Freebox config - help needed please

[Flake]

OK I am in the infant stages of a wall-mounted jukebox.  I have decided that freebox is the way to go but I am at loss as how to configure this.  I cant get any of the album covers to show up (windows media player displays them just fine).  I would also like to find a way to "tag" a number of misc mp3 and wma files I have that are showing up as "unknown artist" files. 

So, how does one get album covers and how does one get his misc files named correctly?  I have experimented with Tag and Rename and one other program but have been really unsuccessful in using these softwares.  I just dont know what I'm doing.

Any help???

Thanks in advance.

[Barry Barcrest]

Ok to get the album cover to display you need to make sure the cover file isn't hidden. By default the windows media cover files are hidden which is why i recommend calling your larger cover files cover.jpg and the smaller ones coversmall.jpg. If you unhide the album.jpg windows media will over write the file with the hidden one again. These is an app on here that will download the covers for you, you will need to search out the thred.

As for WMA files you will be better off converting them to mp3 files as the tag reading is not reliable on WMA files.

Hopefully this will help you out.

[leapinlew]

Ok to get the album cover to display you need to make sure the cover file isn't hidden. By default the windows media cover files are hidden which is why i recommend calling your larger cover files cover.jpg and the smaller ones coversmall.jpg. If you unhide the album.jpg windows media will over write the file with the hidden one again. These is an app on here that will download the covers for you, you will need to search out the thred.

As for WMA files you will be better off converting them to mp3 files as the tag reading is not reliable on WMA files.

Hopefully this will help you out.

That'll do it.

If that sounds like a lot of work to you, it isn't. Thats how this jukebox setup goes. Good luck have fun.

[Kevin Mullins]

So are you just saying go in and unhide and then also "re-name" those album.jpg files ?

I was having the same issue when playing with Freebox, but never really looked into it yet.

[Flake]

OK thanks for the input.  I found the Jukebox Cover Manager software from this forum and have had it running for awhile now.  It seems to be doing the job.  Now I guess I just need to get my misc files tagged and I should be in much better shape.

Thanks.

15" LCD touchscreen should be on its way - from Toronto unfortunately.......

By the way for anyone who is looking for a good solution to stream audio from their computer to a home stereo the Soundcast Audio transmitter/receiver combo works pretty well.  Got mine for X-mas and I was able to set mine up within a couple minutes (and I wasnt exactly sober).  You can find the pair on Amazon.com for about $100 right now.

[Barry Barcrest]

So are you just saying go in and unhide and then also "re-name" those album.jpg files ?

I was having the same issue when playing with Freebox, but never really looked into it yet.

Yes that is the issue. If you unhide and rename them to the name you have specified in the freebox options screen it will then show them. Freebox now uses 2 covers... A Hi-Res one and a Lo-Res one for the album cover page to enable faster paging of the albums. You can set the filename to be the same if you only want one image.

[Kevin Mullins]

Cool... 
As I really liked Freebox and that seemed to be the only real issue I've seen with it so far.

[Barry Barcrest]

Cool... 
As I really liked Freebox and that seemed to be the only real issue I've seen with it so far.

Let me know how you get on, anything else i can help with i will do my best.

[Flake]

OK more issues....I am using jukebox cover manager and it has gone through and auto downloaded most of the album covers I need.  In fact in many cases it has downloaded several album cover versions.  These album covers have several different names such as albumart.....amazon......walmart....etc. depending on where the jpeg came from.  So.....I redid my config on Freebox after this and I'm not getting cover art to display inside Freebox.  What am I doing wrong?

Also, once it has generated a database, I am getting a weird error message that says bad file name found and it quits doing whatever it was supposed to be doing.

Any thoughts?

[Space Fractal]

coverarts need to been named the same in each folder.... typical folder.jpg or cover.jpg, which I prefer.

[Flake]

OK so is there a way to change the name of the files throughout all my folders automatically?

[Flake]

One other thing.....how do you "unhide" these album covers through windows.  I cant find that command.

[Barry Barcrest]

Also, once it has generated a database, I am getting a weird error message that says bad file name found and it quits doing whatever it was supposed to be doing.

Any thoughts?

The message is probably to do with an invalid image for the cover art. Usually a PNG named as a JPG or simular. I named all my files cover.jpg manually, i am not sure how the cover manager works as i downloaded my cover individually or whilst tagging in tag and rename.

