The "Official" Aurender Discussion Thread

[Custodian]

I have tried out the "Add to My Library" feature, and have been successful in transferring Tidal albums to my library, but the album art seems to get lost in the process.

 

Has anyone had any luck with this?

 

Works fine for me.

 

sound quality changed slightly too: better soundstage plus better bass resolution. Anybody else found this?

[haujobb]

Works fine for me.

 

sound quality changed slightly too: better soundstage plus better bass resolution. Anybody else found this?

 

Add to library does not mean the album will be downloaded to your internal HDD. I added several albums to my library but the amount of data on the HDD didn't increase. See it as a convenience feature not to switch sources when compiling play lists and so I doubt there is an improvement in sound quality.

[isquirrel]

Is there anyway other than using AirPlay to use Roon with Aurender W20 or other models?

[Custodian]

Add to library does not mean the album will be downloaded to your internal HDD. I added several albums to my library but the amount of data on the HDD didn't increase. See it as a convenience feature not to switch sources when compiling play lists and so I doubt there is an improvement in sound quality.

Yes I understand that.

 

I meant a general improvement in sound quality quality due to the Firmware upgrade.

 

Sorry if I caused confusion.

[Koso]

Does anyone here use usb tweaks like “Audioquest Jitterbug” or “iFi iPrufier2” between Aurender and DAC? Any experience?

[musicman59]

Does anyone here use usb tweaks like “Audioquest Jitterbug” or “iFi iPrufier2” between Aurender and DAC? Any experience?

 

I used to use the USB iPower and the wyre4sound Recovery with WireWorld USB Platinum cables and then I switch to Nordost Heimdall II USB cable with nothing else and IMO the sound is more transparent and with a bigger soundstage.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Computer Audiophile

[Pat Case]

Does anyone here use usb tweaks like “Audioquest Jitterbug” or “iFi iPrufier2” between Aurender and DAC? Any experience?

 

I use the Bryston BUC-1. I bought the BUC-1 because my ARC DAC8 would not play nice with the Aurender. The DAC8 allows USB input from appropriately equipped computers but not the Aurender. In any event, the BUC-1 does far more than provide. Channel to my DAC. When I hooked it up, there was a very slight and pleasant change in SQ.

[russellbobby]

Does anyone here use usb tweaks like “Audioquest Jitterbug” or “iFi iPrufier2” between Aurender and DAC? Any experience?

 

Before I went with the A10 I had a Regen(replaced by a W4S), sbooster, all being powered by a LPS. Nice improvement with each add on, but with a real good Curious cable they added up to $650.00. I sold it all and it really helped set off the cost of the A10.

[Vincent1234]

Does anyone here use usb tweaks like “Audioquest Jitterbug” or “iFi iPrufier2” between Aurender and DAC? Any experience?

I used to have an AQ Jitterbug between the Aurender X100L and a dCS Puccini. After a few months I removed it and guess what? The sound improved considerably! More airiness and clearer highs. So, be careful what you do. Depending on the quality of your DAC and the rest of your system the results can be unpredictable. I now have the Jitterbug connected to the unused USB slot of my router, to which the Aurender (now an N10) is connected via Ethernet. This does bring some SQ improvement; a more relaxed and more 'grounded' sound. Again: do try and experiment what works for you and what doesn't.

 

Sent from my HTC One_M8 using Computer Audiophile mobile app

[Taxman]

I just realized that the new version of the conductor app has ruined the presentation of all my albums consisting of more than one disc... For a reason I don't know, Aurender now requires you to have all files in one album located in one folder regardless of how the ALBUM-tag is set. I have always had a structure like this:

 

Album ->

Pink Floyd ->

(1979) The Wall ->

CD1 ->

Track 1

Track 2, ...

CD2 ->

Track 1

Track 2, ...

 

In the latest version of the app, this music library structure will end up in two albums in the album view

 

Is it only me? How can they change this behavior from one minor version to another? Do they really expect me to change my entire file structure to comply with how they think the music should be organized?

[classeaddict]

Does anybody do any tweaks to the internet/Ethernet incoming side of things to their Aurender?

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Computer Audiophile

[JS21]

Is it only me? How can they change this behavior from one minor version to another? Do they really expect me to change my entire file structure to comply with how they think the music should be organized?

 

No you aren't. I've also run into it with Tidal albums when "added to my library". What's worse is some of the "2nd album" artwork does not show, just the gold record jpg.

 

Though my HD files are still being displayed and playing properly for now, when I scan, it shows that I have 900+ unrecognized files. Obviously not as much as many of you, but that's what I have for now and I'm not about to edit over 900 files.

I emailed Aurender about this last week and they said they weren't sure why it was happening and it could be just the system database updating.

[SirAtilla]

No you aren't. I've also run into it with Tidal albums when "added to my library". What's worse is some of the "2nd album" artwork does not show, just the gold record jpg.

 

Though my HD files are still being displayed and playing properly for now, when I scan, it shows that I have 900+ unrecognized files. Obviously not as much as many of you, but that's what I have for now and I'm not about to edit over 900 files.

