Displaying album art in nStream

Posted by: Gajdzin on 07 March 2014

I read several threads here about problems with displaying album art in nStream, but none of them address my problem, so maybe someone will help me... Based on the advice here I started rippig my CD collection with dbPoweramp to Synology DS214play NAS. Format is FLAC Level 5, transcoding to WAV by Synology Media Server. The music plays correctly on ND5XS.

 

The problem: album art is in FLAC files, I can see it in nStream when viewing the contents of an album or the list of all songs by a given artist. However, I see no album art when viewing the list of albums by a given artist ("by Album" or "By Album Artist"). And this is where seeing the images is really needed...

 

So I read that I should drop the album art *.JPG into each album folder to fix this. Does it mean I have to manually download from the Internet 1500+ album art images...? So far dbPoweramp pulls those images for me automatically, but it doesn't save them as a separate file, only embed in the FLACs.

 

Or is there some utility that could automatically go into the FLACs in every folder, extract the image and save it as a JPG file in the album folder?

 

For now I stopped ripping until this is resolved, don't want to have to go back and re-rip...

 

PS. I did try clearing the cache in nStream, didn't help.

 

Any advice most appreciated!

Posted on: 19 April 2014 by Gajdzin
Originally Posted by Freightliner Mark:

I have the same problem trying to to see album art.

For the last 2 days NSTREAM has either shown no art / individual mozart opera art in Wagner, and just basically jummbled up Unusable and a waste of time.

Coupled with the fact that my Operas and Symphonies (6000 cds worth) play in the wrong order because I have to have them in files for ease of finding, I REALLY TRUELY HONESTLY wish I had never started streaming. More time is spent on the PC trying to sort out problems (Which are still there)

Yours disappointing NDS streamer.

Sorry to grumble though!

Hey Mark, I was exactly in the same spot a few months ago, after getting my ND5XS and you can find on this forum my posts that were at least as frustrated as yours (no, more frustrated

 

Just take your time, ask questions here, the helpful folks on the forum will help you! After a while you will laugh at how simple it was to solve all those problems.

 

nStream is not perfect, occasionally if you have problem like yours you have to re-index the music on your server, then in nStream go to the menu in the bottom left corner and: "Clear UPnP Cache" and "Clear Image Cache" - that solves 90% of problems. The remaining 10% usually have to do with tagging. There's a lot of good free software for editing the tags on your ripped recordings, just search the forum.

 

Take your time - it's worth it! I listen to SO much more music ever since I ripped my entire CD collection and moved to streaming... Yes, there were very frustrating moments, but now it just WORKS!

Posted on: 19 April 2014 by Freightliner Mark
Originally Posted by Gajdzin:
Originally Posted by Freightliner Mark:

I have the same problem trying to to see album art.

For the last 2 days NSTREAM has either shown no art / individual mozart opera art in Wagner, and just basically jummbled up Unusable and a waste of time.

Coupled with the fact that my Operas and Symphonies (6000 cds worth) play in the wrong order because I have to have them in files for ease of finding, I REALLY TRUELY HONESTLY wish I had never started streaming. More time is spent on the PC trying to sort out problems (Which are still there)

Yours disappointing NDS streamer.

Sorry to grumble though!

Hey Mark, I was exactly in the same spot a few months ago, after getting my ND5XS and you can find on this forum my posts that were at least as frustrated as yours (no, more frustrated

 

Just take your time, ask questions here, the helpful folks on the forum will help you! After a while you will laugh at how simple it was to solve all those problems.

 

nStream is not perfect, you do have to re-index the music on your server, "Clear UPnP Cache" now and then and "Clear Image Cache" - that solves 90% of problems. The remaining 10% usually have to do with tagging. There's a lot of good free software for editing the tags on your ripped recordings, just search the forum.

 

Take your time - it's worth it! I listen to SO much more music ever since I ripped my entire CD collection and moved to streaming... Yes, there were very frustrating moments, but now it just WORKS!

 

Posted on: 19 April 2014 by Freightliner Mark
Originally Posted by Gajdzin:
Originally Posted by Freightliner Mark:

I have the same problem trying to to see album art.

For the last 2 days NSTREAM has either shown no art / individual mozart opera art in Wagner, and just basically jummbled up Unusable and a waste of time.

