iOS, the Naim app, The Beatles all conspiring against me
Posted by: Motel Blues on 09 July 2018
I've asked this question on the MinimServer forum, but at Simon's suggestion I'm airing it here as well, in case it turns out to be a Naim app issue.
When I have multiple versions of the same album on my NAS, I give them the same title and assign each version a different disc number and different discsubtitle tag. That way, when browsing via the Naim app I can have a single representation of the album within the artist's listing, and then drlll down to multiple different versions of the album, each presented as a different disc.
Having recently added a second version of "Sgt. Pepper" to my NAS, I've been attempting to do the usual by tagging the the versions thusly:
DISCNUMBER 1
DISCSUBTITLE Deluxe Anniversary Edition
and
DISCNUMBER 2
DISCSUBTITLE 1967 Stereo Mix
On my iPhone this displays as expected:
I can click on Deluxe Anniversary Edition and be shown all the tracks on that version, Further down, I can do the same thing for the 1967 Stereo Mix.
On my iPad, things are...different:
See how it seems to think track 1 of "Sgt. Pepper" is called ">> Deluxe Anniversary Edition"? If I click on that track 1, the app claims to have added 46 tracks to a playlist (i.e. all the tracks on both versions of the album, plus two bonus non-tracks representing each of the disc titles) and then shows be a 44 track playlist containing all the tracks on both versions of the album.
I've restarted my iPad, the Naim app, the Naim streamer and Minimserver, and rescanned MinimServer. I also cleared the image cache on the apps.There's nothing related to the problem files in the MinimServer log. The effect is the same on my QB as on my ND5: iPhone good, iPad bad.
Normally this method of tagging just works for me. I'm baffled as to how the iPhone and iPad versions of the app could be interpreting the same information differently. Any guidance the collective bran trust can offer would be appreciated, as this is quite frankly doing my crust in.
Some version numbers, in case they're relevant:
MinimServer: 0.8.5.2, update 123
Naim app: 5.10 (on both iPad and iPhone)
IOS: 11.4 (on both iPad and iPhone)
Lots of questions, sorry.
What do you use to do the tagging ? How does it look in that ? It looks as though you're in some sort of file view on the iPad - what does your file system look like on the NAS ? is Sgt Pepper (the track) listed as file number 2 ? what is its filename ?
I use asset and a different method for the same album in different versions but I'll try to duplicate what I think you're doing (using dbPoweramp - Windows) tomorrow and see if I get the same results. It looks as though this is the 50th Ann. version of Sgt Pepper in hi def - did you rip this or download it - did you do any work on the tags, if so what ? (just realised I don't have the hi-def version - I needed an excuse to buy it 
Thanks for the offer of assistance, Tallguy.
Initial tagging is done whilst ripping in dBpoweramp 14.2. Subsequent modifications to rips and downloads are done in Mp3tag v2.86f.
Here's an example of how the Deluxe Anniversary Edition displays in Mp3tag. The first track is tagged as track 1, with the filename 01 The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.m4a
Happy to be corrected, but I don't think I'm in any oddball view on the iPad. There's a Folder View option (presumably generated by MinimServer) but I'm not currently using it, I'm browsing via Artist > Album. The iPad "Sgt. Pepper" display in my original post is sort of analogous to what the Naim app displays after clicking on Artist > Album for any normal single disc album, although it looks a bit odd as it's not displaying the cover art for some reason (a less important rabbit hole for me at the moment) and is interpreting the disc subtitles as track titles. As a comparison, if I click on Miles Davis > The Cellar Door Sessions 1970 on my iPad I get:
Disc subtitles are displaying correctly (exactly as "Sgt, Pepper" displays on my iPhone, but not on my iPad).
The folder structure I use on the NAS is Bit Depth\Artist\Album - there's an example in the Mp3tag screenshot. This does mean that in constructing my compound "Sgt. Pepper" I'm bringing in the separate discs from different folders, since the Deluxe Anniversary Edition is 24-bit and the 1967 Stereo Mix is 16-bit. However, I also tried bunging both discs in the same folder and renumbering the 1967 Stereo Mix to give it track numbers 32 to 44 (starting where the Deluxe Anniversary Edition finished), but that displayed in the same erroneous fashion on my iPad.
I'm not entirely sure what post-download work I dd on the Deluxe Anniversary Edition tags. I know I renamed one version's album title as a conflict in apostrophe orientation was causing the Naim app to display two albums, "Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band" and "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band".
Just because you're paranoid, it doesn't mean that they aren't out to get you! 