Hi, I am a long time Windows user as well as a seasoned .NET developer with 7 Win10 devices in my home ecosystem.
I have been working around this Cast To issue since the Windows 10 upgrade. I've replicated the issue on every Win10 installation I've tried, so I have high confidence that the bug should be easily reproducible.
In brief, there are two issues I encounter with "Cast to device":
- The primary issue is that when closing the Cast to Device playlist dialogue, the WMPDMC.EXE process remains active in the background and does not shut down correctly. It is then no longer possible to add items to playlist using the context menus - there is no error message, but nothing happens. After ending the WMPDMC.EXE process using Resource Monitor, cast to functionality immediately again works as expected. I have encountered no exceptions to this problem, no matter the source and destination, and not only on my own network. If I have cast to two different devices (say, Kodi and Windows Media player on different machines), I will find two instances of the WMPDMC.EXE, etc. After closing their dialogues, they will all need their process ended before the UI will become responsive again and media will be cast.
- Additionally, intermittently, if the Cast to Device has been open but inactive for some time, it will no longer advance to the next playlist item once the active playlist item has completed. Subsequently double clicking on the next item will play it, but similarly, once complete it will not advance. Ending the WMPDMC.EXE process and then recreating the playlist resolves this issue every time, until enough time elapses for it to occur again.
- Also, using the "clear list" feature in the dialogue or removing the only playlist item results in a substantial time delay (often 30 seconds to a minute) during which the dialogue becomes entirely unresponsive, and can not be moved or interacted with at all. The playlist appears blank, with no items or messaging. During this time, "Cast to device" context menus appear to function but items are not added to the playlist. After some time, the dialogue becomes responsive again and displays the "No media items..." and then "cast to device" again functions as expected.
Please advise. I can collect screen captures if required.
-n.
