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[Manni]

The issue is that the nas in this case is a server rather than some low power device hence the need to wake the server as well as spin up the drive

Currently managing such problems requires use of an external remote to drive everything as that can then be programmed to make things work. This is obviously only practical if you already use such a remote though.

Mkv is not relevant either as there are valid reasons for someone to use bdmv

Thank you, and 100% correct

Not sure what you mean by a remote though. The only thing needed to wake up the server is the send a WOL command, and I was able to implement this already thanks to your and Datdude's help, so that each server is woken up the first time a title is played. The only remaining issue regarding that part is that MC doesn't wait/retry to play the title during its timeout delay (which is around 15-20 secs as far as I can see), so even if we have a loop to not return control to MC until the server is online and the media can be played, MC is unable to play the title until a second try, which isn't great.

I was reluctant to do so but I'm going to post a video showing how this works with CMC, as a few have asked.

[Manni]

I have an unrelated but relevant issue on MC for Linux regarding (what I believe to be) unnecessary filesystem accesses when using the modern tag editor. I work around the issue by using an MC Library Client to perform tag editing, which seems to operate purely on the shared database and doesn't lag like working directly on the server.

I haven't tracked all of your posts Manni, nor understand your third-party integration, but maybe you could try using Theater View on a Library Client to see if it still causes your NAS headaches during browsing.

Thanks, but this is exactly what I'm doing. I'm not using the server/client side of MC as that's not relevant for my use. I'm using a local library on the client that is used to play back the media (my HTPC) in Theatre View. The servers are two unRAID servers that only contain the media itself (DVD/BD/4KBD folders). They have no connection with MC, and they don't contain any of the data (cover art, info) that MC uses in Theatre View, especially after I've updated the cover art / info with MC's own info.

Anyway, thanks again to all who helped, unfortunately JRiver isn't interested in implementing this feature, and I don't have a problem as I can simply go back to using CMC as a front end and MC as an external player only.

[Manni]

For context, here is a picture of the two servers that some here would like me to keep on all the time:

Left is A4K (24-bay with 6TB drives) that contains all my 4K content (around 1,000 4K blurays ripped 1:1 as folders and a dozen of 4K blurays series)

Right is B2K (24-bay with 6TB drives) that contains all my 2K content (around 3,000 2K blurays also ripped 1:1 as folders, along with a few hundred DVDs and most of my TV series which are in BD folders or MP4).

These are the two servers that switch on automatically (independently) when a specific media is to be played, put all the drives except the one that hosts the media on stand by after 15 minutes, and switch itself off (back to standby) after 45 minutes without network or disk use. This is entirely transparent to the user, except the 10-15 seconds wait the first time a server needs to be accessed.

At the back is my Synology DS2411 (12-bay with 12-bay extension with older/smaller drives) that I only use to back up most of my 4K film content. I have another TS-859 (8-bay) that I use to back up my 4K TV series content. These don't have to be online to play back media at any time (it wouldn't work anyway, they take 10-12 minutes to switch on from standby!).

[BryanC]

Thanks, but this is exactly what I'm doing. I'm not using the server/client side of MC as that's not relevant for my use. I'm using a local library on the client that is used to play back the media (my HTPC) in Theatre View. The servers are two unRAID servers that only contain the media itself (DVD/BD/4KBD folders). They have no connection with MC, and they don't contain any of the data (cover art, info) that MC uses in Theatre View, especially after I've updated the cover art / info with MC's own info.

Anyway, thansk again to all who helped, unfortunately JRiver isn't interested in implementing this feature, and I don't have a problem as I can simply go back to using CMC as a front end and MC as an external player only.

What you're doing is not what I described. A Library Server client /= a NAS client. You would either need to:

• Install MC directly on the unRAID server as a MC Library Server and use the normal MC Library Server functionality w/ MC Theater View clients
• Install an intermediate MC server (could be on a Pi or something) that mounts your NAS drive that you then access with MC Theater View Library clients

I understand that both of these workarounds add complexity and force you into the MC Library Server/Client model and may not be compatible with your other customizations and workflow.

