Question from Meedio Convert...

[bmdoss]

I have been using Sage for a couple days a have one issue that is starting to drive me nuts.. In meedio I have 3 different media libraries DVDs, IPTV and children's cartoons.. Is there any way to make more than one area to import media to without dealing with media tags..

BTY The DVR side of sage ROCKS...

Thanks

[stanger89]

Without knowing how you have your libray organized (on disc) it's hard to give specific advice. But the easiest way, assuming you have your library in "DVDs", "IPTV", and "Children's Cartoons" folders is to just set their parent directory as the library import directory.

Do that and you'll see those folders listed in the Import Library.

If that doesn't help, detail your directory structure/organization and I can probably give you some better suggestions.

[bmdoss]

I have several folders spread over 3 storage servers each with 3 or 4 drives

Each library pulled from a combo of folders from 1 or more of the storage servers

In sage I can set up one library from several different sources and it works great BUT I need away to add more separate libraries.

Thanks

[mike1961]

I have mine set to Y:\VideoArchives and then I just create any folders I want in that one folder (ie: videoarchives\TV\Quincy\episodes, videoarchives\movies\drama, etc.) and Sage displays the folders automatically without having to tell Sage anything else.

This is great for videos but can it do it for music? Is there any way to display music in the same folder like format? I don't like seeing all the songs jumbled together.

Thanks,
Mike

[mike1961]

BMDoss - have you considered converting your permanent storage videos to mp4 AVC format? You can probably get about 1,000 movies on a 500 gb drive (figure about 250 megs / hour).

I just checked and my movies in my media library average about 440 megs each.

Mike

[bmdoss]

For now I may just reorganize the directory structure on my media servers to match each other. HD's have been so cheap I really have not considered using a MP4/h.264 encoding as part of my storage process.. But It would sure make things a little simpler.. I just thought I was missing something this was rather simple to setup in meedio..

The Media Center portion of Sage seems like a couple steps backwards compared to Meedio but the PVR in Sage is a LEAP forward..

Thanks...

[mike1961]

I use GermSage with SageTV so that Sage automatically plays my mp4 files. I notice almost no quality difference at all. The only drawback is that it takes a long time to encode. So I just let the computer convert it at night. The other nice thing is that I can backup an entire hard drive with tons of movies in just a few hours. Also, there is far less network traffic since the entire movie is under 500 megs compared to 6 gigs. Try it and see if you like it. All the software you need is free anyway.

Mike

[mike1961]

Actually - I'm still a little confused about your original question. You have the 3 drives set up in your media library but I'm not sure exactly what is happening or what the problem is.

Mike

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by bmdoss

I have several folders spread over 3 storage servers each with 3 or 4 drives

I had a feeling

But fear not!!!!

OK, what you'll probably want to do is something like this:

First thing to be aware of is that Sage will "lose" the root directory name of the import directories you specify (so you can't use share names to segregate things in Sage), or another way to look at it, Sage imports each Library Import Dir into the root of the Sage Video Library.

First you'll need shares on each server:
\\Server1\Share
\\Server2\Share
\\Server3\Share

Now what you do to organize everything is create subfolders on each server for the "Categories" you want, eg:
\\Server1\Share\DVDs
\\Server1\Share\IPTV
\\Server2\Share\Childrens
\\Server3\Share\DVDs
\\Server3\Share\IPTV
\\Server3\Share\Childrens

Now you will specify the "\\Serverx\Share" as your library import directories. Then when you browse the Video Library, you will see 3 folders:
Childrens
DVDs
IPTV

Sage will agregate folders across multiple import directorys (not like it's smart, it's actually dumb, it just can't tell the difference between something in \\Server1\DVDs and \\Server3\DVDs but it works kind of neat).

The Media Center portion of Sage seems like a couple steps backwards compared to Meedio but the PVR in Sage is a LEAP forward..

I think that's about where a lot of us are. I know it's where I am, the Media Center stuff does what I need it to (not all that I want it to) but the PVR part is just in a league of it's own.

[stanger89]

I'm sure you knew this was coming Sorry

Originally Posted by mike1961

I use GermSage with SageTV so that Sage automatically plays my mp4 files. I notice almost no quality difference at all.

On an SDTV (which I believe Mike is using a smallish SDTV) there's probably not much/any noticable loss. However on an HDTV (especially a large FP ), 250Mb/hr is macroblock hell, even with H.264 AVC.

[mike1961]

Stanger - (Two Questions Posted Here) I'm not sure if you were involved in a thread we had a few days/week back but the video was not the problem for most but rather the loss of dolby surround sound effect that some did not want to give up (when converting dvd's to mp4). Personally, I play the sound out of stereo with just 2 speakers which is fine for me so I don't care about the loss of surround sound.

I have a 42" HDTV plasma and to tell you the truth my DVD's that I converted to mp4 that average 240 mb/hour look much better than my Sage TV recordings at 3.2 gigs/hour.

Question 1: What is macro blocking? Keep in mind it's not divx, xvid or just plain H264 but it's the high profile format and you can adjust the compression / quality. The quality of your mp4 video is largely determined of course by the quality of the original mpeg 2 file.

Quesiton 2: I'm still wondering if there is any way to display music in folders like you can videos?

