Music Media Helper (Tools for Multichannel Audio & Music Videos)

[AudioHound54]

Thanks, Homer. Converting to FLAC worked flawlessly. I've been concentrating on Atmos rips recently so I kinda automatically selected m4a as my output format.

 

[CINERAMAX]

5.05 RUNNING GOOD HERE!

 

[CINERAMAX]

I'm venturing into a new pc with a server, found the link...

 

[CINERAMAX]

rokutv 55 not very legible as pc monitor!

 

[HomerJAU]

Music Media Helper 5.0.7 released:

Version 5.0.7 (August 11 2021)
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Changes:
Extract Audio from MKV tool: Add new 'Refresh Grid Tags button' to force current tag data into grid columns
Updated BS1770gain tools to latest version

Fixes:
Extract Audio from MKV tool: Musicbrainz Tagging: Selecting a disc did not update grid tags - fixed
Penteo tool: Loading 'Volume tool' from Penteo tool caused Target gain control to be disabled

 

[Sal1950]

Music Media Helper 5.0.7 released:

Don't you ever sleep? LOL
Tanks a Ton
Sal

 

[HomerJAU]

Don't you ever sleep?

I do sleep, but coincidentally, I woke up last night dreaming about some new code I’m writing

 

[kap'n krunch]

I do sleep, but coincidentally, I woke up last night dreaming about some new code I’m writing

you are such a hopeless ROMANTIC!!!! LOL!!!
reminds me of my brother in law (for now) who is a mathematician and dreams of equations...

 

[Sal1950]

BTW Gary, just ran the update from 5.0.5 to .7.
Everything was smooth as silk with the dialog boxes popping up to inform on progress and then starting .7
Nice work! , very grateful.

 

[Sal1950]

Used MMH to "Extract Audio From MKV" for the first time tonight, what a impressive experience.
With just a few clicks and no need to address Help files, I was able to extract the 10 tracks in flac from a MKV of
Supertramps BIA, tag the files and add artwork.
Truly an outstanding piece of software, I get awed each time I use it with how well you've designed the UI and all.
Tanks bro

 

[HomerJAU]

Music Media Helper 5.0.8 released

Version 5.0.8 (August 16 2021)
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Changes:
Channel Volume tool: Added Waveform Viewer chart - new
Channel Volume tool: Now supports adding files by drag and drop from Windows File Explorer on dialog - new

Fixes:
Audio batch tool: ReplayGain not working due to change in BS1770gain tools in previous release - fixed
Chapter Editor tool: Failed to save chapters to mka file - fixed

New Waveform viewer:

To zoom:
Click on a channel and use you mouse wheel
Or:
Hold 'CTRL' key and then press either '+' or '-' key

 

[timbre4]

@timbre There is no need to clean any non audio files as MMH only looks for audio files in folders. This won’t be the issue.
If you use the output option ‘Remix Folder’ (not Overwrite) your files will be duplicated so you need a large disc drive if you intend doing many albums.

Your error messages: I have not seen these issues previously.
Is it possible for you to send me a couple of sample source files that cause the errors? You can see the file names in the error messages you posted.

There was a change from MMH4 to MMH5 where MMH5 attempts to process multiple files concurrently, I wonder if this contributes to the issue? Do you still have MMH 4 installed and could try on the problem Album folders? MMH did two files concurrently, MMH does up to 4 concurrently (depending on your processor) which may be too many if your are using a slow USB drive.

Sorry been busy and didn't see/check for responses. Understood on other file types present being okay.
I did use the 'Remix Folder option'; it created 120 remix sub-folders. Some of these were incomplete, maybe 3 songs out of 12. The simplest way out was to search the drive for 'remix' and delete them for time's sake.

I lurched into this and exposed the entire 'Quad' folder (735 albums) when many are okay and don't need silent channels.
I need to survey the folders for 4.0 FLACs to narrow the project target. I can peek at each in Sound Forge but that will be time consuming, Any fast way to do that?

Here's the hardware setup I used:
Dell XPS 8500 on WIN 10 with 32GB RAM - brand new WD easystore 5TB HDD connected as USB 3.0 (USB powered)
It was processing 4 files at a time; I still have the MMH 4 installed so that is a possible test too.

Putting 2 files up (one's seen in each error message) on a Google drive at links:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/18wlbnQCeks24ARhWxHgPx54LVyqSz-J8/view?usp=sharinghttps://drive.google.com/file/d/1V17ryBNGOyqxagh4EeG3B2Kd8GtjRDVi/view?usp=sharing
Thanks so very much as always

 

[HomerJAU]

Thanks. I’ll check out the test files tomorrow Tim.

 

[HomerJAU]

I need to survey the folders for 4.0 FLACs to narrow the project target. I can peek at each in Sound Forge but that will be time consuming, Any fast way to do that?

The MMH Remix tool only loads files that have the selected no. of source channels. So if you select a Remix Option 'Add Silent Channel(s) to a Quad' file when you select a root folder MMH recursively looks into every sub-folder for file that have only 4 channels and only loads 4 channel files. That should wortk for you. Basically, MMH ignores 5 and 6 channel files. So any files you've done already won't get loaded.

