Dear God, give me strength!

[Turboglo]

So I've been having problems with my wireless network, but have been able to get everything back on track each time. I've been able to eventually find my Drobo and to have iTunes find the library.

 

I've also gone back and forth a couple of times from directly connecting the Drobo USB into my computer, to uploading the CD's wirelessly.

 

But now, all of a sudden, as I have the Drobo hooked up wirelessly, iTunes refuses to find the library in Drobo. I can see that all the music is still there through finder, and the library database folder is still there with about 36KB, but iTunes isn't finding it.

 

Any suggestions?

 

[Turboglo]

There's a folder in the Drobo called "iTunes Library (damaged)". It has 2.1 MB in it. Don't know why or how it got there.

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

Hey Turboglo - I'm totally certain what you've already done or tried to remedy the situation so I have to start with some basic items.

 

Assuming all your music is on the Drobo in the iTunes music folder. The actual library file isn't that big of a deal.

 

Connect to the Drobo via Wireless so the drive mounts on your desktop. Then open iTunes and enter Preferences >> Advanced >> General Tab. Even if your music folder appears correct, hit change and reselect the correct folder on the networked Drobo. This might fix your issue.

 

Or, you can always create a new library file and select your music folder the same way. then chose Add To Library and all your music will for sure be there and working perfect.

 

 

It's hard to suggest an exact fix without a little further discussion. Don't worry, we'll get you there :-)

 

[Turboglo]

Okay Chris, I did what you said (I think). I tried creating a new iTunes Library, and it looked as if it worked, but when I tried to open it, still nothing. I know I'm just doing something really basic wrong. I'm not freaking out because the music files are clearly still present. But I just can't get them to show up in iTunes.

 

I was a bit confused with the process because after I created the new iTunes directory, there were only two items in there: iTunes Library, with 36 KB, and iTunes Library.xml, with 12 KB. So I thought that I would try dragging the music and art files from the old directory, then i tried opening the new one up in iTunes, and still nothing.

 

[Turboglo]

One more interesting observation: When I go into the "iTunes Music" folder through Finder and click on any song, it starts playing and appears in the (formerly) empty iTunes Library window.

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

Hey turboglo - The reason the song you play appear in the library is because of an iTunes setting to automatically add songs to the library when you play them. It can be changed but is usually a handy feature.

 

OK let me explain what I'm going for first then how to get there.

 

Start over with a new library that contains nothing. Add the music to this library and everything will work as new.

 

 

How to get there - On a Mac hold down the option key as you open iTunes and chose the option to create a new library. On a PC I believe you can hold down the shift key when opening iTunes to get this dialogue box. Once you create the new library with nothing in it go to the preferences / options area in iTunes and set your music location to the Drobo iTunes Music Folder. Then on the iTunes FILE menu and select ADD TO LIBRARY. Then browse to that same iTunes Music Folder on the Drobo. All you music will begin populating the library ad you're done.

 

Caveat - You will need to get the album artwork again for albums that you had to manually add artwork to because iTunes didn't the artwork. Of course there are ways to use your existing library and keep all the artwork, but it is hard for me to tell exactly what happened with the existing one and may take longer to get you up and running. Let me know if you want to try it.

 

[Turboglo]

Okay, this is getting weird. I was reading online that you could just drag the folder with the music files (titled "iTunes Music") on top of the window of the empty iTunes library, and the songs will appear. So I did it, I saw the files being copied, but to my surprise, they were being transferred from the "iTunes Music" folder directly into the "iTunes" parent folder (the new one that I made). Strangely, this worked and they DID appear in my iTunes library window and I can click on them and they'll play. But this seems very strange to me.

 

I just received Chris' latest, but I'm afraid to do anything because it's working, albeit weirdly. Also, my iTunes Music folder completely disappeared in the process. I have no idea what's happening behind the scenes. How would I fix this. Create a new folder, call it iTunes Music, drag all the music files into it, then follow those steps? I'm getting paranoid that all this moving around is going to mess things up in the FUBAR sense.

 

BTW, thank you so much, Chris, for your time and effort. I truly appreciate it.

 

[Turboglo]

Okay, I managed to get everything back to the way it was looking before. Not exactly sure why it's working now and it wasn't before, but for now all is good. Thanks again for your help Chris.

 

[Turboglo]

Okay, I managed to get everything back to the way it was looking before. Not exactly sure why it's working now and it wasn't before, but for now all is good. Thanks again for your help Chris.

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

Hey turboglo - No worries, this is why I created the site!

