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Topic: How to use Foobar to apply replaygain to large library... (Read 3161 times) previous topic - next topic
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How to use Foobar to apply replaygain to large library...

Hi folks

I am looking for advice on the best way to apply replaygain to my music library. My music is primarily Flac, both 24 and 16 bit with some SACD ISOs and mp3s. It is almost 4TB in size, all stored on a single 5TB external drive. I have everything backed up on various external HDs. I have searched but not really found a definitive answer as to the best way to proceed. I did however read of several people having files corrupted when processing a large number of files so would be most grateful for any advice.

Thanks in advance.


Chris

How to use Foobar to apply replaygain to large library...

Reply #1 –
foobar2000 does not cause file corruption, at least on files that are valid to begin with. If files have enough padding writing new tags involves just writing the few changed bytes. If that can't be done and temporary files need to be involved the original file won't be touched unless the temp file was written succesfully. Once the temporary file is done the two files are simply swapped in place and the original file is removed on success. If the operating system reports errors on any operation foobar's console will report them to the user.

The users who have seen file corruption may have failing harddrives or bad memory that changes bits at random. Even a bad CPU that miscalculates could break files when they are altered. There is no evidence telling what has happened.
If someone does see foobar2000 breaking a file that user should upload the broken file for analysis and give detailed information what was the operation that broke it. And having the original undamaged file would be a great help too.

With that said I suggest you just select all your files, right click one of them and command ReplayGain -> Scan selection as albums (by tags). This assumes that your files are properly tagged, at least properly enough so that they have Album and Artist tags.
You can easily access all files by using main menu item Library -> Search and type "ALL" in the search field. Then just click one of the results and hit Ctrl+A to select them all.
Those SACD ISOs may not support tag writing. I'm not familiar with components that handle them. You may want to search for "%codec% IS FLAC OR %codec% IS MP3" instead of "ALL" to only select all your FLACs and MP3s and process them first.
If you are afraid of file corruption you can always run Integrity Verifier on your files before the operation and after the operation. And you can even perform binary comparison on the decoded data afterwards for your backed up files and the newly replaygained files with Binary Comparator.

I have hundreds of gigabytes of FLACs and I have ReplayGained and otherwise retagged them countless times with foobar2000. There has never been any corruption or failures.

How to use Foobar to apply replaygain to large library...

Reply #2 –
Quote from: Case on
With that said I suggest you just select all your files, right click one of them and command ReplayGain -> Scan selection as albums (by tags). This assumes that your files are properly tagged, at least properly enough so that they have Album and Artist tags.

Like Case, I, and many others, have replaygained countless files without issue. If you're worried, test your process on a few files first. If you're still worried, process your library in smaller batches, testing as you go. If you're not sure about the correctness of your tags, you can choose "Scan selection as albums (by folders)", which is less reliant on metadata.
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?  ;~)

How to use Foobar to apply replaygain to large library...

Reply #3 –
Great. Thanks for the help- much appreciated. Yes, the cases of file corruption sounded more likely to be due to lack of memory or hardware related rather than the fault of Foobar...but as my PC is only an AMD twin core (tho with 8GB Ram), I thought that I might have the same problem! To be honest, I think it is highly unlikely that all of my files are correctly tagged, though most will be. Is there a component or means of checking this before I proceed? Also, are there any disadvantages to "Scan selection as albums (by folders)" as I think that most likely would be the way to go if it is safer.

Thanks again for your help.