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[RickLang]

I've been using JRiver on my PC for a couple of weeks. I previously used VideoLan (VLC) for audio files, and JRiver is a serious upgrade in audio quality. It’s also clear to me that JRiver would enable me to better organize my audio files and more easily create playlists.

My grand objective is to use JRiver to send audio (and maybe video) to two systems I have in the house, or even one if that works out to be the best option.

System 1 - Logitech Transporter with Krell amps, Tannoy speakers, and a Synology DiskStation running Logitech Media Server

System 2 – Marantz SR4002 with Definitiv Mythos STS speakers, Roku, and a recent Samsung BlueRay. No videos from the Synology currently displaying to this system.

This afternoon I’ve been searching not just at the JRiver forum, but all over attempting to find whether I can achieve the following nearer term objectives with JRiver—

 Deliver JRiver programming to System 1 with equal or better output. (I can see I’d have better control for creating playlists and the like.)

 Use JRiver to deliver both audio and video content to System 2, with the emphasis not on sound quality, but on the ability to deliver a variety of programming stored on the Diskstation.

 Use my Android phone to control either or both systems.

If these objectives/questions are beyond things JRiver wants to address in this forum, I understand. But if so, please just tell me.
Thanks

[vagskal]

System 1 - Logitech Transporter with Krell amps, Tannoy speakers, and a Synology DiskStation running Logitech Media Server

 Deliver JRiver programming to System 1 with equal or better output. (I can see I’d have better control for creating playlists and the like.)

Would you consider running Logitech Media Server (LMS) on a Win PC? If so, you can install LMS and Whitebear on the same PC (which is a requirement for Whitebear). It could be the Win PC where MC runs, and you can keep the music files on the NAS if you want.

The free Whitebear application acts as an intermediary between MC and LMS. I do it that way to use MC to send music uncompressed (better than that is hard to achieve) to LMS to play on my Squeezeboxes. It works well for me. I think all processing done by MC that you want would carry over to LMS/transporter. At least replay gain does, which is the only thing I use.

(It might work with just the built in DLNA service in LMS, which you then could keep on the NAS, but I do not know how well it would work. Try it out. If you are just going to use MC to send music to LMS/Transporter, I would recommend to strip LMS to its bare minimum with no unnecessary plugins and no database loaded in LMS. The Synology NAS is not a powerful thing. Be sure to update the NAS firmware to the latest version, since Synology some time ago had a bad build.)

[RickLang]

Thanks, Vagskal - Your solution sounds fine, but I'm afraid it's above me technically. I have no programming background. I've installed Whitebear, but don't know how to get JRiver or LMS to interact with it.

[vagskal]

The first thing: Do you have LMS and Whitebear running on the same Win PC? This is a requirement.

I am also not a programmer, but there are many friendly people here, Andrew, the Whitebear guy, among others.

[RickLang]

As suggested, I uninstalled LMS from the Synology Diskstation, moved the entirety of my music collection there, and installed LMS and Whitebear on my PC, along with MC18. I can start WhiteBear so that it shows in my Task Manager, but that's all I see. How do I connect JRiver to it? And then what? So far, I haven't pointed the Transporter at anything. Thanks.

[MrC]

First, LMS must already have scanned your music.

Second, Enable Media Network in MC (Tools > Options > Media Network > Use Media Network to share this library and enable DLNA

Third, you should then see your LMS/Whitebear zones under Playing Now in MC.

If you don't see these, 1) check that the port used by Whitebear and MC is the same, and 2) be sure your firewall software isn't blocking the DLNA traffic (see the wiki for relevant Media Network and DLNA articles).  See Whitebear's status page.

At some point, you'll likely want to adjust your DLNA Server settings in MC to convert or not convert, as necessary.

[RickLang]

It turns out that LMS had scanned just a small part of my library. I just did the rest, but none of them show in MC.

I see LMS in MC Playing Now, but Whitebear doesn't show anywhere.

I was able to connect the Transporter to one of the already scanned albums, and that's playing thru the Krell system now. I pointed it to LMS on my PC. MC doesn't seem to know it's playing.

I use AVG anti-virus and keep the firewall turned off. I rely on my router's firewall.

So, I guess my questions now are how I sync MC, WB, and LMS.

[vagskal]

If everything is working you should see "[the name you have given the transporter in LMS] (by Whitebear)" in MC. Is that the case? If so, choose that player in MC and play something. Sometimes I need to restart the Whitebear server to get it going the first time I start the PC (there is an option for that in Whitebear).

If MC, LMS and Whitebear are all on the same PC I do not think there should should be any firewall issues.

In the LMS web UI you should disable the LMS DLNA plugin in the options plugin tab (otherwise you will have duplicate LMS players showing up in MC).

