FLAC tags in WinXP

[Pascal Herczog]

Slightly off topic I guess, but any very much appreciated. I am still struggling with trying to adopt the use of FLAC files for use with Slimserver running WinXP Pro Sp2.

Firstly, when browsing folders in Slimserver, using Fishbone, a directory full of MP3's is displayed in the (correct) sort order by artist, even though the display reads 'title' by 'artist' from 'album'. However, when looking at a folder full of FLAC's, the list is sorted by title. I raised a bug [647] on this, but it appears Slimdevices were unable to repeat the problem. I tried it with the default skin and had the same problem.

Secondly, when looking at MP3's in Windows Explorer, it natively decodes the tags to display in columns for artist/title etc. Very useful when you have folders full of various artists. However, Windows Explorer does not understand FLAC tags. Hence, I was wondering if anyone has developed a windows shell extension to display FLAC tags in Windows Explorer. Doing some websearching makes it seem eminently possible, but I wouldn't even know where to start writing the software, though most of it might already be available as source code anyway. IS there anyone who has developed such a shell extension?

Thirdly, I have tried Foobar2k, but I have not found a way to convert from FLAC to MP3 _and_ retain the tag information from FLAC to MP3. Does anyone have any suggestions for the most appropriate tools for this?

Thanks,
Pascal

[Steve Baumgarten]

> Thirdly, I have tried Foobar2k, but I have not found a way to convert
> from FLAC to MP3 _and_ retain the tag information from FLAC to MP3. Does
> anyone have any suggestions for the most appropriate tools for this?

Foobar2000 will definitely do this for you -- in fact I just last night
converted an album I had previously ripped in FLAC to MP3 for listening
on my iPod. It's a one step conversion and all tags are preserved.

Make sure you have all the FB2K components including the ID3v2 component
(and obviously the diskwriter component). There's also a config option
that tells FB2K what style of tags to write -- by default it writes
ID3v1 tags, so some FLAC tag info may get lost or truncated.

Unfortunately FB2K has a user interface only a programmer could love.
But a little experimentation will do it (if I had a copy in front of me
here at work I'd do a step-by-step, but I don't; I do know that the MP3
tagging options panel is toward the end/bottom of FB2K's very long
list). Once you get it configured it's very straightforward to do just
what you want.

SBB

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[Richard Scott]

I have found that the best extractor/converter out there is Easy CD-DA
Extractor 7.5. It comes with all the tools you need (and user
friendly interface) to rip into pretty much any format, but also can
convert from pretty much any format to any other format (DRM versions
excluded obviously). I use is religiously. It has a free 30 day
eval, and I think then is only $25 to register. More than worth it.

Morgan


On Wed, 17 Nov 2004 12:32:29 -0000, Pascal Herczog
<pascal.herczog (AT) ttpcom (DOT) com> wrote:
>
> Slightly off topic I guess, but any very much appreciated. I am still
> struggling with trying to adopt the use of FLAC files for use with
> Slimserver running WinXP Pro Sp2.
>
> Firstly, when browsing folders in Slimserver, using Fishbone, a directory
> full of MP3's is displayed in the (correct) sort order by artist, even
> though the display reads 'title' by 'artist' from 'album'. However, when
> looking at a folder full of FLAC's, the list is sorted by title. I raised a
> bug [647] on this, but it appears Slimdevices were unable to repeat the
> problem. I tried it with the default skin and had the same problem.
>
> Secondly, when looking at MP3's in Windows Explorer, it natively decodes the
> tags to display in columns for artist/title etc. Very useful when you have
> folders full of various artists. However, Windows Explorer does not
> understand FLAC tags. Hence, I was wondering if anyone has developed a
> windows shell extension to display FLAC tags in Windows Explorer. Doing some
> websearching makes it seem eminently possible, but I wouldn't even know
> where to start writing the software, though most of it might already be
> available as source code anyway. IS there anyone who has developed such a
> shell extension?
>
> Thirdly, I have tried Foobar2k, but I have not found a way to convert from
> FLAC to MP3 _and_ retain the tag information from FLAC to MP3. Does anyone
> have any suggestions for the most appropriate tools for this?
>
> Thanks,
> Pascal
>

[Bill Burns]

Richard Scott wrote:
> I have found that the best extractor/converter out there is Easy CD-DA
> Extractor 7.5. It comes with all the tools you need (and user
> friendly interface) to rip into pretty much any format, but also can
> convert from pretty much any format to any other format (DRM versions
> excluded obviously). I use is religiously. It has a free 30 day
> eval, and I think then is only $25 to register. More than worth it.

I'll second the recommendation for this program, which I've been using
for a while. The developer maintains a forum for registered users, and
responds promptly to bugs and feature requests, too.

--
Bill Burns
Long Island NY USA
mailto:billb (AT) ftldesign (DOT) com

[kdf]

Quoting Pascal Herczog <pascal.herczog (AT) ttpcom (DOT) com>:

> Slightly off topic I guess, but any very much appreciated. I am still
> struggling with trying to adopt the use of FLAC files for use with Slimserver
> running WinXP Pro Sp2.
>
> Firstly, when browsing folders in Slimserver, using Fishbone, a directory
> full of MP3's is displayed in the (correct) sort order by artist, even though
> the display reads 'title' by 'artist' from 'album'. However, when looking at
> a folder full of FLAC's, the list is sorted by title. I raised a bug [647] on
> this, but it appears Slimdevices were unable to repeat the problem. I tried
> it with the default skin and had the same problem.

I suggested something to check on in bug647, but I'm guessing the emails it
sends out must not have reached you. Browsing the music folder doesn't really
do any sorting aside from the native genre-album-artist-tracknum info caching
pattern. It most certainly should not distinguish amongst file types (or for
that matter, skins). Please check your genre and album tags to make sure there
isn't a more logical sort order beyond what you are percieving.

