Can't Stream Music from Windows 8.1 Computer to Xbox 360

Can't stream music from Windows 8.1 to xbox 360. Xbox Guide music player only recognizes songs and not Albums or Artists. I currently can stream video and photos from Win 8 computer to 360 no problem. I have Windows Media Player setup with Streaming Share
turned on. I previously had an XP computer and was able to stream fine. Here is a video of my problem with the music streaming:


Any Help is greatly appreciated!

John

:)

 

Streaming music library onto xbox from Windows 8

I currently can't stream music from Windows 8.1 to xbox 360. I currently can stream video and photos from Win 8 computer to 360 no problem. Here is my problem with the music streaming:

 

Add existing music to Xbox Music on Xbox 360?

I have Windows 8, I have Xbox music and before I could stream it from my computer to the system player. No I can't seem to do it anymore. Funny thing is I can still use the Media Center and it streams but I would prefer either the system player or the Xbox
Music app. My library is added to the app on my computer but I can't get it to stream to the Xbox. Save me.

 

Hey there, John! I moved you over to the proper forums to get you the help you will need. I hope you understand.

This seems to be an odd issue. Do you have your songs set up on your computer in separate folders for the albums they are on and the properties set to show the album on there?

 

I use iTunes to manage my library. The music on my Win8.1 machine is in the folder music|itunes|itunes media|music|artist name|album. Like I mentioned this worked fine playing music from the xbox Guide from an XP computer. After working with Microsoft support
today with 2 chat sessions, a windows support call to india and xbox support call getting passed from network to hardware and then back to network there was a few suggestions that Windows Media Center was needed. I have pro so luckily I only had to spend $10
to discover this did not solve the problem. Microsoft does not seem to have anyone competent to solve this problem to stream music from Windows 8.1 to the xbox Guide music player that worked fine previously. Very frustrated after 5 hours of trying to solve
this. Hoping there is someone smart enough out there to help!

 

First, I want to apologize that you had to go through so many support options for so long. I do hope I can point you in the proper direction.

I'd like to address the Media Center app that you were told to purchase. Since that did not solve this issue, I suggest going to
commerce.microsoft.com, sign into the account that you made the purchase on; then select Billing Help on the left side, select Getting help on the bottom center, and Contact
Support below that. From the drop down, select Windows Store, from the new drop down select Apps & Windows Store, and Getting a refund from the final drop down. This will get you
to the team that can assist you in getting a refund for that app.

For your streaming issue, I suggest contacting our Media Center Extender support at 877-274-4349 and select #4. I know it says Media Center support (it will state the Games for Windows Live information first), but they will help you out with streaming from
your PC to your 360 in general.

Please post back your results for this. I'm very interested in making sure you get this issue resolved so that you can see those Albums or Artists on your 360 from your Windows 8 computer!

 

Ok, I figured out the problem. Sort of?

After many hours of effectively re-building a clean install of WMP12 and my library following

answers.microsoft.com/.../6b206d7d-5507-49a0-8733-679913c2b44b, the xbox was still having the same problem in timing out when searching for Albums and artists. It was inconsistent in playing the Songs it did find in the song category. I created a much smaller
library of 10 artists with albums. This indexed and detected the music library properly in the xbox Guide music player.

It seems the problem is with the number of files or size of the music library. It is funny that it worked fine on Windows XP with WMP11. I guess for it to work I would need to upgrade from Windows 8.1 and WMP12 to Windows XP and WMP11 ;-). However, I am
through with this. I will simply plug in my Apple iPod and control my complete music from there (guess I have to thank MS for not DRM and allowing me to connect my iPod to xbox). I will continue to use iTunes to manage my library and stream music to my Playstation
3, Denon receiver, Bose Speaker, and Airport Express devices. I will get rid of WMP12 and Media Center which seem to get wonkier with each version. Hoping Microsoft soon supports DLNA which seems to work very well. Anyway, thanks to apple for a solution that
works and is much more stable and straight forward.

I did try to contact Microsoft at 877-274-4349 and select #4 to confirm if there is a file/size limit in streaming from WMP12 on Windows 8.1 to an xbox 360. Currently my library is about 150gb of about 2000 albums. When calling the number at 11:30am PT on
Friday 9/26, I received an automated message that support was not accepting calls? I then called xbox 360 network/streaming support. They were not aware of any file/size limit and offered no additional explanation of what the problem was? In fact they said
the iPod solution was probably a better way to go.

This was a very frustrating experience filled with mis-information, poor customer service, and support documentation that was limited, out of date, and mis-leading. Hopefully I am in the vast minority of bad experiences of Microsoft Product/Support nightmares,
but judging from my history of MS Computer and product problems I don’t think this is the case. Hoping to limit my hours of wasted time on MS products in the future.

 

Oh man! First, I'm both happy and sad to see your response. Glad we might have figured out the issue, and sad that the line said they weren't taking any calls at that time.

Please try the number I provided again on Monday to verify everything with the Media Center Specialist. Their hours are 7am to 9pm Monday through Friday. They should have better information about this than the 360 Networking specialist because they deal with
it daily. I do hope that the message on the phone was a fluke and you are able to get someone then.

I know DLNA support is coming to the Xbox One here shortly, so do keep an eye out for that! That should make this whole situation a bit easier on you.

I am sorry to see that we were unable to help you out fully to get your playlists working as you would like it. Hopefully you can confirm on Monday with the specialist the limits that might be in WMP 12 and Windows 8.1.

And please feel free to keep me updated on the situation! It really is a unique one, and I'm interested in the outcome of this.

 

This is a widely reported issue. That you haven't heard of it is not at all surprising given the quality of your 'help'. I too have read that it is a library size issue specific to WMP 12 on Windows 8. I created a new library and put only a few items in
it and it worked fine. I slowly added items until it didn't worked then added/subtracted to tease the limit, but I couldn't keep track of the changes in album and artist count so I wasn't able to determine exactly what the limit was. The only thing that is
clear is that no customer facing agent at MSFT has the slightest clue about it, and no decision makers give two squirts.