Coupled with the fact that my Operas and Symphonies (6000 cds worth) play in the wrong order because I have to have them in files for ease of finding, I REALLY TRUELY HONESTLY wish I had never started streaming. More time is spent on the PC trying to sort out problems (Which are still there)

Yours disappointing NDS streamer.

Sorry to grumble though!

Hey Mark, I was exactly in the same spot a few months ago, after getting my ND5XS and you can find on this forum my posts that were at least as frustrated as yours (no, more frustrated

 

Just take your time, ask questions here, the helpful folks on the forum will help you! After a while you will laugh at how simple it was to solve all those problems.

 

nStream is not perfect, occasionally if you have problem like yours you have to re-index the music on your server, then in nStream go to the menu in the bottom left corner and: "Clear UPnP Cache" and "Clear Image Cache" - that solves 90% of problems. The remaining 10% usually have to do with tagging. There's a lot of good free software for editing the tags on your ripped recordings, just search the forum.

 

Take your time - it's worth it! I listen to SO much more music ever since I ripped my entire CD collection and moved to streaming... Yes, there were very frustrating moments, but now it just WORKS!

Thank You for your kind replies.

I spoke with my dealer who told me that as I want my music in folders Classical / Opera / Rock / 24 bit (which I do as I have so much) then I can only play my albums in alphabetical order which is absolutely ruining the short time I have to listen to music. Every time I open NSTREAM i am slightly anxious expecting it to be faulty which it so often is. 6 months streaming and 6 months very little music.

The 6TB of Twonky (QNAP) is probably the problem.

Thank You again.

 

Posted on: 19 April 2014 by sjbabbey

Get yourself mp3tag and rename your tracks 01 - Title1 etc. You can set up an action in mp3tag to format your titles as %track% - %title% and it will rename your tracks in batches.

Posted on: 19 April 2014 by Gajdzin
Originally Posted by Freightliner Mark:
I spoke with my dealer who told me that as I want my music in folders Classical / Opera / Rock / 24 bit (which I do as I have so much) then I can only play my albums in alphabetical order which is absolutely ruining the short time I have to listen to music. Every time I open NSTREAM i am slightly anxious expecting it to be faulty which it so often is. 6 months streaming and 6 months very little music.

The 6TB of Twonky (QNAP) is probably the problem. 

I don't quite understand what your dealer meant, but I definitely do NOT play my albums in alphabetical order, I play the one I happen to want to play at the moment You can display the albums by Album Artist, or by folder, or in many other ways in nStream. I agree that in case of classical music it's sometimes a little difficult to decide who is the Artist, Album Artist, Composer (as there are often several on one record), etc. But that's where good tagging software and spending some time tagging the files is critical, as I found. And it's actually a fun activity - it made me remember some albums I've forgotten I had

 

Also if you divide your music into logical folders and subfolders, finding the required album could be easier using the display by folder option in nStream. You won't be faced with half a thousand CDs starting with "B" (favourite family name of classical composers, for some strange reason).

Posted on: 19 April 2014 by Iver van de Zand

Hi Gajdzin,

 

I understand your issue and this is why I use an additional tool for LibraryManagement. I have a similar set up like you and also rip with dbPowerAmp. As an extra I use MediaMonkey to manage the library with metadat I cannot add or change with dbPowerAmp.

 

MediaMonkey has to scan you NAS once but this goed quite quick. After that you can simply check missing or wrongly stored album art. If so, select the album and hit the Ctl-L button and MediaMonkey searches a ww database and picks up the correct album art which is stored as folder.jpg in the individual album-folder on your NaS. NStream correctly interprets this, and issue solved.

 

apart form the album art, I experienced similar issues with the correct disc numver for albums with more than 1 disc. Again, MM helped my solve. These things.

 

MM can be used without fee. There is an extended version that requires a fee, but I don't use that One.

 

good luck,

Iver

Posted on: 19 April 2014 by Gajdzin
Originally Posted by Iver van de Zand:
Hi Gajdzin,

I understand your issue and this is why I use an additional tool for LibraryManagement. I have a similar set up like you and also rip with dbPowerAmp. As an extra I use MediaMonkey to manage the library with metadat I cannot add or change with dbPowerAmp.

I don't have an issue any more, it's Freightliner Mark who has an issue now I'm just trying to cheer him up, because I was going through the same nightmare recently, as documented up in this thread.

