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Post by Boomzilla on Jun 3, 2019 6:32:32 GMT -5
I once had a music library that was neat and tidy. Each album had the correct wav-file tracks, name, and artwork. There were many, many hours invested in cleaning and tagging that library in JRiver Media Center to get to that point.
And then I switched to Roon...
Now, what were single albums are shown as individual tracks (with different artwork). If the tracks were all individually separated, it would be easy enough to recombine them, but Roon has lumped tracks 2 and 10 into one file, tracks 3, 7, and 11 into another file (with a different album name and artwork), and the rest of the tracks are listed as individual "albums" that may or may not have the same artwork and album name. Multi-disc albums are scattered and changed even worse. I have five to ten times the number of "albums" t should have. And like Humpty Dumpty, there seems no way to ever put the data back together again.
When I select the multiple "albums" of the same name and artwork in Roon, and then ask that they be merged, Roon says that there are duplicates, and that the songs should be separated into multiple discs. Even when I accept Roon's guess as to what should be in what disc, Roon then tells me that there are duplicate tracks (or tracks with identical numbers).
The majority of my "albums" in Roon now seem to have but one or two tracks in them. Even if there are more tracks, the metadata is scrambled, and often tracks are missing.
In short, Roon has massacred my music library, and there seems no way to restore it.
Of course, I could go through my 4 TB of music, album-by-album to compare what the IMDB says should be on each album with whatever mess Roon has made, but I haven't the time.
In retrospect, FLAC format might have been a better option, but hindsight is always 20-20. So although Roon is a better player (than JRiver), its absolutely pathetic tag/metadata handling makes me surprised that it's even considered a salable product. I've seen freeware that works better.
Am I uniquely snakebit with this (judging from online postings, I'm guessing not)? So what's WRONG with Roon that's caused this, and is there any way back to the neatly organized library I once had?
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klinemj
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Post by klinemj on Jun 3, 2019 6:54:55 GMT -5
I don't know what you do in ripping, but you seem to have a lot of issues with libraries. I just have mine ripped to FLAC and didn't do anything special as I ripped them (no special "cleaning" or "tagging". And all has been good no matter what player I use to play them.
Not knowing what you did as you "cleaned and tagged" your library, I have no idea what went wrong. But, you are getting a very different result than me for sure.
Mark
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Post by Boomzilla on Jun 3, 2019 7:01:44 GMT -5
Hi Mark -
Format is the difference. FLAC format includes all metadata in the individual file. WAV doesn’t.
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klinemj
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Post by klinemj on Jun 3, 2019 8:01:13 GMT -5
True...luckily, I learned early on (within 100 or so rips) that WAV was not for me....for that very reason. I hated that it didn't even carry the track numbers, so albums that were supposed to play in a set order did not - played in alphabetical order of track name.
As I recall, I used JRiver to convert WAV to FLAC and when I did - it brought the metadata. I think it even did it in batches (vs. 1 CD at a time)...been so long I can't recall. But, might be worth a try.
Mark
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klinemj
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Post by klinemj on Jun 3, 2019 8:03:14 GMT -5
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Post by GreenKiwi on Jun 3, 2019 8:05:36 GMT -5
Yeah, I was going to suggest that shifting to FLAC might be the best option for ROON (and just about everything else). There's so much CPU power out there that the little needed to do the decompression should be next to nothing.
Do you happen to have an extra drive handy? You could just set JRMC to convert your library to FLAC. Either by cloning the whole library first, or copying/exporting into the second library.
If it were me, I'd copy the whole library first and then work on the copy.
Good luck.
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Post by wilburthegoose on Jun 3, 2019 8:22:24 GMT -5
Boomzilla - you remind me of Schroeder from Peanuts. Bad stuff seems to keep hitting you. I currently have 36,870 tracks in my Roon library and (as far as I know) have zero problems. Pre-Roon, I had ripped everything to FLAC with dbPoweramp. I agree 100% with GreenKiwi , but would add that dbPoweramp has a really fast converter to get you to FLAC: www.dbpoweramp.com/dmc.htm
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Post by Loop 7 on Jun 3, 2019 8:27:08 GMT -5
WAV is challenging and I ended up giving up on the format for metadata reasons. ALAC and FLAC have served me effortlessly in Roon. wilburthegoose offers an elegant solution for batch conversions. |
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Post by Boomzilla on Jun 3, 2019 9:03:46 GMT -5
The DB Poweramp package I bought came with a batch conversion tool. I may well take the backup drive and convert all the music to FLAC there. Then I can nuke the Roon library and start over.
Thanks for the info, guys - I appreciate it.
