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The Ramblings of Master D. Homie

Rodents & DRM... Gone too far!

clock November 22, 2008 23:54 by author Master D. Homie

Every time my computer booted after changing the mainboard I received the following message: "The Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service service terminated unexpectedly". That message was also entered into the Windows Event Log as Event ID 7034. Microsoft cannot even deal with their own licensing complexity in a reasonable manner. The action of changing the mainboard in my computer triggers an automatic denial of use? Give me a break Microsoft! Microsoft Article ID: 891664 (see below) explains what happens and why. Looks like they automatically assume I am stealing something so they just shut off the service instead of promting you with a question like... Did you just change your mainboard? Thanks for that.

Cause of the Problem - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/891664

This issue occurs because the Windows Media DRM system maintains information based on the hardware configuration of the computer. If certain components are changed, Windows Media DRM may not work because it may view the change as an unauthorized attempt to move protected content to another computer.

This issue may occur if you have made one or more of the following changes to your computer hardware:

  • You recently changed hardware components, such as the CPU or the motherboard.
  • You modified any one of your computer's Basic Input/Output System (BIOS) settings that affect hardware components, such as disabling CPU hyper-threading.
  • You moved the hard disk drive from one computer to another computer.

I found the answer to my problem here: http://thegreenbutton.com/forums/thread/251647.aspx. I decided to search for "C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\DRM" in Google to find more information. This led me directly to the Microsoft support article referenced above.

I have a negative opinion about DRM (Digital Rights Managment) because "they" do stuff like this.

As for the Rodents portion of my post. I have some (yes more than one). They MUST die! The things are under the bathtub or something scratching around. It's driving the cat (Nytro) crazy! Kinda fun to watch the cat, but not my idea of fun knowing that I have rats under the house. Must be that time of year... getting too cold to be outside for the poor little critters. Damn they're loud! Time to go watch some TV. I'll deal with the rats tomorrow. Bwuahahahah!

FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!!! STOP SCRATCHING OR YOU CAN DIE NOW!!! I DON'T EVEN WANT TO SEE WHAT THEY ARE DOING DOWN THERE!!!



Motherboard & CPU Update... Complete

clock November 16, 2008 03:26 by author Master D. Homie

Since Windows Vista is hardware agnostic, I thought any storage controller driver installed in the system by default would allow me to boot from it. Whoops! STOP 0x0000007B was the error of the day last weekend after installing the new mainboard. As Microsoft Article ID 922976 clearly states, I must enable AHCI prior to attempting to boot from a drive using an ACHI controller. So... Old board back into the machine... change the registry... new board back in... Re-Activate Windows... All good. The new CPU runs so cool that the front fan and rear fan don't even run when I'm not taxing the machine.



New Computer Time...Sort of

clock October 2, 2008 00:39 by author Master D. Homie
Today I received a new processor that I won from an Intel promotion! It's a Core™2 Duo E8400 (3GHz. & 6MB Cache, 1333MHz FSB, 45nm). Now I just need a new motherboard to complete the (new) part of my computer :)  I can use the "old" RAM/HDD/DVD/CHASSIS. Then to install the "old" motherboard & processor in the wife's computer.....