[slim] Slimserver 5.1.5. service starts and stops again...

Two thoughts:

1. Use the Event Viewer (Control Panels -> Administrative Tools) and
see if there's an application error there for when the server crashed.
Let us know what it says.

2. Try updating to the latest nightly release:

http://www.slimdevices.com/downloads/nightly/latest

A number of crashing bugs have been fixed in that release.

-dean

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom

Hello,

Windows XP SP1
Slimserver 5.1.5.
The “oldfashioned” slimplayer firmware 2.3

I have cleaned up my act… my computer and installed windows XP sp1.
After installing slimserver 5.1.5. I change some setting like I had
them all the time, but when I try to play a song my server dies and I
can’t get it started again. Is there a solution?

Anyone??

Johan van Dijk

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Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom

2004-05-15 21:27:30 UTC

Hi Dean,

I have just checked the event-logs. There is an error, but I don't think it
has to do with slimserver, because it was there while slimserver was
running...

This is the error:

Unable to start a DCOM Server: {5A5AA0AA-1DEB-4683-96B0-B43301E83971}. The
error:
"Access is denied. "
Happened while starting this command:
C:\WINDOWS\System32\HPBPRO.EXE -Embedding

For more information, see Help and Support Center at
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

Has this anything to do with slim?

I will to update to the latest release. And I will get back to you...

Thanks again.

Johan

================================================================
Johan van Dijk / Rob Boom Mobile: (+31) (0)6 4878 5966 (Johan)
Mobile: (+31) (0)6 28 644 805 (Rob)
================================================================
e-mail: boomdijk-qWit8jRvyhVmR6Xm/***@public.gmane.org | ICQ#: 9959714
Mobile e-mail: boomdijk-nI4mw7d/IixmR6Xm/***@public.gmane.org
================================================================

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Saturday, May 15, 2004 7:44 PM
To: Slim Devices Discussion
Subject: Re: [slim] Slimserver 5.1.5. service starts and stops again...
1. Use the Event Viewer (Control Panels -> Administrative Tools) and
see if there's an application error there for when the server crashed.
Let us know what it says.
http://www.slimdevices.com/downloads/nightly/latest
A number of crashing bugs have been fixed in that release.
-dean

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom
Hello,
Windows XP SP1
Slimserver 5.1.5.
The "oldfashioned" slimplayer firmware 2.3
I have cleaned up my act. my computer and installed windows XP sp1.
After installing slimserver 5.1.5. I change some setting like I had
them all the time, but when I try to play a song my server dies and I
can't get it started again. Is there a solution?
Anyone??
Johan van Dijk
_______________________________________________
Discuss mailing list
http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss

dean blackketter

2004-05-16 04:47:54 UTC

This appears to be (courtesy google) a HP printer process. I don't
think that this is related to SlimServer.

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom
Hi Dean,
I have just checked the event-logs. There is an error, but I don't think it
has to do with slimserver, because it was there while slimserver was
running...
Unable to start a DCOM Server: {5A5AA0AA-1DEB-4683-96B0-B43301E83971}. The
"Access is denied. "
C:\WINDOWS\System32\HPBPRO.EXE -Embedding
For more information, see Help and Support Center at
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.
Has this anything to do with slim?
I will to update to the latest release. And I will get back to you...
Thanks again.
Johan
================================================================
Johan van Dijk / Rob Boom Mobile: (+31) (0)6 4878 5966 (Johan)
Mobile: (+31) (0)6 28 644 805 (Rob)
================================================================
================================================================

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Discuss mailing list
http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss

Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom

2004-05-16 11:49:37 UTC

Hi Dean,

I have tried to download the slimserver software from here:
http://www.slimdevices.com/downloads/nightly/latest , but i can only find
.PL files in the download... Is there a version for windows?

I have further examined event viewer and found the following just after I
started the server software:

The description for Event ID ( 0 ) in Source ( Application ) cannot be
found. The local computer may not have the necessary registry information or
message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer. You may be
able to use the /AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this description; see Help and
Support for details. The following information is part of the event: Perl
interpreter failed.

I have also a apache(+php, mysql and perl) server running on the computer
that I use for slimp3. I had this running before without a problem.

Thanks in advance for your time,

Johan

================================================================
Johan van Dijk / Rob Boom Mobile: (+31) (0)6 4878 5966 (Johan)
Mobile: (+31) (0)6 28 644 805 (Rob)
================================================================
e-mail: boomdijk-qWit8jRvyhVmR6Xm/***@public.gmane.org | ICQ#: 9959714
Mobile e-mail: boomdijk-nI4mw7d/IixmR6Xm/***@public.gmane.org
================================================================

kdf

2004-05-16 12:31:42 UTC

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom
Hi Dean,
http://www.slimdevices.com/downloads/nightly/latest , but i can only find
.PL files in the download... Is there a version for windows?

http://www.slimdevices.com/downloads/nightly/latest/SlimServer_v2004-05-16.exe

-kdf

Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom

2004-05-17 12:05:36 UTC

Hi Dean,

I have installed the latest build of Slimserver and I can now setup the
server, but as soon as I try to setup the player the server stops. I can
restart and the server stays online. But as soon as I try to setup the
player the server dies again...

