Task Scheduler and media center

Hi,

My monitor keeps turning on in the middle of the night (desktop on 24x7) and I went through the power settings (advanced) and turned off network/keyboard/mouse pwr mgmnt in device manager. It still keeps turning on overnight but I don't know specific time.

Under powercfg - waketimers I see one entry for mcupdate scheduled. I went into turn windows features on/off via control panel and under Media there is only Media Player, there is no Windows Media Center that I could uncheck. How can I turn this *feature* off and hopefully it won't impact windows updates, my malwarebytes or avast scans (which both run after midnight at some point). I was thinking it was Avast turning on monitor to display results of scan. Only issue it sees every night is unable to access my Outlook *.ost files for 2 email accounts. I did post over there to see if anyone sees this as well. I think I just need to know how to disable the mcupdate task but haven't found exactly where to do this. Specific command/pointer would be appreciated if this is indeed what is turning my monitor on overnight. I physically turn it off when done using the PC and this only happens overnight while asleep. And no, it's not my cats messing with me ;-)

Thanks!

Mike

Use the tool "autoruns" to identify the corresponding auto start entry. You can also use it to disable/ delete the corresponding entry.

altae said:

Use the tool "autoruns" to identify the corresponding auto start entry. You can also use it to disable/ delete the corresponding entry.

Grabbed the tool, ran it and didn't see/find mcupdate_scheduled. However I did find it in task scheduler (a couple of them actually, I think mcupdate and mcupdate_scheduled). When I type in powercfg -waketimers it shows entry for mcupdate_scheduled and shows svchost.exe expires on 9/11/2015. So it must have run. But when I do powercfg -lastwake it shows wake history count = 0. When I run scheduled tasks/task scheduler it complains that something no longer exists. I am assuming it's the entry from waketimers. When I look in Autoruns under Everything I see several different mcupdate tasks which are in yellow highlight and says File not found. When I look in c:\windows\ehome there is no mcupdate.exe visible. Not sure if this is a hidden file or not as I haven't set show hidden files yet. Strange it shows File not found for that entry and others.

In Task Scheduler looking in the task scheduler library I do see anything other than what's listed in middle of the app window. And in that pane there is no mcupdate listed at all. I've looked at all tasks shown and nothing points to mcupdate. However, looking at the File not found in Autoruns the multiple mcupdate entries show various arguments on it such as -MediaCenterRecoveryTasks, etc....so it seems this does a lot of things and may not want to turn it off completely. Trying to find the mcupdate_scheduled is where I am getting lost to just turn that off and see if my monitor stays *off* nightly.

Mike

Here is output from 2 commands for powercfg:

Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.10240]
(c) 2015 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\WINDOWS\system32>powercfg -lastwake
Wake History Count - 0

C:\WINDOWS\system32>powercfg -waketimers
Timer set by [SERVICE] \Device\HarddiskVolume2\Windows\System32\svchost.exe (SystemEventsBroker) expires at 6:07:21 PM on 9/16/2015.
Reason: Windows will execute 'NT TASK\Microsoft\Windows\Media Center\mcupdate_scheduled' scheduled task that requested waking the computer.

C:\WINDOWS\system32>


Under change windows options and under Media it only is showing media player, no media center. I can pretty much say it isn't avast as it had completed before 3am and the monitor was off (I got up to go to bathroom and turned monitor on and saw that the avast scheduled scan completed). After that Malwarebytes ran around 3:45am for completion and yes the monitor was on when I woke up around 6am today. So it may be it or the above mcupdate_scheduled that is happening some time after 3am that is turning the monitor on by itself and I can't find how to disable the mcupdate_scheduled. Any ideas now?

Thanks,

Mike

Ok I went into the registry and found the 2 mcupdate* instances, saved off the keys, did a system restore point and deleted those two keys. Now to wait a couple/few days to see if my monitor stays OFF now overnight. I know it wasn't avast as it was done earlier and I woke up ~3am for bio break and monitor was off, malwarebytes ran after that and completed ~3:46am but I doubt that's it since it doesn't pop a dialog box unless something is amiss. So we'll see, and if this worked, it is under localmachine->software->microsoft path for those two keys in case anyone else is having this messed up issue. I hope like hell this works. Not that the monitor is burning lots of $ being on for a few hours before I wake, just the damn principle that if a) I do not have windows media center b) it should NOT be doing this crap!

Mike

OK monitor still turning on. I'm going to change the schedule or disable nightly scanning for a night or two for malwarebytes and see if that resolves the issue. Looking in powercfg there is nothing being scheduled so the things I did in prior post removed it from the system (mcupdate and mcupdate_scheduled registry key removal).

Mike

OK disabling Malwarebytes didn't solve the issue so I am now looking at msconfig stuff and continuing debugging this annoying issue.....if/when I get a resolution I'll post then vs keeping this thread going since I have not resolved it still!

If anyone has other suggestions other than what I've already done, run it by me and I'll take a look!