The goal here is to decouple rogue filesystem access from browsing the database.

[mattkhan]

Not sure what you mean by a remote though.

If you exclusively use some home automation/external remote to control MC (including browsing in your case which makes it a little unlikely but still) then that remote can trigger all commands required to bring things online. Ie MC has v limited capability to fire hooks on certain events but does have an API hence you can script it externally but not generally from within mc itself

[Manni]

What you're doing is not what I described. A Library Server client /= a NAS client. You would either need to:

• Install MC directly on the unRAID server as a MC Library Server and use the normal MC Library Server functionality w/ MC Theater View clients
• Install an intermediate MC server (could be on a Pi or something) that mounts your NAS drive that you then access with MC Theater View Library clients

I understand that both of these workarounds add complexity and force you into the MC Library Server/Client model and may not be compatible with your other customizations and workflow.

The goal here is to decouple rogue filesystem access from browsing the database.

Sorry for the misunderstanding, but:

Option 1 wouldn't help in any way, as I would have to switch on at least one UnRAID server in order to be able to browse the library. I don't want to have any of my UnRAID servers on when I browse the library. I used to have a Win10 VM on my A4K server to host MyMovies server and the server part of CMC, but I redesigned this because I just didn't want either server to be on except when playing media it contains.

Option 2 wouldn't be any different from what I have now, or you would need to explain further. In which way would having MC on a Raspeberry Pi (I do have one that I use for video calibration) as a client mounting the NAS would help, compared to having a local library on my HTPC that is able to mount the shares just as easily once the serve is online?

To clarify, the problem here is that MC doesn't support WOL for media shares, it only supports WOL for its own server/client infrastructure. That means that both server and client have to be on in order for MC to browse the library (wherever it is) and play a title.

I want to browse the library with just the client (Raspberry or HTPC, it shouldn't make a difference) and both my servers offline until I actually need one of them to play the media. That's what MC is currently unable to do, even when it doesn't need to access any of the information on the servers.

If a Raspebery Pi can do this, why couldn't a HTPC do it?

I'll post a video of CMC, this should explain better what I was offering to help implement in MC (but we know it won't happen as jriver isn't interested and I don't have time to spend on something that won't happen, especially given the number of issues and bugs I've experienced, and the fact that I am apparently the only one interested in such a feature in MC).

[Manni]

If you exclusively use some home automation/external remote to control MC (including browsing in your case which makes it a little unlikely but still) then that remote can trigger all commands required to bring things online. Ie MC has v limited capability to fire hooks on certain events but does have an API hence you can script it externally but not generally from within mc itself

Thanks, I understand now. I already do this with Roomie Remote to control some functions manually (including firing up either Unraid server manually) so yes, I could do this but that defeats the point.

I was trying to use MC as the front end on my HTPC to select a title and play it, and switch on the server automatically if needed. I won't program this with a remote when I can just do this with CMC on the HTPC, and select the title either on the HTPC itself or on the myMovies app on my iPad/iPhone, for MC to be launched automatically as an external player. It's all working fine, I'll just keep using that

[JimH]

Is your Media Center library itself on the server?  Check under MC settings for file locations. That would create a delay.

[BryanC]

Option 1 wouldn't help in any way, as I would have to switch on at least one UnRAID server in order to be able to browse the library.

Negative, the MC Library client downloads and queues the MC database so your NAS will not need to be on until you access/modify a file. Browsing on an MC library client doesn't seem to trigger any filesystem access on the MC server while browsing. I don't know if it's by design or an unintended quirk, but it works for me.

Option 2 wouldn't be any different from what I have now, or you would need to explain further. In which way would having MC on a Raspeberry Pi (I do have one that I use for video calibration) as a client mounting the NAS would help, compared to having a local library on my HTPC that is able to mount the shares just as easily once the serve is online?

Because you then shift from using local libraries with mounted shares to using MC client libraries, which reduces rogue filesystem calls.

To clarify, the problem here is that MC doesn't support WOL for media shares, it only supports WOL for its own server/client infrastructure. That means that both server and client have to be on in order for MC to browse the library (wherever it is) and play a title.