(There is actually no need to scan anything with LMS if you just want to push/send uncompressed files from MC to LMS/transporter. I just point LMS to an empty folder.)

EDIT: + what MrC says, of course (except the LMS library scanning thing).

[MrC]

I didn't know that LMS/SBS didn't need the scan.  But now that I think about it, it makes sense.  Thanks for the correction and info.

[RickLang]

MrC & Vagskal - I appreciate you're help. I have to quit for the evening. We've made progress, but I'm not sure where I am or what my next step should be. Here's current status–

In MC Playning Now dropdown, I see "Logitech Media Server [Jaguar]", but nothing about Whitebear. Above that in the list I see Transporter listed, but it doesn't appear under Drives and Devices. Jaguar is the name I've given my PC. I've stopped and restarted Whitebear, LMS, and MC multiple times attempting to get something to see Whitebear, but that doesn't happen.

A problem may be that I've never created a mysqueezebox.com account. I've just been using wired connections, so I didn't think it important even in this reinstall on my PC. Should I do that. I am able to see the Transporter when I open the web interface of LMS. I was able to select albums and songs for the Transperter from the web interface as well. I couldn't find the LMS DLNA plugin in the LMS web UI.

The sentence about just pointing LMS to an empty folder makes me think I should start the installs over again. Maybe the media files are organized in the wrong application.

I probably won't be able to get back to this until late tomorrow, or maybe even the weekend. Thanks again.

[MrC]

That you see "Logitech Media Server [Jaguar]" implies that you have the DLNA/UPnP plug-in enabled in LMS.  You should disable this if you are using Whitebear.

I've never connected to mysqueezebox.com - that's not a problem.

[vagskal]

In the LMS web UI, select the tab Plugins and find the DLNA plugin (you can search for DLNA on the web page) and disable it.

In MC your Transporter should show up under Playing Now in the left hand tree (not under Drives and Devices) as "[the name you have given the transporter in LMS, Transporter for instance] (by Whitebear)".

If you just want to push/send music from MC to the Transporter, the LMS library is not necessary and can be left empty. If you have already scanned your music files with LMS, you can just leave it like that (unless you get performance issues with a large/huge LMS library). You can, if you like, in a simple way clear the LMS library by pointing LMS to an empty folder and do a complete - but very quick - rescan with LMS.

[jmschnur]

Can one push music logitech touch players from the mc18 server?  I see them as zones in MC.

Thanks

Joel

[vagskal]

Can one push music logitech touch players from the mc18 server?  I see them as zones in MC.

Yes, you can push music from MC to all Squeezebox players. In MC, first select under Now Playing the Squeezebox player you want to push to and see/hear what happens when you then play some music in MC.

[jmschnur]

Did not play. What if anything do I need to set the touch to .

IPeng showed it but not playing.

[vagskal]

a) Did you find your Touch under Playing Now in the left hand tree in MC?
b) Did MC say anything when you tried to play to the Touch?
c) Do you have Whitebear installed on the same Win PC as LMS?
d) Just to be sure: It was a MUSIC file you tried to send to the Touch? (If you, for example, try to send an image file to the Touch I think MC will silently do nothing.)

If even iPeng is unable to execute a play command to your Touch, then you might have a more fundamental LMS issue (probably firewall related) that can be better addressed in the LMS forums.

You must first in MC select the Touch and then execute a play command in MC. An alternative way of doing this is to right click on a music file or music album and select Send to => Play ([your Touch]).

You do not have to set the Touch to anything other than LMS (the name you gave your library in LMS). I do not know if MC can send music to a Touch connected to mysqueezebox.com instead. To avoid confusion, just run one copy of LMS on your home network.

[jmschnur]

I did not have white bear running . I will do that. LMS is on my whs2011 server.
MC is on a client.

[RickLang]

Vagskal,
I verified that the Upnp/DLNA plugin is not enabled on the LMS web Plugins tab. However, under Playing Now I see the following—
  Player [greyed out]
  Yellow Folder [which is open and labled as follows] "Playing from Logitech Media Server [Jaguar]"
     Main Librar
     JAGUAR: Rick:
     Logitech Media Server [Jaguar] [Which when I click displays the following 2-line message] "Click to load or configure this library. 'Logitech Media Server [Jaguar]' is a DNLA library from a device on the network"
Under that is the Add Library option.
Prior to opening MC18, I first started Whitebear by clicking on the file whitebear_file_core_08-03-2013. Then, having verified in the Task Manager that Whitebear was running, I started LMS. Then I started MC.
In the MC panel on the right, it shows the same info about what's running - Logitech Media Server [Jaguar]. Below that is the invitation to manage LMS, along with information about the number of files (2737), etc. Since you made it sound optional, I've left the files in LMS for now.
My own guess is that my problem is that I'm not getting MC to see Whitebear as its intermediary. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I don't see anything to indicate that Whitebear is running unless I look in Windows Task Manager.

