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[digiasia]

I am using MC18 now, I have a question as follows, would appreciate if anyone help.

before installing MC, I can easily tell the file type from Windows File Manager, but now all the
audio and video file type become "media center file", which makes me very difficult to tell one
from another.

Is there any way I can solve this ?

thanks !

[Mike48]

For some reason, Windows comes set to display only part of the filename. You just need to change that so that it displays file extensions.

If you like, you can unzip and apply the attached registry file. It's in ascii format -- you can see what's in it. 

If you'd rather do it yourself, open any folder. On the main menu, click "Tools" and select "Folder Options...."  Choose the "View" tab. UNCHECK the Advanced setting "Hide extensions for known file types".

Hope that helps.

[marko]

No way to solve this, no.

It's one of the reasons why I, and many others, choose not to associate any file types with Media Center.

If you come at it from the other direction, you won't miss out on anything Media Center-wise.

What I mean is this: Instead of organising your files in explorer, then sending them to MC to be played, use MC to automatically import files, find and play files from within MC, and get MC to organise the files on your hard drive the way you want them organised.

The whole system does rely on having your files tagged appropriately within your MC library. Once up to speed with that, it's easy to stay on top of things, tagging new files as they are imported. It's the MC engine room and works really, really well. I cannot remember the last time I browsed my media folders using explorer.

To turn off MC file associations, you can use "Tools > Options > File types" from within MC, but probably the easiest way to go wholesale is to run the installer again and at the file associations page, hit the 'select none' button and continue.

-marko

[yannis]

You could use an icon manager utility to assign any icon of your choice to any extension you need. That way, you don't lose you associations - you just change the icon.

[digiasia]

thanks to all opinions above.

Besides the file type association issue, I think MC is good.

[glynor]

No way to solve this, no.

It's one of the reasons why I, and many others, choose not to associate any file types with Media Center.

If you come at it from the other direction, you won't miss out on anything Media Center-wise.

What I mean is this: Instead of organising your files in explorer, then sending them to MC to be played, use MC to automatically import files, find and play files from within MC, and get MC to organise the files on your hard drive the way you want them organised.

The whole system does rely on having your files tagged appropriately within your MC library. Once up to speed with that, it's easy to stay on top of things, tagging new files as they are imported. It's the MC engine room and works really, really well. I cannot remember the last time I browsed my media folders using explorer.

To turn off MC file associations, you can use "Tools > Options > File types" from within MC, but probably the easiest way to go wholesale is to run the installer again and at the file associations page, hit the 'select none' button and continue.

+1

However, they really, really, really should fix this file association problem.  It is just an elbow grease problem.  It is annoying to fix (they can't register things in "groups" but have to register each individual file type separately).  But MPC-HC, VLC, and others have fixed it (they also all used to have some variant of this problem in the past).

It isn't the highest priority thing, but it is annoying, and it comes up regularly here.

[6233638]

This was really annoying me too - so I decided to do something about it.

http://www.datafilehost.com/download-cc671528.html Updated! http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=78538.msg547682#msg547682

This registry file will replace the entries for all audio, video, playlist, and other files so that they are no longer just listed as "Media Center File".

A word of caution though: I am running Windows 8, and am using icons from %SystemRoot%\System32\imageres.dll and %SystemRoot%\System32\wmploc.DLL. I don't know if these icons exist in other versions of Windows, or if they do exist, I don't know if they are still in the same location.

Update: Seems to work fine on Windows 7. (probably Vista too, but I don't know that anyone has tested it)




The reason I'm using these icons is because I think they fit in with the operating system better, and are much higher resolution than most other icons.


I am also creating a lot of keys under the HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\MediaCenter.TYPE nomenclature.

For these associations to update, I had to right-click any "Media Center File" types, go to "Open with..." and select the default application as Media Center again.

I mostly used the same grouping for file types as MC18 does in the Tools > Options > File Types dialogue.


As with all registry changes; proceed at your own risk.

[kstuart]

The imageres.dll and wmploc.dll files exist in my Windows Vista installation, dated 2006 and 2010 respectively.

--

For this fine contribution, you have hereby earned the right to be known by a name, rather than just a number !

[kstuart]

Hmm - something wrong with the download.

The site states "MC18 Icons.7z", but downloads as an .EXE file.

Sorry, I never download .exe files from unknown source.

(I do not have "use download manager' checked, so that is not the issue.)

[MrC]

The site states "MC18 Icons.7z", but downloads as an .EXE file.

Opera?

[kstuart]

NoScript actually.   

NoScript prevented the javascript from removing the default of "download manager", while whatever screen display action actually removes the checkmark is not javascript (because the download manager checkbox actually unchecked visually when I clicked on it, even though NoScript prevented the download manager option from being removed).

Anyway, I allowed the file hosting site in NoScript, and then the .7z downloaded.

PS  I am going to look at the .reg and see what it does, before running it...

[kstuart]

And, after all that, 7z replies with:

" Unsupported compression method "

I also tried marko's attachment and same result.

[Vincent Kars]

+1

However, they really, really, really should fix this file association problem.  It is just an elbow grease problem.  It is annoying to fix (they can't register things in "groups" but have to register each individual file type separately).  But MPC-HC, VLC, and others have fixed it (they also all used to have some variant of this problem in the past).

