Vista & MicroStudio 4.002

[seawolf]

With Vista Home Premium, there is an issue in custom assembly. If I select several songs from directory "A", then try to add songs from directory "B", it will not permit them to be added.

Another bug is that when you save a custom assembled disk layout, the file name appears and you are able to retrieve it, but the song information is gone.

Both of these work fine under XP Pro SP2.

With Vista !!!

With XP Professional !!!

DC

[ddouglass]

Have you tried to just use directory "B" to see if it is a security problem with "B"?
Essentially if it works in XP but not in Vista then it is probably a security issue with Vista. If you haven't tried this try turning off the UNC and see if that fixes both problems.

[seawolf]

Yes, I have all of the directories used by Hoster & MicroStudio as loose as they can be, and I have turned off all of the other sharing options as well. Thanks for the thoughs, though.

DC

[mindonstrike]

Originally Posted by seawolf

With Vista Home Premium, there is an issue in custom assembly. If I select several songs from directory "A", then try to add songs from directory "B", it will not permit them to be added.

I can't confirm this. On my vista machine I just added 10 songs from one directory and 10 from anotherand had no issues. I didn't write a disk but they were all there ready to be written.

Another bug is that when you save a custom assembled disk layout, the file name appears and you are able to retrieve it, but the song information is gone

When I saved the write list and then reopened it I did find that 2 songs were missing.

Sam

[seawolf]

I am posting this both as a new thread and as a footnote to my original in the hopes that someone can shed some light on the problem.

The ONLY way I can get MicroStudio ver.4.00X to work on ANY machine, either XP Pro or Vista is to convert all of the songs to *.kma format. Then and only then will all features work as advertised. If you followed the posts, it all started with the installation of 4.002 on a Vista machine. The "Write Disk" feature would NOT read any of the *.lst files created with v. 4.00X nor could I select files from more than the default directory to custom assemble.

Now, another anomaly has reared its ugly head -- after converting all 10k+ files to *.kma, I discover that witn 4.004's "new and improved" option to define the field order, it randomly applies its own logic to the file name and sorts is as it sees fit! For example, over 1/2 of the songs (all of which imported without error) show the Title as "unknown" and the "artist" as the title, even though I selected "Title" " - " "Artist"! Also, it will not let you finish the equation, that is -- complete the picture by telling the program that the entire file is "Title - Artist.kma" !! Go figure...

I am so frustrated now that I am actively searching for another program that will do what MicroStudio advertises. At this point, I have tried all of the "fixes" that I know about, tried every file format and NOTHING FIXES THE PROBLEM!!! The MTU staff has been as helpful as anyone could expect, but we have reached a stand-still.

Does anyone out there have any ideas, suggestions or recommendations? As a retired pilot, I find that I have run out of airspeed, altitude and ideas...

[ddouglass]

Originally Posted by seawolf

The ONLY way I can get MicroStudio ver.4.00X to work on ANY machine, either XP Pro or Vista is to convert all of the songs to *.kma format. Then and only then will all features work as advertised. If you followed the posts, it all started with the installation of 4.002 on a Vista machine. The "Write Disk" feature would NOT read any of the *.lst files created with v. 4.00X nor could I select files from more than the default directory to custom assemble.

I have never seen any *.lst files generated by Microstudio, so don't know what you are talking about. When you import song files with Microstudio 4.00x they are created in *.BIN format and prior to version 4 they were created as *.CDG (which Songverter can change to BIN). Microstudio will list, play and write all formats including MP3, WMA, WAV, and ZIP along with BIN and KMA. If you have opened a folder before you may need to "Refresh" the list in order to see all the files.

Originally Posted by seawolf

Now, another anomaly has reared its ugly head -- after converting all 10k+ files to *.kma, I discover that witn 4.004's "new and improved" option to define the field order, it randomly applies its own logic to the file name and sorts is as it sees fit! For example, over 1/2 of the songs (all of which imported without error) show the Title as "unknown" and the "artist" as the title, even though I selected "Title" " - " "Artist"! Also, it will not let you finish the equation, that is -- complete the picture by telling the program that the entire file is "Title - Artist.kma" !! Go figure...

