Upgrading Windows 8 Media Center to 8.1

Just done the update of my Windows 8 Media Center to 8.1. First issue was I looked in the store and could not see the update. I was looking for an ‘update’ in the top right not a huge application entry in the middle of the screen. Strange how you can miss the obvious

The download took about 30 minutes which worked in background whilst I was using Media Center. It then did a reboot,  the main install of files took about 30 minutes too. It seemed to sit at 85% for a long time, then another reboot. A few ‘preparing devices’ messages and ‘getting ready’ for a good 10 minutes, then ‘Applying PC settings', another reboot then ‘setting up a few more things’ . I then had to accept some licenses, and login with a LiveID, and eventually it started, and everything was working.

I did not time it exactly but I think about 90 minutes all told.

Update 4th Nov 2013 – I have been away on holiday and came back to find not much recorded by my Media Center. Turns out the problem was the EPG was not updating and showing ‘No data’ for about 70% of my channels (all the BBC ones plus some others). Turns out the upgrade corrupts/loses the EPG mappings. The fix is to do a full channel rescan