Prevent Windows Media Player Album Art Download

Anonymous
2009-12-02T13:24:14+00:00

I have spent a large amount of time fixingand manually editing my music album art with 500x500px images.

I have read the article at http://social.answers.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/w7music/thread/6ff8c9fd-d97f-4304-bad5-693f7dbb4532/ however this isn't my problem - I can add the artwork as I need.

The problem I have is that Windows Media Player is going online and replacing my 500x500px artwork with the 200x200px artwork from the online database. In addition to this, it is creating all of the 75x75px Small artwork files which are cluttering the My Music folder.

I have set Retrieve Additional Information from the Internet to No, and I have set Update Music Files by Retrieving Media Info from the Internet to No also, however it still goes online.

I used Wireshark to determine it is going to the following addresses:

redir.metaservices.windowsmedia.com.akadns.net

serviceswitching.metadata.windowsmedia.com.akadns.net

I have blocked these addresses on my router but WMP is finding a way around. I looked in the registry and there is nothing regarding totally disabling the artwork download (although this should be disabled with the options already set).

I can set the Folder.jpg files as Read-Only and this prevents WMP from overwriting my 500x500px files, but I still don't want it creating the AlbumArtSmall files.

Richard Green, MCSA Windows Server 2003

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Music, photos, and video

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Anonymous
2011-11-02T20:30:33+00:00

easy... just totally block windows media player using your firewall... or add those address as 127.0.0.1 (redir.metaservices.windowsmedia.com.akadns.net; serviceswitching.metadata.windowsmedia.com.akadns.net)

in the HOSTS file.

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  1. Anonymous
    2009-12-03T08:17:04+00:00

    Suresh,

    In my original post I stated that Retrieve Additional Information from the Internet is **disabled.**Thanks

    Richard

    Richard Green, MCSA Windows Server 2003

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  2. Anonymous
    2009-12-03T05:24:54+00:00

    Hi, 

    Welcome to Microsoft Windows 7 Answers Forum!

    You may try the steps as below and check if the issue gets fixed.

    1. Open Windows Media Player 12
    2. Click Organize, click Options and then click the Library tab
    3. In the Automatic media information updates for files area, make sure that 'Retrieve additional information from the Internet' is not checked.
    4. This should prevent Media Player from overwriting what you have added.

    For more information :

    http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en/w7itprogeneral/thread/3552ec2d-d510-49ec-985c-1fc04c3d6da6

    http://social.answers.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/GettingReadyforWindows7/thread/0b3e71b3-9b85-4d0a-987c-e7b52677840d/

    Thanks and Regards:

    Suresh Kumar- Microsoft Support.

    Visit our Microsoft Answers Feedback Forumand let us know what you think.

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