What is to complete? You don't have to tell Microstudio what the extension is, but only the order and seperators for the the file name. This works exactly the way the Import from Hard Drive works in Hoster. My guess would be that 1/2 of your song files have a different separator set-up so won't list correctly.

[seawolf]

The *.lst file is the one created when you save a write to disk list of songs. Every time you save a song collection so that you can re-write the disk if necessary, it creates one of these files.

[seawolf]

With regard to your comments...
"What is to complete? You don't have to tell Microstudio what the extension is, but only the order and seperators for the the file name. This works exactly the way the Import from Hard Drive works in Hoster. My guess would be that 1/2 of your song files have a different separator set-up so won't list correctly."

I agree that I shouldn't have to tell MicroStudio what the extension is, but when it reads some of the files one way, importing "Unknown" as the title and imports the Title as "Artist", sumpin' ani't working right. My thinking was/is that if I could show the terminator/file type separator (.), it might ensure that what came before was "Title - Artist", but the program won't let me place that "." without something in the following field and that is only "&This", "DiskID" or "Track", even though the manual indicates differently, and I quote:

"Typical filenames use separators to end each field string such as "-" or "_-_" or " - " and ".". Some of these characters such as "_" or "-" or "space" may also be in a field string (ex: Newton-John, Olivia or Parton,_Dolly). If there is a problem, edit your filenames. You can either choose the ending characters from the drop-down list, or type in up to 3 characters, spaces and/or symbols for each field. The last separator field must contain a "." period.
NOTE: Unlike the Field list boxes where you can only select from the drop down list, in the Separator list boxes you can also type in up to three characters, symbols and spaces. This allows you to define any field order with any separators your filenames may contain."


ALL of my songs are in the identical format... "TITLE - ARTIST" and they ALL imported into Hoster without a problem, so the file format should not be an issue. I can convert back to *.zip and the contents are "Title - Artist.mp3" and "Title - Artist.cdg" so all indications are that the file headers are intact.

DC

[swany]

First thing I do not have a PC with the new microstudio, but have struggled with Vista on my laptop with hoster and all my DJ music on it. #1 problem and this may be related to yours. Vista quits searching any file after the first 5000. I too have made my laptop with Vista, to be XP as possible, best bet that I've found is to go to your control panel with the PC online and get as many upgrades (patches) as possible mine required 23. I have a Gateway, first thing I had to do is call Gateways support, and they gave me a (I'm not supposed to tell you this) then walked me through one upgrade when I was having issues with the sound card. I can search my hard drive for kma files that I've recently downloaded off new discs and it won't show up in a hard drive search. It will show up in the search function for Hoster so I'm good there. I have two PCs on XP with hoster and don't have this problem. Now when I add music to the laptop, I first convert them on a XP, put them all in one file on my flash drive. Add that file to the Vista hard drive in hoster songs, merge the kma files into the data base through hoster. Thing is now I can find them with the Vista, hard drive search go figure. If I buy another new laptop, I can tell you if it has Vista, I will format the hard drive and install XP before I install any Microstudio or Hoster. I am getting along with the one Vista I have, I now know most of the quirks, however my employees and my wife are next to being a psycho killers after one night on it. So that show has been deemed for Swany use only.

[mindonstrike]

Now, another anomaly has reared its ugly head -- after converting all 10k+ files to *.kma, I discover that witn 4.004's "new and improved" option to define the field order, it randomly applies its own logic to the file name and sorts is as it sees fit! For example, over 1/2 of the songs (all of which imported without error) show the Title as "unknown" and the "artist" as the title, even though I selected "Title" " - " "Artist"! Also, it will not let you finish the equation, that is -- complete the picture by telling the program that the entire file is "Title - Artist.kma" !! Go figure...

The define field order should have no bearing on KMA's. KMA's have their own never changing header and therefore they are not reliant upon a a particular field order as set under the tools tab. If the title and artist info is correct in Hoster they should be as well in MS.
At least thats the way it works on my machines, Vista and XP

Sam