BTW, I had nothing but bad experience with Media Monkey, it would actually freeze trying to scan my entire library. Instead, somebody on this forum suggested TagScanner to me. It works great and I used it to clean up the tags on all my ripped disks. Next I planned to get even more ambitious and add the lyrics to all tags - there's a great software called mp3Tag pro for doing that, but I gave up since nStream, sadly, cannot display the lyrics (although it's a standardized tag that can be added to a FLAC file, just like the artist name or cover art).
Posted on: 19 April 2014 by Solid Air

I have now updated to DSM 5 on my Synology D413j in order to do transcoding in DSM - which works fine, except . . .

 

Initially I had the artwork problem described above, but fixed that. but I still have another problem I can't seem to solve, which is that all the track titles have the suffix .flac in N-Stream. The only way I can get the tracks to display correctly is if I turn off transcoding. 

 

it isn't a tagging issue - all the albums are tagged correctly using MP3tag and all display fine using Minimserver on the same NAS, or if I turn off transcoding, so it isn't related to tagging. 

 

Any thoughts?

 

It's not a serious issue as a) I can use Minimserver anyway, and b) it's only a suffix. But there must be a solution, surely?

 

Alex

 

Posted on: 19 April 2014 by Mike1960
Originally Posted by Solid Air:

I have now updated to DSM 5 on my Synology D413j in order to do transcoding in DSM - which works fine, except . . .

 

Initially I had the artwork problem described above, but fixed that. but I still have another problem I can't seem to solve, which is that all the track titles have the suffix .flac in N-Stream. The only way I can get the tracks to display correctly is if I turn off transcoding. 

 

it isn't a tagging issue - all the albums are tagged correctly using MP3tag and all display fine using Minimserver on the same NAS, or if I turn off transcoding, so it isn't related to tagging. 

 

Any thoughts?

 

It's not a serious issue as a) I can use Minimserver anyway, and b) it's only a suffix. But there must be a solution, surely?

 

Alex

 

I agree it would be nice not to have the suffix eg "Stairway to heaven.flac" instead of just "Stairway to heaven".

 

I also use DSM5 to transcode from flac to wav. I rip with XLD on my Mac to flac and alter any tags with kid3 and end up with the same result.

 

Mike

Posted on: 20 April 2014 by Gajdzin
Originally Posted by Solid Air:
I have now updated to DSM 5 on my Synology D413j in order to do transcoding in DSM - which works fine, except . . .

Initially I had the artwork problem described above, but fixed that. but I still have another problem I can't seem to solve, which is that all the track titles have the suffix .flac in N-Stream. The only way I can get the tracks to display correctly is if I turn off transcoding. 

I also use Synology (214play) with Multimedia Server and have transcoding turned on, but I don't get those .flac suffixes in N-Stream. Except I have not upgraded DSM, I use the version that came with the box. I have read what's new in version 5 and did not find anything worth upgrading, so I kept the original version. Unfortunately, apparently you can't downgrade DSM, so you may be stuck with this new "feature"...
Posted on: 20 April 2014 by Foxman50
Originally Posted by Gajdzin:
Originally Posted by Solid Air:
I have now updated to DSM 5 on my Synology D413j in order to do transcoding in DSM - which works fine, except . . .

Initially I had the artwork problem described above, but fixed that. but I still have another problem I can't seem to solve, which is that all the track titles have the suffix .flac in N-Stream. The only way I can get the tracks to display correctly is if I turn off transcoding. 

I also use Synology (214play) with Multimedia Server and have transcoding turned on, but I don't get those .flac suffixes in N-Stream. Except I have not upgraded DSM, I use the version that came with the box. I have read what's new in version 5 and did not find anything worth upgrading, so I kept the original version. Unfortunately, apparently you can't downgrade DSM, so you may be stuck with this new "feature"...

