SqueezeCenter testing problems

mrdark8

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I'm feeling a little tired so apologies, if this post is a little rushed, etc.

I've been ripping CD collection to .flac (via EAC and tagged with Mp3tag) and now have some 26GB+ so far, though some are .mp3, which were downloads and have to stay as .mp3 accordingly.

I've been trying "SqueezeCenter 7.2" with "SoftSqueeze 3.7" - the virtual SB player.

Neither are running properly. Although I've not tried a lot with them, I have scanned my music folder ok and did see glimpses of things working a few days ago.

What happens is, SqueezeCenter usually loads (not always) in Internet Explorer 7 but once 'in', I can't view any albums or any other options for viewing/playing my music anymore.

SoftSqueeze has dropped connection and doesn't play anything. A few days ago, SoftSqueeze worked in as far as it played a chosen track but then wouldn't allow searching fluidly after or during playback. It just lagged seriously and then froze. I had to resort to closing via Windows.

This is frustrating as I was eager to get a SB3 (SB Classic) but this performance is putting me off.

The test PC isn't cutting edge but should be plenty:- Win XP Home SP3, P4 @3Ghz + 512MB RAM and plenty of HDD unused.

Could anti-nasty software I have be blocking something? There are no obvious errors but SoftSqueeze 'log' does say something like 'lost connection'.

I'll give it a go over weekend as I remain hopefull and have not yet tinkered a great deal.

I would like to experience this software as it's meant to be (i.e. fluid and easy to use)

Ramble over. Any advice would be great, maybe some things I can check over that I've ommmited in my hasty testing?

PS: Cleaning CDs, ripping, tagging, adding album covers and organising into folders is quite time consuming. I reckon on about 30mins per album, all in and being quite methodical.
 
hi mrdark8 i have a sb3 and recently updated the software to 7.2 and had nothing but trouble sb3 not connecting ex ext easy solution uninstalled it did a registary clean rebooted put 7.1 back all is well . 7.1 is rock solid the sb3 is a great peice of kit the best up grade i have made, try the 7.1 hope it goes well.:hiya:
 
I've only tried SoftSqueeze a few times and it in no way reflects the performance of a real SB. Frequent crashes and lost connections like what you're experiencing. The actual SB is flawless for me (well nearly).

If you're finding the ripping process time consuming, try dbPowerAmp. There is a charge but you can trial it for 30 days. It has batch ripping capabilities if you have multiple CD drives, automatic tagging checked with multiple sources and album art lookup. It's not free, but if you value your time that much, it seems to be well worth the investment from what others have said.
 
Thanks for your reply :)

I think I'll follow your advice and remove Version 7.2/clear Windows in favour of the earlier Version.

Do you have a link to the download for earlier SqueezeCenter?

I had a quick look on Logitech site and only seems to be 7.2 available to trial.
 
Version 7.1 is available here

I'll add my praise for this version. It's been rock solid since I installed it and I have never felt the need to upgrade. :thumbsup:
 
david f1976

Your comment: "it in no way reflects the performance of a real SB" is reassuring. TBH, I was expecting the real thing to be responsive (fluid) but was still put off somewhat by my experience with the 7.2 server - 'client' software.

I really couldn't live with a system as unresponsive as the 'test bed' I had going for a few days. Actually, make that unuseable.

I've not been using my HI-FI since my TV blew up a few weeks ago during the final fight of a Stevan Segal movie on TV. It was a CRT which made a loud fizzy noise, flashed and smelt of burning plastic. I cut the cord with scissors and got it out of my room quite sharpish. It made me jump slightly, I prefer to think, I reacted appropriately :blush:

TV was played though a line-in on my pre-amp. I'm now kind of saving my HI-FI until I get all my music sorted and perhaps will add an LCD along with a SB3.

I'm thinking about using a notebook (should "Centrino 2" platform ever come to more Dell models, giving the extended battery life I'm after) on the web inteface to make playlists, anticipating this being easier to do graphically. Normal use, I'll use the supplied regular remote as not too eager to get the Duet remote although it does look smart and because it's £100 I can put towards a TV and other toys I'm looking at:D

History

I used to have a 5-CD player as my mini jukebox audio source. I wore that out some time ago! Since then, I picked up an old single slot CDP to tide me over until I could get a good quality sound from PC.

I have tried PC audio before with 320Kbps .mp3s before I learnt of SB and .flac. I used Windows Media Player 11 and something called a "HI-FI Link" by Xitel which bypassed all PC Audio and went from USB (USB A > B) into the Xitel's own 20-bit DAC and then onto my pre-amp (technically it's an integrated but pre and power sections can be seperated and it only acts as a pre) via long shielded 2-RCA cables. This sounded okay but wasn't satisfying enough.

Not quite sure how to describe it but there wasn't enough detail to my ears. I'd say too much bass was cut-out. Listening against a (not high-end) CDP with the same track playing showed up too much difference between the two with CDP clearly winning.

I've seen good reviews for the SB3 and understand that it can be improved by using an outboard DAC, if necessary.

Peter314

Cheers for the link, hopefully SoftSqueeze will play nicely this time (even though it's no match for the real thing as per david, I just want a feel for it)
 
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If you're finding the ripping process time consuming, try dbPowerAmp

Whilst I grumbled initially about the time it takes, I don't really mind all that much. It's only that it does take a long time to get ones back catalogue of music properly ripped, tagged and organised.

Once done, it'll only be a question of adding new CDs and rescanning the music library (unless I lose everything before getting a backup system implemented!)

This won't be much hassle longer term.

Gotta get back to moving mp3 downloads around folders now and perhaps give that remaining picky CD at the edge of the desk another go at ripping.
 