I also have a tool for my own use (never released) that opens every file and reports which channel(s) are silent by looking at the audio data for every channel. It's relatively slow but runs recursively on all sub-folders and files (FLAC or WAV only). I you are interested I can add it to MMH?

I checked your two example files:
1 is corrupt and causes the error 'cannot convert string to double (MMH trying to get No. Of Channels) - this is fixed by just ignoring the file if its corrupt, It won't play and can't be opened by any audio apps I have.

The other is ok. But I think the errors were related to MMH processing 4 files concurrently on a slow hard drive. I can easily do 8 at a time but I have NVME 4.0 drives (write at 5000MB/s) and a slow USB drive can't do more than 60MB per second at most, maybe a lot less. MMH is now hardcoded to 2 max which is what MMH4 used. MMH 5 previously looked a the number of processors and set to 4 if there were 4 or more. Writing 4 x 96kHz multichannel files at same time is the problem I think.

Eventually I should make the max concurrent a user preference for those with SSD drives

THX
Garry

 

[HomerJAU]

Music Media Helper 5.0.9 released

Version 5.0.9 (August 18 2021)
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Changes:
Channel Volume tool: New Waveform Viewer chart has minor performance and visual improvements
Remix Channel Layout: Now limited to 2 concurrent conversions (fixes issue with 4 concurrent & slow hard drives)

Fixes:
Remix Channel Layout: Reading a corrupt file would report a programmatic error - fixed (file now ignored & not loaded)

 

[timbre4]

GARRY: I also have a tool for my own use (never released) If you are interested I can add it to MMH?
TIM: Yes, I’d be interested in that if not too far off your radar. Glad the Remix is skipping 5 or 6 channel files.
I chose Quad and add 2 channels when I all I needed was to add one. Maybe that would ease processing?

GARRY: 1 is corrupt and causes the error 'cannot convert string to double (MMH trying to get No. Of Channels)
TIM: Aha - corrupt file detector! Guess I need to know that too. Will note them as they occur and get corrected files to replace.

GARRY: The other is ok. But I think the errors were related to MMH processing 4 files concurrently on a slow hard drive. USB drive can't do more than 60MB per second at most, maybe a lot less. MMH is now hardcoded to 2 max which is what MMH4 used. Writing 4 x 96kHz multichannel files at same time is the problem I think.

TIM: Got it, the PC may have plenty of juice, but even USB 3.0 powered HDD is still limited. Thinking these are okay for music serving off Oppo player hosts, but will work the batch file processing slower.

Thank you

 

[HomerJAU]

Maybe that would ease processing?

Same to add 1 or 2 silent channels. It’s saving the files. It takes time to write and multiple files at same time means the drive is working to its max.

I’ll add the silent channel reporting to the Audio Batch tool this week.

 

[HomerJAU]

TIM: Got it, the PC may have plenty of juice, but even USB 3.0 powered HDD is still limited. Thinking these are okay for music serving off Oppo player hosts, but will work the batch file processing slower.

I’m going to add a new ‘Output Folder’ option to the Channel Remix tool which will create new album folders in the Output Folder instead on under the source album folder in a ‘Remixed’ folder as MMH does now.

This would enable you to point the output files to your fastest hard drive or SSD drive when remixing instead of using the source drive.

I have already implemented the new ‘Check for Silent Channels’ Audio batch option. This checks all channels in all files for channels with very low to zero audio signal. This will released in next MMH update.

I ran some tests a while back and found a few surprise quad mixed tracks in official 5.1 album releases (Queen have a few 4.1 mixes)

 

[timbre4]

In awe once again! Tonight I switched back to MMH 4 for 2x file processing. Got a string of those previous errors; mostly the processing speed and a handful that are corrupt. I used Snagit to capture each album/track error to reference later.

When it reached the N artists, the errors stopped and it made it all the way to the T artists. Plodded through 2 James Taylor quads and then it finished through Z artists with no more errors. Not sure why it would be like this.

5TB USB 3.0 with about 2TB in each of two folders (quad / 5.1) and about 1 TB free space

 

[HomerJAU]

I'm just testing the new Output Folder option in the updated Channel Remix tool and I've increased performance by removing a redundant file copy step in most remix options. This will help with slower discs for sure (but all users benefit). Previous versions always copied the original to the Remix folder then worked on the copy, this step is now removed.

Adding the new User Defined Output Folder makes it easier for users to get to the remixed albums too!

Here's the new dialog User Output Folder options (new items in yellow):

When using a 'User Defined Folder' MMH creates each media file's source folder under the selected 'Output Folder'.

For example, if your source is: F:\surround\Bob Dylan - Blonde on Blonde

And your Output Folder is: G:\Remixed Files

Then MMH will create a folder named: G:\Remixed Files\Bob Dylan - Blonde on Blonde and create the remixed files in this new folder for the source folder

If you are doing a batch conversion of multiple albums/folder MMH creates new folders for all the sub-folders (album folders) in your source folders it processes

(This will be released tomorrow in MMH 5.0.10)

THX
Garry