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[berniel99]

I have used MC for Linux for many years and been extremely happy with all aspects of this software.  All of my music is stored on a Synology NAS and the NAS is running a media server (which provides the DLNA functionality).  For all versions of MC 21 through to MC 24 connecting to the NAS was as simple as double clicking on the server icon and select "connect".  Everything worked, including album art, 5.1 channel streaming, FLAC, DSD and MP3 files, etc.  The server detected the JRiver application running on the LINUX box and using the "default DMA profile" .... just worked!

I recently upgraded to MC26 and to my surprise, MC no longer works as it did.  It just spits out the error message "Please ensure that the server you are connected to supports search....".  After some extensive trial and error, I found a DMA profile on the NAS which worked.  DMA device profile = "Windows Media Center".  Unfortunately, this profile does not work for any of the other applications I run on the Linux box.  To me this is therefore an unacceptable/annoying  workaround.

I looked in other parts of the JRiver forum and found comments which tend to suggest that what I have done for all of the years I have used JRiver is incorrect and I should be using SMB file sharing to connect.  I hope these comments don't mean that DLNA is no longer supported in JRiver.   I would really appreciate a definitive answer to the changed DLNA support.

[berniel99]

On further testing, I found that the NAS will tend to automatically determine the client application when it runs on a PC and will change the DMA profile to suit.  It does this perfectly for PCs running Foobar 2000.  That fact that the NAS does not switch from the default profile to something that works, e.g. DMA = "Windows Media Center", suggests to me that that JRiver no longer announces itself correctly when it initiates the DLNA connection.  This would explain why I and others have now got difficulty connecting automatically with DLNA.

[JimH]

If you have a NAS, you're better off to just import the files into MC.  You don't need to use DLNA.

[berniel99]

Using DLNA is extremely safe and simple, compared to "import and sync" with a NAS that has been securely setup with users and passwords.  Furthermore, once the source media has been properly tagged and filed, it is available to any DLNA device in exactly the same format and quality, as it only streamed from the server. (This is a read-only operation by definition).

Suggesting that I don't use DLNA, rather than telling my why, worries me.  DLNA is not extinct yet with over 6 billion DLNA devices in use as I write this.  I can't work our why DLNA is still promoted on the JRiver website, if it is being phased out, or abandoned.

As I said initially, MC26 functionality has been changed to decrease the DLNA compatibility with other equipment and this I find concerning (considering the high quality of the software as a whole).
 

[bob]

Nothing has changed in the way DLNA servers are parsed in MC26 from MC25.
Search support has always been required for MC to use DLNA libraries.
If your NAS updated the DLNA server this may be where your issue lies.
Another possibility is that your library increased in size to the point where it's can't handle the search request.
Just for your information, the way this works is that MC will do a search for all audio files and ask for them 1000 at a time to avoid overloading the server.
Then it does the same for images
and then one more time for video.

[berniel99]

Hi Bob,

Thanks for looking this up for me.  The issue only came to my attention when I upgraded from MC24 to MC26. (not MC25)  Yes I have a huge music library with over 25,000 songs.  Yes the Synology NAS has updated its functionality many times over the years, but not recently and certainly not a the time that I upgraded the JRiver client.  I have since experimented with different DMA profiles in the Synology for the JRiver client and found another one that appears to work slightly better.  The one marked "Roku" does not have the error message and appears to work fine.  (This is a manual override settings)

I am guessing that since the NAS is able to report details about the client software that connects to the media server, that there is something identifying that you send to the server.  It reports the client as "JRiver Inc. <machine name>".  If Synology know the exact client that is connecting, perhaps, one can be custom built in the NAS to better match the requests that you send. (I don't know how to do this).

I know that you have no control over Synology software but it is one of the big players in the market and it would be great to have this functionality working again (i.e. automatically).  Any help would be appreciated.  At the moment I am having to manually change the profile in the NAS every time I want to listen to music.  This is not a good experience when you have to do it every day.

Cheers,
Bernie.

[bob]

Hi Bob,

Thanks for looking this up for me.  The issue only came to my attention when I upgraded from MC24 to MC26. (not MC25)  Yes I have a huge music library with over 25,000 songs.  Yes the Synology NAS has updated its functionality many times over the years, but not recently and certainly not a the time that I upgraded the JRiver client.  I have since experimented with different DMA profiles in the Synology for the JRiver client and found another one that appears to work slightly better.  The one marked "Roku" does not have the error message and appears to work fine.  (This is a manual override settings)

I am guessing that since the NAS is able to report details about the client software that connects to the media server, that there is something identifying that you send to the server.  It reports the client as "JRiver Inc. <machine name>".  If Synology know the exact client that is connecting, perhaps, one can be custom built in the NAS to better match the requests that you send. (I don't know how to do this).

I know that you have no control over Synology software but it is one of the big players in the market and it would be great to have this functionality working again (i.e. automatically).  Any help would be appreciated.  At the moment I am having to manually change the profile in the NAS every time I want to listen to music.  This is not a good experience when you have to do it every day.

Cheers,
Bernie.

