Confessions of the squeezebox kind

[Covenant]

I have had an SB3 for a year now, love it to bits but mainly use it for internet radio. I do have at least 60 albums recorded on my computer which I play now and again. I have never got to grips with tagging and just put the album by artist name in a folder.
The result of this is that I have, for example five Van Morrison albums, pick one and get a selection of tracks from all five albums.
Is there any really easy way to sort this without being a computer whizz kid?
I really dont want to put a huge effort into it-this is supposed to be fun!

[Mike]

I really dont want to put a huge effort into it-this is supposed to be fun!

Sounds like it is already! :)

I must look into this Squeezebox lark, I've heard many good things about them!

[Ali Tait]

Yeah the Duet looks very sexy,lovely remote with screen for selecting tracks.Me want!

[Covenant]

A wonderful invention. The internet radio bit is amazing, there are at least 11000 stations of varying quality and the higher bitrate ones are really good.
The thing I really like about it is it keeps changing as the software is developed-not just by the makers but by keen amateurs who add little features on.
A decent dac is a must as the analogue output is average quality.

[Ali Tait]

I've been listening to some of the stations via my Googlephone plugged straight into my preamp.Sounds very acceptable.

[Stratmangler]

Covenant

What format are your albums ripped as ?

Chris:)

[Mike]

Yeah, exactly!... Internet radio. I'm lucky enough to have a variety of broadband connections available to me for something around 'shitpence' a month! :)

Currently at home I have 10meg, 20meg, and next week - 50meg!

I should be able to pipe in all sorts of stuff, and I'd be an idiot not to exploit it to the best of my abilities! :eyebrows:

[Stratmangler]

Currently at home I have 10meg, 20meg, and next week - 50meg!

How come so many connections ?

You're slowest one is around 8 times as fast as I can get 'round here without going the cable route, and even then I am suspicious as to the cable company's claims about the speeds they can (allegedly) achieve.

Some folk don't know when they're born !

Chris:):)

[twelvebears]

OK, may as well 'fess up to being a confirmed 'computer music' geek. If it's to do with Squeezebox, music formats and ripping, software, tagging or data storage, it's my bag.

Have spent a HUGE amount of time and effort on the subject and my lossless collection is just under 400Gb.

Getting my digital music collection 'just so' is a personal obsession, so PM me and I'll do whatever I can to help.

[Mike]

How come so many connections ?

It goes with 'the job' Chris. ;)

[Stratmangler]

It goes with 'the job' Chris. ;)

:p:p:p

I'm only jealous !

Chris:lolsign:

[Stratmangler]

OK, may as well 'fess up to being a confirmed 'computer music' geek. If it's to do with Squeezebox, music formats and ripping, software, tagging or data storage, it's my bag.

Have spent a HUGE amount of time and effort on the subject and my lossless collection is just under 400Gb.

Getting my digital music collection 'just so' is a personal obsession, so PM me and I'll do whatever I can to help.

I've similarly spent much time on sorting my digital collection. I use a combination of EAC and MP3tag to sort my CD stuff out. All files are ripped as FLAC.

It may be best if any advice were put out in the public domain, the rest of us have a chance of picking up some seriously good tips along the way.

Chris:)

[Stratmangler]

If it's to do with Squeezebox, music formats and ripping, software, tagging or data storage, it's my bag.

I could do with some advice as to storage, whether or not RAID would be useful etc.

I currently run Squeezecenter 7.3.2 on a PC running XP Pro.
My music files are on a USB HD hanging off the PC.

I would like to get a dedicated low power consumption machine sorted out to act primarily as a music server, running Squeezecenter and serving out music files, but also with sufficient capacity to act as backup for my computers too. The possibility of web serving may come along at a later date.

Any suggestions as to what to aim for will be gratefully received.

Chris:)

[Covenant]

Covenant

What format are your albums ripped as ?

Chris:)

I use EAC to rip to FLAC.

[Stratmangler]

I use EAC to rip to FLAC.

OK.

Did you enable the freeboard access (requires an email address to do so) ?

I have not to date been bombarded with spam from doing this (entering an email address).

When you load a CD in EAC, once it has been recognised by your system, hold down the Alt+G keys - the machine should go out to the 'net and find the info on the disc you are about to rip.

You can then edit the info as per requirements - to edit track info you need to highlight the track in questions, then press F2 - you will then find the entire track title open for editing.

Chris:)

[Class]

You can PM me as well, Covenant, or maybe we could create a "How to organize your digital music" thread if there isn't one already?

