Topic: Really dissapointed in Media Center (Read 5640 times)

nyc-ink · « **on:** May 17, 2003, 06:48:55 pm »

I held off downloading media center till the final realease, and frankly I'm not happy with it and am going back to Media Jukebox. First complaint is so far i've found several files that don't show up under the artist listings even though the info on the file properties is filled in properly. Second what happened to the nice search feature that was in Media jukebox. There is no search icon that can be put on the task bar, instead you have to hit cotnrol-f to do a search, and after you do the search it starts playing the songs in the search by it's self. I don't suppose it occurred to anyone that you would want to do a search to add a song to "playing now". But of course I wouldn't have had to use the search feature if files were showing up where they were supposed to be.
Brian

JimH · « **Reply #1 on:** May 17, 2003, 06:55:30 pm »

Brian,
You might double check your tags. Something isn't right. MC works.

Jim

nyc-ink · « **Reply #2 on:** May 17, 2003, 07:09:07 pm »

Jim I checked the file properties, the artists is listed under the artist but the song doesn't show up in the artist's list. I've already rolled back to MJ 8.x and low and behold the files are listed the way they should be. And what happened to the simple "find music" feature on MJ it worked great! The app shouldn't assume I want to start playing a song just because I've done a search on it!
Brian

nila · « **Reply #3 on:** May 17, 2003, 07:14:59 pm »

Brian,
your mistake is you are hiting enter after you do a search.

That's what's making it play.

The searches happen automatically,
u dont need to hit enter or anything else to do the search. It automatically refines the search as you type.

As for the missing files - if the tags are correct then are you sure there are no search criteria set that are making the files not appear in the view scheme you were using? That is the most likely case for what your describing.

nyc-ink · « **Reply #4 on:** May 17, 2003, 07:34:44 pm »

The problem is you don't know what are problem files till you actually want to play them. Therefore this process can be endless. I did an import media (without removing the files) twice and that didn't fix the problem. In all candor I think I'm going to stick with MJ, frankly I find MC a bit complicated for my uses. But thanks for the suggestion. Also I spent far too many hours organizing my files over tha past few years, I have no desire to repeat the process.
Brian

nyc-ink · « **Reply #5 on:** May 17, 2003, 07:35:23 pm »

PS does anyone else get a debugging error when trying to reply on this board?

nyc-ink · « **Reply #6 on:** May 17, 2003, 07:38:08 pm »

Here is an example of the problem I was having:

The song I wanted to play was "Can't help loving that man of mine" by Lena Horn, when I go to lena horn in my artist list the song is not there, I know I have that file. I do a search on Lena Horn and the song shows up the search results, but still won't show up in the artist listing. Roll back to MJ and the song is listed under lena horn.

whoeveryouare · « **Reply #7 on:** May 17, 2003, 07:52:43 pm »

Now I remember... I had a similar problem. See if this might apply:

http://www.musicex.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=MediaCenter;action=display;num=1051323046

It all depends what naming and filing conventions you use. I happen to be different than 99.999% of everyone else (apparently), so I got bitten by this aspect of MC9.

If this doesn't help, my apologies for wasting your time...

nyc-ink · « **Reply #8 on:** May 17, 2003, 08:22:09 pm »

Read the entire post, don't get it frankly. If the artist name is entered correctly in the file properties it should show up in the artist listing.
Brian

Bartabedian · « **Reply #9 on:** May 17, 2003, 08:23:26 pm »

Actually, I have had weird behavior from MC like this. I will import something new, go to the listing, and it's not there! Go to my computer in MC, it's there, and it shows it as imported, but it doesn't show anywhere else in MC, not even in main Media Library, where everything is. If I go and make any tag adjustments to any of these "ghost" files from inside MC\My Computer they will begin to appear in MC elsewhere.

Very, very strange, has happened a few times over the last few builds, thought it was me or my system, but it keeps happening, and now someone else has seen this too.

Something is odd with MC, still a bug in there somewhere.

LisaRCT · « **Reply #10 on:** May 17, 2003, 08:43:48 pm »

Whenever I import files I immediately go to the playlist "Recently Imported", where I correct any tagging errors or ommissions. I keep that window showing columns set-up just for this purpose.
This is the only place where I show both "Artist" and "Album/Artist" . . . . this is where you can control where your songs show up in the view
"Media Library - Audio - Artist/Album".
Be sure to check the Artist/Album field, it was my hidden problem in sorting.

nyc-ink · « **Reply #11 on:** May 17, 2003, 08:51:08 pm »

Thanks for your replies, I really appreciate it, but I'm going to stick with MJ, I'm not up for redoing my entire database. Thanks again.
Brian

Bartabedian · « **Reply #12 on:** May 17, 2003, 08:52:47 pm »

Quote

Since the "autoalbumartist" method is used by default, the weird behavior of that item can cause tracks or entire albums to not appear when you think they should.

The test is to see if the missing tracks appear under (Multiple Artists).

This is not my problem. I don't use "albumartist" at all, and my missing-after-import files didn't show up anywhere in MC, except in My Computer in MC. I've been working in MC since December, I know when something is odd, and I agree with nyc-ink, something IS odd here.

whoeveryouare · « **Reply #13 on:** May 17, 2003, 09:02:44 pm »

Well, your problem is not nyc-ink's problem! His problem files do appear in MC--just not under artist.

rocketsauce · « **Reply #14 on:** May 17, 2003, 09:58:13 pm »

Quote

I'm not up for redoing my entire database.

You don't have to redo your entire database. Just edit the view schemes so that they use the regular Artist field instead of the Album Artist (auto) field. It'll only take a minute.