I emailed Aurender about this last week and they said they weren't sure why it was happening and it could be just the system database updating.

 

Can you tell me if your master database happens to be on a Mac and if you used Finder to copy the files? I had about twenty thousand unrecognized files after the upgrade and was able to remove them all with a single command. In my case the files were always on the Aurender however the updated scanner now notices them and they are not music files. I can explain in much more detail if you fit the scenario.

 

Also can you reply with one of the unrecognized file names likely will begin with ._

 

 

Carlin "Rick" Smith

[JS21]

Can you tell me if your master database happens to be on a Mac and if you used Finder to copy the files? I had about twenty thousand unrecognized files after the upgrade and was able to remove them all with a single command. In my case the files were always on the Aurender however the updated scanner now notices them and they are not music files. I can explain in much more detail if you fit the scenario.

 

Also can you reply with one of the unrecognized file names likely will begin with ._

 

 

Carlin "Rick" Smith

 

Yes, from a Mac. Here's a screenshot..

[Taxman]

Can you tell me if your master database happens to be on a Mac and if you used Finder to copy the files?

I have my master on a Mac and copy all music files to the Aurender using finder. I haven't done a complete scan after the upgrade though. But maybe I would also get tons of unrecognized files if I do!?

[SirAtilla]

Yes, from a Mac. Here's a screenshot..

[ATTACH=CONFIG]33719[/ATTACH]

 

Ok let me tell what is occurring here and luckily not really a bug on the Aurender side. The Mac file system HFS utilizes the concept of a data and resource fork where the resource fork can contain other things like the icon, embedded thumbnail etc. The main data fork is where the real contents are in just about all cases. Historically there are a few exceptions but not relevant to this discussion. On the Mac filesystem the data and resource fork don't appear separate but when copying to a network drive, particularly one served by SMB like the Aurender, Finder will place the resource fork in a separate hidden file started with ._filename. The reason is a good one if you restored from that location Finder would reassemble the two parts back into the proper Mac filesystem format. In the case of properly assembled music files there is nothing really in these extra files.

 

Now I will say the Aurender scanner did change during the update in the sense that it now tried to scan these invisible files and listed them as unrecognizable. But they were also there in the past the difference is they are being reported now. I am glad they are as I would prefer to not have them on the Aurender.

 

So here is a simple method to remove them using Mac unix commands.

 

 

1. First mount the Aurender music drive (if you have an Aurender with multiple disks you will need to do this per disk).
   
2. Using Terminal on the Mac (under Applications->Utilities) navigate to the mounted volume - $cd /Volumes/Music1
   
3. You can execute the following command to just list all the files to confirm you have the command line correct - $find . -name "._*"
   
4. You can then execute the following command to remove all of these files which is essentially just passing the results of find to remove
   - $find . -name "._*" -exec rm {} \;
   
5. You can execute a clean scan using Conductor if you want to verify none exist.
   

 

My last word of advice is to not use Finder to copy the files. There are many tools that when copying ignore creating these resource forks including utilizing even built in unix copy commands like rsync. I personally use a program called Chronosync. If you used Finder a lot you will likely also have a bunch of .DS_Store files on your Aurender as well. .DS_Store files contain information about folders and spotlight metadata. You can use the same commands above to remove these files replacing "._" with ".DS_Store". Again utilities like Chronosync, rsync either ignore these files or can be configured to ignore them.

 

Hope this helps and happy to help others further. After the upgrade did this procedure on 3 different Aurenders.

 

Carlin "Rick" Smith

[SirAtilla]

Most certainly you would yes.

 

Carlin "Rick" Smith

[Cycleman]

But they were also there in the past the difference is they are being reported now. I am glad they are as I would prefer to not have them on the Aurender.

 

Hi Rick,

 

Thanks for this detailed info. My question for you now is: WHY do you prefer to not have those files on the Aurender?

 

I mean, I've been getting those "unrecognized files" report too as I use the scanner. However, those music files are, in reality, still there and still play fine.

 

So, why might I want to play around with Terminal -- where if you make an error, there is the chance of some unwanted things happening -- when the reality of playing music with the Aurender has not been changed?

 

Dave, who has been using Mac computers for over 30 years now and is comfortable enough with Terminal but is asking these questions with a more general perspective

[SirAtilla]

Hi Rick,

 

Thanks for this detailed info. My question for you now is: WHY do you prefer to not have those files on the Aurender?

 

I mean, I've been getting those "unrecognized files" report too as I use the scanner. However, those music files are, in reality, still there and still play fine.

 

So, why might I want to play around with Terminal -- where if you make an error, there is the chance of some unwanted things happening -- when the reality of playing music with the Aurender has not been changed?

 

Dave, who has been using Mac computers for over 30 years now and is comfortable enough with Terminal but is asking these questions with a more general perspective

 

Dave,

 

Because they have nothing to do with music playback and they are not music files. They also generate so many errors in the scanner log that if I had a real issue with a file I would never see it as it would take significant time to scroll through that list to find a real issue.

