Compilation Albums.... Again

The tagging regime I use for compilation albums for Asset is as follows:

Compilation : 1

Artist: name of the individual artist

Album Artist: <blank>

Title: %track% - %title% (%artist%)

The most important step is to ensure that you have the Compilation tag set properly and leave the Album Artist field blank. You may need to add the Compilation tag manually using the extended tags dialog (Alt +T in mp3tag). This system works for me as the album shows only once in album view as various artists and the individual track artist can be identified from the track title.

As ever, I suggest you test on a sample compilation before applying to your whole library.

Good luck!

Thank you for the reply,

I set the tag id's as you have and even re-ripped in DB Poweramp and set the compilation tag from there and from within DB Poweramp but the albums are still fragmented.

My musical tastes are fairly simple and I only use the album / artist search and having numerous artists, especially ones i do not like, show up on the i-pad screen is irritating to say the  least.

I am sure there must be a way to make the compilation albums behave as they do in ITunes and Twonky ie compilation album listed under Various Artists but still identifying the track artist without imbeddiing it in the track title.

Thank you again for the reply, if anyone else has any ideas it would be appreciated as this is really spoiling my enjoyment of an excellent naim product

Mr Deeds

Although i don't use Asset, i have previously and but had no issue with compilation CD's

My settings for albums using sj's layout

For CD1

Compilation : <blank>

Disknumber : 1

Artist: name of the individual artist

Thank you for the reply Foxman,

I am not sure if I have tried leaving the compilation tag blank I will try when I get home from work

I dont know if this helps but I got the compilation albums to list correctly, or to my taste, in Twonky by adding the folder Various Artists to the Compilation directories. I then see in N-steam Album Title, Track Title and Track artist without the need to embed the tack artist in the tack title.

To me it seems a basic function of any DLNA software to at least give an option to group compilation albumartists together.

Tried the above but 'am still unable to get this to work

I have spoke to Naim and they have insisted that this is a tagging issue and although it sounded like he knew what it was, he would tell even when I pushed and to be honest was a little upset with the attitude, even if it is understandable as it is a third party issue.

I have managed to get things working correctly in Kazoo as well as Twonky, just looks like a admit defeat.

OK, I'm coming at this from a different angle. This may be an issue related to the browse tree views you've configured in Asset. If you're using the "Artist/Album" view then your compilation tracks will be split between the individual artists. To avoid this you might try having a simple "Album" view (no ticks in the A to Z or the No Track List boxes) without any further sublevels. Try this with the tags I suggested.

Failing this I think you'll have to raise your issue on the Illustrate/Asset UPnP forum as Mr Spoon is usually very helpful.

Thanks again for taking time out to reply SJ, am sure these posts are frustrating for the regulars here and to be honest am kinda embarrassed about my ignorance.

Am almost certain your on the right lines about it being to do with asset set up, I've found another thread here regarding the tree structure with some basic instructions, I'll have another go in the morning and tie it in with your advice on tags.

At least I feel like, with the help here am making progress, your help is appreciated.

I use Asset, and for my compilations I set the Album Artist to 'Various Artists' and the compilation flag to 1.  This works for me (or at least did work - I can't say that I've noticed one way or the other recently as it isn't heavily used).

This got me wondering, though.  What would happen if compilation was set to 1 for all albums?  Would that make normal albums misbehave in some way?  I might have to give it a try.

Interesting post. I didn't have this problems before with Twonky and now have introduced those ones with Asset. I will have a look at the suggestions for setting the compilation flag if that works for me. As I find it quite annoying to see multiple versions of the same album.

Not sure why you would want to do this but I'd expect that the albums would show up as "Various Artists" in Album view.

I have set Album Artist to 'Various Artists' and the compilation flag to 1, I have also tried leaving the Album Artist blank - compilation flag to 1 and removing the compilation flag.

Whatever I do the album becomes fragmented into artists on a Artist /Album search which is all I really use in N-Stream.

In Twonky all you have to do is specify which folders you want to be treated as a compilation album but in Asset the compilation flag doesn't seem to do a thing, on, off set to 1 0r 0

Qnap 251 has arrived but might as well go back as Twonky on The WD My cloud just works

I still believe that using the "Artist/Album" view is at the root of your problem so I think you have 3 options:

1. Add a simple "Album" view as I suggested earlier

2.  Retain "Artist/Album" as your main (only?) browse view but retag your existing compilations with "Various Artists" as both the "Artist" and "Album Artist" (to be sure, to be sure) but before doing so change the track title format to %title% (%artist%) i.e. the original individual artist so that you can identify the true artist.

