Windows Media Player constantly updating media library

I've struggled with same problem for a whole day and found a workaround. There is a special file called "wmpfolders.wmdb" which stored information about all folders looked through by WMP. You can find this file in you local app folder: c:\Users[your name]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Media Player. What you can do with this file is mark a folder so WMP will ignore it and will not update any files stored in this folder. To do so edit this file with any text editor (it just a plain XML) and replace Exclude="0" with Exclude="-1" to mark folder as excluded.

You can exclude specific subfolders or any top level folder.

Hope it helps someone.

YES!!!!!  I FINALLY GOT IT!!!

So the aboved solution works... but there is more to it.  It's actually quite a bit of work, but it works. 

1. Navigate to c:\Users[your name]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Media Player
2. Delete all the .wmdb files
3. Open Services.  Go to "Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service".  Stop the service.  Then double-click on it and change the startup to Disable.
4. Restart computer.

5) Navigate again to c:\Users[your name]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Media Player (keep this folder open as there are a few things that need to be done here) There should be no .wmdb files.

6. Open Windows Media Player once, and close it as soon as you see the wmpfolders.wmdb file created.
7. Edit the file the way it is mentioned above.  (Only top folders should be listed.  i.e., C:/user/Music, etc).  After doing so, save and close the file.
8. Edit the properties of the wmpfolders.wmdb file.  Check on "Read Only".  Then go to the Security tab.  You should have your user account, System, Administrator, and WMPNetworkSvc listed.  You need to delete WMPNetworkSvc, but you can't because it's a Special Permission group.
9. Click on "Advanced" at the bottom of the window to change special permissions.
10. In the next window, click on "Change Permissions".  
11. Now uncheck "Include inheritable permissions from this object's parent".  A window will pop up.  Select "Remove".
12. Now you will see that you have no permission entries.  You need to add Administrator and your user account back on.  (SYSTEM is never used, so it's pointless.)  Click OK to close the window.
13. Click on "Add".  Type "Administrator" (cap sensitive) and press OK.  At the bottom of the window, select "Full Control".  Do NOT click OK yet.
14. Next add your user account. Click on Add.  Type your user account name (cap sensitive) and press OK.  At the bottom of the window, select Allow on all except "Full Control".  Click OK. Click OK again.

*****LAST PART*******

15. While still in the c:\Users[your name]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Media Player folder, right click>New>Text Document.  Make 5 copies (or just do that step 5 times).
16. Label them as CurrentDatabase_372.wmdb, another as LocalMLS_0.wmdb, and continue on as 1 through 4.  Make sure you have the file extension as .wmdb and NOT .wmdb.txt

Open up Windows Media Player, and it will not longer be able to add anything to the existing "fake" database.

Question: What if you want your music to be in the database?

Answer:

1. Complete steps 1 to 4.
2. After restarting your computer, before opening Windows Media Player, edit your media folders in Window.  i.e., Pictures - remove any folders.  Video - remove any folders.  Music - keep any folder you'd like Windows Media Player to scan.
3. Now open up Windows Media Player.  It should only see your music folder since WMP and Windows 7 use the same root.  Let WMP update the database.
4. Go go back to the c:\Users[your name]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Media Player folder.  You should have database, a LocalMLS file, and the wmpfolders file.  Now continue on with step 5  (of course, during the final step, do not create a new file if it already exist)
5. Now go back and add your media folders to Windows (not Windows Media Player)
6. Open Windows Media Player.  You should see your already updated music database, and even though Windows has a link established to your Music/Picture/Video folders, all other video/pictures/etc in WMP should show "There are no items in your [specified] library".

WMP will not be able to update it's database.

If you wish to add more music later, you have to change the permissions of the wmpfolder.wmdb file.  Change the user account permission setting to Full Control.  Before opening WMP, you have to remove the folders in Picture and Video.  If you do not remove the folder, once you open up WMP, it will start scanning again.  After doing so, open up WMP, and manually drag the folder or files that you wish to add to the music database.  After doing so, go back to the wmpfolder.wmdb file and change the user account permission back to Read & Execute only.

Well, that's it.  It's a PITA, but that is how you get WMP to not have access to update the databases.