Displaying Multiple Video and NowPlaying Items

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You can have multiple Video and NowPlaying view items; however, the following limitations may affect your design:

  • The Windows Media Center shell can play only one video stream at a time. In most cases, multiple Video view items will be drawn, but will show the same content.
  • The Media Center shell has only one Now Playing inset for the NowPlaying placeholder for applications. Therefore, if you have more than one NowPlaying placeholder, the shell will choose just one location to display the inset.
  • Some Media Center Extender devices can only display video in a single screen location at a time, so only one Video view item will display video.

Therefore, consider the following as you implement Video and NowPlaying view items:

  • Extender scenarios vary with hardware, but implementations that support displaying video in only one place are likely in the foreseeable future.
  • The Extender implementation on Xbox 360 supports multiple Video elements and so can display video in multiple places at the same time.
  • The NowPlaying limit in the Media Center shell is not likely to change.

Sample Explorer

  • View Items – NowPlaying > all samples
  • View Items – Video > Video

See Also