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Problems Running Multiple Instances Plus Other First Time Observations
FYI: I am a registered member using v 11.5 which I purchased just yesterday. Prior to purchasing dbPowerAmp I have had no previous experience to speak of with converting sound files from one format to another.
I needed to convert several hundred .mp3 files to .aac and had all the input data stored in separate folders under a master folder. First, I went through the .mp3 files and updated the ID tags because the files I downloaded lacked Album, Title and Track information. During that process I noticed that even though iTunes supports a "Track n of n" feature dbPowerAmp merely lets me type in the number of a track so if I want to keep the output as compilations, and I do, I have to do a second round of typing back in iTunes 7 to add the "of n" data.
Each .mp3 file I am working with averages approximately one hour of spoken Word apiece so they are considerably bigger than the average song. As a result, conversion time is measured in hours across the span of the library I'm converting.
When I attempted to run more than one instance of dbPowerAmp to speed this process up I would find the .aac files were either randomly missing labels, typically the one on the file that was already being actively converted and, curiously, the same file in the 2nd to Nth iteration of the software I was trying to run. Let me be more clear. If I fired up just 2 instances of dbPowerAmp and, after navigating down to the folder where I wanted the converted files to be written in preparation for kicking off the second instance... if the first instance happened to be writing the third file out of a seven item compilation I lost the ID3 tags on it AND on the third item in the second instance when it completed.
As a usability issue I have this observation to make. Imagine a folder called "MP3 Input Files" and another called "Teaching Series" which both had roughly 60 sub-folders that shared the same names. Assuming those names were "Series 01", "Series 02", "Series 03" and so forth I found it time consuming to have to renavigate (via the Browse button) over and over again to the identically named folder under "Teaching Series" as I was working with under "MP3 Input Files". This would have been considerably easier if the software had remembered the last target folder for me instead of making me re-click to it from "My Documents". Is there a switch somewhere to override this behaviour (e.g. some checkbox I have overlooked)?
While I'm on the subject, does anyone besides me think a great new feature would be the ability to select one high level folder with countless data folders underneath it and have a checkbox that said "Convert from x to y" in THIS folder and ALL Sub-Folders? And, once we said "Yes" to be given an opportunity to simply create or select a second high level folder somewhere else and have the software not only do the input file conversions throughout the entire structure but replicate the sub-folders with the same names as your inputs?
And before I forget, once again in my determination to attempt to speed this very time consuming process up I tried setting the "Priority" to 'Above Normal' since I was really only doing file conversion runs anyway. That crashed the WinXP Pro SP2's Explorer window I was using and destabilized my computer, forcing a reboot.
Looking forward to your comments.
I needed to convert several hundred .mp3 files to .aac and had all the input data stored in separate folders under a master folder. First, I went through the .mp3 files and updated the ID tags because the files I downloaded lacked Album, Title and Track information. During that process I noticed that even though iTunes supports a "Track n of n" feature dbPowerAmp merely lets me type in the number of a track so if I want to keep the output as compilations, and I do, I have to do a second round of typing back in iTunes 7 to add the "of n" data.
Each .mp3 file I am working with averages approximately one hour of spoken Word apiece so they are considerably bigger than the average song. As a result, conversion time is measured in hours across the span of the library I'm converting.
When I attempted to run more than one instance of dbPowerAmp to speed this process up I would find the .aac files were either randomly missing labels, typically the one on the file that was already being actively converted and, curiously, the same file in the 2nd to Nth iteration of the software I was trying to run. Let me be more clear. If I fired up just 2 instances of dbPowerAmp and, after navigating down to the folder where I wanted the converted files to be written in preparation for kicking off the second instance... if the first instance happened to be writing the third file out of a seven item compilation I lost the ID3 tags on it AND on the third item in the second instance when it completed.
As a usability issue I have this observation to make. Imagine a folder called "MP3 Input Files" and another called "Teaching Series" which both had roughly 60 sub-folders that shared the same names. Assuming those names were "Series 01", "Series 02", "Series 03" and so forth I found it time consuming to have to renavigate (via the Browse button) over and over again to the identically named folder under "Teaching Series" as I was working with under "MP3 Input Files". This would have been considerably easier if the software had remembered the last target folder for me instead of making me re-click to it from "My Documents". Is there a switch somewhere to override this behaviour (e.g. some checkbox I have overlooked)?
While I'm on the subject, does anyone besides me think a great new feature would be the ability to select one high level folder with countless data folders underneath it and have a checkbox that said "Convert from x to y" in THIS folder and ALL Sub-Folders? And, once we said "Yes" to be given an opportunity to simply create or select a second high level folder somewhere else and have the software not only do the input file conversions throughout the entire structure but replicate the sub-folders with the same names as your inputs?
And before I forget, once again in my determination to attempt to speed this very time consuming process up I tried setting the "Priority" to 'Above Normal' since I was really only doing file conversion runs anyway. That crashed the WinXP Pro SP2's Explorer window I was using and destabilized my computer, forcing a reboot.
Looking forward to your comments.
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