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[Tim]

Hi all,

Sometimes and for no reason obvious to non techie me, windows renames my external drive from E:/ which is what media center recognises to G:/ which it doesn't. Last time it happened I got it fixed at a repair shop as part of some other work but they said it was not do-able from within windows and was quite complex.

Question is: can I rename the filepath to recognise G:/ drive instead of E:/ drive from within MC 17 - at the moment I cannot play anything back. Thanks for any ideas.

Tim

[JimH]

That can happen if you have a thumb drive or similar plugged in when you boot.  It's why people often assign these drives to Z:, for example.

On our wiki, there is a topic called "Moving Files".  It has some suggestions.

You could also find more with an Internet search.

[Tim]

Thanks - the question however remains - can I fix it or not? Any straight answer very much appreciated.

[Tim]

OK I am now in a total mess ? Having found no reasonable solution to the problem I clicked on import in drives and devices and now have a completely jumbled interface with duplicated filepaths and all the new stuff labelled G: says file not found anyway. Why is this so complex. It seems that this programme is designed primarily for people who really enjoy messing around with computers. I on the other hand just want something that simply stores some music on an external drive and plays some digital semblance of music back from a flac file when I need a playlist for a party etc. For photos, video editing etc I use dedicated Adobe and Nikon software which I can manipulate just fine and generally does a great job. Surely knowing that windows randomly reascribes names to external drives JRiver has developed a simple way of playing back from those drives regardless of a change of letter in windows. Seriously fed up 

[JimH]

Please save the complaints.  It makes it harder to solve your problem.  Just report where you're stuck.

Yes, it can be fixed.  My post above had a link to a topic that tells you how you can replace one drive letter with another.

But you may be better off to clear your library (under File/Library/Library Manager) and import again.

[Listener]

Sometimes and for no reason obvious to non techie me, windows renames my external drive from E:/ which is what media center recognises to G:/ which it doesn't. Last time it happened I got it fixed at a repair shop as part of some other work but they said it was not do-able from within windows and was quite complex.

Question is: can I rename the filepath to recognise G:/ drive instead of E:/ drive from within MC 17 - at the moment I cannot play anything back. Thanks for any ideas.

As JimH said, Windows may assign a different drive letter to your external drive if the usual one is already taken.  You can assign a permanent drive letter using the Windows Computer Management program.  Here are step-by-step instructions for Win 7:

1. Click on the Windows start button, then click on "Computer" in the menu that pops up. 

2. In the Windows explorer window that appears, find "Computer in the left pane and right-click on it.  Choose "Manage" from the menu that appears.

3. In the left pane, click on "Disk Management".  (If it isn't visible, click on "Storage" to make "Disk Management" visible.

4. In the right pane, you should see a list of drives in your system.  Locate the external drive in that list and right-click on that line.  Click on "Change drive letter and paths" from the menu.

5. In the small window that appears, click on "Change". 

6. In the (even smaller) window that appears, choose a new drive letter from the drop down list to the right of the "assign..." text and click on OK.

You may need to log in as an administrator to make these changes.  Here is a link to instructions for Windows XP

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307844


---
Your assertion about other software automatically adjusting to a changed drive letter certainly doesn't apply to any other software I use including Adobe software.  You are using a Windows computer.  It is your responsibility to learn how to operate it.

Bill

[Tim]

Bill, thanks for your helpful and direct response - much appreciated. I think I will try wiping the current interface info from j.river and start again from the external drive which I will name z. As for other software recognising my letter changed external drive Nikon NX2 seems fine - perhaps the context is different technically, I would not know. Equally, I like to use whatever tool is at my disposal to create things and do not waste time on awkward nuances of software until I need to. My responsibilities are many and varied but from an ethical standpoint the mooted 'responsibility' of understanding every aspect of windows is low on my priorities.

I was merely (ok loudly) commenting on the fact that I have found this programme consistently unintuitive compared to others - though have not compared other music players. I really like the interface and the sound is ok considering the usual digital limitations - it's fine for party playlists and this is it's main function for me - but I find importing from cd's a gamble as some compilations will scatter all over the interface whilst others remain intact as an 'album'. Any ideas on that specific problem?