PS: Cleaning CDs, ripping, tagging, adding album covers and organising into folders is quite time consuming. I reckon on about 30mins per album, all in and being quite methodical.

Wow, that's a long time. How much of that is ripping etc? You should be able to bring that right down for most CD's. What is your work flow?
 
Hello Autopilot,

Having followed a guide A Perfectionist's Guide to Audio CD Extraction and Lossless Compression and mostly applying the recommended settings, my workflow process has been:


  1. Open EAC (closing open programs but not background tasks)
  2. Check CD is clear of dust and greese. Clean with cotton sleeve or clean with radial cleaning disc (Microtech) + cleaning fluid (well, it allows me to bring in another gadget!)
  3. Insert CD into a DVD-RW Drive (I do have a DVD-ROM 16x also) Model: Pioneer DVD RW DVR-107D (Driver not recently updated)
  4. Allow "AccurateRip" to detect CD (if it can, I had to change the CDDB server on either EAC or Mp3tag after 40 or so CDs)
  5. EAC > press Shift+F6 (to do same as Menu > "Test & Copy Selected Tracks" > Compressed)
  6. Watch a little to see if first track Reads OK and then begins extracting audio
  7. Find biscuits, old PC mags on shelf above PC to amuse myself
  8. Check the log type file when 100% reached to see if tracks are 100% accurate (or 99.5% ish) - as earlier post, compression is external Flac 1.2.1. Remove CD
  9. Open Windows Explorer + navigate my EAC dir + create artist folder (if necessary)
  10. Move EAC created album folder into new artist folder + rename in Title Case with year (I created a consistant way of naming things)
  11. Open Mp3tag + open album. Select all tracks + tag artist, album, year + add album cover art (cover art obtained from when I ripped mp3s or else find online and try to keep around 200x200 pixels or less
  12. Go through each track and correct mistakes + Title Case checking against CD cover (often mistakes for detected CDs) Use something like allmusic.com if I've not got cover or something
  13. Convert 'Tag to Filename' in Mp3tag + save tags
  14. Check that the album folder in Windows is accurate. I know it should be but I use this to double check I didn't miss anything in Mp3tag or made a mistake
  15. Neatly arrange my "done" pile of CDs lovingly with a glee of satisfaction
  16. Grab the next CD, smell the mostly unopended paper insert and start again

I would say most of the time is ripping, maybe 85%

I've ripped virtually all my CDs and have moved onto checking the tags and relocating several hundred mp3s to conform to new naming structure.

Please don't be offended if any of the above is really obvious, I'm just trying to include it all for completeness of my process :smashin:

Note - I didn't know to begin with that I could batch tag things and so was adding album art and artist name to each track in term. :oops:

Genre

I'm not sure if it's worth checking years of album release and also changing all "Genres". I accepted most genres, hoping to find a site (or two) from which to gather this information. Within a site, it may be more accurate in the way bands are compared against each other as opposed to just searching randomly and finding a genre.

The problem being that genres aren't very consistant. One persons 'grunge' for example is anothers 'alt rock' or just 'rock' and so on. Indeed, some people don't want to add a genre as it 'pigeon holes' things too crudely. If you like an artist, you like them (or a track or 2) whether it's classical, world or pop...

If I only add one genre tag, it needs to be the most accurate. I haven't worried too much with this as I'll probably not search the music library in this way. Still, it'd be nice to get the metadata on.
 
If you still have a lot of CD's to get through - here is my top tip for saving time - just rip to WAV, cutting out the compression part for now. Making sure you have a sensible folder structure like artist/album/01 example track.wav, as WAV's can't be tagged.

Once all you albums are ripped to WAV, which will be much quicker, then use DBpowerAMP or Foobar2000 to batch compress the WAV's to FLAC, MP3 or whatever - you can sleep/work/drink while this is going on. Then clean up your tags etc. I have known this technique save people days sitting at the PC.

BTW, while EAC is probably the best DBpowerAMP is virtually as good and also uses AccurateRip. It's not free, but uses a subscription based service to add tags and Album Art at the time of ripping from a much better database. Overall i think it's better than EAC, considering all the extra features, and worth the money. I use EAC + MP3tag, but it's worth mentioning. Easier to use too.
 
SqueezeCenter - UPDATE

:thumbsup: Thanks to the link above, I can confirm that version 7.1 is working. My 'test rig' allows me to search properly (responsive) in SoftSqueeze and I've gotten to grips with it.

The web inteface seems ok also. It would be nice to be able to open albums in their own window for e.g. making playlists.

I've not restarted the server/virtual receiver though because since I started playing, I don't want to turn it off (and that's using PC soundcard 3.5mm to old Micro HI-FI system with limited speakers in this room)

Autopilot

Thanks for that info, it may well help another forumite but I stuck with my rather long winded approach as I'd got quite far and having played all afternoon, I've done virtually all of the work now. Pheeeeeew.

I've got a modest 28.5GB of flac/mp3.


Next up - external backup HDD or NAS!


SB Classic

A couple of questions:

  1. Does the display on the REAL SB3 (Classic) flicker or is this just something that occurs on SoftSqueeze?
  2. Is there any 'static' type noise when playing a new track on REAL SB3 as on my PC, there is a brief ((tiss)) sound - if you know what I mean? Only for the briefest time when starting a different track. I'm only concerned about my amps, should this occur for real (I expect it doesn't btw)
 
>A couple of questions:<

No and no.:thumbsup:
 
Hey all
Can you tell me where I can find a link to SoftSqueeze 3.7?
I've looked on Slimdevices download section but couldn't find it.
I've previously dabbled streaming to my xbox 360 with some frustrating results & would like to check out how the Squeezebox family will work for me.

Cheers, Paul
 

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