Whats happened to my back up

[Keith]

Following my recent posts regarding my confusion with SSD and HDD and what appeared to be an annomaly in folder and track counts on my music that I'd restored to the B2.   I did as someone suggested and started to look for unusual folder/track files  on the external back up drive.  

Whilst artists, albums and tracks appeared ok as I worked throught the data alphabetically I soon started to notice that track names, title and track numbers were jumbled in many cases, in some track names appearing twice and many tracks missing - often including track one on the index.

I fear that my backup is corrupt though its the first time its been needed since I added all my music to the system.  Have I got no choice but to start again and go through the process of ripping all my 400 plus cds back onto the HDD?

[Daniel Taylor]

Hi Keith,

In the example in your picture, it appears that the tag info is screwed up.  I have seen that on some albums I've ripped - actually more times than I'd call rare.  The meta data in tags are entered into the database by individuals like you or me.  And, unfortuneately, they aren't always careful with their entries.

The messed up tags would not be a problem for playback on the B2.  But it would be a problem for something like Sonos, which uses the tag info when using the B2 disk as a NAS drive.

The example you show, by itself, doesn't necessarily indicate that your backup is as big a mess as you might fear.  Although you may have additional examples not shown here.

[Peter Lowham]

Hi Keith,

In the example you have given here, the column  'Name'  data (track number and name )look OK for this album.  The problem is that the 'Title' column data do not match the 'Name' column.  However, the 'Title' data are correct for the album, albeit in the wrong order.

The 'Title' data are read from the tag data. That would suggest that some sort tagging error has been occurring.  One explanation for this is that during rip, and where multiple album names are offered, then the wrong version of the album has been selected.

Another situation that can cause problems is artist, album and track renaming.  If you run an Export, then subsequently you rename some artists, albums and tracks and then you run another Export, then you will have duplicated versions held on the Export.

I don't think that your backup has been corrupted.  The tag data was probably incorrect on the B2 before the 'Export' was done.

You can fix the tag data through the use of a product such as 'mp3Tag' (I use this) which is available as a free download over the Internet.

Regards,

Peter.

[Keith]

Thanks guys appreciate the replies.

Daniel - there are others that seem to have tracks missing though the total number of tracks appear correct 

but not all titles exist, in other cases the title list has the corect total of tracks but inludes duplicates.   The B2 plays the files fine but the displayed track name is often incorrect.  In the example above A Hard Rain is missing in the titles list but shame shame shame is duplicated.  So is the Hard Rain track actually missing from the folder or is their but just titled incorrectly? 

Peter - I did think I was extremely careful selecting the album, but perhaps as soon as I'd seen the correct name I didn't look for other options that may have been presented without scrolling.  However if I was to have done that how would I have been able to check for the correct album version with seeing the listed tracks and correct order for playback ?

Do I run the mp3 tag programme on the backup which is flac not mp3 - will it work with flac files?  Presumably I'd then have to re-install onto the B2 as I don't suppose I can do this directly on the Brennen.  If I have to re-install the modified back up will it only work on those files with modified tag data or the entire backup?

Cheers

[Keith]

Peter - I've just looked at the  mp3Tag app and it looks like I have to edit every track manually to correct the errors or is their a way of automating this from the app or web?  If not its going to a nightmare to do them manually.

[Iain]

Keith,

I have not had exactly the same problem as yourself, but I recognise your pain.

Even though I have the flu or something, I have managed to add 150 CDs manually again to my old JB7 with new SSD.  Chin up!

Best wishes

iain

[Daniel Taylor]

Hi Keith,

The other problems that you may be seeing are not apparent in the picture you provided, so I'm not clear on what may have happened.

Do you understand that in your picture, the Name column comes from the song's filename on the disk.  That's what the B2 uses for getting the song name.  The Title column comes from the tag information that is used by other systems such as Sonos.  Although the Title tag information is wrong, that will not affect the operation of the B2.

When you say the song plays okay, but often the displayed song name is incorrect, where do you see the song name displayed?  Are you using Sonos?

The mp3tag program will work on FLAC files okay.  It will work on your backup disk, too, when you connect the disk to your computer's USB port.  There is a way to copy the data in the filenames to the appropriate fields in the tag area.

You can also use the program on the B2's internal disk when the B2 is set to be a NAS disk.  There is a section on NAS on the Brennan website.

[PMB]

Hi Keith,

If you use the web UI when ripping you can view the Track listing before ripping.  In this example if I click on the title I get the Track list -

Sometimes the Track listing is different to the CD - there may be bonus Tracks, etc or as Daniel says - "And, unfortuneately, they aren't always careful with their entries" - was this a deliberate slip Daniel?

Paul

Brennan Support.

[Keith]

Peter - thanks for the reply - sorry didn't make myself clear I'm playing on the B2.  I thought my issue was that the filename and title weren't the same and should be obviously its not that and the filenames are incorrect am I right in thinking that these are applied to each track when the cd was ripped and that the information comes from the database lookup from my selection of album choices presented.  I don't know why but I had it in my head that the some of if not alll this info came direct from the CD, because it (usually) would find the Album title and from that the individual file names of each track.  I think I thought the lookup was only for the album art.  

Paul - thanks for that I wish I'd realised but did most of the ripping from the unit not the GUI.

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That said I've not changed any artists names etc and earlier today I deleted one mixed up CD and ripped it again - there was only one choice of album on the database which I selected (as I would have during the original rip) and all the tracks now have ( and display) the correct titles.  

Could something have happened when the backup was created as I'm not convinced that all these mixed up albums are down to my iniitial selections,  as I've been playing tracks regularly and not noticed the descrepancy , especially initially after getting all my collection on the SSD

Thanks again guys

[Daniel Taylor]

Hi Keith,

I've been thinking about this some more, and I think my earliest comment was wrong.  When the B2 reads the database for an album, it should name the file the same way it stores the track name in the tag info.  So the mismatch between the Name column and the Title column in your picture is a puzzlement.  I'm sorry, I don't have an explanation for that.

Most of the time, there is no text information stored on the CD, although it has that capability.  And even if it were there, the B2 does not read it from the CD.  The information is retrieved from an online databse.

[Keith]

Daniel thanks for the update - just to clarify in my external drive listing both name (filename I assume) and title should be indentical.  Does the name dictate the title or the other way around ?  If this is the case then my logic suggests this mismatch cant be down to me selecting the wrong album when ripping the CD to the B2. if I'd selected the wrong one whilst the tracks maybe wrongly named both the name and title, whilst wrong would still read the same.   Which backs up my comment earlier of the CD I deleted and ripped again which had all the tracks corrrectly titled unlike the version I'd restored previously.

Paul - Given the points above can you offer any further explanation, more importantly the easiest way of correcting this ?

Thanks again guys
 

[Daniel Taylor]

After I realized my earlier mistake, it takes me in a completely different direction of thought.  When the B2 reads the database, the name it gets for the song should be applied equally to the track name and the song title field in the tag info.  So, yes, they should match.

So what caused it?!?  Ha.  Well that's a good question.  One thing that comes to mind is something we constantly remind new users: never ask the B2 to do more than one thing at a time.  The reason for that is that the B2 has shown that it has a problem with multi-tasking.  So in this situation, if you might have been engaged with renaming songs from an earlier album while the B2 was ripping an album, either or both of the albums could have got scrambled, or possibly some other data may have been overwritten.  When the B2 loses track of what it's supposed to be doing, there's no telling what the outcome will be.

Besides the possibility of multi-taking gone awriy, I have no other ideas for what went wrong.  So, as you've found, it's best to just delete the scrambled album and re-rip.