freezes the video/audio on the recorded TV I'm watching, AND the new recording is corrupted and can not be viewed.

Each time Ehrecvr.exe crashes, my computer will not function and I have to do an emergency shutdown. It restarts 'normally'.

My Vista is up to date -- Service Pack 1 and 2, etc.  I have tried re-installing all the relevant drivers -- video and (3) tuner, and uninstalling all WMC cumulative updates and then reinstalling the latest cumulative update.  I have tried a 'Clean boot'.  None of these actions changed the nature of the problem.

The problem appears to be a software conflict issue (??).  I am open to any suggestions that might resolve this long-standing problem.  I am not expert enough to know if this might have an obvious cause, or remedial actions I should take.

I have an HP Expresscard Digital/analog Tuner, 438587-001 Rev C; NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GS processor, 256 dedicated memory with driver 7.15.11.7713 Rev A.  Other System details are:

OS Name Microsoft® Windows Vista™ Home Premium
Version 6.0.6002 Service Pack 2 Build 6002
System Model HP Pavilion dv9500 Notebook PC
System Type X86-based PC
Processor Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU     T5450  @ 1.66GHz, 1667 Mhz, 2 Core(s), 2 Logical Processor(s)
BIOS Version/Date Hewlett-Packard F.59, 11/25/2008
SMBIOS Version 2.4

@ Pbredder

For me a factory settings recovery was the only lasting solution, I did remove faulty hardware [card reader].  In my case the trouble starts with the latest update to either of the display, TV card or graphics card driver. 

If by clean boot you mean clean install, you may have an hardware incompatibility  issue.  When I did a clean install everything worked perfect like a brand new box.  I then installed both service packs before doing anything else (turned off auto updates), except for installing Firefox.  I then installed the remaining [important] updates except for IE and Windows Mail, which I don't use.

ok, i found out that my Media Center works properly now that I unistalled "Sony Vegas 7"

as soon as I uninstalled that program Media Center works perfectly!

 Ya Sony software is infamous for been incompatible, I boycott Sony myself, unless it's backed by Erickson (cell phone). Sonic Stage for my MD (learned the hard way) has always been a pain [in the ***], in XP and don't seem to work at all in Vista.

 Just to update my investigation of my problem,  after uninstalling the Nvidia and and then installing the latest Nvidia driver, I am able to watch Live TV in Vista Media Center without any difficulty, IF it is a standard definition (SD) station.  I still have the problem I described earlier, with high definition (HD) stations, even though both the HP digital/analog expresscard tuner  and Nvidia driver are supposed to work with HD stations.  I hope this additional information is helpful.