It isn't the highest priority thing, but it is annoying, and it comes up regularly here.

+1
I’m afraid like so many previous occasions it won’t help

[6233638]

Update: found a couple of bugs:
1. I had managed to skip over Cue Sheets altogether
2. I had skipped a " which meant that WMA files were not being given a custom icon

Here's an example of all the audio types being shown in Explorer - yes, these are all associated with MC18!


I would have done this for the rest of the files, but even doing these took far longer than I expected. (I'm sure there was probably a smarter way to do this than rename files manually...)

[6233638]

Another small update to this. I reinstalled Windows the other day, and before I used this registry file again, I changed the entries to be under:

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\JRiver.MediaCenter.FileType.TYPE

rather than

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\MediaCenter.TYPE

This way it puts all entries together, and there's a lot less chance of it conflicting with anything else.
As mentioned previously, there was already a "MediaCenter.WTVFile" key there for Windows Media Center, so I didn't like using "MediaCenter.TYPE" after finding that out.

I've also been considering an edited version that puts the files into simplified Audio/Video/Playlist groupings - sometimes having each file type in its own group is a bit much.
And again, for this to work and not have Media Center take control again, you need to disable the file association under Tools > Options > File Types

[InflatableMouse]

Thanks for this.

Seems to work on Windows 7 too, except for this minor issue that "JRiver Media Center" or "Media Center" is now shown as simply "Media".

Also, wasn't there a specific icon for MP3, like for M4V and WMV? Not that it really matters, just wondering.

[6233638]

Thanks for this.

No problem!

Seems to work on Windows 7 too, except for this minor issue that "JRiver Media Center" or "Media Center" is now shown as simply "Media".

This is unrelated to anything my registry file touches, and it should have been fixed in 18.0.172.

Another user was still reporting that problem though: http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=80322.msg546657#msg546657
Based on what they reported, the attached file should fix it.

Also, wasn't there a specific icon for MP3, like for M4V and WMV? Not that it really matters, just wondering.

There should be, but it will only show up at larger icon sizes. At 16x16 all the music icons will look the same. It's relatively easy to customize the icons to anything you want though - the hard work was actually splitting things up into their own file type rather than all showing up under "Media Center File"
You might have to re-associate the files with Media Center for the change to show up though - Shift+Right-Click > Open With… (though it looks like you already know what you're doing)

If it's still not showing up after you do that again, if you upload your copy of %SystemRoot%\system32\wmploc.dll I'll check and see if it's in a different location.

[InflatableMouse]

This is unrelated to anything my registry file touches, and it should have been fixed in 18.0.172.

Another user was still reporting that problem though: http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=80322.msg546657#msg546657
Based on what they reported, the attached file should fix it.

I thought it was weird because I checked your registry file before I merged it and couldn't see this in there. I totally missed that other thread and hadn't noticed this before.

Anyways, cheers!

There should be, but it will only show up at larger icon sizes. At 16x16 all the music icons will look the same. It's relatively easy to customize the icons to anything you want though - the hard work was actually splitting things up into their own file type rather than all showing up under "Media Center File"
You might have to re-associate the files with Media Center for the change to show up though - Shift+Right-Click > Open With… (though it looks like you already know what you're doing)

If it's still not showing up after you do that again, if you upload your copy of %SystemRoot%\system32\wmploc.dll I'll check and see if it's in a different location.

Yeh, just need larger icons, they show up with mp3 in the icon.

All cool!

[JustinChase]

for this to work and not have Media Center take control again, you need to disable the file association under Tools > Options > File Types

it's been a long day, so maybe I'm just not thinking clearly, but isnt' the whole point of this fix to allow us to have JRiver associated with all the file types?

if we need to disable association for this to work, what's the point exactly?  I'm sure I'm just missing something simple here.

[6233638]

it's been a long day, so maybe I'm just not thinking clearly, but isnt' the whole point of this fix to allow us to have JRiver associated with all the file types?
if we need to disable association for this to work, what's the point exactly?  I'm sure I'm just missing something simple here.

The registry file replaces the default Media Center file type association with new ones (that still point to Media Center) which have unique names for each file type.
If you let Media Center handle file association, it changes them back to "Media Center File" again.

[JustinChase]

okay, I must be doing it wrong then.  I removed all MC associations, then ran you reg file, and when I double-clicked a few files in windows explorer, they didn't open in MC, so I re-installed MC to re-associate the files with MC, and everything just says "Media Center File" again.

I must be just doing it wrong.

if it matters, I'm running version 19 now.  is there a different version of this for v19?

[6233638]

okay, I must be doing it wrong then.  I removed all MC associations, then ran you reg file, and when I double-clicked a few files in windows explorer, they didn't open in MC, so I re-installed MC to re-associate the files with MC, and everything just says "Media Center File" again.

To update the names in Explorer after running this tweak, you may need to right-click the files and use "Open With..." and pick Media Center again.

if it matters, I'm running version 19 now.  is there a different version of this for v19?

I posted an updated version in the beta forum here. It has to be different because Media Center 19 uses MC19.exe rather than MC18.exe

[JustinChase]

I just wanted to say thanks again for doing this.  I installed MC fresh on a new laptop a while ago, and finally got around to installing this reg file again, and it's working great.  I really hope Matt et al can get this baked into MC before the next version.  It really makes like better.