My current SqueezeCenter stats:
Total Tracks: 42,420
Total Albums: 3,285
Total Artists: 1,396
Total Genres: 131
Total Playing Time: 2858:37:29

It isn't that much work to maintain a large-ish collection but it really pays off to do some research and do it "correct" from the start.

As an example I didn't know about the possibility of having multiple artists on the same track and as a result I have lots and lots of tracks like "02 - We Don't Play Guitars (feat. Peaches).flac" where the only way to find Peaches would be to search the track title, she wouldn't be listed as artist for this track.

Now, this is tagged as "Peaches;Chicks On Speed" artist and both can be found by browsing or searching for these artists in SqueezeCenter, it works really well.

[Stratmangler]

or maybe we could create a "How to organize your digital music" thread if there isn't one already?

There should be such a thread.

Chris:)

[Covenant]

Yes please-a 'how to organise your digital music' thread sounds good to me although I get the feeling I might be in for a lot of work.

[Covenant]

OK.

Did you enable the freeboard access (requires an email address to do so) ?

I have not to date been bombarded with spam from doing this (entering an email address).

When you load a CD in EAC, once it has been recognised by your system, hold down the Alt+G keys - the machine should go out to the 'net and find the info on the disc you are about to rip.

You can then edit the info as per requirements - to edit track info you need to highlight the track in questions, then press F2 - you will then find the entire track title open for editing.

Chris:)
Yes to the first bit.
Can the F2 bit be done after the album has been ripped?

[Stratmangler]

Yes please-a 'how to organise your digital music' thread sounds good to me although I get the feeling I might be in for a lot of work.

The initial work will just be the ascent of the steepest face of learning - once you've mastered that climb things will start to become as simple and straightforward as falling off a log !

There's nothing difficult in your path - a logical and systematic approach will soon sort out your tagging problems.

Chris:)

[Stratmangler]

Yes to the first bit.
Can the F2 bit be done after the album has been ripped?

'Fraid not - you'll need to get to grips with Mp3tag.

That said, it is pretty straightforward.

Chris:)

[Covenant]

Not straightforward to me I'm afraid.
So I have my music stored:C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\My Documents\My Music
Taking Van Morrison as an example how do I change the tag so that track 1 of Astral Weeks (Astral Weeks) is followed by track 2 (Beside You)?
Sorry to be a dummy-once I have done one properly it will probably make sense.

[Class]

Not straightforward to me I'm afraid.
Download and install Mp3tag (http://www.mp3tag.de/en/download.html).

Right-click the folder of the album you want to tag (you do have one folder for each album, right? :)) and select Mp3tag, this wil load the album into the application.

Make sure the track numbering in the "Track:" box is correct (1,2,3 etc.).
If they are, maybe you have the shuffle function active in SqueezeCenter?


(edit: Maybe you could make a copy of an album somewhere and try the various tags with Mp3tag on it, it's very user friendly IMO.)

[Covenant]

Right-click the folder of the album you want to tag (you do have one folder for each album, right?

Err no... I just created a folder for each artist.

Make some more folders?

[Stratmangler]

You could do with making a folder for each album within the artist folder, then put the tracks into the relevant folder.

Then you can edit the tracks to give appropriate information.

Chris:)

[Class]

I have my music organized like this: "M:\FLAC\Artist - (year) Albumtitle\01 - Tracktitle.flac".

You can also stick all albums by an artist into subfolders if you like: "M:\FLAC\Artist\(year) Albumtitle\01 - Tracktitle.flac", it's a matter of taste, it's the tagging that's important, not how you arrange your files (but it is much easier to maintain your collection if you do).

It might be faster browsing the folders if you do it like the last example, as there will be less folders (in the "M:\FLAC\" directory in my example) but it's not an issue for me with ~2600 folders, the folder opens with no noticeable delay at all and it is located on a Linux server.

If you do like me and have the "(year)" part come before "Albumtitle" it will sort properly by release year for that artist:
The Herbaliser - (1997) Blow Your Headphones
The Herbaliser - (1999) Road Of Many Signs (EP)
The Herbaliser - (1999) Very Mercenary

[Stratmangler]

but it is much easier to maintain your collection if you do

Which is precisely why I suggested it in the first place - dealing with 20 albums by 1 artist is totally unmanageable if all the tracks are held in 1 folder.

