Scan Disk Issue ?

[JFBUK]

I have encountered an issue when running Scan Disk. 

When I run Scan Disk , either from the Web UI settings window or from the front panel the scan disk seems to complete successfully but the Web UI then loses all functionality. That is, my music details do not display or only partially display and nothing I click on responds.

I have discovered I can fix this by running a web upgrade from the front panel to reload the latest B2 software. Everything returns to normal.

I suspected I have something corrupt in my file names so took a look at my b2db file.

I found the following :

Robinson, Smokey & The Miracles/The Tracks of My Tears

20 tracks

01 Going to a Go-Go [Smokey Robinson & The Miracles].flac

02 (Come ’round Here) I’m the One [Smokey Robinson & The Miracles].flac

03 I Second That Emotion [Smokey Robinson & The Miracles].flac

04 If You Can Wait [Smokey Robinson & The Miracles].flac

05 The Tracks of My Tears [Smokey Robinson & The Miracles].flac

06 The Tears of a Clown [Smokey Robinson & The Miracles].flac

07 I Don’t Blame You at All [Smokey Robinson & The Miracles].flac

It looks like an apostrophe is being written as  ’ but only for certain albums.

What is more puzzling is that when viewed via the Web UI the tracks display with the apostrophe correctly. Similarly the folder listing when viewed directly on the B2 HDD is correct. See attached screenshots.

Copy of b2db (zipped) attached as well.

I have edited one of the troublesome track names via the WebUI (delete the apostrophe and re-insert). I only edited one track name.

I then checked my b2db and the track name correctly had the apostrophe.

I ran scan disk again and the track name was still OK so I don't think that it is necessarily Scan disk that caused the corruption.

Does anyone have any insight on this ?

Thanks

John

[JFBUK]

Update.

I rip my CD's on my PC before uploading.

The Smokey Robinson album and another where I have the erroneous characters in the names were both ripped with dbPoweramp so I'm wondering whether its the culprit ?

(I have just read Peter's comments on Iain Bell's 'code 2' issue regarding dbPoweramp's ripped filenames)

[Fred Waltman]

The character you see as â€™ is actually a Unicode character -- I believe "RIGHT SINGLE QUOTATION MARK" which is different than the APOSTROPHE (a/k/a SINGLE QUOTE) that you get when you hit that key on your keyboard. I don't think the problem is with dbPowerAmp itself, but with wherever it downloaded the track names.

dbPowerAmp (at least my Mac version) has options to basically limit file names to "keyboard" characters  (ANSI Characters only in filename) and also a place to "map" characters. I my case I have set up the left and right double quotes to both map to the " character. This can be tricky to set up - -I  cut and pasted the characters from a string where it was obvious that "smart quotes" were being used. I didn't do that for single quotes and I didn't have any issues that I remember. I even got tracks like

Variations for cello & piano in G major on Handel's "See, the Conqu'ring Hero comes," WoO 45: Thema, allegretto.flac

I realize this probably doesn't help you but when the CD has already been ripped but it might help somebody getting started.

Cheers,

Newbie Fred

[JFBUK]

Thanks Fred

I have run a test looking at the filename on my PC as ripped and the Hex value of what I thought was an apostrophe in the troublesome filenames is indeed  "E28099" (right single quotation ).

As that filename was automatically generated by the ripper software from an online database (e.g. Musicbrainz) then that's the source of what appear to be bad characters.

So my query now becomes - "are these characters the reason why scan disk is giving me my Web UI problems or is there something else  ?"

Thanks

John

[Fred Waltman]

John,

I don't think the characters themselves are the problem -- I've got things like Dvořák in my B2 and it scans OK. And I seem to remember when I ripped a Kitarō CD it showed up something like 喜多郎 ( I don't actually remember the characters, those are from Wikipedia :)  )

Newbie Fred

[Mark Fishman]

John,

instead of reloading the B2 software, have you tried

 - reloading the web page for the web UI? (to force the web page to refresh)

 - rebooting the B2? (to force the B2 to load the new b2db into memory properly)

 - power-cycling the B2, after Saving and waiting for the clock to return?

[JFBUK]

Mark,

 1. reloading the web page for the web UI? (to force the web page to refresh) >>  the refresh never completes so ineffective. Opening a new browser session for the web UI also does not bring up details

 2. rebooting the B2? (to force the B2 to load the new b2db into memory properly) >> sometimes this clears the problem sometimes not

 3. power-cycling the B2, after Saving and waiting for the clock to return? >>  sometimes this clears the problem sometimes not

3 + 2 seems to work reliably

I also noticed that after a scan disk the front panel brings up the warning about Hard Disk Read Only

I know that could well indicate a hard drive problem, and potentially a progressive degradation but I am somewhat sceptical given that after a fix everything seems to be operating as normal.