One of the things that is very confusing about your posts is that you keep calling your machines with MC "clients". They are NOT clients in the context of MC. You mount your NAS shares on them but they are all running local instances of MC. You can take it up with Jim if you think a third-party program like MC should be responsible for sending magic packets to NAS shares (personally I think this is the purview of the OS as I treat all shares like any other mounted filesystem, as does MC).

The purpose of the Pi is to act as a real MC Library Server that mounts your remote NAS as necessary and then your client(s) with Theater View are actually real MC Library clients and you'll decouple the MC database from the filesystem/mounts. And if it's a PITA or impossible to send WOL via your current Windows machines (it sounds like it is) you can run Linux and have more fine-grained control over your mount time-outs, chaining WOL, etc.

[Manni]

Negative, the MC Library client downloads and queues the MC database so your NAS will not need to be on until you access/modify a file. Browsing on an MC library client doesn't seem to trigger any filesystem access on the MC server while browsing. I don't know if it's by design or an unintended quirk, but it works for me.

Because you then shift from using local libraries with mounted shares to using MC client libraries, which reduces rogue filesystem calls.

One of the things that is very confusing about your posts is that you keep calling your machines with MC "clients". They are NOT clients in the context of MC. You mount your NAS shares on them but they are all running local instances of MC. You can take it up with Jim if you think a third-party program like MC should be responsible for sending magic packets to NAS shares (personally I think this is the purview of the OS as I treat all shares like any other mounted filesystem, as does MC).

The purpose of the Pi is to act as a real MC Library Server that mounts your remote NAS as necessary and then your client(s) with Theater View are actually real MC Library clients and you'll decouple the MC database from the filesystem/mounts. And if it's a PITA or impossible to send WOL via your current Windows machines (it sounds like it is) you can run Linux and have more fine-grained control over your mount time-outs, chaining WOL, etc.

OK, let's clarify:

- As I've said many times, I don't use AT ALL the MC server/client architecture.
- I don't have any problems sending WOL commands in Windows at all. I do this manually all the time, using batch files or small utils, and automatically when using CMC as a front end. I even do it without any problem with MC, but it doesn't help because MC doesn't wait for the share to be online, and doesn't retry. You might have to re-read the thread so that we don't rewrite the whole thing, but I was able to get MC to send a WOL command whenever it needs to access a share that is on a server that's currently on standby. Unfortunately, even if you don't give the control back to MC until the share is online, MC gives the same error, so you have to try playing the title a second time for it to play. So unless the devs extend the timeout used by MC before deciding that a file is not accessible when it tries to play it, and unless MC tries again during that time out (once it gets the control back from the batch file) to play the title, there is nothing that can be done on the user's side to implement a WOL command in order to wake up a server when trying to play media hosted on it.
- I am not interested in using the MC client/server infrastructure, especially if it involves using a Raspberry Pi or installing an MC server on a VM in both Unraid servers (supposing that's even possible, can you have more than one server). I simply want to be able to browse my collection with my HTPC without any server online, and when I need to access the media, for the server to be switched on automatically.
- Unix or any other OS is not an option on my HTPC. I use it for many other things (gaming, video editing) so it's going to be Windows (and I have no problems with Windows).
- I agree that Windows should send a WOL when trying to access a server that's offline, but it doesn't. It's only a problem for MC, it's not a problem for CMC, which is and will remain my front end.
- I thought it was an easy enough feature to implement but it doesn't seem to be. I helped Brian from MyMovies to implement it with WMC at the time, and Paul to implement it with CMC, it only took a few hours of programming and testing, but for some reasons it would cost thousands of dollars for JRiver to do the same, so clearly it's not a viable option.
- I also assumed that others would be interested too, but it doesn't seem to be the case, so there isn't much of a point in exploring this further.
- I appreciate your help, but jriver has already indicated that they are not interested in implementing that WOL feature, so let's just drop it. I have a perfectly working solution with CMC, it does exactly what I need, I would prefer to use MC's Theatre View because of its extreme flexibility, but it's buggy and it doesn't allow me to do what I want, so I can live without it.