 

I want to make clear your Aurender does not play them and they are excluded from the Conductor database. So when you say the files play fine it is the original music file not these duplicate files with the ._ prefix.

 

The unix commands are a one time clean-up. I would recommend using copy utilities that don't place the files there in the first place. On the Aurender the only real risk you have from a mistake in the command line might be deleting the music files which are stored elsewhere for archival or backup purposes anyway. Nothing about the underlying systems files are exposed to the user.

 

At the end of the day Dave these extra files won't hurt anything if left there but it certainly isn't clean.

[Cycleman]

Okay, Rick, that makes sense.

 

But could you more clearly list the Unix commands, since when I copy-and-pasted, I got error messages.

Such as this:

 

Irving-Main:~ Dave$ $find . -name "._*"

-bash: .: -n: invalid option

[SirAtilla]

Okay, Rick, that makes sense.

 

But could you more clearly list the Unix commands, since when I copy-and-pasted, I got error messages.

Such as this:

 

Irving-Main:~ Dave$ $find . -name "._*"

-bash: .: -n: invalid option

sure -

 

After mounting the Aurender disk change directory to your Aurender Music Disk

 

cd /Volumes/Music1

 

command to list all files

 

find . -name "._*"

 

command to remove all files

 

find . -name "._*" -exec rm {} \;

Dave being in the correct directory is very important since as I constructed the command it starts in the directory you are currently in and recursively looks at all folders below that directory. I can't tell in your message if you are in the directory at the root of the Aurender disk.

 

You can always use the command

 

pwd

 

which should give you an output of

 

/Volumes/Music1

 

this will confirm you are connected to Aurender disk

[Taxman]

Most certainly you would yes.

Thanks, that worked just fine even though these files haven't been an issue before. Since I keep my music library on another disc, I guess it would make sense to use rsync or something similar to keep the Aurender local library synchronized with my "master" - I just need to find out how to replicate the changes - guess I have to read the man-page for rsync!

 

Still, this doesn't solve the problem with duplicate album entries in the album view. I filed a support request yesterday to Aurender regarding this but haven't heard anything yet...

[SirAtilla]

Thanks, that worked just fine even though these files haven't been an issue before. Since I keep my music library on another disc, I guess it would make sense to use rsync or something similar to keep the Aurender local library synchronized with my "master" - I just need to find out how to replicate the changes - guess I have to read the man-page for rsync!

 

Still, this doesn't solve the problem with duplicate album entries in the album view. I filed a support request yesterday to Aurender regarding this but haven't heard anything yet...

 

Glad it worked for you. Will be interesting to see the result of the duplicate album issue as while I don't have multi-disc albums split in separate folders from some previous testing of albums of different audio resolutions can definitely confirm the Aurender previously would combine like metadata discs regardless of physical file location.

[Taxman]

Thanks Rick!

When investigating this further I and since I have been copying albums back and forth from/to the Aurender, I realized that the Aurender adds some invisible files/folders as well that at least I don't want to have on my master. There is a folder .aurender for each album and that folder contains files like auThumb*.jpg that are thumbnails of the album art.

 

Currently I'm testing a sync command to copy all new/modified files from my master to the aurender, and it seems like this could work. This is the command I'm testing:

 

rsync -avz -n "/Volumes/Media Backup/Aurender/" "/Volumes/HDD1"

 

The option -n will just list all files that will be copied without actually doing any copy. Any thoughts/ideas on how to improve?

[SirAtilla]

Thanks Rick!

When investigating this further I and since I have been copying albums back and forth from/to the Aurender, I realized that the Aurender adds some invisible files/folders as well that at least I don't want to have on my master. There is a folder .aurender for each album and that folder contains files like auThumb*.jpg that are thumbnails of the album art.

 

Currently I'm testing a sync command to copy all new/modified files from my master to the aurender, and it seems like this could work. This is the command I'm testing:

 

rsync -avz -n "/Volumes/Media Backup/Aurender/" "/Volumes/HDD1"

 

The option -n will just list all files that will be copied without actually doing any copy. Any thoughts/ideas on how to improve?

yes I noticed the hidden files on the aurender as well when troubleshooting this issue.

 

My only suggestions off top of my head is I would use avr options (r for recursive versus z for compress). You can also use the --exclude option to specifically ignore .DS_Store files if any exist on the Mac side.

 

rsync -avr -n --exclude ".DS_Store" "/Volumes/Media Backup/Aurender/" "/Volumes/HDD1"

I can play around with this a little later this evening and post some further comments. I want to test what happens if I change say a folder name does it fully replicate and remove the old folder name. Believe it will. There a few other options that I used like --inplace in the past that can improve performance.

 

One of the reasons I use Chronosync (trying to not sound like an advertisement as no affiliation) but after I import and curate metadata on computer I just launch a pre-configured job to sync up the Aurender. The job mounts, copies, un-mounts, and e-mails me a report of the activity which may be my favorite part. You could do much of the same if you wrapper your shell script with your rsync command in an Automator Workflow.