Odd behaviour with Synology UPnP Server

Why is the root folder named FLAC ???  ...........  Can you either take a screen shot or write what the folder tree looks like.   Mine looks like  UPnP>Music>Folders (named by  artist or composer)    That works perfectly for Media Server & Minimserver

Why not just uninstall the Synology server and use Minim? It transcodes and plays gapless, which the Synology doesn't, and its intelligent browsing is far superior. 

Hi Mike,

Apologies wrong use of "root". My folder path is UPnP/Music/FLAC/Folders (named by artist or composer or orchestra). I just find it unusual that the behaviour started just after upgrading to DSM6 and unusual in that folder view doesn't work whereas album view does. I feel it may be something to do with the path (also impacts playlist) just can't think what.

Hi HH,

Yes I could just move to Minim but I like a bit of flexibility where possible and I'm curious as to what the issue is. Plus I will have to redo my favourites playlist as it seems to be linked to Synology server as that was what I was using when I started it. The playlist has new tracks added to it every now and again and recently these have been added whilst using Minim so I have some tracks that work and some that don't.

Well, I've not found a single aspect of the Synology server that is better than Minim. I never use folder view, and every time I've tried the Synology server I've been defeated. The fact that it cannot transcode gapless rules it out for me. I can see why you are interested though; it's nice to understand what's preventing things from working as they should. 

 I agree its odd if it worked OK with DSM-5.    I would try removing the FLAC stage,  I don't see any logic in an extra layer  ---- UPnP>Music>Folders (named).     Its double strange as DSM-6 did not change much if anything in Media Server,  maybe the folder structure lives in another part of the OS     

But I agree with HH,   if all your files are FLAC,  Minimserver does it better.    However I am waiting for someone to try Media Server working with DSM-6 to see if the FLAC gapless transcoding problem is fixed.

Hi DWO-NAIM,

I use Synology Media Server, and I just tried browsing by folder, for me it works perfectly.  After the DSM-6 update, did you update the Media Server application?  After this particular OS update the Media Server needed to be manually updated.

Mike,  Sorry I can't do the test, like you I'm WAVEing all the way.

As to this issue of folder (directory) levels . . . my uServe sometimes fails to "see" deep into level after level of folders.  I have on there Downloads/Grateful Dead/Live Dead/DicksPicks/[individual albums] and it doesn't seem to reliably index that deep. MinimServer seems to not miss anything however.

Any similar experiences??

Hi Huge,

Thanks for the suggestion and yes I did manually update the Media Server after installing DSM6 but that made no difference.

I have spent the evening confirming odd behaviour still present, repeatable on another iPad, re-indexing again, starting stopping the server etc but all to no avail. I therefore decided to bite the bullet, accept that I will have to redo my favourites playlist and uninstalled the Media Server and re-installed it again followed by re-indexing of media folders. Now works - hurrah... what it was I'll never know. At least I still had access to my music via Minim whilst contemplating the Synology behaviour. I'll now redo my favourites list x 2 one for Minim and the other for Synology. I typically use Minim but its nice to have a backup in case one player fails for whatever reason.

I'm no expert on gapless playback but if someone gives some me some "simple" instructions I'd be happy to give it a whirl to see if it works or not. As mentioned above I typically transcode FLAC to WAV on the fly so hopefully not too difficult.

Many thanks for helpful suggestions

DWO

DWO-Naim posted:

I'm no expert on gapless playback but if someone gives some me some "simple" instructions I'd be happy to give it a whirl to see if it works or not. As mentioned above I typically transcode FLAC to WAV on the fly so hopefully not too difficult.

The most popular gapless album that most folk have is is Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon,  sorry if you're all Clasical,  but there are so many in the classics, opera has even more.  Gapless is were some or all the tracks blend seamlessly into each other,  no pause.      Just play a FLAC as normal with transcoding set & it should play a gapless recording as gapless.  Minim does it (no question)  Syn's Media Server in DSM-5 did sometimes, but most times it didn't.    That's what we need to check in DSM-6.  They have done a lot of enhancements in Video transcoding (or so they tell us),  so we must hope its the same program thats used for Music

Hi Mike, 

Just had a quick play through with LSO playing Britten's The Turn of the Screw. Only used first five tracks to get a feel. 

Synology - No discernible gap between any tracks, certainly nothing near 2 secs. Appeared seamless although I did hear a slight click between 3 to 4, may be the recording.

Minim - Again no discernible gaps. Click between 3 and 4 less obvious, but only by smallest of margins, may even be imagination. I did notice that Minim displayed track lengths were 1 second less than those displayed by Synology.

I'll try a couple more albums over the weekend including other genres

OK good stuff DWO,   I intend to convert a few gapless albums from .wav to .flac & try this weekend.    

I will post results on the thread "New Synology DSM"  https://forums.naimaudio.com/topic/new-synology-dsm     can you copy/paste your post above over to that thread as it makes continuity sense  (?)

I can report a similar problem in Synology DSM (v6 on DS212J) now unable to "see" below using folder view.  In my case, I can see one level below, but not two, where all normal resolution tracks are stored. 

Fortunately, I also have the latest version of MinimServer installed, and this not a problem there.