Boom
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klinemj
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Post by klinemj on Jun 3, 2019 9:04:04 GMT -5
Looks like the reco is unanimous so far...switch to FLAC...and you can use dbpoweramp or JRMC to batch convert. I like Greenkiwi's suggestion to make a copy and work on it.
Mark
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klinemj
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Post by klinemj on Jun 3, 2019 9:05:19 GMT -5
looks like we posted at the same time...JRMC also has batch convert. Not sure which is better at it...dbpa or jrmc.
Mark
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DYohn
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Post by DYohn on Jun 3, 2019 9:18:40 GMT -5
Funny how I've never had these sorts of problems.
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KeithL
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Post by KeithL on Jun 3, 2019 9:53:05 GMT -5
I've found that dBPowerAmp seems to have the most powerful and most universal tagging options. (Although this means that you have to put a little effort into programming it to do what you want.) The batch converter in dBPowerAmp is also remarkably powerful.
I can also make a guess about what happened.... although this is just an educated guess. Tags are basically database fields - but there is no actual standard for what tags to use or what they mean. Because of this, different programs may use different ones, ignore tags created by other programs, or interpret the same tags somewhat differently.
So, while things like Artist and Album seem pretty standard, different programs can make up their own tags, or ignore tags used by others. Because of this, tags that are interpreted one way by JRiver may be interpreted differently by Roon. (And, since you can make up your own tag fields, there's no telling how those will be interpreted, or ignored, by various programs.) Odds are, if you use the same program to RIP, and then play, your music, the tags will make sense... However, when you try to transport them between programs, sometimes weird things happen. For example, if you RIP a copy of Beethoven's Fifth, performed by the Boston Pops, conducted by Arthur Fiedler, on a certain date....
It may be obvious that "Composer" is "Beethoven".
But, whose name goes in "Artist"? Is it "Beethoven" or "Boston Pops" or "Fiedler"? Personally, since I tend to use several different programs, and change around quite often, I prefer to organize my files PHYSICALLY. So, for example, in my library.... The first song from Blue Oyster Cult's album entitled Agents of Fortune is named "01 - This Ain't The Summer of Love"... Which is in a folder named "Agents of Fortune"... Which is in a folder named "Blue Oyster Cult"... So, that song is stored as: C:\LOSSLESS_MUSIC\Blue Oyster Cult\Agents Of Fortune\01 - This Ain't The Summer Of Love.FLAC That way, if the tags don't work right, I can just look for the file itself to be PHYSICALLY where it belongs on the disc.
Note that, by prepending the track number, in two-digit format, I've made sure that song lists first both alphabetically and numerically.
If I cared about when albums were produced I would have named the album "1976 - Agents of Fortune".
dBPowerAmp can be programmed to do this, including setting up the file name formats, and putting them in the right folders, at the same time it RIPs the CD.
It's a lot of work to figure out - but, once you do figure it out, you only have to do it once...
If you like to rearrange files a lot - and fiddle around with the tags - then you should also check out a program called "Tag & Rename". It does a lot of stuff... including intelligently reorganizing and converting tags and creating tags based on physical locations.
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Post by monkumonku on Jun 3, 2019 11:17:42 GMT -5
Boomzilla - you remind me of Schroeder from Peanuts. Bad stuff seems to keep hitting you. I currently have 36,870 tracks in my Roon library and (as far as I know) have zero problems. Pre-Roon, I had ripped everything to FLAC with dbPoweramp. I agree 100% with GreenKiwi , but would add that dbPoweramp has a really fast converter to get you to FLAC: www.dbpoweramp.com/dmc.htm Schroeder is the one who plays piano and worships Beethoven. Don't you mean Charlie Brown? |
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Post by wilburthegoose on Jun 3, 2019 12:04:39 GMT -5
Actually, you're right monkumonku ! I meant Pig Pen  |
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Post by bluemeanies on Jun 3, 2019 12:19:32 GMT -5
I once had a music library that was neat and tidy. Each album had the correct wav-file tracks, name, and artwork. There were many, many hours invested in cleaning and tagging that library in JRiver Media Center to get to that point. And then I switched to Roon... Now, what were single albums are shown as individual tracks (with different artwork). If the tracks were all individually separated, it would be easy enough to recombine them, but Roon has lumped tracks 2 and 10 into one file, tracks 3, 7, and 11 into another file (with a different album name and artwork), and the rest of the tracks are listed as individual "albums" that may or may not have the same artwork and album name. Multi-disc albums are scattered and changed even worse. I have five to ten times the number of "albums" t should have. And like Humpty Dumpty, there seems no way to ever put the data back together again. When I select the multiple "albums" of the same name and artwork in Roon, and then ask that they be merged, Roon says that there are duplicates, and that the songs should be