>
> Secondly, when looking at MP3's in Windows Explorer, it natively decodes the
> tags to display in columns for artist/title etc. Very useful when you have
> folders full of various artists. However, Windows Explorer does not
> understand FLAC tags. Hence, I was wondering if anyone has developed a
> windows shell extension to display FLAC tags in Windows Explorer. Doing some
> websearching makes it seem eminently possible, but I wouldn't even know where
> to start writing the software, though most of it might already be available
> as source code anyway. IS there anyone who has developed such a shell
> extension?

That would be a good thing to have. sadly, I too have no idea where you would
find such a beast.
-kdf

[Larry Truesdale]

Hello,

Foobar is my tool of choice. As you've already been told, the UI is
not intuitively obvious. There are several areas where you might want
to customize the configuration for your purposes. But as to writing
the tags, this is how I do it.

Under Preferences->Diskwriter in the menus you will find an "output
presets" field. You may want to create a new preset or modify one of
the existing ones. When you edit the preset of your choice, you can
use the following in the "Parameters" field:

--preset standard --id3v2-only --ta "%artist%" --tl "%album%" --tn
"%tracknumber%" --tt "%title%" --ty "%date%" --tc
"FOOBAR(v0.8.2)->LAME(v3.93.1,standard)" - %d

You may want to modify this, but it should get you going in the right direction.

Larry


On Wed, 17 Nov 2004 12:32:29 -0000, Pascal Herczog
<pascal.herczog (AT) ttpcom (DOT) com> wrote:
>
> Slightly off topic I guess, but any very much appreciated. I am still
> struggling with trying to adopt the use of FLAC files for use with
> Slimserver running WinXP Pro Sp2.
>
> Firstly, when browsing folders in Slimserver, using Fishbone, a directory
> full of MP3's is displayed in the (correct) sort order by artist, even
> though the display reads 'title' by 'artist' from 'album'. However, when
> looking at a folder full of FLAC's, the list is sorted by title. I raised a
> bug [647] on this, but it appears Slimdevices were unable to repeat the
> problem. I tried it with the default skin and had the same problem.
>
> Secondly, when looking at MP3's in Windows Explorer, it natively decodes the
> tags to display in columns for artist/title etc. Very useful when you have
> folders full of various artists. However, Windows Explorer does not
> understand FLAC tags. Hence, I was wondering if anyone has developed a
> windows shell extension to display FLAC tags in Windows Explorer. Doing some
> websearching makes it seem eminently possible, but I wouldn't even know
> where to start writing the software, though most of it might already be
> available as source code anyway. IS there anyone who has developed such a
> shell extension?
>
> Thirdly, I have tried Foobar2k, but I have not found a way to convert from
> FLAC to MP3 _and_ retain the tag information from FLAC to MP3. Does anyone
> have any suggestions for the most appropriate tools for this?
>
> Thanks,
> Pascal
>

[Daniel Cohen]

What's the best way to insert ID3v2 tags for MP3 under Mac OS 10.3?
Is there a freeware program? There are shareware programs, but they
do a lot more than I need, so I'm not that inclined to pay.

I can use xACT to insert tags for FLAC.

My MP3 items are mostly programs recorded from the radio, so things
like CDDB lookup under iTunes won't work.

Also, I haven't had a need to browse or search under genre or artist
previously, but I'm soon going to need to. I assume this is done via
the tags. Do I need to keep all the music in one big folder, or can I
use subfolders to separate out genres, etc. I know that's the way
iTunes works, but I wasn't planning to use that, as it doesn't deal
with FLAC, I think.
--
Daniel Cohen

[Daniel Cohen]

I've just been to the London Mac Expo. I was sorry t find that the
Squeezebox wasn't on display in the Digital Lounge.

The Roku was. I think I did somewhat prefer its looks (and clarity of
display) to the Squeezebox. But we all know that its functionality is
not as good.

Hermstedt's Hifidelio is an interesting product. It seems to be a
music server for the consumer market, essentially a computer
dedicated to music use. 80Gb hard drive, CD player and recorder, MP3
ripper, inputs and outputs to amplifiers, internal CDDB database
(which can be upgraded via a computer, not sure if it can be done
directly), 802.11b. It isn't clear to me if additional music can be
put on an external hard drive. If it can, one of the main weakness
would be addressed, that is that 80Gb is too small if one wants to
use FLAC rather than MP3. As you can see, it doesn't need a separate
computer, though the 802.11b does allow access to another computer.

It can play music in different rooms (different streams) if a
suitable receiver is in the other room. They say that currently the
only compatible receiver is the Roku. I don't know if it would be
worthwhile for Slimdevices to discuss with Hermstedt the possibility
of the Squeezebox being made compatible.
--
Daniel Cohen

[Anthony James]

What functionality does the Roku lack?

[dean]

On Nov 19, 2004, at 8:37 AM, Daniel Cohen wrote:

> What's the best way to insert ID3v2 tags for MP3 under Mac OS 10.3? Is
> there a freeware program? There are shareware programs, but they do a
> lot more than I need, so I'm not that inclined to pay.
iTunes does a pretty good job with ID3 tags.

> My MP3 items are mostly programs recorded from the radio, so things
> like CDDB lookup under iTunes won't work.
But there's an ID3 editor built into iTunes. Will that work for you?


>
> Also, I haven't had a need to browse or search under genre or artist
> previously, but I'm soon going to need to. I assume this is done via
> the tags. Do I need to keep all the music in one big folder, or can I
> use subfolders to separate out genres, etc. I know that's the way
> iTunes works, but I wasn't planning to use that, as it doesn't deal
> with FLAC, I think.
Subfolders are no problem.