Likewise, no problems with my Synology DS215j NAS until I upgraded to DSM6. I search for my music via the 'folder' path as this kept albums correctly together (including compilations) but now when I select folders I will see the list of artists, however when I select an artist the screen is blank, previously I would see the albums and been straight in.  I'm using the NAS, Netgear gigabit switch and NDX but I'm fairly new to streaming so would appreciate any help! What do I need to do please?  TIDAL working normally by the way. Thanks

Nigel

This is very strange,  mine was working perfectly & I did not see anything different ............. now this morning it can't find the UPnP - or at least not without a lot of fiddling.    It won't wake it up from hibernation.    

Tried an app reset,  no change,  did a delete/reinstall app,  then it couldn't auto find the streamer, also couldn't find with manual name & IP entry either.    Ran a router reset & its all OK:  I can see all the Synology UPnP server views OK,  folder, artist, genre etc.         Very strange.       I let the NAS go to hibernate & woke it up OK,  a bit slow maybe.  I will repeat the hibernation test again & see what happens one more time.  

Bizarre, after DSM 6 update the Android app now finds my media server more reliably!

Having said that, the Android app going to 1.7 happened just a little earlier, so I can't be absolutely certain which gave me the improvement.

Bizarre,  you can say that again !!!!    I just let my NAS go to hibernation & then it would not wake up when touching the app UPnP "button".  I woke the NAS on my PC webpage,  then switched out of the app & then back in & got into "Finding Rooms" again & it couldn't find any.  s###    OK I have just got a new ISP fibre service & I know BT are working on optimising so it that,  so I reset the router & its all OK & the app finds rooms OK (NDX) ,     but could not open the UPnP folder tree, it showed only the opening blue UPnP thumbnail.    Went into Media Server>DMA restricted access & cleared out all the MAC/IP ran a reset to delete the numbers & refreshed;   that all worked OK & everything was working fine.

Back into hibernation ............. tried a wake up,  it did wake, was very slow to do so,  something isn't right.    .......  I've got a free afternoon so I'm gonna keep digging           

My broadband was up & down like the proverbial whores draws,  thats been fixed & I suspect that was partly the problem.  I've since done a systematic all system power cycle, reset the app & its now discovering all the devices & running normally.  The Synology Media Server with the iOS app sees & browses all the folder tree branches just as its always done,     

Glad it's all up and running again.

Perhaps it is just me but I do think that of all the connections that run through my house the HiFi is particularly sensitive to little glitches. My other devices; PCs (many), phones (many), TV etc always seem to work, even when the HiFi doesn't. Is it a function of UPnP?

I'm not at all sure what is the cause of my issues,   TBH I'm confused by the loss of broadband, the speed was all over the place, that I can follow, but what I did not understand until I checked the router log is that their were some resets & router IP address changes at time I was not doing anything.  I suspect that put the confusion into the NAS & network discovery & more so into my diagnostic logic.

But I am inclined to agree that compared to a lot of other domestic devices that seem to keep going when the internet gets flacky,  the hifi systems we have are sensitive to glitches & are nowhere near as robust as I believe they should be.    Its become the domain of the techno savy & a positive turn off for those who are not so inclined.

I'm not sure it is a router problem as to my simplistic understanding there are two sides to the router, the ISP side where the Internet comes in then on the other side (suspect the firewall is in this middle part) is the house network controlled by the built in DHCP server. The router IP address changes you mention are, I believe, on the ISP side where your ISP is allocating your Router an IP address on their network that gives best connectivity, it may do a few connections to confirm best route.

The problems I have tend to be more associated with the house network side. In this case the router is common to all devices it's the HiFi that keeps losing the network. I find it difficult to understand why some devices just work and some (mostly my hifi) don't. In asking if it is UPnP related I am really asking is the issue more to do with layer 3/4 than the network at layer 2.

I may be way off beam but If someone more knowledgeable can give a simple explanation I'd be happy to read it.

I too would think that all of this is supposed to work fine even if the home router has no connection to the outside world.  But it sounds like Mike B's router has / had a wonky connection to the outside world, one which may have had it resetting itself from time to time, etc.

If my NDS sits on, but unused, for an extended period of time (sometimes a few weeks have gone by), it sometimes cannot be seen by the Naim App and I have to power it (the NDS) off and then on again.  Then it works.  In those cases, killing the Naim App, rebooting the iDevice, etc., do not work.

DWO & Bart,  hi folks, its too late for this,  a growing boy needs his sleep  .............   I think we are all hypothesizing a bit too much.    My router has been messing around & for reasons best known to the ISP, they have a problem with sync speed & have been resetting & changing IP addresses.   That threw my logic into turmoil as I couldn't understand why the NAS discovery was having issues.    But behind all this was (a) I had a new (same ISP) fibre optic broadband service start on Tuesday last week,  all OK no probs,  but quickly followed by  (b) Synology DSM-6 installed,   all OK & only a small issues with a bunch of unwanted Synology installed &running programs & the system not going to hibernation as much as it used to .........  so (c) I investigated & understood the new installed programs & un-installed & (d) set about understanding & changing various enabled & un-enabled progs to find out why it was waking from hibernation so much.  ...........  hibernation is WIP (almost done)   all the rest is done & dusted.  I think what threw me was more than one issue going on & one was a moving target & I had not realised it - my bad.