Anyway, thanks again for your helpful direction on the disk renaming path.

cheers

Tim

[Tim]

I am hoping to clear library and re-import from the external drive (now z). Can I do this and retain playlists or must it all go and be rebuilt? I do not know if I need a key or code and do not know what this refers to when asked by the first manage library window. What is the easiest step by step path to achieve what I am trying to do?

thanks again.

[MrC]

The easiest way was mentioned in the Moving Files wiki entry.

When your files have changed location, all that is required is to update MC's notion of where those files reside.  In your case, a simple change of the drive letters in the Filename field that MC uses to reference the files is sufficient (e.g. Change E: to G:, or whatever).  This is done in one single operation on the selected files.

If you're already past this, and have imported files from both locations, I would:

1) Remove references to the new files: use Search Wizard to show only files in the new location, select the files, and hit Delete and OK (use the first option)
2) Change the Search to now select only files from the old drive
3) Use Rename, Move & Copy in Update mode to Find/Replace the old drive letter with the new (and whatever other path component as necessary)

[Tim]

Thanks very much,

I am sorry but I cannot find 'search wizard' and am not familiar enough with the program to fully implement all the other suggestions. I have re-named the drive as z. how do I get media center to recognise this and change what is currently E: to Z: filepath in the program. If someone can take the time to tell me where to find all these wizards etc. in a click by click way it would be appreciated.

thanks again

[Listener]

Thanks very much,

I am sorry but I cannot find 'search wizard' and am not familiar enough with the program to fully implement all the other suggestions. I have re-named the drive as z. how do I get media center to recognise this and change what is currently E: to Z: filepath in the program. If someone can take the time to tell me where to find all these wizards etc. in a click by click way it would be appreciated.

thanks again

The word "search" is in plain sight at the top right corner of the MC window.  Click on the down arrow and then click on the word "wizard".

A dialog window like this one will appear



In the dropdown list under the word "Rules", select a database field on which your search will be based.  For example, "album".

Now the wizard window will look like this



To the right of the name of the database field you just selected, there are now two new controls.  You enter a value in the control on the right.  For example "Greatest hits".  Note that MC provides a list of all the values for that field that are present in  the database.  You just clicdk in one or more checkboxes.  The area in the middle initially contain "is".  This tells MC how to use the value on the right in the search.  You can select conditions like "is", "is not", "is greater than" from the dropdown list.

You need to spend some time getting more familiar with the menus, controls and dialog windows that MC provides to let you control its operation.  MC follows standard Windows conventions so whatever skills you have developed using other Windows applications can help you learn to use MC. Then when you want to solve a specific problem, you can look for features that relate to solving your problem.

[rjm]

Windows has known problems with reliably mapping external drives. If you want to guarantee that Windows always maps a certain external drive to a certain drive letter I recommend the utility USBDLM.

http://www.uwe-sieber.de/usbdlm_e.html

[Listener]

Windows has known problems with reliably mapping external drives. If you want to guarantee that Windows always maps a certain external drive to a certain drive letter I recommend the utility USBDLM.

http://www.uwe-sieber.de/usbdlm_e.html

Assigning a specific drive letter using the step-by-step procedure I outlined above has worked reliably for me for years.  However, if you have a number of USB mass storage devices, you might be sure that they have distinct names ("MusicHD" for example.)  Windows uses those names to relate drives to permanently assigned drive letters.

Bill

[rjm]

Assigning a specific drive letter using the step-by-step procedure I outlined above has worked reliably for me for years.  However, if you have a number of USB mass storage devices, you might be sure that they have distinct names ("MusicHD" for example.)  Windows uses those names to relate drives to permanently assigned drive letters.
Bill

Perhaps I am an outlier with over a dozen external drives but I know for certain XP and Vista had problems. I am not sure if Windows 7 and 8 are better but I use USBDLM as a matter of policy on all my systems.

[Tim]

Thanks listener for trying to explain the wizard. Which combination of available words from the various dropdown lists exactly do I choose to make the program change filepaths from E drive to Z drive? This seems a very esoteric route to what must be a simple rename of a letter in some box somewhere.