Do you know whether scan disk produces a log or can it be enabled to produce a log ?

Thanks

[Peter Lowham]

Hi John,

I've had a look at your b2db file and processed it in my 'Estimator Spreadsheet'. It all appears normal and healthy to me.  The issue with the apostrophes and the 'strange' characters is not a problem; this is caused by MusicBrainz/ FreeDB/ other CDDB sites using different character codesets at different times so when the B2/ dBpoweramp is downloading the tag information, it has to use the content that it is given.  My collection of about 20,000 tracks has about 300 of these characters, and my two B2s are both working perfectly.

I have attached two JPG files to show the effect of viewing your 'b2db' file with different editor encoding set. The SS1_ file shows my editor using 'ANSI' character encoding and the SS2_ file shows your file being viewed in 'UTF-8' encoding.  

Reading through your information suggests to me that your B2's (micro)SD card may be somewhat corrupted and should be re-flashed or replaced.  Running the web upgrade does not rebuild the (micro)SD card, it only applies fixes and updates, so this method will not fix an SD card with corruption in general.

If you have a spare (micro)SD card that is 8GB or larger, you can flash the 'B2B' software onto that.  The procedure is reasonably straight-forward and will take about an hour to run through for the first time, as you need to download a small app called 'balenEtcher' and the 'B2B' software image file (both of which are free) from the Brennan website (a few minutes on a reasonable internet link).

Below is a link to the Brennan website page if you would like to look at that.  If your B2 is the later model, you will need to remove two screws from the back panel, an open up the B2 to gain access to the microSD card.  But be careful not to open the back by more that 1.5 inches/ 4 cm otherwise the CD drive cable connection can be pulled out.  This is all described in the webpage.

To see the re-flash instructions in detail, scroll down the page to 'New SD card'.

https://www.brennan.co.uk/itemcontent.php/content/Techy

Alternatively you can purchase a new card from Brennan at £10.

If the SD card is somewhat corrupted, this might be the reason that the HDD is going into 'read only' mode.  The fact that 'Scan Disk' completes without the HDD going into 'read only' tends to indicate to me that the HDD is OK.

Regards,

Peter.

[JFBUK]

Hi Peter,

thanks to you  (and others) for spending time to try and help diagnose what is happening.

I think you have misread my earlier post because the HDD is going into 'read only'  when 'Scan Disk' completes.

With the help of "Newbie Fred's " responses I had already concluded that the seemingly spurious characters were not the cause and were in fact a consequence of how album and track names are stored on Musicbrainz etc.

1. I have flashed an alternate SD card (albeit not a brand new one) and did a web upgrade to the latest software (May 12th 2021) but unfortunately the problem still occurs.

2. I then decided to repeat the exercise but not upgrade the software so the software version was Sep 8 2020 .

3. I ran scan disk and it worked with no problems. I ran it again to make sure and still OK :)

4. I ran the web upgrade to the May 12 2021 software and everything was OK but the settings & status panel reports zero hard drive usage. Otherwise the WebUI is working as expected.

5. I ran a scan disk again and the WebUi is not functioning :(

6. Save and a power cycle brings things back but the disk usage is still reported as zero.

I also connected to my B2 as 'Root' using WinSCP and checked the HDD properties before and after a 'scan disk' that caused a problem.

There was no difference in the permissions.

Various screenshots attached. 

@Paul @Brennan - I am definitely seeing different behaviour for scan disk between the two versions of the B2 software. Also the 'New SD card' link points to file with name containing 2019 when it fact its its the Sep 8 2020 version.

Thanks to everyone who has responded  but I don't want anyone to spend any more time on this as I have a workaround which is acceptable to me (save and reboot) and the incidence  of having to manually 'scan disk' is low.

Others may disagree but my experience points to something changing in the software that causes 'scan disk' to intermittently not complete successfully.

Thanks 

John

[PMB]

Hi John,

Curious, not noticed this myself - anyone else seeing this?

I'll see about getting the download image date changed.

Paul

Brennan Support.

[Mark Bernstein]

After a scan, I too have had the WebIU act dead, but by toggling  back to the app and then back to the WUI, it comes back to like.