I have gradually been adding album art to my collection, just in case I purchase a Squeezebox Controller - whether I do or not it immaterial, as it looks nicer when I use the web interface. Adding the album art would be a nightmare without having decent folder organisation.


it's the tagging that's important, not how you arrange your files

Absolutely - but if your tags are a mess then you need to have a file system that makes sense in order to access the files and amend the tags.

The 2 things go hand in hand.

Chris:)

[Class]

I'm Norwegian and my English isn't very good, I guess my posts isn't very clear :)


Which is precisely why I suggested it in the first place - dealing with 20 albums by 1 artist is totally unmanageable if all the tracks are held in 1 folder.

Which I said here:

[...] (you do have one folder for each album, right? :))


Absolutely - but if your tags are a mess then you need to have a file system that makes sense in order to access the files and amend the tags.

The 2 things go hand in hand.

Which I said here:

[...] (but it is much easier to maintain your collection if you do).

[Stratmangler]

I'm Norwegian and my English isn't very good, I guess my posts isn't very clear :)

No problem - I was not having a dig , just trying to clarify the need for proper file organisation before you get wrapped up in the process of tagging the files.

Your English is very good BTW, better than some native English speakers I have encountered.

Chris:)

[Covenant]

Ok I have created a few sub-folders to put albums in (will do the rest gradually) and have MP3Tag. What do I need to do to ensure that only the music from say Astral Weeks is played rather than any V.M track?

[Stratmangler]

Open the Astral Weeks folder in Mp3tag.

Do the files actually appear in the correct order from the top ?

If they do you can do Crtl + A (select all) followed by Ctrl + K (brings up track numbering). Doing this puts tags onto the files for track number - a file named "track 1" may not necessarily contain the correct data.

After numbering tracks you can fill in the common fields, namely artist, album name, year etc. Ctrl + S saves this information to the tracks.

Finally go through each track in order and name it.

To get Squeezecenter to see the file properly I would suggest that you clear your library and do a full rescan.

Chris:)

[Covenant]

Sorry I havent replied earlier, been messing with this on and off all day :scratch:.
I started off badly by trying to create sub-folders. I only got somewhere when I took Astral Weeks out of the Van Morrison folder and renamed it Van Morrison-Astral weeks.
The Ctrl + K bit you told me has got the tracks in the right order. So at least I have one album that works ok.
Thanks for your help Chris.

Jerry

[Stratmangler]

Hi Jerry

Glad that you're getting somewhere with your music file managment and tagging.

The way I have mine organised in XP Pro is to have an artist folder, then a folder for each album by the artist, so my Van Morrison folder contains 4 subfolders, 1 for each Van album I have on CD.

The reason for my doing things this way is for my benefit only - it does make it easier to go back and amend tags should I feel the need.

I usually browse for albums on the Squeezebox by selecting Music Library/Artist/whichever album I fancy hearing. Squeezecenter basically ignores my file system accessing things this way - it all hinges on having my music files tagged up appropriately, and the search is driven by the album tags.
If you're accessing the files by searching Music Library/Music Folder route then this may explain your woes.

I've just been accessing my music via the latter route, and although the approach is pretty much the same as using my preferred method, the track numbers do not show, just the song title - this is down to my tags not having the tracknumber embedded in the song title. My track number tags are a separate entity.

Ultimately you'll find that a bit of time experimenting using your own preferences as a driving force will end with you having a library you can access in the way you want to.

The further I get into this the more I realise what a can of worms this subject is :doh:

Chris:)

[maxrob200]

HI
I rip my music using dbpoweramp converter to FLAC which can then access the Internet database for the album information. It tags all the tracks and I then just rip it to the folder that it creates automatically. You may need to edit the artist details if you have different albums by the same artist e,g Van Morrison to Van Morrison - Greatest Hits and then another album as VM-Greatest Hits 2 etc.
Squeezecentre allows you to create playlists but I dont use them as I listen to each album at a time. You may have your SB3 set to random play, it can be set to play all the tracks or single only.

[trailer]

Has anyone compared the SB kit to Sonos?

[NRG]

The Sonos delivers fine sound quality...it works in a slightly different way to the SB which relies on a point to point unidirectional delivery mechanism for audio streams. The Sonos kit creates a wireless network mesh between all units installed in the system and can have multiple bidirectional audio streams moving around the network. The end node are slightly different as well, there's units with good quality built in amplifiers and others without, these units can ingest analogue inputs and stream them to other units around the house.

Its a very flexible system but comes at a cost. All the above is controlled by a wireless 'controller' with LCD screen and iPod like touch wheel....this is the biggest let down IMHO, the interface is not intuitive and battery life a little short...also if you have a number of units in the house you may want want more than one controller....a Nintendo DS would be better! It has longer battery life, is cheaper and the UI is way better....shame Sonos don't have an interface for it.

