2013-03-06

Netflix Won't Run on Windows 8 with Hyper-V Installed

I tried to get the Windows 8 Windows Store version of Netflix to run. It wouldn't. Netflix clearly says that it won't run in a virtual machine. However, what they don't tell you is that it won't run at all if Hyper-V (the Windows 8 technology that allows virtual machines) is even installed on the machine, with no virtual machine even running. Uninstall Hyper-V and everything runs again.

I imagine that this is some kind of very badly implemented DRM (Digital Rights Management) scheme. They are probably afraid that if there is a virtual machine running that it can somehow intercept the unencrypted video stream coming from their server allowing someone to create movies that can be pirated. If I have a need for Hyper-V on that machine, though, I am going to uninstall Netflix not Hyper-V. Poor planning and engineering on their part. If DRM is implemented, it needs to be completely unintrusive to the non-pirate. Unfortunately this is almost never the case.

5 comments :

  1. FYI... i am running Win8Pro w/MCE and Netflix App works fine for me and i have 3 Hyper-V VM's running just fine. (however netflix will not run in the VM, only on the Host machine).

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  2. Must because you are smart and Greg (and I) aren't... because Netflix is NOT running for me either. Worse, I implemented a BCDEDit workaround that was suggested in another MS Forum post and now Hyper-V machines don't run either, even after rebooting.

    Worst, I've got 50+ hours invested here in the 4 installs (1 Win 7 machine is installed also), not to mention the bucks for 2 extra Win 8 licenses. And nothing works. That is except that #@!?!# "modern" UI which I pass thru a dozen times an hour to get to my desktop so I can work.

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  3. I know this post is older...but did you solve it Rodger?

    From what I understand if you have an ATi/AMD based graphics card this is when the issue occurs, and it works fine on nVidia/Intel/etc based GPU's.

    Is this the case for you and Greg?

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  4. Yep, problem still persists. With every Netflix update I hope this will get fixed, but it never does. Very disappointing.

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  5. Another way long overdue post from me. It's not Netflix or other app vendors that can take care of this. AMD has specifically disabled DRM support on Windows 8 when running Hyper-V.

    I talked with some engineers and execs with AMD and they said they have no plans for this to change. :(

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