[Space Fractal]

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=80454.0 - check this coverart manager out.

For some reason I have removed the link to his homepage with great help apps, but I add the link back.

Freebox Jukebox homepage have same link, but the its homepage is down, but it just a bandwith problem which ac cour each month.

[Flake]

Man this whole process is a major pain in the  .  Not only do I have tagging and cover art issues but I have to through each folder and set up the tunes as Artist/Album/songs.  Previously many of my songs are simply under the Artist folder if there was not more than one album.  Plus now I have to go in and manually rename all my cover art?  The Jukebox Cover Manager software says it will automatically rename all cover art to cover.jpg format but for the life of me I cant figure out how to get it to do that.  If I double click on the image through the software it will prompt me to rename it but I would have to do that on all of them???  Plus sometimes I get a rename failed message............

Plus I still have tagging issues.  I have tried using Tag and Rename and one other program but to be honest I find these programs about as user-friendly as CLR mame pro.  Is there a tutorial out there on how to use Tag and Rename?

I really......really want to use Freebox but this is killing me.   

[Space Fractal]

Freebox is a album based software, not singles and is heavy based on tag files, so it not a software if you doesn't have full albums.

That is the reason I wrote my own software, because I have mixed singles and albums and I like buttons.

With these lines in mind, I have to say Freebox is a nice software, and have of course linked from my software page as well, but you would have the effort to tag all songs perfectly, but you would have proud to you did that, even it very painfully.

Personly I use http://www.id3-tagit.de/ my self.....

[Lave Laar]

The Jukebox Cover Manager software says it will automatically rename all cover art to cover.jpg format but for the life of me I cant figure out how to get it to do that.  If I double click on the image through the software it will prompt me to rename it but I would have to do that on all of them???  Plus sometimes I get a rename failed message............

The auto rename function only works for folders that contain a single image-file. To list those folders you can click "With exactly one image" under "Show folders".
For the rest of the folders you will have to click on each album and delete the images you don't want. 
You can disable the confirmation for the double-click rename under Options -> Program settings -> Image files.  Here you can also enable the "replace if already exist" option to avoid the rename failed message.

As for unhiding the folder.jpg files take a look at this thread: http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=83844.0

[Barry Barcrest]

Tagging the files and sorting them is a huge job and it's as boring as it gets. However in the end you'l be glad you spent the time... You need to do a few albums at a time and you will eventually get through it.

[Flake]

OK new problem - since I have embarked upon cleaning up my tags and cover art files every once in awhile I redo my config on Freebox to make sure what I'm doing is working.  Tonight I have selected the create thumbnails option and once it begins generating those after the database is loaded it crashes.  I cant tell where exactly it crashes since its moving so fast but it has happened now 4 times in a row.  I have not added any new files since I first began working with this and if anything at this point my library should be in better order than before.  What gives? 

One other note - I have opened up Freebox after the config has crashed and nothing is showing up - like its blank.  Now I am only running a demo version as of now so not sure if its as stable as the full version.....................I dont know......I really have no idea.

I tell you what if I could pay someone to do this I would seriously consider it. 

[leapinlew]

Freebox is a album based software, not singles and is heavy based on tag files, so it not a software if you doesn't have full albums.

I disagree. Freebox does singles just fine. You'll want album covers to represent the bands, and you can put whatever songs you want in each album.

It's awesome software. I don't know of any software thats going to work well with poorly tagged MP3's, incompatible format types, etc.

I've often said the biggest pain in jukebox building is the cleaning up of the music collection. You can try automated tools, but the safest way to do it is 1 album at a time and make sure each album is good.

If someone starts off thinking they'll find some automated tool that will automagically sort all your mp3's, tag them properly, find album art, and do all this in the proper format - they will be disappointed.

Once the music has been cleaned up and your collection is organized. You'll be glad you did it. If it seems like work, your in the wrong hobby.

[Flake]

Yes I'm starting to get the hint that there is no automated tool to do this job of tagging for me.  I have found that Tag and Rename may help automate the process a little but it certainly just doesnt go through all my folders and retag files automatically as I was lead to believe from reading other posts about it.

But no offense man, if you think manually tagging and sorting all your music files is a great way to spend an evening and then afterwords realizing you are only 5% closer to being finished then you and me probably dont have the same idea of fun.