separated into multiple discs. Even when I accept Roon's guess as to what should be in what disc, Roon then tells me that there are duplicate tracks (or tracks with identical numbers). The majority of my "albums" in Roon now seem to have but one or two tracks in them. Even if there are more tracks, the metadata is scrambled, and often tracks are missing. In short, Roon has massacred my music library, and there seems no way to restore it. Of course, I could go through my 4 TB of music, album-by-album to compare what the IMDB says should be on each album with whatever mess Roon has made, but I haven't the time. In retrospect, FLAC format might have been a better option, but hindsight is always 20-20. So although Roon is a better player (than JRiver), its absolutely pathetic tag/metadata handling makes me surprised that it's even considered a salable product. I've seen freeware that works better. Am I uniquely snakebit with this (judging from online postings, I'm guessing not)? So what's WRONG with Roon that's caused this, and is there any way back to the neatly organized library I once had? Bummer BOOM..sorry to read this. Your story sounds familiar by way of other forums...A good reason to search for another venue...streaming services to your liking...unfortunately you had a bad experience involving TIDAL but revolving around BB...IMO I would throw in the towel and resort to a quality streaming service...Qubuz is now in the U.S. marketplace. OR back to the basics...phyiscally handle your CD's NO OFFENSE PEOPLE...seems like you guys like to work more than listening to your music 🎶 |
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Post by novisnick on Jun 3, 2019 12:49:33 GMT -5
I once had a music library that was neat and tidy. Each album had the correct wav-file tracks, name, and artwork. There were many, many hours invested in cleaning and tagging that library in JRiver Media Center to get to that point. And then I switched to Roon... Now, what were single albums are shown as individual tracks (with different artwork). If the tracks were all individually separated, it would be easy enough to recombine them, but Roon has lumped tracks 2 and 10 into one file, tracks 3, 7, and 11 into another file (with a different album name and artwork), and the rest of the tracks are listed as individual "albums" that may or may not have the same artwork and album name. Multi-disc albums are scattered and changed even worse. I have five to ten times the number of "albums" t should have. And like Humpty Dumpty, there seems no way to ever put the data back together again. When I select the multiple "albums" of the same name and artwork in Roon, and then ask that they be merged, Roon says that there are duplicates, and that the songs should be separated into multiple discs. Even when I accept Roon's guess as to what should be in what disc, Roon then tells me that there are duplicate tracks (or tracks with identical numbers). The majority of my "albums" in Roon now seem to have but one or two tracks in them. Even if there are more tracks, the metadata is scrambled, and often tracks are missing. In short, Roon has massacred my music library, and there seems no way to restore it. Of course, I could go through my 4 TB of music, album-by-album to compare what the IMDB says should be on each album with whatever mess Roon has made, but I haven't the time. In retrospect, FLAC format might have been a better option, but hindsight is always 20-20. So although Roon is a better player (than JRiver), its absolutely pathetic tag/metadata handling makes me surprised that it's even considered a salable product. I've seen freeware that works better. Am I uniquely snakebit with this (judging from online postings, I'm guessing not)? So what's WRONG with Roon that's caused this, and is there any way back to the neatly organized library I once had? Bummer BOOM..sorry to read this. Your story sounds familiar by way of other forums...A good reason to search for another venue...streaming services to your liking...unfortunately you had a bad experience involving TIDAL but revolving around BB...IMO I would throw in the towel and resort to a quality streaming service...Qubuz is now in the U.S. marketplace. OR back to the basics...phyiscally handle your CD's NO OFFENSE PEOPLE...seems like you guys like to work more than listening to your music 🎶
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klinemj
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Post by klinemj on Jun 3, 2019 13:19:49 GMT -5
KeithL maybe you missed it above. He did a lot of manual tagging of WAV files My guess is something got boogered up there. I have had no issue ripping FLAC with Jriver and using Roon or other players to play it. Same for many others here. And, many of us who did rip to WAV used JRMC and dbpa to batch convert to FLAC successfully. Mark
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Post by monkumonku on Jun 3, 2019 14:33:59 GMT -5
Actually, you're right monkumonku ! I meant Pig Pen He's not the guy to invite over when you're playing vinyl.   |
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Post by wilburthegoose on Jun 3, 2019 16:17:02 GMT -5
bluemeanies - I spend a total of zero minutes a week curating my collection. I do spend time looking for good new albums on Tidal to add to my collection. PS - I tried Qubuz for a month, but dropped it. Simply not enough albums I wanted to listen to were available on Qubuz (I think it's still very Euro-centric and heavy on Classical). I have zero issues with Tidal. PPS - Using physical CDs in 2019 would take a LOT more work than my zero minutes per month.
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