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[fitbrit]

I encountered a strange problem today that I could not resolve. It might well be a bug, or something I am overlooking.

Here is the setup:

Dedicated Music PC (Server) acts as MC server.
MC Client PC (Client) acts as MC client.
Both are running MC 22.
All music is saved on an external drive connected via USB 3.0 to Server. It is the F drive, and is shared on the network.
The F drive of Server is mapped to the F drive on the Client too.
CDs are ripped onto the F:\Media\CD Music\ subfolder on the Client using dBpoweramp.
Server is configured to auto import media on the F:\Media\ folder and subfolders.
The client-server relationship is set up to play the local file if it exists.

Server correctly imports the files ripped on the Client.
Client correctly shows imported files too.

However, when trying to play music on Server ("There" on the server) using Tremote on the Client, the CDs ripped on Client, fail to play. A message pops up (see attachment) on the Server.

"The database entries for the selected files are missing or invalid."

The files can be played directly from the library on Server, but fail when trying to start playback from Client.
Only music ripped on Client onto the shared F:\ drive has been affected so far - all the music already residing on the F:\ drive plays fine on Server when using Tremote on Client to initiate play.

Any ideas?

[eddyshere]

Using unc paths ... And not mapping ...?

[fitbrit]

Using unc paths ... And not mapping ...?

Good suggestion, but the drive is mapped. You can see the filename in the screenshot. I was trying to play the same album that appears in the screenshot. Playing it locally works, playing it remotely doesn't.

[DJLegba]

When I use a client in "Tremote" mode the file locations reported in MC are relative to the server. In the screen shot below, the files are located in E:\Music\Download on the server. The client PC doesn't even have an E: drive. The client can successfully play to "There". I think the issue is that your client computer isn't using the server's library.

[fitbrit]

Thanks for your suggestion. It IS using the server's library - its own library is empty. The ripped tracks only show up on the client once they appear on the server.

[RoderickGI]

The first thing I would do is restart both PCs and see if the problem goes away. If yes then I would put it down to Windows idiosyncrasies or silent updates. If no, move on.

Then if not I would open Windows Explorer and check that I can view the F: drive successfully. If not, again, blame Windows networking. If yes, move on.

Finally I would right click on one of the "bad" file on the MC Client, and select "Locate>On Disk (External)" and see what happens. With my installation, with no shared mapped drives, I get an error saying MC can't find the file 'm01p://192.168.0.14:52199/MCWS/v1/GetFile?File=xxxx' does not exist.

See what you get, and compare that to what you get for a known "good" file that plays successfully.

If none of that solves the mystery, I would delete the local reference to the server on the Client, then delete the actual local copy of the library files, then add the server back in, forcing a full resync, and hopefully fixing the issue. Thumbnails will need to be rebuilt locally, but everything else should be there right away. That sounds drastic, but as the error message was "The database entries for the selected files are missing or invalid", it could be there is some corruption in the local copy of the database that isn't being fixed by the synchronisation process.

[fitbrit]

Thanks, Roderick. I'm not sure how, but the problem seems resolved now, at least partially. The only issue that remains is that in playing now, the wrong cover art appears for the files being played, despite folder.jpg being correct. I think that can be lived with for now. I am not sure how it resolved, but it could be that the client machine needed restarting; we'd only tried restarting MC on both PCs and restarting the server in full.

The first thing I would do is restart both PCs and see if the problem goes away. If yes then I would put it down to Windows idiosyncrasies or silent updates. If no, move on.

Then if not I would open Windows Explorer and check that I can view the F: drive successfully. If not, again, blame Windows networking. If yes, move on.

Finally I would right click on one of the "bad" file on the MC Client, and select "Locate>On Disk (External)" and see what happens. With my installation, with no shared mapped drives, I get an error saying MC can't find the file 'm01p://192.168.0.14:52199/MCWS/v1/GetFile?File=xxxx' does not exist.

See what you get, and compare that to what you get for a known "good" file that plays successfully.

If none of that solves the mystery, I would delete the local reference to the server on the Client, then delete the actual local copy of the library files, then add the server back in, forcing a full resync, and hopefully fixing the issue. Thumbnails will need to be rebuilt locally, but everything else should be there right away. That sounds drastic, but as the error message was "The database entries for the selected files are missing or invalid", it could be there is some corruption in the local copy of the database that isn't being fixed by the synchronisation process.

[RoderickGI]

The only issue that remains is that in playing now, the wrong cover art appears for the files being played, despite folder.jpg being correct.

That will be a Thumbnails problem, and can be fixed by deleting the contents of the "C:\Users\[UserID]\AppData\Roaming\J River\Media Center 22\Thumbnails" directory on the Client and letting MC rebuild all Thumbnails.

It seems that the Client thumbnails database can get out of whack sometimes, perhaps with network issues or something. Deleting the thumbnails database so it will be rebuilt is the only solution. You will probably need to have MC closed on the Client to do the deletion, and restarting the Client should restart the thumbnail rebuild. Or you could tell MC to rebuild the thumbnails: Options>Tree & View>Thumbnails>... Build missing thumbnails...

[fitbrit]

Thanks for the tip about thumbnails.