 

It sounds like things are pretty FUBAR'd to use your description. Just because it is working the way it is does not mean you want it this way. You may run into some ugly problems down the road. But, feel totally free to run with it if your happy. Whatever works for people is cool with me ;-)

 

My suggestion - If your music is not on the Drobo for some reason move it over there. If the Drobo already has the folder with all your music files then I highly recommend following my steps and starting over with a fresh library. A major reason I suggest this is because it removes any doubts that everything is setup correctly, at least in my opinion. This is always something that can be done at a later date as well. Just make sure your music is on th Drobo. To verify iTunes is using the Drobo, right click a song and select SHOW IN FINDER (on a Mac) and probably something similar in Windows. This will take you to the music folder location. I want to make sure nothing was copied back the internal hard drive fomr some unknown reason.

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

Looks like you posted while I was writing my response. Glad to hear you're up and running!

 

[Turboglo]

Yes. And I should have added that the way that I fixed it was to create a new folder in the Drobo iTunes directory titled "iTunes Music", then move all the music files into that.

 

Just for certain, I checked that the files are indeed on the Drobo and not my internal drive. At this point I have too many music files to fit in the MacBook.

 

At this point I can plug into the "earphone out" of my Macbook with a cable that splits into stereo RCA's and play music that's stored on a remote hard drive. That's pretty cool. Of course, the sound quality is not there because of the lack of a quality DAC, but I'm seeing light at the end of the tunnel. (Just hope it's not the proverbial train.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Turboglo]

My Altmann DAC arrived and I've had the weekend to burn everything in. It's an amazing DAC. I'm using a cheap Samsung DVD as a transport connected to the DAC via coaxial and it sounds better than my old Naim CDS-3, I'm not kidding.

 

But here's a problem. The computer doesn't sound as good as the transport, even though Charles Altmann insists that it should sound as good, or even better. I'm using Toslink, and he says that's what he uses, a cheap plastic Toshiba optical cable.

 

So I went online and did a little research and it seems possible that my MacBook is not putting out a true lossless signal. One forum instructed you to go to this link:

http://www.malor.com/dtswavs/Mendelssohn_2.wav

 

...turn your volume down, and then as the file is playing, slowing raise the volume. If all you have is hiss, then you are not getting a full lossless output.

 

Well, sure enough, I went to the link and all I got was hiss. So my conclusion is that I'm not getting full resolution, or whatever technical description there is.

 

Here's what was posted:

 

If you mess with the outbound volume at all, it changes the bitstream. If Apple isn't differntiating between 'computer sound' and 'DVD sound', as Windows does, it would damage digitally-compressed bitstreams, like Dolby Digital. It would turn them into a long hiss. Apple is probably making sure the music is truly lossless to your receiver, which normally would control the volume. However, it's possible that you're getting the worst of both worlds... it may be resampling up to 48Khz (very common on Intel-based hardware) and then refusing to do volume control on top of that.

 

To find out if you're really running true lossless sound (which is good), you can download this 44.1khz DTS-encoded WAV file [self-link, 55 megs]. Set all your computer volumes to max, but turn your receiver volume WAY DOWN (you don't want to damage your speakers if it's not working) and play it back. If you get multichannel classical music, you have true lossless sound. If you get only a hiss, then hit stop, powercycle your receiver, and immediately hit play again. If you still get only static, then most likely Apple is just lazy, not lossless.

 

if it turns out you're truly lossless, then a digital volume control would probably degrade your sound a bit. If you're not lossless, then you should be jumping down Apple's throat for not including it.

posted by Malor at 8:51 AM on April 2, 2006

 

[http://ask.metafilter.com/35539/Why-is-optical-digital-audio-locked-at-full-on-a-Mac]

 

 

So has anyone run across this problem? Is there a fix? Is it true that this is a problem in Intel machines only? Would an older mini do the trick?

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

I kind of got lost in the mix of that post.

 

I get 100% bit perfect output from my Intel based MacBook Pro via USB or Toslink. The iTunes volume will degrade the audio stream to less than bit perfect.

 

[Turboglo]

Chris, just curious. Did you go to that link and did you get it to play music through your MacBook Pro?

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

I haven't tried it yet. I was really cranking some John Coltrane tonight and I couldn't stop. When all the stars align it's hard to stop listening :-)

 

I'll give it a shot, but I'm skeptical that it's proof positive of bit perfection.

 

[Turboglo]

Actually kicking back, relaxing and listening to music? I kinda remember what that was like : )

 

Enjoy!

 

[Turboglo]

Well my newbiness is certainly showing. But I bet I'm not the first, or last person who will have this problem.

 

It seems that iTunes has an equalizer and it is preset for use with the MacBook's little internal speakers, which, as one would guess, lowers the bass and boosts the mids and highs.

 

I simply turned it off, and presto chango, beautiful MUSIC!!!!