My problem is I wanted to get this thing done soon.....but as a CPA my professional life is going to be kicking into high grear next week and it will be almost impossible for me to make any significant progress after that.  At least not without pissing off my wife.  I'm sure she wont be very receptive to me spending what little free time I have retagging and organizing my music files.

[Barry Barcrest]

Tag and Rename will tag your files on a per album basis. It is pretty easy to tag them as you rip them from your CD's. Then if you dump each CD into it's own folder tag and rename will also get the cover when it gets the tag info from Amazon. Setting up your files is a problem all of us have delt with in the past and yes it's a pain but it is something that you have to take time to do. Like i said you are best off working on a few albums at a time and if tag & rename can get the info for you it's pretty painless. It's when you have to manually enter the tags because tag & rename can't find the album on amazon that it becomes a pain as you have to read them off the back cover and type them in.

[leapinlew]

But no offense man, if you think manually tagging and sorting all your music files is a great way to spend an evening and then afterwords realizing you are only 5% closer to being finished then you and me probably dont have the same idea of fun.

No offense taken.

What I've learned though, is that it's WAY WORSE when someone finds a mistake on the jukebox. It's best to take some time and sort through them and do it right. Good luck.

[Flake]

Tag and Rename will tag your files on a per album basis. It is pretty easy to tag them as you rip them from your CD's. Then if you dump each CD into it's own folder tag and rename will also get the cover when it gets the tag info from Amazon. Setting up your files is a problem all of us have delt with in the past and yes it's a pain but it is something that you have to take time to do. Like i said you are best off working on a few albums at a time and if tag & rename can get the info for you it's pretty painless. It's when you have to manually enter the tags because tag & rename can't find the album on amazon that it becomes a pain as you have to read them off the back cover and type them in.

This has been the approach I am taking although I'm not sure I have quite really figured out Tag and Rename yet. 

Hey do you have any input on the config crashing issues I posted earlier?  It only crashes when compiling thumbnails.  Any idea what my problem is?

[Barry Barcrest]

This has been the approach I am taking although I'm not sure I have quite really figured out Tag and Rename yet. 

Hey do you have any input on the config crashing issues I posted earlier?  It only crashes when compiling thumbnails.  Any idea what my problem is?

I did post a reply further up.

It seems like one of the images isn't actually a JPG but has a JPG extension. It is ok if the image is a BMP but most likely it is a GIF or PNG and it cannot be loaded.

These are not easy to identify, i had to manually go through mine when i had it happen.

[Flake]

OK I will work on trying to discover the bad file -  Thanks.

However, I do seem to be having yet another issue.  I have cleaned up several folders of music but for some reason after I update my database (without compiling thumbnails for now) and re-open Freebox there are a few albums that arent getting labeled correctly.  For instance, Alice in Chains - Facelift is getting labeled as Facelift as the artist instead of Alice in Chains and so it shows up in the F's.  When you go to select a track from this album the artist info in the bottom left hand corner says the artist is Alice in Chains.  However, Alice in Chains - Dirt shows up correctly in the A's along with other Alice in Chains albums.  The funny thing about this is they both have the exact same tag structure.  I know this because when I flip back and forth between these two albums in Tag and Rename they are identical (other than they have different track and album names).  This is also happening with other albums as well. 

Could this simply be some glitch?  I seriously doubt that is my problem but I truly have no idea how to fix this since all my tag info is identical to each other.

I am still working with the Demo version so I was wondering if that has anything to do with it.

[Barry Barcrest]

Make sure you are altering the IDV2 tag. The ID V1 is not read in freebox. That is probably the problem, you can sync the IDV1 and V2 in tag and rename.

[Flake]

Make sure you are altering the IDV2 tag. The ID V1 is not read in freebox. That is probably the problem, you can sync the IDV1 and V2 in tag and rename.

Hmmm.....God I wish I knew what you were talking about.........

So any help on how to do this?  Pretty please??

[Nvts]

I have a lot of songs all tagged properly as it tagged them correctly when I ripped them.  However, Freebox does not seem to be able to read the genre and year tags, so I cant use those features.  Any hints?

[Barry Barcrest]

I have a lot of songs all tagged properly as it tagged them correctly when I ripped them.  However, Freebox does not seem to be able to read the genre and year tags, so I cant use those features.  Any hints?