I think the Sonons aims to do something different to the SB, if you just want streaming audio to your one main system then the SB is cheaper and does a great job. The Sonos amplifiers sound great to me and offers more flexibility but that comes at a higher cost. Depends on what you want to do...

[nat8808]

I could do with some advice as to storage, whether or not RAID would be useful etc.

I currently run Squeezecenter 7.3.2 on a PC running XP Pro.
My music files are on a USB HD hanging off the PC.

I would like to get a dedicated low power consumption machine sorted out to act primarily as a music server, running Squeezecenter and serving out music files, but also with sufficient capacity to act as backup for my computers too. The possibility of web serving may come along at a later date.

Any suggestions as to what to aim for will be gratefully received.

Chris:)

I reckon just a simple mirrored array should be good enough (RAID 1) and, in theory, Windows XP Pro can do it itself with whatever is connected.

I say 'In Theory' because sometimes software RAID doesn't provide for actually fixing problems when a disk fails. I would instead buy a secondhand PCI raid card off ebay (Adaptec or other big name so that drivers are readily available) for pounds and connect proper 3.5" drives inside the pc, perhaps even with swappable drive trays so you can simply pull out the drive as a means of storage (with the power turned off) and replace with a new one, allowing the RAID array to rebuild and carry on as if nothing had hapened.

I have no personal experience in this I should add other than my father selling professional raid solutions and sometimes helping out. The advantage of expensive, dedicated RAID solutions is reliability, their modularness (for quickly replacing parts) and much quicker rebuilds. What I outlined above may take a day to rebuild should there be a disk failure, though depends on the card you find - get an older, ex-pro one.

There is also network attached storage (NAS) which is just a stand-alone versions of the above, attached to your other pc via a network. More cost affective to get a free, old PIII machine, set up the RAID 1 as above and share the drives on the network. Doing this though would be a step closer to the webserver you spoke about, could also allow a firewall between this storage and your other computers and provide direct connections for all those P2P networks..

[twelvebears]

Hi Stratmangler

As someone who has spent what feels like YEARS of my life fiddling with my digital music collection, including having to rip my ENTIRE 800+ albums TWICE due to a catastrophic RAID array failure, I would strongly advise you to consider a DROBO as a storage solution.

Having played around which both software RAID via Windows XP, hardware RAID via both dedicated cards and built-in motherboard solutions, I can honestly say that DROBO by Data Robotics is by far and away the best, most hassle-free and flexible solution I have used.

DROBO is completely self-managing, can be either direct attached (Firewire or USB) or NAS (using an add-on device called DroboShare) and best of all, it doesn't have the same drive limitations as traditional RAID, but offers the kind of storage vs redundancy efficiency of a RAID5 set-up (though it works differently).

You can progressively fill DROBO with whatever size, speed and make of HDs you have knocking around (you can buy it with or without drives) and just swap them out one at a time later on when you need more space.

Unlike traditional RAID arrays, you will get an increase in available capacity as soon as you swap out a smaller drive for a larger one, whereas in a traditional RAID array, all the drives have to be upgraded to the same size before the array capacity can be expanded.

I can personally vouch for the effectiveness of the data protection because I have progressively upgraded from initially having X3 old 500Gb drives, to now having X4 1Tb drives with about 1.8Gb of lossless music and films without any problems.

During that time, one of my old 500Gb drives died and then later, we had a power cut whilst DROBO was rebuilding the data follow an exchange of a small drive for a larger one. On both occasions, DROBO was able to carry on and fully recover all the data without any problems AND it all remain fully accessible during the progress.

As you can tell I'm a BIG fan and I've only got one of the original Mk1 DROBOs, there's now a faster Firewire equipped one (mine only has USB) and a Pro version which can take up to 8 drives.

Basically I'd sooner chew my own leg off than go back to using traditional RAID again.

There's nothing wrong with having a very basic machine to act as the server and give access to the DROBO, which can just be attached to a USB socket, but I would strongly urge you to consider DROBO as the storage management solution itself.

I know that £400 for the DROBO may seem expensive, but having lost my whole collection once, it's really not something to skimp on unless your digital music collection is small and easily replaceable.

[Peter Stockwell]

I've seen thin clients, I was thinking of one of these to run squeezecenter, beacuse as yet I haven't seen a squeeze app for the droboshare