[vagskal]

The problem seems to be that you are not seeing the Transporter in MC. Can you control the Transporter from the LMS web Ui?

The fact that you are seeing the LMS library in MC without any reference to Whitebear indicates that you have a another copy of LMS, with the LMS DLNA plugin, running on your network.

Whitebear should start with Windows and can be accessed via the Windows tray (look for an ice bear icon). In Whitebear, try to restart its server. If that does not help, tell us what is shown on the Whitebear status tab (a screenshot perhaps).

Since you say you are running MC, LMS and Whitebear all on the same PC, there should not be any firewall issues as long as LMS can control the Transporter.

[vagskal]

I did not have white bear running . I will do that. LMS is on my whs2011 server.

LMS and Whitebear must run on the same machine for Whitebear to be able to help with the DLNA thing. I do not know if Whitebear will run on your server. Try it out.

[RickLang]

Whitebear doesn't appear in my system tray. The only way I can tell that it, or some subset of it, is running is to look in the Task Manager. It definitely does not start when I restart the machine. I always have to start it manually by clicking on the file I mentioned in my last post. I think it's a good bet that I haven't properly installed Whitebear.

Yes, I can see Transporter in LMS. I can also control it - change albums, change songs.

Everything is running on the same machine - LMS, WB, and MC. I can see only one iteration of each. On a chance that my uninstall of LMS on the Synology hadn't completed, I just checked that - no packages at all.

So, it seems I haven't installed Whitebear correctly.

[vagskal]

You can get Whitebear here: http://www.whitebear.ch/mediaserver

[RickLang]

That link made all the difference, vagskal. I had gotten a Whitebear from somewhere else, and it didn't do a proper install.

So, now I see LMS (by Whitebear), but I think the bear is confused because I still see all the other things I listed last night—Main Library, Jaguar:Rick, and Logitech Media Server [Jaguar].

Further, I no longer have control of Transporter, although now, for the first time "Transporter (by Whitebear)" appears in the Playing Now stack.

Regarding the Transporter, the first item in the Whitebear stack of available songs is what now shows on Transporter's display. Also, when I try to take control and send Transporter a different file, the message I get is this: "There was a problem controlling the selected DLNA device. Double-check your devide, server and network settings."

I suspect that I'm now encountering the DNLS conflict you suspected last night, but there may be other issues as well. For example, the DNLA library in Whitebear shows that nothing is loaded.

Anyway, I feel we're almost there. 

[vagskal]

Further, I no longer have control of Transporter, although now, for the first time "Transporter (by Whitebear)" appears in the Playing Now stack.

Regarding the Transporter, the first item in the Whitebear stack of available songs is what now shows on Transporter's display. Also, when I try to take control and send Transporter a different file, the message I get is this: "There was a problem controlling the selected DLNA device. Double-check your devide, server and network settings."

That sounds like progress. LMS/Whitebear is actually communicating with MC. (If you play something on the Transporter from the LMS web UI or by any other means than MC, LMS/Whitebear reports back to MC the song currently playing - but not the entire playlist - when you select in MC the Playing Now view for the Transporter.)

Let us first concentrate on getting MC to send music to the Transporter.

I am playing only flac and mp3 files and have the settings shown in the screenshot. Check your settings. Are you trying to play other file types than flac and mp3?

Further, I no longer have control of Transporter

Do you mean that you are no longer able to control the Transporter from the LMS web UI?

[RickLang]

First of all, vagskal, good job and thank you.

My time to play with this has been extremely limited these last few days, but I've poked at it and rebooted multiple times, and now 'LMS (by Whitebear)' appears in Playing Now. Also, MC controls what appears on the Transporter display.

I think the key guidance you gave me was in pointing me to a good location for the Whitebear install. I don't even want to think about what I had before.

Now my main task is learning how to get the most out of MC. If you can point me to something on that order - something like an easy path for beginners - that'd be great.

Thanks again, Rick

[vagskal]

Now my main task is learning how to get the most out of MC. If you can point me to something on that order - something like an easy path for beginners - that'd be great.

http://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Up_and_Running

[AndyU]

One thing to take into account is that both MC and your Transporter have digital volume controls - depending on how you use your system you might want to disable one or other of them.  MCs volume control is 64bit and so of very high quality; the Transporter I think has a 24 bit volume control with the option of three analogue attenuations on the unbalanced outputs.

[bobkatz]

Wow, this sounds complicated! Is there a simpler way?

I have a transporter in one room and a Squeezebox in the other. I'd like to get rid of my antiquated (and no longer supported) Logitech Media Server and somehow hope there is a way for the Squeezebox and the Transporter to see JRiver directly. So many different and incompatible flavors of DLNA and UPNP were invented.

[MrC]

The SBs require SBS or LMS.