WMP Tag Plus - MPEG4, Vorbis and FLAC metadata support for WMP Options

[borisgoodenough]

I'm using Tag Plus and ran into a tag-related problem, so I'm hoping Tim or one of the other experts here can point me in the right direction.

I'm slowly switching over to FLAC files, and would like to integrate them into an existing WMP MP3 library, in order to stream to my audio system via a Grace tuner. (The tuner detects the computer as a UPNP device, and reads the WMP database to organize by tags.) Used the xiph codec and Tag Plus to bring the FLAC files into WMP, and everything behaved as expected. The WMP library displays the newly-imported FLAC files and tags, and WMP 12 plays them on the computer.

But the Grace tuner doesn't recognize these FLAC files as music, or see their tags, as it does with the MP3 files in the WMP library. It does recognize and play FLAC files from a directory structure in an external storage drive that's not integrated into the WMP library -- so it looks likely that the problem is how the FLAC files and tags are being integrated into WMP.

In poking around, this is the identical behavior displayed by Windows Explorer (Win7/32). Directories set up for music files display the file details from the tags of the MP3 files -- but none from the FLAC files imported to WMP via Tag Plus.

So here's the question: if Explorer looks at different sets of tags than those used by WMP, where are those tags located and can I get at them via Tag Plus to see if those are the same tags that the Grace tuner also needs to identify / play the FLAC files that are now imported into the WMP libraries?

Thanks in advance.

This post has been edited by borisgoodenough: Jan 21 2013, 15:22

[Tim De Baets]

Explorer doesn't look at a different set of FLAC tags than WMP, it simply doesn't look at any tags at all, because it doesn't recognize FLAC. WMP Tag Plus only adds tagging support to WMP and not to Explorer. To get FLAC tagging support in Explorer, you will need to install an additional FLAC property handler such as this one or the one included in dBpoweramp.

Also, are you sure that the Grace tuner supports FLAC via UPNP? I'm not familiar with the UPNP protocol but I would guess that this is completely different from playing from a directory structure. I'm not sure if the protocol even supports custom audio formats like FLAC.

[borisgoodenough]

Thanks, Tim. The good news: installed the FLAC handler and Explorer now recognizes the FLAC file tags. So does the Grace tuner, which sorts / organizes based on those tags.

The bad news: once I select on the basis of tags, the tuner still doesn't recognize / display the actual FLAC files as playable music files.

The Grace tuner does support FLAC playback via UPNP -- at least in some circumstances. It recognizes an external HDD or thumb drive attached to the router's USB port as a UPNP server, displaying and playing a directory structure of FLAC files. But there's no tag or playlist support in this setup, and the number of directories it supports (10) on a non-WMP drive seems geared toward something like a thumb drive, but useless for a music library. Which is what started me down the road of trying to integrate the FLAC files into WMP in the first place.

(I realized this is headed off-topic, so we can drop it, or take it elsewhere if you have some thoughts on what I might try. Grace support has been worse than useless -- a boilerplate litany of reboots / resets.)

[Tim De Baets]

I don't have any experience with audio streaming so I'm afraid that I can't help you further. You may want to ask for advice in the FLAC forum on this website.

[Inf1neon]

Today I downloaded and installed WMP Tag Plus 2.1 to get FLAC tags working in Media Player 12. All the metadata appear to be working fine except for the album art? I've tried replacing the art with *.png files but that didn't help. I notice that the album art displays fine in VLC (2.0.5). I've also since installed Windows 7 File Explorer support for FLAC using 'Windows 7 FLAC Property Handler' and that works perfectly showing the album art.

Has anyone else had this problem or can anyone help me troubleshoot this? Thanks!

[Tim De Baets]

Does the album art appear if you re-add the FLAC files to the library? Make sure that WMP Tag Plus is checked in Tools - Plug-ins, select the files, right-click, Delete - Delete from library only - OK. Then go to Tools - Advanced and select Restore deleted library items.

If that doesn't help, can you upload one of these files and PM me the download link so I can take a look myself? You can use Dropbox or a file sharing website like Skydrive/Rapidshare. Thanks!

[b23h]

Today I downloaded and installed WMP Tag Plus 2.1 to get FLAC tags working in Media Player 12. All the metadata appear to be working fine except for the album art? I've tried replacing the art with *.png files but that didn't help. I notice that the album art displays fine in VLC (2.0.5). I've also since installed Windows 7 File Explorer support for FLAC using 'Windows 7 FLAC Property Handler' and that works perfectly showing the album art.

Has anyone else had this problem or can anyone help me troubleshoot this? Thanks!

Hi. Someone covered this issue quite some time ago. I would suggest experimenting with one albums artwork. What you want to do is set up file explorer to view all files, including system files. Then you will see multiple image files in each folder. Some of the image files will have very long file names, you want to delete those that have very long file name strings. Again, test this with only one album and see if that works for you.

I found that if I allowed those files to stay, every time I rebuilt my library or viewed the library from another computer, the album art would not show up. Once those image files with the long strings are deleted, the album art shows up without any issues.

test the issue....

This post has been edited by b23h: Mar 10 2013, 09:10

[b23h]

pg 8

"01 When I Kissed the Teacher.flac
02 Dancing Queen.flac
03 My Love, My Life.flac
04 Dum Dum Diddle.flac
05 Knowing Me, Knowing You.flac
06 Money, Money, Money.flac
07 That's Me.flac
08 Why Did It Have to Be Me.flac
09 Tiger.flac
10 Arrival.flac
11 Fernando [-].flac
12 Happy Hawaii [-].flac
13 La Reina del Baile [-].flac
14 Conociéndome, Conociéndote [-].flac
15 Fernando [Spanish Version][-].flac
(*) AlbumArt_{A3B92F5A-1A65-4A74-9498-B5815DB1E161}_Large.jpg
(*) AlbumArt_{A3B92F5A-1A65-4A74-9498-B5815DB1E161}_Small.jpg
(*) AlbumArtSmall.jpg
Arrival (flac).cue
CD.jpg
desktop.ini
Folder.jpg
Inlay.jpg
Sleeve Back.jpg
Sleeve Front.jpg


If I delete the files preceded by (*), WMP will now show up the folder.jpg image automatically."
--------------

this person is implying that you also need to delete the AlbumArtSmall.jpg. I am not sure that is the case, but the other two should be deleted.

[Tim De Baets]

b23h: with older versions of WMP Tag Plus, it was indeed necessary to delete the AlbumArt_*.jpg files for the album art in Folder.jpg to show up. However, now that WMP Tag Plus supports album art this shouldn't be necessary anymore.