We have an application that controls the windows encoder. It was written in C++ using windows encoder SDK. It works fine with encoder 7 but with encoder 9 it crashes with Run Time error. I was able to isolate the problem to a very small piece of code. The following is the sequence(also - please see the code below)
1) Create an encoder object

loop
2) Load it with .wme file(this file works just fine if used through the windows encoder 9 GUI)
3) Start the encoder
4) Stop the encoder

this sequence crashes on the second iteration of Load(everything seems to work fine on the first iteration
I also noticed that the Load function itself is not a problem - I had some methods after stop on which the program would crash...seems to be some kind of memory corruption. Please help

#import "c:\Program Files\Windows Media Components\Encoder\WMEnc.exe" no_namespace named_guid
#import "c:\Program Files\Windows Media Components\Encoder\MSPShell.dll" no_namespace named_guid

#include <stdio.h
#include <windows.h
#include <atlbase.h
#include <comdef.h
#include "RemoteEncoder.h

IWMEncoder* encoder = NULL

void HandleStartEncoder (


   if(encoder == NULL
       printf("encoder is null\n")

   // First check if the encoder is still running
   WMENC_ENCODER_STATE encstate = encoder->GetRunState()
   if(encstate == WMENC_ENCODER_RUNNING || encstate == WMENC_ENCODER_STARTING
     printf( "Encoder still running")

   else printf("encoder is stopped\n")

   ///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
   // Load in WME template if it exists
   ///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
   const char* wmefilename
   _bstr_t wmepath
   wmefilename = "c:\\encoder\\encoder.wme"
   wmepath = wmefilename
   encoder->Load(wmepath)
   encoder->Start()

   HRESULT hr = encoder->get_RunState(&encstate)
   if (encstate != WMENC_ENCODER_RUNNING && encstate != WMENC_ENCODER_STARTING)
    printf("encoder not running\n")
   } else
    printf("encoder running\n")
   
   encoder->Stop()
   hr = encoder->get_RunState(&encstate)
   if (encstate != WMENC_ENCODER_RUNNING && encstate != WMENC_ENCODER_STARTING)
    printf("encoder stopped\n")
   } else
    printf("encoder did not stop")
   

//     return S_OK

void main()
   HRESULT hr = S_OK
   hr = CoInitialize(NULL)
   if ( SUCCEEDED( hr )
   
       hr = CoCreateInstance(CLSID_WMEncoder
                             NULL
                             CLSCTX_INPROC_SERVER
                             IID_IWMEncoder
                             (void**) &encoder)
   

    for (int i = 0; i < 100; i++
   

        HandleStartEncoder()
   

   // Release pointers
   if ( encoder
   
       encoder->Release()
       encoder = NULL
   

...and here is the .wme file

<?xml version="1.0"?><WMEncoder major_version="9
   minor_version="0
   Name="WMEncoder15080
   SynchroniesOperation="0" ><Description /><SourceGroups ><SourceGroup Name="Live" ><Source Type="WMENC_VIDEO
               Scheme="device
               InputSource="Default_Video_Device" ><UserData ><WMENC_BOOL Name="UseRecordQueue" Value="no" /><WMENC_STRING Name="RecordTempPath" Value="C:\DOCUME~1\arodkin\LOCALS~1\Temp\" /><WMENC_STRING Name="MinimumDiskSpace" Value="10485760" /><WMENC_BOOL Name="SaveToDiskOnlyDuringCapture" Value="no" /></UserData></Source><Source Type="WMENC_AUDIO
               Scheme="device
               InputSource="Default_Audio_Device" ><UserData ><WMENC_BOOL Name="UseRecordQueue" Value="no" /><WMENC_STRING Name="RecordTempPath" Value="C:\DOCUME~1\arodkin\LOCALS~1\Temp\" /><WMENC_STRING Name="MinimumDiskSpace" Value="10485760" /><WMENC_BOOL Name="SaveToDiskOnlyDuringCapture" Value="no" /></UserData></Source><EncoderProfile id="Multiple bit rates audio (CBR) / Multiple bit rates video (CBR)" /><UserData ></UserData></SourceGroup></SourceGroups><Broadcast Http="8080" /><WMEncoder_Profile id="Multiple bit rates audio (CBR) / Multiple bit rates video (CBR)" ><![CDATA[        <profile version="589824"
            storageformat="1"
            name="Multiple bit rates audio (CBR) / Multiple bit rates video (CBR)"
            description=""><streamconfig majortype="{73647561-0000-0010-8000-00AA00389B71}"
                  streamnumber="1"
                  streamname="Audio Stream"
                  inputname="Audio409"
                  bitrate="32000"
                  bufferwindow="5000"
                  reliabletransport="0"
                  decodercomplexity=""
                  rfc1766langid="en-us"

                  bfixedsizesamples="1"
                  btemporalcompression="0"
                  lsamplesize="768"><waveformatex wFormatTag="353"
                        nChannels="2"
                        nSamplesPerSec="32000"
                        nAvgBytesPerSec="4000"
                        nBlockAlign="768"
                        wBitsPerSample="16"
                        codecdata="008800001700001E0000"/></wmmediatype></streamconfig><streamconfig majortype="{73646976-0000-0010-8000-00AA00389B71}"
                  streamnumber="2"
                  streamname="Video Stream"
                  inputname="Video409"
                  bitrate="241000"
                  bufferwindow="5000"
                  reliabletransport="0"
                  decodercomplexity="AU"
                  rfc1766langid="en-us"

                                    quality="60"/><wmmediatype subtype="{33564D57-0000-0010-8000-00AA00389B71}"  
                  bfixedsizesamples="0"
                  btemporalcompression="1"
                  lsamplesize="0"><videoinfoheader dwbitrate="241000"
                       dwbiterrorrate="0"
                       avgtimeperframe="333667"><rcsource left="0"
                 top="0"
                 right="320"
                 bottom="240"/><rctarget left="0"
                 top="0"
                 right="320"
                 bottom="240"/><bitmapinfoheader biwidth="320"
                             biheight="240"
                             biplanes="1"
                             bibitcount="24"
                             bicompression="WMV3"
                             bisizeimage="0"
                             bixpelspermeter="0"
                             biypelspermeter="0"
                             biclrused="0"
                             biclrimportant="0"/></videoinfoheader></wmmediatype></streamconfig></profile>
   ]]></WMEncoder_Profile><UserData ><WMENC_LONG Name="Encoding\Dest" Value="2" /><WMENC_STRING Name="Encoding\Audio0" Value="{41DB0988-374A-4CB6-8929-44BAEA325D03}" /><WMENC_STRING Name="Encoding\Video0" Value="{BB8FC6CB-4E56-474A-BC95-16DD3072AF1A}" /></UserData></WMEncoder