Fix NS_E_NO_MULTIPASS_FOR_LIVEDEVICE (0XC00D1B97) – Quick Guide

This error pops up when Windows Media Center or Windows Media Player can't handle a live TV tuner with multipass enabled. The fix is disabling multipass in the tuner driver settings.

Quick Answer (for the impatient)

Open Device Manager, find your TV tuner under Sound, video and game controllers, right-click it, go to Properties > Advanced tab, and set Multipass Processing to Enabled (or Disabled, depending on the driver wording). Apply and reboot. Done.

Why This Happens

I've seen this exact error a dozen times, usually on Windows 7 or Vista machines with a digital TV tuner card (like a Hauppauge WinTV or an AverMedia card) when you launch Windows Media Center and try to watch live TV. The error code 0XC00D1B97 translates to “No multipass for livedevice.”

What does that mean? The tuner driver has a feature called multipass processing — it's a type of video noise filtering that works by processing frames multiple times. But Windows Media Center (and older versions of Windows Media Player) doesn't support that feature for live TV streams. So when the driver advertises multipass capability but doesn't actually allow it to be toggled off, WMC throws this error.

The culprit is almost always the driver's Advanced properties page. Some tuner manufacturers ship drivers with multipass set to “Hardware Default” or “Auto,” which Windows interprets as “on” and then refuses to use the device. The fix is simple: force it off (or on, depending on the driver) explicitly.

Fix Steps

Open Device Manager. Hit Win + R, type devmgmt.msc, press Enter.
Find your TV tuner. Expand Sound, video and game controllers. Look for something like “Hauppauge WinTV 885” or “AverMedia Hybrid Tuner.” If you have multiple, start with the digital tuner (the one with DVB-T or ATSC in its name).
Open properties. Right-click the tuner > Properties. Go to the Advanced tab.
Locate Multipass Processing. You'll see a list of driver parameters. Look for “Multipass Processing,” “MultiPass,” or “Video Processing Mode.” It's usually a dropdown with options like “Hardware Default,” “Enabled,” or “Disabled.”
Set it explicitly. Change it to Disabled (or Enabled if Disabled isn't an option — try Enabled first, then reboot and test; if that fails, try the other). Then click OK.
Reboot. Yes, you need to restart. The driver won't reload the setting until you do.
Test. Open Windows Media Center, go to TV, and try to watch a live channel. The error should be gone.

If That Doesn't Work

Sometimes the Advanced tab doesn't show the multipass setting. In that case, try these:

Update the driver. Go to the tuner manufacturer's site (Hauppauge, AverMedia, etc.) and grab the latest driver for your exact model and OS. Don't use Windows Update — it often gives you generic Microsoft drivers that lack the Advanced tab.
Roll back the driver. If you just updated and the error appeared, roll back to the previous version. In Device Manager, right-click the tuner > Properties > Driver tab > Roll Back Driver.
Use a registry hack. Some drivers hide the multipass setting. Open Registry Editor (regedit) and navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4d36e96c-e325-11ce-bfc1-08002be10318}\ (that's the GUID for media devices). Find the subkey for your tuner (look at the DriverDesc value) and look for a DWORD named MultipassProcessing. If it exists, set its value to 0 (disabled). If it doesn't, create it. Reboot.
Switch to a different tuner. If you have multiple tuners in the system (common with dual-tuner cards), try disabling one in Device Manager and using only the other. Sometimes one tuner's driver handles multipass differently.

Prevention Tip

Once you've got it working, disable Windows Update from updating your tuner driver automatically. I've had machines where a driver update re-enabled multipass and broke TV again. Go to Control Panel > System > Device Installation Settings > set to “No, let me choose what to do” and then select “Never install driver software from Windows Update.” Yes, it's a bit aggressive, but for a media center PC, stability matters more than “convenience.”

Also, if you ever reinstall Windows, write down the exact driver version that works. I keep a text file with “Driver = version 7.8.0.32145” for each of my tuner cards. Saves hours of head-scratching.

Note: This error is specific to Windows Media Center (Windows 7/Vista). It doesn't happen with modern apps like Plex or Kodi because they handle tuners differently. If you've moved on from WMC, you won't see this error.