While Synology say you cannot downgrade it is in fact quite simple to do so. I run DSM 3.2 and have tried many new versions in the hope that they had fixed the transcode issue, which clearly they finally have. However i use Minimserver now and prefer it. But each time i have just down graded back to DSM 3.2

 

Graeme

Posted on: 20 April 2014 by Gajdzin
Originally Posted by Foxman50:
While Synology say you cannot downgrade it is in fact quite simple to do so. I run DSM 3.2 and have tried many new versions in the hope that they had fixed the transcode issue, which clearly they finally have. However i use Minimserver now and prefer it. But each time i have just down graded back to DSM 3.2

Can you tell me what transcoding issue they fixed in DSM 5.0? I never had any transcoding issues with the previous version.
Posted on: 20 April 2014 by Foxman50
Originally Posted by Gajdzin:
Originally Posted by Foxman50:
While Synology say you cannot downgrade it is in fact quite simple to do so. I run DSM 3.2 and have tried many new versions in the hope that they had fixed the transcode issue, which clearly they finally have. However i use Minimserver now and prefer it. But each time i have just down graded back to DSM 3.2

Can you tell me what transcoding issue they fixed in DSM 5.0? I never had any transcoding issues with the previous version.

Gajdzin

 

When transcoding hi res flac to wav, say 24/96, the Synology would convert this too 16/44. The last version this worked correctly on was DSM 3.2 Bld 1955, some years back.

 

Graeme

Posted on: 20 April 2014 by alan33

SolidAir said:

I have now updated to DSM 5 on my Synology D413j in order to do transcoding in DSM - which works fine, except . . .

I also have DSM 5, on a DS213+ but cannot get the DSM Media Server application to transcode FLAC to WAV since the option is only to transcode when the player does not handle the original format. Since Naim supports FLAC, this is logically consistent. But I don't see a "force transcoding" setting...so it doesn't transcode!

 

Although this forcing is apparently newly available in Audio Station (which people use to play music from the NAS on their mobile devices, in conjunction with a partnered mobile app) as a means to eliminate massive bandwidth charges when high res files are not wanted (eg when using 3G rather than wifi to talk to the NAS), I don't see it in Media Server.

 

I have transcoding working with MinimServer (stream info says WAV)  but not in the native Synology Media Server (stream info shows FLAC irrespective of the status of the check box to "transcode when device doesn't support native format").  For those interested: the powerPC (qorl iirc) in the DS213+ seems to be a great processor, showing only about 3% to 6% load when transcoding and streaming CD quality 16bit rips...I was impressed at least!

 

Have be others experienced this transcoding limitation on Synology Media Server? Anyone with a 213+ able to verify (in case it's a processor-specific issue)? Anyone with a different Synology NAS able to confirm stream info and share the Media Server settings options (again, in case it's a model and / or processor issue)? It's not a major issue, but I'd like to clear up the mystery...

 

Regards, alan

 

Posted on: 20 April 2014 by Russt

Alan,

 

I'm new to streaming, currently ripping 500 cd's with dbpoweramp to Synology 213J.

 

To transcode from FLAC to WAV, open Media Server from within DSM, click on DMA compatability and tick check boxes for 'enable audio transcoding' & 'enable customized MIME types'. Apply these settings and try that. I use n-stream and after clearing upnp cache on ipad, tracks are shown as WAV in top right corner of track playing.

 

I hope that helps!

 

Russ

Posted on: 20 April 2014 by alan33

Thanks Russ!

 

i think this must be model-specific, then, as my option to 'enable transcoding' has the proviso 'enable transcoding when player does not support format' (or words to that effect).  I will keep an eye on this setting each time I upgrade DSM and/or Media Server to see if it changes. 

 

Regards, alan

Posted on: 20 April 2014 by Russt

Alan,

 

The screen I'm talking about is shown in 'Asset or Minimserver for Synology DSM 3.2' forum on the 3rd entry down.

 

I'm running DSM 5.0 by the way.

 

Russ

Posted on: 20 April 2014 by Gajdzin
Originally Posted by alan33:
I also have DSM 5, on a DS213+ but cannot get the DSM Media Server application to transcode FLAC to WAV since the option is only to transcode when the player does not handle the original format. Since Naim supports FLAC, this is logically consistent. But I don't see a "force transcoding" setting...so it doesn't transcode!
(...)
Have be others experienced this transcoding limitation on Synology Media Server? Anyone with a 213+ able to verify (in case it's a processor-specific issue)? Anyone with a different Synology NAS able to confirm stream info and share the Media Server settings options (again, in case it's a model and / or processor issue)? It's not a major issue, but I'd like to clear up the mystery...

I run Synology Media Server on DS214play / DSM 4.3 and there's no such problem - all FLAC files get transcoded to WAV, although, as you said, Naim supports FLAC.

If you're saying that doesn't work under DSM 5, then I definitely won't upgrade!
Posted on: 20 April 2014 by alan33
Thanks guys ...

