Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

[mjbraun]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

It is difficult to say, x4 speed might be the drive, or something else.

Well, I tested one of the drives while bypassing the FireWire bus and I got a similar performance result, so I guess the drives just perform at that speed. Oh well.

That being said, I can't get the system to complete a batch rip. It will load, lookup, and start ripping two discs and then never finish either of them. We're talking over 58 minutes and only get past 3 tracks. If I hit "End Batch" the program won't halt (it just stays on "Ending Batch Rip").

Also, I've installed a second FireWire drive, so I can save locally rather than over the network (and I've changed the encoder to MP3 versus the Local Encoder).

I'm connected to the host via Remote Desktop as Administrator, but I don't think that would cause any permission problems.

[Spoon]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

It is difficult to say, x4 speed might be the drive, or something else.

[mjbraun]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

5 minutes for a disc are not unreasonable, even though your disc was relatively short.

Spoon,

As before, and as always, thank you very much for creating such a wonderful product and for your prompt responses.

If 5 minutes isn't too bad for the short disc, that's fair. I was basing my judgment of the relative performance on the "dBpoweramp: CD Ripping Speed Trials" page where the CD being ripped was approximately 1 hour, 50 minutes long and yet was ripped to Wave in under 4 minutes, so I assumed my 38-minute CD would rip much faster (even though the drive is slightly slower).

Still, I'm not sure why Batch Ripper would be taking 15 minutes for the same CD using the same profile as used in the single-cd. I did notice under Process Explorer two copies of CD Grab executing under the Batch Ripper process tree, each running two copies of CoreConverter, if that's useful information.

Also, I finally managed to find a tool (Opti Drive Control) to report on my drive performance and, using the same CD as in my previous test, I ran a transfer rate test. Strangely, I received an average read speed of 3.97x which makes me think something is acting as a bottleneck...

[Spoon]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

5 minutes for a disc are not unreasonable, even though your disc was relatively short.

[mjbraun]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

Try using CD Ripper and see what its speed is.

Test CD -
Artist: 12 Rounds
Album: Pleasant Smell
Tracks: 8
Time: 38:31

Drive -
Manufacturer: MATSHITA
CD Drive: DVD-RAM SW-9585S
Firmware: PZ1M
Serial: 09/21/050000A
Maximum Speed: 7056 KB/sec (x40)
Current Speed: 7056 KB/sec (x40)
Spin-down After: 8 minutes
Buffer Size: 2 MB
Accurate Stream: Yes
C2 Error Pointers: Yes
Reads ISRC: Yes
Reads UPC: Yes

Host System -
OS: Windows Server 2003
Make: Compaq Proliant
Model: DL360
Drive(s): 2x 18G.2b SCSI (RAID 1)
Processor(s): 2x 800Mhz Intel PIII
RAM: 768 MB

MP3 Settings -
Target: CBR
Constant Bit Rate: 192kbps

CD Ripper -
Rip to: Wave
Rip Time: 5:33
Rip to: MP3
Rip Time: 6:10
Rip to: Encode Local (MP3)
Rip Time: 7:48


While the server isn't exactly the most high-performance box, given that the Wave rip vs. MP3 encoding times aren't wildly different, I wonder what I could be missing. Also, nothing else is on the Firewire bus other than the PowerFile. Are there any utilities that I can run to test the throughput of the DVD drive and Firewire controller just to make sure it's not bottlenecking?

[Spoon]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

Try using CD Ripper and see what its speed is.

[mjbraun]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

I do not know of any.

Thanks Spoon. I've more-or-less given up on the SCSI system and migrated to a Firewire-attached dual-drive PowerFile R200, which pretty much works like a charm. The only issue I'm running into are *really* slow rips (15+ minutes per CD). I'm ripping secure to a network drive, encoding to mp3 via the local encoder beta, on a dual processor machine, and I'm only seeing processor spikes on occasion, yet Batch Ripper is often showing performance of greater than 10x.

Any ideas what could be affecting my performance or how best to diagnose the situation?




Thanks!

[Spoon]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

I do not know of any.

[mjbraun]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

The changer has a normal DVD drive inside? it has to support SCSI MMC v3 to be supported (modern drives from the last 5 years).

CORRECTION: I misquoted the model in my earlier post: the device is an MC-1200U, not at MC-2200. This means the drives are CD, not DVD.

This is relevant because as the device was made in 1997 (!!) and thus most likely does not support MMC-3 on the Plextor drives. As the drives are not stock, it looks like I may have some hardware hacking ahead of me to mount more modern drives in the case.

An additional question, though, and for future reference: are there any tools that will tell the MMC compatibility of a drive? I found mmctext.exe as part of the Microsoft Windows Driver Kit but the system requirements were excessive.