3. Use a different UPnP server as you have suggested.

I use Asset and also set the compilation flag and Album Artist to 'Various Artists'.

To overcome the fragmentation I do not use the Artist / Album tree in Asset but have added a new one as follows:

Parent: Album Artist / Album (A-Z and No Track Listing both checked)

Child: Album (A-Z and No Track Listing both unchecked)

This then lists by album artists only and no album fragmentation occurs.

You can test this behaviour before making changes by browsing the Advanced Search tree that will be presented in Nstream.  It is listed as Album Artist / Album.  This assumes you have not removed any of these!

Richard

SJ thank you for your time and input, I have no idea why your suggestion didn't work for me other than my lack of ability in tagging.

Richard, thank you that seems to have done the trick, I did try this last night, I had noticed you suggested this in another thread. It didn't work last night but admittedly it was about 1.30 and I was tired and frustrated by then.

Thanks to all for your time and input

Rod

No problem, DD.

Just glad to hear you've got it sorted out.

ATB

Steve

Hi again chaps,

i've run in to trouble again, all of the track artist names have gone from the compilation albums I was testing today.

Haven't changed a thing, all I did was install and run asset for the Qnap 251, followed the tree structure that Richard advised, even uploaded the same files to the Qnap that worked this morning.

if I wasn't laughing think I'd cry 

Install minimserver see if that helps

I've got no idea where they went, everything was working ok this morning album listed under various artists, tracks had the contributing artist and no album fragmentation.

To be honest fed up with it now, think I'll return the Qnap and drive and stick with my flaky WD NAS, at least it works �� so if anyones after a cheap Qnap NAS I'd keep my eye out on Amazon warehouse deals.

I've been reading up on the minimserver forums and it appears the problem is tha apps such as N-stream and Twonky misinterprate the industry protocol incorrectly, think this comes from the guy who develops minimserver, so this explains why N-stream and Twonky work for me.

I've deleted my last rather long reply having read your posts on the illustrate/asset forum. It seems that you want Asset to do something which it cannot do i.e. collate all tracks on a compilation by different artists and to show these with the name of the individual track artist without the artists name forming part of the track title.

Asset organises audio data based upon the tag metadata rather than which files are collected together in the same folder. It can collate tracks on a single album by different artists using the album tag data and the compilation tag but then the album artist must be left blank. Asset will then treat the album artist as "various artists". You will then be able to see these albums using the "Album Artist/Album" (A to Z and No Tracklist both checked) parent view with the "Album" (A to Z and No Tracklist unchecked) child view but you will not see the individual track artists names unless these are included as part of the track title. 

If you believe that Twonky is able to do what you want, then you can install Twonky on your QNAP251 via Control Panel > DLNA Media Server > Enable TwonkyMedia DLNA Server.

Sorry SJ, am away with the kids at the moment, only fair I have neglected them the last few days.☺️

I was going to read your other post later as well, I have sent the NAS back as I was getting frustrated and not enjoying my music, you are correct Twonky and kazoo both worked on the Nas. I followed exactly what worked in the morning on the trial PCs version of Assset, maybe the beta version I used has a bug, it's supposed to fix the issue of the album artist field not leaving the field blank even when removed.

I decided i am going to use my powerful gaming PC to stream from, I tested it quick with JRiver transcoding to WAV, playing the 40th anniversary edition of Ziggy Stardust and the difference is really night and day against the Qnap, which surprised me as it's connect via power plug. Am not sure I believe the theory that wav sounds better than other formats, AIFF or FLAC but there's a definite improvement, maybe it's that. All compilation albums were correctly grouped as well ��

Thaks again for all your efforts and time, it really was appreciated

Nothing worked - so for my jazz collection I fixed it the hard way by just making the artist also various like with the album artist - I know I loose something but I hate it how it's working without that setting. and I don't want to go back to fkac playing on Naim.

Bert, am nothing worked, I couldn't live with a system that was unable to display track artists in a compilation album.

All my compilation albums are tributes to other artists or the like of classic rock CD's with artists am not familiar with, so knowing who performing is kinda nice

I've settled to use JRiver as it displays everything as it should but even  with this there are issues, am seriously starting to think I have made a mistake moving from Linn to Naim

Oh well time to start another thread,