As Jim said, accessing my data is my problem, and I don't have a problem accessing my data as long as I don't try to do it with MC, so I don't have a problem, and neither does MC

[mattkhan]

1) When importing this cover art and info, MC would store it locally, as I don't think it stores it on the share with the title. If it does, I can't see it.

probably moot at this point but you can check Options > File Location > Cover Art to see where it should store cover art

however, having check this in my setup, I see that the most recent item in here is from 2023 & that all more recently imported items are storing the image in the same folder as the media. Is that a bug or a side effect of some other feature?

relevance to this thread = it reads as images being on the share cause problems even when browsing but it's meant to be possible to decouple cover images from the media itself and that seems broken atm

[mwillems]

probably moot at this point but you can check Options > File Location > Cover Art to see where it should store cover art

however, having check this in my setup, I see that the most recent item in here is from 2023 & that all more recently imported items are storing the image in the same folder as the media. Is that a bug or a side effect of some other feature?

relevance to this thread = it reads as images being on the share cause problems even when browsing but it's meant to be possible to decouple cover images from the media itself and that seems broken atm

mattkhan, what does the option immediately above the directory setting say (i.e. Options-->File Location-->Cover Art-->Audio mode:)?  That setting is the setting that should control how cover art is stored (in one central directory or with the files).  If you have a client/server setup, the setting on the server will be the one that controls.  Mine is set to "In the same folder as the file", which stores cover art images with the files and not in the Cover Art directory, so while Options-->--File Location-->Cover Art shows a cover art directory for me, the directory set for cover art storage is empty (as expected).

Another potential interaction is if you have set the sidecar settings under Options-->General to something different than the default.  I think writing external sidecars for filetypes will also write the cover art with the file as well?

[mattkhan]

thanks

It's set to "in the same folder as the file"
"write to external sidecar files for media type" is set to video which I guess is the default as I have no recollection of this setting existing let alone changing it, is this the one you mean?

I don't remember ever changing it either but clearly something happened in late 2023 to change it. I wonder if I change it will jriver move those files?

suffice to say it's rather surprising that "audio mode" impacts films & if multiple apparently unrelated config options decide where some file lives then it's unrealistic to expect any individual to have a clue how it works

[BryanC]

It's set to "in the same folder as the file"

You need to set it to "In a Specified Folder", select your external location, apply changes,

In Standard View select all files, right-click cover art>save cover art in external location

Then do a recursive search of your audio dirs with your favorite tool and remove any files with image suffixes.

Run Options>File location>Cover Art>Clean Cover Art Folder for good measure.

[lepa]

MC can ONLY save covers for VIDEO beside the video.

I have requested a change for this couple of times because of same issues (server is offline while browsing). Larger thumbnails introduced recently probably improves situation.

I however have used MCUtils to move all the cover art also for videos to my library PC's SSD which is always online when MC is and only use MCUtils to set any new covers. ZRatings can do same for movie covers if only that is needed. I'm glad with my solution.

[JimH]

MC can ONLY save covers for VIDEO beside the video.

I have requested a change for this couple of times because of same issues (server is offline while browsing).

We should probably change that.

[mattkhan]

MC can ONLY save covers for VIDEO beside the video.

I wonder how I ended up with (what appears to be) all video art up until late 2023 in that separate folder? MC (or me) moves in mysterious ways....

makes no difference in my case because my approach to power saving was to move MC into a VM running on my unraid server (which is on all the time anyway because it hosts a bunch of other things) and, keeping vaguely on topic to the power saving theme, I did that because of MC client inability to wake a server on demand (i.e. if client stays awake but the server goes to sleep then client only wakes the server on restart) which is conceptually the same problem as the OP has (and which, afaik, is still a gap)

[Manni]

@mattkhan, BryanC, Lepa and mwillems, thank you for the support and for the comments regarding file location.

As reported earlier, this is one of the the first things I checked and all my library data is (or should be) saved on the local drive on which MC is installed (my HTPC), primarily appdata/roaming. I have never touched these options, so they are whatever the defaults are or were when I first installed MC.

