Animations stutter while MediaElement is loading a Video

Hi,

I have a MediaElement which is loading a new video once a while. It takes 1-2 seconds on my system from setting the new MediaElement.Source until the video is fully loaded and ready to play. In the meantime another control performs a motion animation. This animation is stuttering horribly while the MediaElement loads the video.

I think the MediaElement is blocking the UI thread while loading.

How can I fix this problem? Is it possible to somehow tell the MediaElement to load the new Video asynchronously?

Regards, Paul