Software Recommendations

zewookie

Hey guys,
I'm just getting into the HTPC hobby at the moment, but I'm have a slight conundrum. I can't find the right software for me. I've tried XBMC and MediaPortal, but neither seem to fit what I want from a media manager.

Let me clarify. I use MediaMonkey for my music. Its fast, only slightly buggy, and has library features coming out of everywhere. I can organise, tag and play, all in the same window. I'm hoping there's some media centre software out there similar to it. To get to the point, I'm looking for media centre software that will allow me to get into its guts and let me really scan for my media files. XBMC and MediaPortal both only pick up about half of my media library (not counting music), and unsurprisingly, they both pick up different things.

I want something that has great library management and (hopefully - although the YaMMM plugin does this to great effect) tagging facilities, along with the ability to throw a skin over the top so my non-techie housemates can use it.

Any bones that can be thrown, please throw them!
Thanks guys.

frash

I've tried YAMMM but despite it's promise to pull in the IMDB movie rating I can't get it to work.

Am trying Media Browser (plugin for WMC) right now & it has the skin thing you wish for but matching up with the movies seems to be hit & miss (AVI name must match IMDB name exactly).
Have heard that Media Center Master works well with it so might try that.

Good screenshots of Media Browser in this guide

Like you I'm in the early stages.

RockyTwoArms

I would definitely agree that media monkey is the best out there for music. That said the winamp broadcast over http is nice for on the go listening to your collection.

It may be worth looking into the reasons why your media is not being picked up by xbmc and media portal. I suffer from the same problem mainly due to lack of attention to renaming and organising things. Also look into editing the scraper settings. Two bookmarks I've been meaning to get back to;
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=126297
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHV6uM2pDmA&list=PLCADC4FFB77909D71&index=1&feature=plpp_video

hope these help, currently I'm determined to get xbmc working the way i want partly due to the android app partly because i like how open it is to customise

file format factory is hand for bulk conversion.

L'prof

RockyTwoArms wrote: »

I would definitely agree that media monkey is the best out there for music. That said the winamp broadcast over http is nice for on the go listening to your collection.

It may be worth looking into the reasons why your media is not being picked up by xbmc and media portal. I suffer from the same problem mainly due to lack of attention to renaming and organising things. Also look into editing the scraper settings. Two bookmarks I've been meaning to get back to;
http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=126297
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHV6uM2pDmA&list=PLCADC4FFB77909D71&index=1&feature=plpp_video

hope these help, currently I'm determined to get xbmc working the way i want partly due to the android app partly because i like how open it is to customise

file format factory is hand for bulk conversion.

Agree with the above, once you know how your media should be named, XBMC picks up everything.

For example, with my movies I tell it to check by folder names and I just copy and paste from IMDB eg. The Dark Knight (2008) Occasionally with foreign movies it scans in the wrong movie, but that can be changed manually.

For tv shows, I have a folder with the show name eg Mad Men and inside are the episodes, named as so Mad Men 1x01

If you need any help then let me know because XBMC really is worth persisting with and I nearly gave up too!