C# WPF Time Until xx

I am trying to display the time remaining until a time specified by the user. I want to show Hours, Minutes, Seconds, and maybe milliseconds until the specified time.

DateTime remaining = DateTime.Parse("2/24/2014 18:00:00 pm");
DateTime startDate = DateTime.Now;
TimeSpan t = remaining - startDate;
string countdown = string.Format("{0}:{1}:{2}:{3}", t.Days, t.Hours, t.Minutes, t.Seconds);
CountDown.Content = countdown;

Visual Studio says I need to parse the string to take in the date before setting it to a DateTime object.

So do I need to create a new string, then parse it to a string, and then set the string to a DateTime object?

Update:

The actual error message I am receiving is:

System.FormatException was unhandled HResult=-2146233033 Message=String was not recognized as a valid DateTime. Source=mscorlib

Jon Skeet
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If I understand the question correctly, you just want:

DateTime target = new DateTime(2014, 2, 24, 18, 0, 0);
TimeSpan remaining = target - DateTime.Now;

There's no need to parse a string just to get a DateTime value, if you already know the year/month/day etc you want.

However, you've also talked about "a time specified by the user". If that date/time is being specified as a string, then yes, you'll need to parse it. Ideally, it would be specified by some sort of date/time picker control, in which case you should just be able to get an appropriate DateTime value. Avoid string conversions unless you really need them.

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