Rob

nyc-ink · « **Reply #15 on:** May 17, 2003, 10:39:34 pm »

okay, how do you do that? I'll give it a try tomorrow?
rian

crowfan · « **Reply #16 on:** May 17, 2003, 10:44:11 pm »

I hate to be a pain, but how do you change the autoalbumartist feature to regular artist?

thanks

ahh you beat me to the question :-)

whoeveryouare · « **Reply #17 on:** May 17, 2003, 10:53:16 pm »

1) In the MC9 tree, navigate to Media Library > Audio > Artist/Album.

2) Right click on Artist/Album, and select "Edit View Scheme".

3) Select "Album Artist (auto)", and click the Edit button.

4) Change the "Component Type" to Artist, and click OK twice.

That's it.

nyc-ink · « **Reply #18 on:** May 17, 2003, 11:16:42 pm »

cool, it worked, many thanks!
Brian

whoeveryouare · « **Reply #19 on:** May 17, 2003, 11:34:04 pm »

Cool! I'm glad it helped. I'm also glad that I'm not the only one who was put off by this weird behavior. (Well, I'm not glad you had a problem and were frustrated by it, but--you know what I mean.)

nyc-ink · « **Reply #20 on:** May 17, 2003, 11:36:31 pm »

This reminds me of the early days when MS released a new version of Office. Take a note guys, major changes like this cause frustration!
Brian

KingSparta · « **Reply #21 on:** May 18, 2003, 03:50:59 am »

Quote

PS does anyone else get a debugging error when trying to reply on this board?

you can turn that error message off if you go to tools, internet options, advanced.

not sure why J river has not fixed that yet.

JimH · « **Reply #22 on:** May 18, 2003, 04:52:26 am »

Quote

... the artists is listed under the artist but the song doesn't show up in the artist's list.

Then the artist is different by one or more characters. Try editing the artist.

robbiex · « **Reply #23 on:** May 18, 2003, 05:04:53 am »

I agree that there is a problem with the file tags. File tags that were previously set-up by the Jukebox are not recognized by the MediaCenter.
Also, the video operation cannot read .vob files.
Robbie

JimH · « **Reply #24 on:** May 18, 2003, 05:30:08 am »

Quote

I agree that there is a problem with the file tags. File tags that were previously set-up by the Jukebox are not recognized by the MediaCenter.
Also, the video operation cannot read .vob files.
Robbie

I don't believe there is a problem in reading tags, but there could be confusion if you used ID3V1 tags formerly and MC is reading ID3V2 tags. Both programs have settings and tools for this.

Bartabedian · « **Reply #25 on:** May 18, 2003, 01:23:23 pm »

I just had a chance to rejoin this thread.

!!!BTW, I am so NOT disappointed in MC!!!

Jim, something is weird here. I've never had import problems until recently (last couple of weeks). It's been random when it happens; my routine goes like this:

1. As I acquire new MP3's, I tag with T&R
2. Move to proper directories then import into MC
3. Rebuild AV2 database to reflect additional albums (I use AV a lot)

Now I generally don't check everything as MC has been very stable at this for a long time. Recently, even after doing a number of imports across a weeks time, certain albums just don't show in MC, don't import into AV and are essentially ignored by every faction of MC, until I change the tags from the My Computer view of MC. (And in that view, the files show up as imported, with the correct icon, before any changes are made).

The next time it happens (OK, if

...) I would be glad to send you the file to test for yourself. If it doesn't happen again, got any recommendations for medication?

AndyCircuit · « **Reply #26 on:** May 18, 2003, 02:06:49 pm »

JimH wrote:

Quote

Then the artist is different by one or more characters. Try editing the artist.

Had the same problem until found up to eight spaces at the end of some artists names. Don't know why, just deleted the spaces and everything was allright. (Only a few and not all of them tagged with MJ8 ) 10 minutes to cleanup in my case

rocketsauce · « **Reply #27 on:** May 18, 2003, 03:43:08 pm »

Quote

1. As I acquire new MP3's, I tag with T&R

Have you tried changing the tagging options in T&R? Maybe (if you do have it enabled) try disabling the option Write Windows XP compatible ID3v2 tags. I recall a couple of threads from the past regarding issues between MC tags vs. WinXP tags. Don't know if those have been resolved.

Rob

Bartabedian · « **Reply #28 on:** May 18, 2003, 06:38:28 pm »

Quote

Have you tried changing the tagging options in T&R? Maybe (if you do have it enabled) try disabling the option Write Windows XP compatible ID3v2 tags. I recall a couple of threads from the past regarding issues between MC tags vs. WinXP tags. Don't know if those have been resolved.

Rob

I've always had that checked (since they added that as an option a few versions ago) and it worked well, until a couple of weeks ago. Then the weirdness started. It must be a certain tag, or something in the tag that causes it. It's happened on maybe 5 or 6 albums recently. But that option in T&R never caused me trouble before, and most of the albums are appearing right away. It is odd, but I know I've witnessed it on a few occasions.

As a matter of fact, the last time I saw this, it was an album that I had copied into it's "home" directory, retagged the original files again with slightly different names, then copied those into the same "home" directory. So in essence, two exact files of the album exsisted in the directory which was then imported, but neither set of files showed up.

salsbst1 · « **Reply #29 on:** May 18, 2003, 09:21:00 pm »

Quote

PS does anyone else get a debugging error when trying to reply on this board?

Yes, I think IE 6 and this board do not get along. The Save and Preview buttons cause a javascript error.

rocketsauce · « **Reply #30 on:** May 18, 2003, 09:29:00 pm »

Quote

javascript error

In IE, go to Tools/Internet Options/Advanced. In the Browsing section, uncheck Display A Notification About Every Script Error.

Rob

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Author Topic: Really dissapointed in Media Center (Read 5640 times)

nila

LisaRCT