I've seen that screen and enabled the check boxes Russ. Note that the explanation indicates transcoding formats if not recognized by your device. Now that I'm upgraded to DSM 5 (with latest updates) I will try this yet again to be sure. If I've created a tempest in a teapot I will report back (away from home visiting parents for Easter - best wishes to all btw!). At the moment, I have them unchecked as they appeared non-functional when I first tried it. I installed MinimServer that same day and never really went back...

Gazdjin - I'm not saying it doesn't work in DSM5.0, in general. Clearly it's working for others! I have not had it working on my DS213+, which is a different animal than others in the lineup due to the processor. Synology has one operating system, which is great, but not every feature works on every model.

As I say, I will double check when I get home tomorrow!!

Regards alan
Posted on: 21 April 2014 by alan33

Ok, teacup / tempest admission time! Sorry to cause confusion with this thread: I posted without verifying first.

 

On my Synology DS213+, running DSM 5, using Media Server with "transcode" checkboxes set, I now have FLAC files arriving at the Naim gear in WAV format. I guess I never tested this properly (at least not since upgrading to version 5.0). Resource Monitor shows CPU is sitting at 5%, RAM at 14% (both with occasional bounces higher likely due to other processes); data transfer is sitting at about 180 KB (Naim shows WAV 1411 kb/s stream, which matches, and 44.1 kHz sample rate, appropriate for CD rip). 

 

Yay. I like it when things work and are understandable...

 

Regards, alan

 

Posted on: 21 April 2014 by Gajdzin
Originally Posted by alan33:

On my Synology DS213+, running DSM 5, using Media Server with "transcode" checkboxes set, I now have FLAC files arriving at the Naim gear in WAV format. I guess I never tested this properly (at least not since upgrading to version 5.0). Resource Monitor shows CPU is sitting at 5%, RAM at 14% (both with occasional bounces higher likely due to other processes); data transfer is sitting at about 180 KB (Naim shows WAV 1411 kb/s stream, which matches, and 44.1 kHz sample rate, appropriate for CD rip). 

Good news, Alan! And do you get the song names in nStream without that .FLAC at the end (that somebody was experiencing here)?

Posted on: 22 April 2014 by alan33
Hi Gazfjin -

Yes, transcode "on" results in track names under nStream showing .flac extension in multiple views (by folder, by album, etc) during selection and beneath the album cover while playing.

Note: I toggled the check boxes (for transcode and mine extensions) on and off, clearing upnp cache in iPod each time, to confirm this behaviour of displayed track names

Note2: as I am not using any non-standard mime types (only flac to wav), I have left the "transcode" box checked for flac but I left the "custom mime types" unchecked...works fine.
Posted on: 22 April 2014 by Foxman50
Originally Posted by alan33:
Hi Gazfjin -

Yes, transcode "on" results in track names under nStream showing .flac extension in multiple views (by folder, by album, etc) during selection and beneath the album cover while playing.

Note: I toggled the check boxes (for transcode and mine extensions) on and off, clearing upnp cache in iPod each time, to confirm this behaviour of displayed track names

Note2: as I am not using any non-standard mime types (only flac to wav), I have left the "transcode" box checked for flac but I left the "custom mime types" unchecked...works fine.

Hi Alan

 

Can you confirm that hi res 24/96 - 24/192 also gets transcoded correctly at full resolution and not converted to 16/44

 

Graeme

Posted on: 22 April 2014 by alan33
Hi Graeme -

That will take a bit longer as I don't have any high res source material handy on my NAS. I just have (some of) my CD collection ripped to flac.  I do have one CD that came with a bonus 24/96 (iirc) disc (Steve Earle, "Townes")...but as my original UnitiQute v1would not play this when I bought it I just left it aside. Will see how that goes on the new SuperUniti and report back.

Of course if there is a freely available demo track to download and test, point me at a web site and I'll give it a go!

Regards alan
Posted on: 22 April 2014 by Solid Air

Hi Graeme,

 

I have an identical set-up and it is indeed transcoding hi-res correctly, at least those tracks I've tried, ie Kate Bush, Radiohead and others. So it works, but you have to put up with the .flac suffix, which is irritating in a small way. 

 

Upgrading DSM was an intriguing use of an hour, but I'm still using Minimserver for choice. 

 

Alex