Vista - Media Center using HDMI Audio = BUGs

Here is a run down of my set up and something interesting at the end.

My main PC in my office has 6TB of drive space. It stores about 200 DVD's of my 1000 collection. I have 4 XBOX 360's in my home and my home is completely wired in cat6.
The movies are stored as mpegs so the 360 units can stream them. I use Media Center with MyMovies2 for the collection interface. I was never happy with the picture quality and loss of bonus features with the mpegs. So it was time to build a killer streamer. The HTPC I just built , specs below, is to stream from the 6TB PC as well as play any discs I have not ripped yet. MyMovies2 also has the ability to stream Blu-Ray and HD-DVD ISO files when used in conjunction with Power DVD, AnyDVD and Daemon Tools.

HTPC:
Asus PQ5-EM Motherboard-Intel G45 Chipset onboard HDMI Video /Audio
Intel E8600 CPU
ADATA DDR2-800 4GB
Asus Blu-Ray Drive

Currently the Asus P5Q-EM is running Vista 64, MyMovies2(client), AnyDVD, Daemon Tools and Power DVD 7.3.

If you open up available HDMI Audio Devices I have 2. One is the Intel that Actually works and the other is a Microsoft that says it works, but even if I set it as default it gives nothing. So the Intel HDMI Audio is Default.
I have it configured to 7.1 speaker set up.

In this Set up Power DVD and Media player work great. I can stream Blu-Ray and play anything at all in 7.1 or 5.1 what ever the source has to offer.

Now in Media Center I go to configure the audio set up and the first question it asks is what type of connector are you using for audio. RCA, SPDIF, Coax ETC... but no HDMI.
Whatever I choose give me no audio in media center and the videos will lock up in about 1 minute.
So I start the set up and then cancel. Once you lose the audio it is gone for navigation within Media Center also. Restarting Media center gives you back your navigating audio.

Now if I go back to Audio Devices available and select Intel HDMI and change it to 2CH. I then get full audio and 5.1 from the mpeg movies through Media center. But now Blu-Rays only give 2CH no matter what, whether streamed or from the disc.

Ok, here is the funny thing.... After playing with settings and drivers for awhile, I had the Intel HDMI set for 7.1 and then tried Power DVD both from disc and streaming Blu-Ray, worked perfectly, Tried Media Player with the Mpegs, worked perfectly, Opened Media Center then My Movies2 and loaded up a Blu-Ray stream, It worked perfectly. The I loaded up an mpeg movie in my movies and it played perfectly in 5.1. I then tried several mpegs and they all worked.

What I found is when you go into Media Center, If the first thing I play is a Blu-Ray stream it somehow tells media center how to hook up correctly to the HDMI Audio. Once I stop the Blu-Ray stream I can play any movie I have stored on the 6TB server with no problem through Media Center. Once I close Media Center it goes back to wanting 2CH. As long as I play A Blu-Ray first in Media center then everything will work like it is supposed to.

So, If I had to guess I would say this is a Media center issue. It does not appear to be finding the HDMI audio correctly.

Anyone feel free to chime in on this issue. God knows I could use the help....

Honestly? I think you've found a legitimate bug in WMC and / or Vista. You've troubleshot this *extensively*, my congratulations on your exhaustive sleuthing skills, but I really don't see a way out of this, unless you somehow create a short 5 second BD clip that always plays before your movies automatically....

This is the only answer I was not hoping for. Thanks for your input.
I think you are absolutely correct with your answer.

Boards with this Intel G45 Chipset are just popping up now. I was one of the first few to get one of these retail boards in the last few weeks. This chipset / board with on board HDMI Video and HDMI Audio as well as hardware acceleration for Blu-Ray is what all of us Home Theater enthusiasts have been waiting for. This issue will become very common place in the next few months.

How hard is it to let Microsoft's Media center team know about this bug?

Thanks for your help,
Chris

Wait, did you say G45 boards? I swear I read something very similar about this issue already regarding the G45 chipsets.

Let me look.

If I have, then you're probably in luck as this issue has been discussed a lot already, and you're not alone.

Yup - I knew I read this recently.

Intel blogger slams employer over G45 IGP issues | Register Hardware

G45 has HD decode problems - The INQUIRER

Which further puts egg on my face - I should have read your specs more carefully, but I'll plead that even then it may not have sparked my memory.

Yes, I read those articles. The 7.1 glitch is no HDCP hand shake for a Repeater (Stereo receiver in my case). This bug is fixed by running AnyDVD in the background.

The hardware acceleration is one that has not been fixed that i know of. There have been posts herea nd there of a fix, but if it is hardware i do not know what kind of fix they are talking about.

This bug I have found is a Vista / media center bug that just adds to this whole mess.

Thanks for your help, It is much appreciated.

I thought it would be building upon that hardware glitch, which was first discovered in the 965 series, as it was never fixed.

As to the fix, only thing I can think of is (and you're gonna hate this one) get a new mobo with a dif chipset.

All in all, I think you'll be happier with that.

Believe it or not, right now this is the best solution. As soon as something better comes along I will swap in the blink of an eye.

The G45 Chipset was seen as the Holy Grail to all Home Theater enthusiasts. And the Asus board I just bought was the most eagerly anticipated of them.

Is there a way to at least report the Media Center bug to Microsoft?

I am pretty sure the is - you'd need to get a hold of the media center dev team, but that first article I linked you to references a blogger who is apparently an Intel employee - so you might start there as opposed to WMC, as this I don't think is strictly a WMC bug, but a bug that builds upon the hardware issue in the Chipset.

As for the WMC dev team, a Google search should get you to one of their blogs pretty easily.

Thanks for your help, I will keep any progress posted here.

Ok, There is a fix for this problem , but it creates new problems with Media Center. Thanks to Woozy at the AVS Forums for this idea. This at least gave me a starting point for further testing.

Go into Media Center Settings and turn OFF Media Center Sound Navigation and Save. Close Media Center.
Go to Audio Devices and configure your Speaker set up for 5.1 or 7.1.
I tested Media Center with both 5.1 and 7.1.
The results were identical, So you can use 7.1 with this fix also.
The new problems introduced are that stopping a movie during playback still brings up the stop menu as usual. Normally in that menu you would select DONE and the movie completely stops.
Now the movie stays in the background and will not completely stop It is just paused although it shows the Square stop symbol. The same goes for a music file played. Now if you start another movie the new movie will take over. The same with a music file. But if using my movies and you start a Blu-Ray then the other movie will start playing along with the Blu-Ray at the same time.

(I am still testing to see what exactly triggers this next problem)
Also on some occasions while exiting Media Center with this fix the PC screen goes black with the mouse pointer in the center of the screen and the mouse pointer is rapidly flashing. You have no control over your PC at this time. You must do a hard reboot from the power switch. When the PC comes back you will no longer have 5.1 or 7.1 support. If you go into Audio Devices and select the Intel HDMI Audio device, when you go to configure the only option available is 2CH.
Another hard reboot will restore the 5.1 or 7.1 as you originally had it set.

This helps quite a bit, but once Media Center crashes it is a pain. Just also noticed - while navigating through Media center the movie that will not stop would randomly start playing again.