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[baldo]

I have 3 different machines that have MC.  1 Win PC, 2 Win laptop  3 Mac.  (with 3 different hard drives,  for the FLAC files).  No interest in getting a NAS BTW!

I maintain the library on say 1 WinPC, create a back up, copy that to the other machines and then do a library restore.  This works great for all the machines.

However, recently I notice that MC on 2 and 3 sometimes load an older version of the library rather than the one that I restored.  What is going on here? 

I also notice in Playing Now area I can see two items labeled Main Library both of which are located on the C: Drive\J River\ MEdia Cente\Library  folder.

When I do a back up and restore I do that to my external USB drive where I keep all my MC files.

Why is MC reverting to previous copies of the library and not the latest one that I restored to?

Many thanks

[baldo]

BTW, this happens on both on, Win laptop and the Mac.

[baldo]

Anyone?  Been a few days and was just wondering why this is happeing.

Many thanks

[JimH]

Search for *.zip in your file browser.

You're doing something that isn't supported or recommended.  Read about Library Server on the wiki.  It's the recommended method for what you want.

[baldo]

Thanks JimH.

This is now happening on my Mac as well as on my Laptop (although I think the laptop has stopped doing this)

I just want to now where the library that is being loaded is stored so that I can make sure that that is the one I want it to load up.

There are just two possible places, the hard drive that MC is installed on (which should be the normal drive for all software and systems files) or the USB drive that I keep all my audio files on.

I am not doing anything that is not supported by MC. I have paid for the 3 licences that I have my MC on.  Really don't see why it is doing this.

Many thanks.

[JimH]

https://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Library_Manager

[baldo]

thanks for the link to the wiki JimH.  having read it, re - read it and then re read it again, I am afraid that this is not what I need.

I want to have 3 identical copies of my library on three different machines.  Each machine has its own USB drive. On the windows machines, even the drive letter is identical.  All I do is use the library backup/restore function.  I backup the library on machine 1 and then restore that backup onto machine 2.  Cloning is what I am doing.

All USB drives are clones of each other.  This has worked fine for several years. infact for at least the last 7 years!  SO why is it now suddenly reverting back to random past copies of the library.


The issue I am having is occurring on the same machine, so either the laptop or the Mac. Its the same issue. That of reverting to earlier versions of the library before a Restore.

I have spent a LOT of time sorting out the meta tags on the files to keep my files tidy and its just very annoying when MC ignores that work by reverting to a previous version of the library.

This now just happened again on my laptop. 

How can I ensure that MC library is the same as it was the last time i used the machine and not some other previous random earlier version.

Sorry but this is getting really frustrating and annoying for me.

Let me know what you need from me to be able to help me fix this.  I've been a loyal MC user for over 10 years now and the experience of using it is starting to get worse not better.

Thanks for your help in advance.

[baldo]

I see that I have two "Main library" and both of them are on my C drive.  This is not where I keep my libraries, they are kept on the USB drive.

How can I force MC to only use the library that is located on the USB drive?
 

[JimH]

Look at the dates of the zip files.

[JimH]

thanks for the link to the wiki JimH.  having read it, re - read it and then re read it again, I am afraid that this is not what I need.

I want to have 3 identical copies of my library on three different machines. 

That's not the recommended way of sharing the files, and we don't support it.

Library Server is the answer to your problems.

[dtc]

I just want to now where the library that is being loaded is stored so that I can make sure that that is the one I want it to load up.

To check the location of the current library go to Playing Now - Playing From and click on Main Library. It will tell you the location of the default Main library.

To load a library from a different location you can use Add Library under Playing From

It sounds like your process may be copying the new library to a location that is different than what is specified in Playing Now - Playing From.

When doing a Restore it restores to the location of the currently loaded library.

[baldo]

with all due respect JimH, if I want to have 3 different copies of MY files then that is what I want.  Three separate machines, 3 separate hard drives and 3 separate licenses for MC. 

If I have paid for 3 separate licenses then surely it is up to me how I use them, as long as I am not breaching any laws like sharing them with others or anything like that. 

Its also not like I am doing something that is beyond the capabilities of the product that I bought!!

I don't see how having 3 different versions of a library on one machine will solve my problem using library server.  None of the machines are talking to one another.   Am I missing something or have I not explained what I am doing here clearly enough?

Can someone help me to understand how creating lib1, lib2 and lib3 on my laptop will solve the issue on my Mac or on my PC?

Sorry if I come across as a bit strange but this just does not make sense. This has worked fine for years and years and years. Only now it is doing something odd.  It seems the software performance is being downgraded for some reason. As I said, I am not doing anything that I have not done before.

Hope that makes sense.
 

[baldo]

Look at the dates of the zip files.

yes, i use that to identify the version that I am restoring to.

[baldo]

hey dtc, thanks for your input. I think that this is what we need to look at.

I see that one of my librarys is on the C: Drive in apps data and I am not allowed to change the location of that.

Should I create three different linrarys on each machine and have each respective library pointing to the USB drive?

so, lib1 points to library on USB1, lib2 points to USB2, lib3 points to USB3.

the issue is comlicated by the mac drive location format, but that is another story!!!

[dtc]

The default Windows location for the library is

C:\Users\<user name>\AppData\Roaming\J River\Media Center <version>\Library

so it looks like somehow you have gotten libraries in other places.  What is the location of the installed library in Playing Now?

For simplicity you probably want to get back to just having the library in the default location.  You might want to delete (or rename) these extra libraries and possible delete MC32 and do a clean install.  Then you can do a restore of your backup file from the main system.

Not sure what happened, but I think you need to get back to a default setup.

Good luck.