Upgrade issue - The path is not a legal form

[seattlefog]

I upgraded to v5 in February and encountered "invalid root element". I eventually ran setup again, and the issue went away. I started encountering the invalid root element again a few days ago. Today I went to the nextpvr site and ran setup, hoping a new version would resolve the issue. The setup executes, unzips, and displays "starting nextpvr". it hangs there. There is a .net error message and an application error in Windows Application event log. there is a install.txt file in c:\temp. I will attempt to attach the install.txt and error messages from the event log. 

Launching nextpvr client also doesn't run. I'll attempt to attach the screen shot of the error it produces as well 
thank you for any guidance you may provide.

[sub]

Try renaming your C:\Users\Public\NPVR-data\config.xml to config.temp or similar, then try restarting it.

[seattlefog]

Try renaming your C:\Users\Public\NPVR-data\config.xml to config.temp or similar, then try restarting it.

I renamed the file, ran the setup again. Looks like it hangs in the same place with the same 2 messages in the application event log. I note that a new config.xml was not (re) created. Should I put the original config.xml back?

[sub]

What version of Windows are you running?

[sub]

Stop the NextPVR Service, then start a command prompt, cd "c:\program files\nextpvr", then run NextPVRServer.exe, and let us know what it says.

[seattlefog]

Stop the NextPVR Service, then start a command prompt, cd "c:\program files\nextpvr", then run NextPVRServer.exe, and let us know what it says.

c:\Program Files\NextPVR>nextpvrserver.exe
Unhandled exception. System.ArgumentException: The path is empty. (Parameter 'path')
  at System.IO.Path.GetFullPath(String path)
  at System.IO.DirectoryInfo..ctor(String path)
  at NUtility.SettingsHelper..ctor()
  at NUtility.SettingsHelper.GetInstance()
  at NUtility.Logger.SetLogFileName(String name, Boolean ignoreSettings)
  at NPVR5.Program.Main(String[] args)

I'm running windows 10 Pro. 
Edition Windows 10 Pro
Version 21H2
Installed on ‎6/‎18/‎2020
OS build 19044.1415
Experience Windows Feature Experience Pack 120.2212.3920.0

[seattlefog]

I'm on very recent Windows updates... including a preview release of the .NET framework. I'll attach a screenshot in the chance that one of these might be a contributing factor. 
Hopefully you can provide even a work-around, since i can't  readily watch (let alone record) TV at the moment. Thanks!

[sub]

It's not really clear to me why it's having problems.

Do you have either of these environment variables set on your machine?

NEXTPVR_DATADIR
NEXTPVR_DATADIR_USERDATA

[mvallevand]

Trying renaming NPVR-Data to something else and rerun the installer and see if that helps.

Martin

[seattlefog]

the environment variables don't exist.  I don't see any similar ones either. should I create them?

I renamed the data folder to: C:\Users\Public\NPVR-datar. the install and error messages appear to be the same. The npvr-data directory does not get recreated by the install process. 


I note that there are some component registrations in the registry referencing x86 locations. 

Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Classes\CLSID\{98E9A611-0046-4F22-8FC0-8C2B43ACBB5B}\InprocServer32
(default) C:\Program Files (x86)\NPVR\NPVRNetPushSource.ax  . That path no longer exists... probably residual from v4. 



Is there a cleanup script or steps that might remove any other v4 or 32-bit residual data? Assuming that's even relevant? any other data in the registry of config files that I could check? thank you.