This is the user agent for MC26 (when running on a Mac):
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_10_2) AppleWebKit/601.3.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/75.0.3770.100 Safari/601.3.9 JRiver_Internet_Reader/2.0 UPnP/1.0
Here is the user agent for MC24
User-Agent: OSX Darwin, UPnP/1.1, JRiver Internet Reader/2.0 (compatible; Windows-Media-Player/10)

There were a few changes in MC26 because we are trying to conform to a more browser friendly user agent for streaming media playback.
The key really is likely to be JRiver_Internet_Reader/2.0 instead of JRiver Internet Reader/2.0
From what I understand the spaces were not standard in the string (versions prior to MC26).

[berniel99]

Interesting.  Do you think that the Synology NAS takes the "compatible; Windows-Media-Player/10" text from JRiver and uses a "DMA = Windows Media Center" in it's media server automatically, and responds more appropriately to JRiver when it makes the library request of the first 1000 titles?  That may explain why it "just worked" out of the box and now no longer works.

I cannot tell you what is right or wrong since it is not my product to develop, however, it would be good if you could come up with a User-Agent header that worked with both the Synology NAS and MACs.

Here's hoping.  Again, I appreciate your research, bob.

Bernie.

[berniel99]

I noticed another change today in the DLNA functionality.  I normally operate my media server by remote control using the JRemote app on my iPhone.  When I was playing a song that was originally 96kHz/24bit, the JRemote app reported the file to be 96kHz/16bit.  So I chased around today to try to see where this conversion was taking place.

1. I loaded the song directly into MC on the local file system and it was correctly reported on the JRemote app. (Hence we can surmise that JRemote is reporting accurately and the issue is within MC)
2. I then opened up the Options dialogue and MC reports the media source as 96kHz/24bit.  Furthermore, I have no options set to do any conversions or set any DSP options.
3. I then loaded up VLC player and played via DLNA and it reports the media as being 96kHz/32bit.

It would be good to get an explanation of what is going on here, given that the system that I have is supposed to be bit perfect.

[berniel99]

I installed MC24 today to see whether the bitdepth issue was a change in functionality, or was always wrong. I can confirm that MC24 also had this issue.  Should this be submitted as a bug then?  The steps are as follows:

1. Fresh install of MC26 (or MC24)
2. Select the audio device that is direct to HW.  In my case it is "hw:CARD=HDMI,DEV=3,[ALSA] HDA Intel HDMI,HDMI 0,Direct hardware device without any conversions"
3. Select a DLNA media source (In my case it is the Synology Media Server)
4. Select a 96kHz/24bit source file
5. Confirm that the Options panel shows the file "source as 96kHz/24bit"
6. Connect JRemote as a control device.  Play the song.  Note the info bar on the bottom shows 96kHz/16bit.

Without being able to record the output of the HDMI cable, I cannot tell you, by measurement, whether the actual output is still 24bit, which would mean that what is reported by MC to the control point is incorrect,
or, whether MC is actually truncating the bits to 16.

[bob]

I installed MC24 today to see whether the bitdepth issue was a change in functionality, or was always wrong. I can confirm that MC24 also had this issue.  Should this be submitted as a bug then?  The steps are as follows:

1. Fresh install of MC26 (or MC24)
2. Select the audio device that is direct to HW.  In my case it is "hw:CARD=HDMI,DEV=3,[ALSA] HDA Intel HDMI,HDMI 0,Direct hardware device without any conversions"
3. Select a DLNA media source (In my case it is the Synology Media Server)
4. Select a 96kHz/24bit source file
5. Confirm that the Options panel shows the file "source as 96kHz/24bit"
6. Connect JRemote as a control device.  Play the song.  Note the info bar on the bottom shows 96kHz/16bit.

Without being able to record the output of the HDMI cable, I cannot tell you, by measurement, whether the actual output is still 24bit, which would mean that what is reported by MC to the control point is incorrect,
or, whether MC is actually truncating the bits to 16.

Let's try to narrow this down a bit to see where the change is taking place.
If you are in MC and you do a file list and choose to show the BitDepth field in MC, what do you see for the files that are supposed to be 24 bit?

When you are playing the file from JRemote, what is your output device? The Player zone in MC? Some other zone in MC? The device zone in JRemote?

[berniel99]

OK.

1. In MC, in the file list it the files shows up as 16bit.
2. The Zone is set to "Player" which is the default. (I have never used the Zone functionality)

JRemote is therefore showing what MC is reporting. (good, then its not JRemote)

I am using JRemote, simply as a control point and media is still being output to the Linux client which is just denoted "Player".

[bob]

OK.

1. In MC, in the file list it the files shows up as 16bit.
2. The Zone is set to "Player" which is the default. (I have never used the Zone functionality)

JRemote is therefore showing what MC is reporting. (good, then its not JRemote)

I am using JRemote, simply as a control point and media is still being output to the Linux client which is just denoted "Player".

So what that says to me is that the DLNA server is showing you the content directory as it will be when the DLNA server transcoded the content.
We basically do the same thing when you configure our DLNA server to transcode content.

You should check to see if your DLNA server settings can be tailored to MC better, in other words it really should never have to transcode content. MC can basically play anything.

[berniel99]

What you say may be right, but the Synology documentation does not say that that will occur if you leave "transcode" unselected (as shown in the attached screenshot).  The only two "profile overrides" that work with MC26 are "Windows Media Center" and "Roku", shown in the second screenshot, both have the same effect on MC26.

The behaviour shown by the Synology DLNA to other applications, eg. VLC and Foobar 2000, suggest that no transcoding is taking place.