You need to be 100% sure you have tagged the ID3V2 tag and not the ID3V1 tag. If you load up tag and rename there is a tag synronisation wizard that will sync the ID3V1 tag to the V2 tag. You can specify to only overwrite blank fields. After that you should be good to go. A Couple of beta's ago i fixed the ID3V1 tag reading so these kind of problems shouldn't arise once i make the next release.

[Nvts]

Not sure why it is having troubles then.  I see the tags in Winamp, and on the top of the config screen, but not in the columns on the bottom.  I'll see what I can figure out when I see the Juke next.

[Nvts]

I did figure out one thing I had wrong.   I had one single random mp3 in the root of an artist, and the Config program did not bother going into the rest of the subfolders with the other albums.  Once I moved the single file into a Misc subfolder, it found the other bunch of albums.

I seem to have pushed enough buttons to get the Genre filter to work, however, they still do not appear in the loaded albums section of the config program.  (Edit:  I did the exact same thing after moving all the misc songs into Misc folders, pushed the same set of buttons, and now they appear.  i'm confuzed.)  (Edit to the edit:)  I do th esame thing now, and I dont see the genres again.  what a pain.)

I do seem to get multiple copies of the same album when filtering by genre, but not in the main menu.    I guess I'll play around more.  My GF's files are all messy, so I am trying to clean a lot of stuff up for her.   

I have a lot of files that were ripped from WMP, and havew WMA tags.  I can't seem to get them to convert to ID3 tags, at least according to Mp3tag, and freebox keeps showing them as No Tag.

[Barry Barcrest]

Ah... Ok I'm with you now...

You won't see the genres in the config view apart from when you build the DB. They are not stored in that file, it creates a seperate file for each genre.

If you recreate the DB then it will append to the genre files (Which is why you see the same album multiple times when you go into a genre), so delete your genre folder (And years and artists if you are using them) before you recreate the DB.

I am hoping to get the deletion of these files automated when you select generate Db, it's just something i keep forgetting to impliment.

[Flake]

OK as I've stated earlier, as I progress on cleaning up my music files I periodically re-run the config to see what I'm doing is working and I have to say I'm just bewildered as to the results.  So last night I re-run the config and now none of my Alice in Chains albums show up - at all.  I can access them via the search function but they dont show up in the album view.  Now these files are all tagged properly and in mp3 format.  I have good coverart and everything.  They have even shown up and were working fine during earlier config runs.  Now all of sudden they aren't?  Also, none of my Radiohead coverart shows up now and it used to before?  These are not the only examples of problems just using them to describe the general pattern of random failure of my use of this software.

I have to tell you man this is getting seriously frustrating.  What gives?  I downloaded the demo version you had on your site back in late December.  Is this a stable version?  Should I download a new demo?

[Barry Barcrest]

There has been an updated config released over on the freebox forums. You would be better posting there as there are a lot more users to help you out with your issues.

[Flake]

Arrrrggghhh...........couldnt find the new config file.  Posted a plea for help on the forum.

[Barry Barcrest]

I sent you a PM with the link to it in.

[Flake]

I got it last night - thanks.  Didnt solve my problem though.  Not only that but some of the thumbnails its creating are like all white with what looks like some lettering from a post in this forum or something......really weird.    

I appreciate the help man but this software and me just dont seem to be getting along at all.  I think I might try Nordbeat or Ejukebox, although they are expensive.............I dont know maybe I'll give Touchtrax another shot as well.  Although it seemed to lag on my computer (P4 2.0GHZ with 1 GB RAM and 80 GB HD).  I tried Albumplayer as well but everytime I wanted to add just one song to the queue it would add the entire album.  I just couldnt figure out how to just add one song at all in like a 15 min time period so you know others will have the same issues.  I want question free software.  After having to retrain everyone over and over on the mame cabinet everytime I wanted something thath would be question free.  Thats what I like about Freebox is the look and simplicity.

[Barry Barcrest]

When it is generating it's covers you should not have anything else going on because of the crappy code i used to resize the thumbnails it will grab whatever is displaying ontop of the thumbnail hence you seeing forum posts etc.

Sorry you couldn't get on with the software. Sounds like you have been havin issues with other software as well i really just don't know what else to say 

[Flake]

Yes clearly I am a jukebox noob.  I cant believe I'm spending more time configuring software on a jukebox setup than I did on my mame cabinet. 

Boggles the mind it does.