I attach a screenshot of the relevant settings.

I also recorded a few videos to show how WOL works with CMC as a front end launching MC as an external player, as well as a few videos showing how things currently work (or rather don't) with MC. Apologies for the poor quality and for not editing them, but I didn't have much time.

First, here is how it works with CMC:
https://mega.nz/file/pnk3xLaT#Z-3HpPSROQm9hZ5311mRF7ZrovQ7L4W1N_9zrxEG4f4
Simple, easy and user friendly. My family members have no idea what's happening under the hood, they just know they have to wait a little bit before playback starts. That's how it should be done in my opinion.

Here is how far I managed to get trying to make it work in a similar way with MC, thanks to Mattkhan and DatDude's help:
https://mega.nz/file/Z7ElyC6A#HpksIRuJFVbdqyGSKn41nqrFgjmD9qkiL-dYYHRX5Ho
Unless the devs extend that timeout delay to give the external WOL command time to wake up the server, and try again playing the title when MC gets the control back, nothing more can be done on the user's side.

Here are some issues that happen with MC even with both servers online, so not related to offline info:
https://mega.nz/file/UqchjY4K#q0vyzwx83YHtCIhOpAH4bxbPEUx1lSDANT93uUrsLBg

Here is the behaviour with one server offline (B2K):
https://mega.nz/file/c2tU0T6b#RfEpobp0WpXIkVufStjtsOYKrHF_Vlanjgiv40HgZqQ

And finally, here is the behaviour with both servers offline:
https://mega.nz/file/lutiDTLR#azSreBiQCUvJNwnYDCzm1X8RNwu39-EDfNPYU72YXdY
It was much worse yesterday, but you can get an idea from the animation in the other video, and imagine that the cover art in the top right corner ends up entirely black. As all the needed information is displayed even with both servers offline, it proves that there is no need to access them. So I have no idea why switching the servers off causes these issues with the cover art animation or makes the interface so sluggish.

I understand that this won't change, but I just wanted to share these before moving on.

Thanks again to all those who helped, and I hope that people won't mind living with these issues, not knowing where data is stored, or why offline shares need to be accessed when there is no need to as all the info is clearly available locally in the database, in cache or on the local appdata/roaming folder.

I'm back to using CMC as a front end for now as it works better for my needs, and I'll keep using MC as an external player. It's my favorite player by far, not only because of full menu support but also thanks to all the progress made in JRVR over the last couple of years. And thanks again to Hendrik for adding HDR 3D LUT support to JRVR, I'm almost done validating the data, it's working great and I should post some information in the relevant thread soon.

[datdude]

It's certainly not worth my time either if you're not interested in my suggestions and if you believe that no one else is or will ever be interested in saving energy and help the environment. Believe me, this has NOTHING to do with the few dollars saved per year. It's about reducing my carbon footprint as much as I can and preventing avoidable energy waste. I fully understand that not everyone cares about that, or even believes it matters.

Since you brought it up, curious, how what is the idle power draw for this whole setup? How much is the front-end computer drawing vs the storage?

I'm assuming you are using smart plugs to truly keep things off and not drawing any power when not in use? All those HDs will be drawing power regardless of being in standby or at idle, unless you are physically disconnecting current from wall. That's what I do at night when I shut off my HTPC and NAS.

Also requires much more power to spin up from standby and of course to do the backups. Are these 5400 RPM or 7200 RPM HDs? More power is used even when in standby for higher RPM drives.

Fact remains that fewer HDs with a higher capacity, will consume less power, then more total HDs. That's why I suggested it. That's all. Wanted to clarify that for anyone else reading this in the future since one might think that high-capacity HDs consume a lot more energy than lower capacity, but they really don't if at all.

[JimH]

Dropbox?

[Manni]

Since you brought it up, curious, how what is the idle power draw for this whole setup? How much is the front-end computer drawing vs the storage?

I'm assuming you are using smart plugs to truly keep things off and not drawing any power when not in use? All those HDs will be drawing power regardless of being in standby or at idle, unless you are physically disconnecting current from wall. That's what I do at night when I shut off my HTPC and NAS.