[Spoon]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

The changer has a normal DVD drive inside? it has to support SCSI MMC v3 to be supported (modern drives from the last 5 years).

[mjbraun]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

But wait! There's more! (Apologies for posting too frequently)

I downloaded the Windows version of MTX and used it to trigger an inventory of the library via "mtx -f Changer0 inventory", after which clicking "Populate" properly reports the number of CDs in the system. However, when I try to kick off a rip, I get "No CD After Load" errors. What am I missing now?

[mjbraun]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

Not to clog up the list, but one other thing: if I do re-enable the Removable Storage Service, the system attempts to inventory the library, but won't stop (it reaches the end of the discs and then starts over again).

[mjbraun]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

Greetings,

I was wondering if anyone had experienced any luck using dBpoweramp with the JVC MC-2200 or similar SCSI-attached libraries? I'd like to know folks' experiences before I pick up a copy of the software, since I didn't see a yea/nay regarding support for the box in the thread.

Thanks!

With a devil-may-care attitude in the face of danger, I went ahead and acquired the software. Result: it kinda works in that the changer is recognized, etc, but I can't get the batch rip to work.

Here's what I'm facing:

1. Windows Server 2003 system with an Adaptec 2940UW SCSI controller
2. Removable Storage Service disabled (I was getting changer in use errors until it was disabled)
3. Medium Changer shows up under device manager "Medium Changer" as 8 copies of JVC MC-1200 Disc Library (Bus Number 0, Target ID 6, LUN [0-7])
4. dMC-R13[1].4-Ref-Registered.exe + dBpoweramp-Batch-Ripper-MediumChanger-Loader.exe + dBpoweramp-Batch-Ripper.exe
5. Batch Ripper Configuration sees the 4 Plextor CD-ROM PX-32CS drives.
6. Configuring the first drive: Loading Method = Medium Changer, CLI instructions = --changer="0" --driveid="0" (I changed --driveid to 1-3 for the remaining drives, other settings remained the same). Offer Spindle Change = <never>
7. Test Load CLI: "Start Test": brings up the dialog "Ready to Batch Rip on Medium Changer 0, Medium Changer Contains ? Discs"
8. Click "Populate" (currently there are 5 CDs in the machine). No activity from the box, but the dialog changes to "Medium Changer Contains No Discs"
9. Click "Ok": Dialog returns but has returned to "Medium Changer Contains ? Discs"
10. Click "Cancel": Debug Output =
    **********************************************
    Beginning Test
    
    Running Program: "C:\Program Files\Illustrate\dBpoweramp\BatchRipper\Loaders\Me dium Changer\Load\Load.exe" --changer="0" --driveid="0" --drive="E" --rejectifnodisc --logfile="C:\DOCUME~1\ADMINI~1\LOCALS~1\Temp\1\dBB4 .tmp" --passerrorsback="C:\DOCUME~1\ADMINI~1\LOCALS~1\Temp \1\dBB5.tmp"
    Running...
    Waiting For Changer Mutex: Got
    Finding Changer: Found: \\?\scsi*blooper*changer&ven_jvc&prod_cd-chg_mc-1200&rev_1.02*blooper*4&1e262cc3&0&000600*blooper* {53f56310-b6bf-11d0-94f2-00a0c91efb8b}
    Opening Changer: Open
    Getting Changer Storage Elements: Got 200
    Current Changer Position: 200
    ** Reached End of Changer Storage, Offering Reload.
    Finding Full Slot From 0 to 200
    Reached End, No More Discs to Load
    ** Reached End of Changer Storage, Offering Reload.
    *** Error: User Cancelled Batch Rip. [cancel batch]
    Closing Changer: Closed
    
    Testing Complete
    

So the first part that I gather is that the "Populate" command isn't inventorying the library to discover where discs are loaded. I've tried clicking the Mass Load and Mass Unload buttons, to no avail as well. What should I do next?

Thank you very much for your help!

[mjbraun]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

Greetings,

I was wondering if anyone had experienced any luck using dBpoweramp with the JVC MC-2200 or similar SCSI-attached libraries? I'd like to know folks' experiences before I pick up a copy of the software, since I didn't see a yea/nay regarding support for the box in the thread.

Thanks!

[mikelangelo11]

Re: Discussion of Automated CD Loaders

Is it possible to use archive creator with an automatic Disk Publisher, Primera, Bravo Disk Publisher?
This unit has a CD Burner, a robotic arm and a CD printer which I use to make up to 50 discs automatically without having change the CD and sticking labels.
Archive Creator does see the Primera drive but when I tried to use it, it tells me that there is no CD in the Drive (of course).

If there would be a way to combine have bothe great produts work whith each other, that would be heaven...