Thanks,
Mike

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by mike1961

Stanger - (Two Questions Posted Here) I'm not sure if you were involved in a thread we had a few days/week back but the video was not the problem for most but rather the loss of dolby surround sound effect that some did not want to give up (when converting dvd's to mp4). Personally, I play the sound out of stereo with just 2 speakers which is fine for me so I don't care about the loss of surround sound.

Yeah, that was me, and while we ended up on the audio, the video was a problem for me too

I have a 42" HDTV plasma and to tell you the truth my DVD's that I converted to mp4 that average 240 mb/hour look much better than my Sage TV recordings at 3.2 gigs/hour.

That doesn't surprise me terribly, DVDs start off much better than recordings.

Question 1: What is macro blocking?

These codecs work by breaking the video up into blocks, Macroblocking refers (generally) to being able to see those blocks. Give me an hour or two and I'll try and post a couple screenshots.

Keep in mind it's not divx, xvid or just plain H264 but it's the high profile format and you can adjust the compression / quality. The quality of your mp4 video is largely determined of course by the quality of the original mpeg 2 file.

My comparison was a chapter for SW III ROTS, Nero Recoded in Standard AVC at 500kbps.

Quesiton 2: I'm still wondering if there is any way to display music in folders like you can videos?

Not sure, I don't use Sage for music, I rarely sit down to listed to music in my HT, actually I rarely get to listen to music anywhere but at work or in my car.

[bmdoss]

Originally Posted by stanger89

I had a feeling

But fear not!!!!

OK, what you'll probably want to do is something like this:

First thing to be aware of is that Sage will "lose" the root directory name of the import directories you specify (so you can't use share names to segregate things in Sage), or another way to look at it, Sage imports each Library Import Dir into the root of the Sage Video Library.

First you'll need shares on each server:
\\Server1\Share
\\Server2\Share
\\Server3\Share

Now what you do to organize everything is create subfolders on each server for the "Categories" you want, eg:
\\Server1\Share\DVDs
\\Server1\Share\IPTV
\\Server2\Share\Childrens
\\Server3\Share\DVDs
\\Server3\Share\IPTV
\\Server3\Share\Childrens

Now you will specify the "\\Serverx\Share" as your library import directories. Then when you browse the Video Library, you will see 3 folders:
Childrens
DVDs
IPTV

Sage will agregate folders across multiple import directorys (not like it's smart, it's actually dumb, it just can't tell the difference between something in \\Server1\DVDs and \\Server3\DVDs but it works kind of neat).



I think that's about where a lot of us are. I know it's where I am, the Media Center stuff does what I need it to (not all that I want it to) but the PVR part is just in a league of it's own.

I am in the process of doing just as you described I was hoping it would work something like that..

Thanks for all the help...

[dflachbart]

Originally Posted by bmdoss

The Media Center portion of Sage seems like a couple steps backwards compared to Meedio but the PVR in Sage is a LEAP forward..

That's exactly how I feel too ...

And that's the reason why, after starting with SageTV, I also bought Meedio for the Media Center functionality I need (both integrated via Girder) ... I'm waiting for Sage to catch up, until then I'll stick with my current solution.

Dirk

[olauritz]

I asked another place in this forum about if there were a possibility to browse mp3's in folder-sturcture - and no solution has come up - actually i really like sagetv like everyone else - pvr/tv-guide works better than anything else i've tried(and i believe i've tried everything exept MCE - in which i will not even try.. ) - BUT the mediacenter part kind of sucks actually. All i want to do is forget about my xbox and xbmc, but noone seem to come close to what that has when it comes to movies, mp3's - sadly enough.

[gplasky]

Use the SageMC STV and enable the Music Folders option. Then you can browse your music by folders. Read the first post in that thread or the WIKI for instructions.

Gerry

[olauritz]

Actually sagemc 16x9 did a lot for me, now sagetv is like 90% of what i want it to be(the winamp module i cant get to work yet - would have been nice with the winamp fullscreen visualization), now there is a couple of other things that irritates me - why do i have to refresh 'my imported files' to see my movies that are newly added, why cant i just browse them like i do with the mp3's now? And secondly there would be perfekt if sagetv would automount iso's(like mediaportal maybe?).

I have from time to time tried the eval versions of sagetv, but there has always been something that have made me go away again - and wait to register until it jas gotten what i feel i need as minimum - now i actually consider it, and im shure in a month or so ill just have to register it!

[mike1961]

Can you elaborate on that? Where is the "first post in the thread and what thread?" Also, will I have to stop using GermSage for my videos because I can't get rid of that until the internal SageTV has those features.

Thanks,
Mike

Originally Posted by gplasky

Use the SageMC STV and enable the Music Folders option. Then you can browse your music by folders. Read the first post in that thread or the WIKI for instructions.

Gerry

[gplasky]

Originally Posted by mike1961

Can you elaborate on that? Where is the "first post in the thread and what thread?" Also, will I have to stop using GermSage for my videos because I can't get rid of that until the internal SageTV has those features.

Thanks,
Mike

10/30/2005
SageMC_169_5_8 - Version 8 SageTV 3.x STV
SageMC169 Ver 5 Version 8
Various improvements and bug fixes.
New My Music Files menu (enable with Options menu on Main Menu). This will let you play and browse your music collection via the file system.

Gerry

[mike1961]

I'm still confused as to what SageMC is or how it is different from Sage and Sage Client and GermSage.

Thanks,
Mike