Thanks!

Mike

msoucy said:

OK disabling Malwarebytes didn't solve the issue so I am now looking at msconfig stuff and continuing debugging this annoying issue.....if/when I get a resolution I'll post then vs keeping this thread going since I have not resolved it still!

If anyone has other suggestions other than what I've already done, run it by me and I'll take a look!

Thanks!

Mike

I had this exact same problem. powercfg -waketimers was showing that the Windows Media Center was attempting to update daily at 9:46:54 AM. Which is odd because I've never used Windows Media Center and is not even included with Windows 10. Anyway... That's when the computer was waking up so I was sure I at least isolated the guilty service.

To resolve this, you need to run Windows PowerShell in Admin mode (search, "powershell", right click, "Run as Administrator"). You'll get a command prompt like window with a blue background. Enter the following command:

Code:

Get-ScheduledTask | ? { $_.Settings.WakeToRun -eq $true -and $_.State -ne "Disabled"} | % { $_.Settings.WakeToRun = $false; Set-ScheduledTask $_ }

It should report back a few lines with tasks that the command turned off. If any of the text is red, you probably did something wrong. Once done, close the PowerShell window and your "powercfg -waketimers" command should now display that "There are no active wake timers in the system.". Disco! Your computer will no longer wake up on it's own!

Tim

teckel said:

I had this exact same problem. powercfg -waketimers was showing that the Windows Media Center was attempting to update daily at 9:46:54 AM. Which is odd because I've never used Windows Media Center and is not even included with Windows 10. Anyway... That's when the computer was waking up so I was sure I at least isolated the guilty service.

To resolve this, you need to run Windows PowerShell in Admin mode (search, "powershell", right click, "Run as Administrator"). You'll get a command prompt like window with a blue background. Enter the following command:

Code:

Get-ScheduledTask | ? { $_.Settings.WakeToRun -eq $true -and $_.State -ne "Disabled"} | % { $_.Settings.WakeToRun = $false; Set-ScheduledTask $_ }

It should report back a few lines with tasks that the command turned off. If any of the text is red, you probably did something wrong. Once done, close the PowerShell window and your "powercfg -waketimers" command should now display that "There are no active wake timers in the system.". Disco! Your computer will no longer wake up on it's own!

Tim

Hi Tim,

I have no waketimers set as I checked again earlier while on phone with a friend. The command you sent in the post came back with a bunch of text in red BUT this is what it showed:

Get-ScheduledTask : The system cannot find the file specified.
At line:1 char:1
+ Get-ScheduledTask | ? { $_.Settings.WakeToRun -eq $true -and $_.State ...
+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+ CategoryInfo : ObjectNotFound: (MSFT_ScheduledTask:Root/Microsoft/...T_ScheduledTask) [Get-ScheduledTas
k], CimException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : HRESULT 0x80070002,Get-ScheduledTask

I disabled Avast's Emergency Update via task scheduler as that's one of two tasks malwarebytes found via fsrt output (he had me run it and send logs). I also took a look at my monitor settings and there is nothing set to turn it on at any time (in this case 3am daily it is happening). So I am stumped at this point. I will see what happens when I get up tomorrow, if monitor is on or not. I physically turn it off via power button on bottom (HP 2311xi btw) and it's light goes from blue to off, no amber, just off/dark. And again, this only started the day after I updated from Windows 7 Home Premium to Windows 10. Bizarre and I know it isn't my cats messing with me :)

Mike

msoucy said:

Hi Tim,

I have no waketimers set as I checked again earlier while on phone with a friend. The command you sent in the post came back with a bunch of text in red BUT this is what it showed:

Get-ScheduledTask : The system cannot find the file specified.
At line:1 char:1
+ Get-ScheduledTask | ? { $_.Settings.WakeToRun -eq $true -and $_.State ...
+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+ CategoryInfo : ObjectNotFound: (MSFT_ScheduledTask:Root/Microsoft/...T_ScheduledTask) [Get-ScheduledTas
k], CimException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : HRESULT 0x80070002,Get-ScheduledTask

I disabled Avast's Emergency Update via task scheduler as that's one of two tasks malwarebytes found via fsrt output (he had me run it and send logs). I also took a look at my monitor settings and there is nothing set to turn it on at any time (in this case 3am daily it is happening). So I am stumped at this point. I will see what happens when I get up tomorrow, if monitor is on or not. I physically turn it off via power button on bottom (HP 2311xi btw) and it's light goes from blue to off, no amber, just off/dark. And again, this only started the day after I updated from Windows 7 Home Premium to Windows 10. Bizarre and I know it isn't my cats messing with me :)

Mike

Not sure, are you sure you ran PowerShell as administrator? I get no red errors when I typed in that command. BTW, I typed it in, I couldn't cut and paste. If that's the same for you, it could be that you didn't type it in correct or you should type it in if you found a way to paste it.

Tim