EDIT: I've searched the JRiver wiki pages and cannot find the info I am looking for, which is how to disable any setting that changes metadata in the files themselves. I want JRiver to update the info displayed in the library files when I have made changes to the metadata, I just don't want JRiver autofilling any metadata fields under any circumstances.
I am extremely careful and scrupulous in tagging the music files I rip or download and I have my own protocols for how I fill in various data fields. One of these is that in the field for YEAR I give the year only, not the month and date. So for a release that came out in 2004 according to the cover info and/or Discogs page, I enter 2004 in the data box, not 2004-06-07 even if that is the exact date the album was released. This is the way I want to do it and they are my files in a local library I've spent many thousands of dollars acquiring and many hundreds of hours meticulously tagging, checking spellings and punctuation to conform with the most accurate and grammatically correct info I have available. So I do not want any of the programs I use to play or manage my music files (JRiver for playback, and dBpoweramp for ripping and tagging) filling in empty metadata fields or or editing the metadata I've assigned to every music file in my library.
Yesterday when I went to make a small edit in a Todd Rundgren album of dsf files, I noticed that the year showed the month and date in the 0000-00-00 format. I thought it might have been an oversight when I ripped and tagged the album, but just now I went back and checked all the files I've played in the past two weeks since installing MC28 and there were at least a couple dozen albums where the metadata for Year had been altered in the same way as the Todd Rundgren album. Took me about an hour to check every folder and then edit the ones that had apparently been auto-edited, presumably by JRiver.
How do I disable this function in MC28? I am almost certain it is MC28 that is making these changes in the metadata, though it is possible it could be something in dBpoweramp since I also recently updated that program. I know that dBpoweramp autofills empty metadata fields when ripping a disc, but that is when I make the changes to fit my data criteria and protocols. That program now supports metadata editing for dsf files and I did go in there to make some corrections on some of my dsf albums, and at the time I did not notice any changes in the year info, and that was just before I installed MC28 and imported all my DSD files to a separate library that I've been playing for the past two weeks.