Also requires much more power to spin up from standby and of course to do the backups. Are these 5400 RPM or 7200 RPM HDs? More power is used even when in standby for higher RPM drives.

Fact remains that fewer HDs with a higher capacity, will consume less power, then more total HDs. That's why I suggested it. That's all. Wanted to clarify that for anyone else reading this in the future since one might think that high-capacity HDs consume a lot more energy than lower capacity, but they really don't if at all.

Sorry for the late reply, it was a busy week-end... I'm hoping to have some good news to report soon regarding WOL implementation in MC, but I can't say much at this point.

I've implemented support for Vera Lights, I'll create a thread for that explaining how to do it, and I'll link to it in this thread when it's done for those who are interested. I can only support turning the lights off when the film starts and dimming the lights when the film stops, but it's better than nothing. Internal support could add dimming the lights on pause for example.

Regarding your point on servers, I'll reply but I think we should moving on because that's mostly off-topic in this thread.

All you say is correct in general, but I don't think you're familiar with how UnRAID is different from a standard RAID NAS, otherwise you would understand why I'm saying that in my case the number and the size of drives doesn't make a significant difference. Sure, having 21 drives instead of 7 has a marginal impact of around 10-15W, but it doesn't matter as much as with a standard RAID NAS.

With a standard RAID NAS, whenever you want to access a single file, ALL the drives have to spin up. So when you play a film, ALL your drives have to be active. In this situation, obviously having fewer larger drives is desirable. I attach a picture showing my UnRAID servers when playing 4K content. B2K is on stanby, and A4K has only one single drive active (blue LED, in the bottom right).

With UnRAID, whenever you want to access a single file, only ONE data drive needs to spin up. If you're writing data, your parity drive(s) will also spin up, but if you're only reading data, for example when playing a film, only ONE drive is active, ALL the other drives, including the parity drives, are in standby. This is why I'm sayin that in my case, as explained earlier, have fewer drives wouldn't make as much of a difference. The single larger data drive would use a bit more power than a smaller drive when active, but of course I would save more power by having fewer drives in standby.

I bought 6TB drives because at the time it was the largest size supported by my RAID NAS (Synology or QNAP). I simply recycled them in my UnRAID servers, because I can't justify buying 8 20TB at $500 to replace 22 6TB (free).

I am replacing my 6TB parity drives with 20TB and will gradually replace the 6TB with 16TB or 20TB drives when my 24-bays are full.

Regarding power when on standby, there is no need to do this with my UnRAI servers. I have designed them with PSUs that use very little to nothing when on standby, so I don't need to switch them off the wall entirely.

My A4K server uses around 12W when on standby, and my B2K (that I rarely use) uses 0W on stanby (no idea how that's possible, as it uses 7W when powered off, but that's what my kill-a-watt says and it's fairly accurate).

My HTPC uses around 125-135W when playing a film. I can live with that, given that it's also my video-processor (and that I use it for gaming and video editing as well). Its PSU only uses 14W on standby, so I don't feel the need to switch it off the wall entirely. I would do so if it was 30W or more.

I sold my Envy Extreme MKII and my JVC NZ8 projector partially to save power and replaced these two with a Samsung S90C that, combined with my JRVR HTPC as a source, only uses a fraction of what these two used with standard sources (mediaplayer, 4K BD player etc).

So HTPC around 130W and one media server at around 75W only when playing media, that's about 200W in total for the media server I use the most frequently (A4K) and the HTPC. Given that I have a few hundred TBs at my fingertips, that's not too bad. I really don't want to add 200W (A4K and B2K server switched on) just so that I can scroll through my library, without even watching content... Makes no sense to me.

Anyway, hopefully, this will be resolved soon with MC, I'll update the thread when/if it is.

I attach the detailed measurements for each server so you can see the details of their power use.

[Manni]

I've created a thread describing how to partially implement Vera Lights (or any Z-Wave device) control with MC, and I've edited the first post to add a link to it.

If you're interested, it's here: https://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php/topic,141291.msg980264.html#msg980264