fanart storage XBMC

zuroph

Where oh where is this stored in XBMC Dharma running on windows 7?! I've been looking for ages!

squire23

It depends on what Media Scraper you're using. I use Ember Media Manager before I load into XBMC as XBMC's scrapers just take way too long. They save the fanart as a .tbn file.

zuroph

very new to xbmc, so just using the internal scraper linked to moviedb.com. Didn't know of ember. Its fine for me anyway, first scrape took time but since then its grand.

Voodu Child

I use ember to scrapr the fanart/nfo/poster and keep it in the folder with each movie. I prefer this for backup reasons, just seems handier to have the poster, fanart and .nfo in the same folder as the movie.

Even if you do that, XBMC caches fanart locally anyway - under Windows you can find it in Users>Username>Appdata>Roaming>XBMC>Userdata>Thumbnails

Also, if you are using the Acer Revo, then I highly recommend you try out the .dds poster/fanart function. It uses a type of image file that the GPU can decode instread of the CPU, and with the Revo I find it makes fanart backdrops load instantly.

You don't have to convert anything manually either, just enable it and XBMC will gradually convert the cached fanart to .dds format over time. This hogs a bit of your CPU in the background, but once they're all converted the interface is much snappier.

Mac daddy

I use ember media manager much easier and plus all content is stored with the film/album itself.

Example before I add a source to xbmc I would add it into ember instead, scrape it, modify the fanart and poster ect if not happy with it.
And once I'm happy with it add the source into xbmc and it just reads what is in the folders.

Port Royale

Its cached in

C:\Users\"[YOUR USER NAME]"\AppData\Roaming\XBMC\userdata\Thumbnails\Video\Fanart

Jakmeehan

Voodu Child wrote: »

I use ember to scrapr the fanart/nfo/poster and keep it in the folder with each movie. I prefer this for backup reasons, just seems handier to have the poster, fanart and .nfo in the same folder as the movie.

Even if you do that, XBMC caches fanart locally anyway - under Windows you can find it in Users>Username>Appdata>Roaming>XBMC>Userdata>Thumbnails

Also, if you are using the Acer Revo, then I highly recommend you try out the .dds poster/fanart function. It uses a type of image file that the GPU can decode instread of the CPU, and with the Revo I find it makes fanart backdrops load instantly.

You don't have to convert anything manually either, just enable it and XBMC will gradually convert the cached fanart to .dds format over time. This hogs a bit of your CPU in the background, but once they're all converted the interface is much snappier.

Thanks for that info, I am awaiting my Revo 3700 to arrive. I had a look thru the XBMC Dharma options on my current PC but couldn't find that option anywhere. Could you point me in the right direction please?

I am using the Aeon MQ2 skin

Voodu Child

Jakmeehan wrote: »

Thanks for that info, I am awaiting my Revo 3700 to arrive. I had a look thru the XBMC Dharma options on my current PC but couldn't find that option anywhere. Could you point me in the right direction please?

I am using the Aeon MQ2 skin

At the moment you have to activate it using a config file. It'll probably be a GUI option in a future build.

Create a file called advancedsettings.xml in your userdata folder if you don't have one already. (create a text file with notepad and just change the extension to xml)

It should have the following text in it:

<advancedsettings>
<useddsfanart>true</useddsfanart>
</advancedsettings>

Thats it. The next time you use XBMC it will create a .dds version of any fanart that you look at, and save it in the fanart cache. Then in future it will use that dds version instead. On the Revo it takes a while for it to create each dds file. But if you scroll through all your movies one by one (allowing the fanart to display for each one) then you can just leave it for a few hours and it should do them all in the background.

Jakmeehan

Voodu Child wrote: »

At the moment you have to activate it using a config file. It'll probably be a GUI option in a future build.

Create a file called advancedsettings.xml in your userdata folder if you don't have one already. (create a text file with notepad and just change the extension to xml)

It should have the following text in it:


Thats it. The next time you use XBMC it will create a .dds version of any fanart that you look at, and save it in the fanart cache. Then in future it will use that dds version instead. On the Revo it takes a while for it to create each dds file. But if you scroll through all your movies one by one (allowing the fanart to display for each one) then you can just leave it for a few hours and it should do them all in the background.

Lovely - thanks very much.

I have a library of approx 950 movies and 80 tv shows so it would take a long time to scroll through it all to let the fanart display for each! Is there a faster way of converting my library of fanart to .dds or is that the only way?

Appreciate your help

Voodu Child

Jakmeehan wrote: »

Lovely - thanks very much.

I have a library of approx 950 movies and 80 tv shows so it would take a long time to scroll through it all to let the fanart display for each! Is there a faster way of converting my library of fanart to .dds or is that the only way?

Appreciate your help

Yep, you can batch convert all your thumbnails, that was originally the only way of doing it. I don't know how, I didn't need it, but im sure the answer is in this thread:
XBMC

Jakmeehan

For anybody who has a massive library (too big to manually scroll thru everything) you can follow these instructions to batch convert all fanart to DDS.

The download link is broken for the texture tools, use this instead.