In the eventviewer is this the result:

The description for Event ID ( 0 ) in Source ( Application ) cannot be
found. The local computer may not have the necessary registry information or
message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer. You may be
able to use the /AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this description; see Help and
Support for details. The following information is part of the event: Can't
call method "HASH(0x20eb4f4)" on unblessed reference at
/PerlApp/Slim/Web/Setup.pm line 135.
.

And that is Chinese to me... ;-) Please help... By the way the player play
shoutcast and mp3's..

Thanks in advance for your time,

Johan

kdf

2004-05-17 16:46:31 UTC

This was a bug that should now be fixed in today's build.
-kdf

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom
Hi Dean,
I have installed the latest build of Slimserver and I can now setup the
server, but as soon as I try to setup the player the server stops. I can
restart and the server stays online. But as soon as I try to setup the
player the server dies again...
The description for Event ID ( 0 ) in Source ( Application ) cannot be
found. The local computer may not have the necessary registry information or
message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer. You may be
able to use the /AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this description; see Help and
Support for details. The following information is part of the event: Can't
call method "HASH(0x20eb4f4)" on unblessed reference at
/PerlApp/Slim/Web/Setup.pm line 135.
.
And that is Chinese to me... ;-) Please help... By the way the player play
shoutcast and mp3's..
Thanks in advance for your time,
Johan

_______________________________________________
Discuss mailing list
http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss

Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom

2004-05-18 07:39:08 UTC

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom

Hi Dean and Kdf,

Yes, it seems that the problem of crashing is over, but now I can setup the
player and scan the library... but it doesn't stop scanning. And when I
select an album to play it selects it (shows the songs), but doesn't play
it. Shoutcast radio stations play though!...

What can I do?

Thanx for your time...

J
====================================
KDF responded with:

As an experiment stop the server, try finding slimserver.db and deleting it.

Under windows, it should be located in a directory named Cache in the same
folder as slim.exe. most likely c:\program files\slimserver\

once that is deleted, start the server again.

Are you using iTunes, an audiodir, moodlogic or a combination of them? I'm
currently using the latest cvs updates and can't reproduce the scanning
problem.
What I have installed will be in the May 18 build, so that may fix your
problem if wiping the cache file doesn't.

Let us know how it goes. I am suspecting that we'll have to come up with
some smart routines to properly wipe out old data if this is the solution
for you.
The system that is currently in place seems to be unreliable.

-kdf
===================================

===================================
I mailed:

Hi Kdf,

I have deleted the slimserver.db. I have restarted the server... And it
stopped!

This is the error:
The description for Event ID ( 0 ) in Source ( Application ) cannot be
found. The local computer may not have the necessary registry information or
message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer. You may be
able to use the /AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this description; see Help and
Support for details. The following information is part of the event: Perl
interpreter failed.

I am not using anything else than Slimserver, no itunes moodlogic or....

Very strange...

I also found this:

The description for Event ID ( 0 ) in Source ( Application ) cannot be
found. The local computer may not have the necessary registry information or
message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer. You may be
able to use the /AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this description; see Help and
Support for details. The following information is part of the event:
Undefined subroutine &PerlSvc::stopServer called at slimserver.pl line 42.
.
This is the event-error as I stopped the server...

Can do anything with this?

If you need more info....

Johan
=================================

=================================
Then I found this:

Hi Kdf,

If you need more info....

I just checked the cache dir and even though the server stopped it tried to
create a server.db file.. I have attached it...

Johan
=================================
=================================
Kdf responded:
it will try to create on startup. its unreadable, but its a raw dump of
the library information. I'm stumped shy it would cause your server to
crash. I can only think that the way to go on this would be to uninstall,
then delete all the entire c:\program files\slimserver directory, including
the cache. Then reinstall.

Hopefully this will work for you, if not please repost yoru results to the
list, as I have messed up and replied in person instead of the list. Dean
will want to know anything that went on as well. He's the expert on the
proper windows EXE. Soemthing may be wrong with the actual build. I use the
perl scripts only, and have ActiveState perl installed so that it runs in
windows :)

cheers,
kdf
================================
================================
I wrote:

No this is what i have done from the start... So I know that that is not the
problem...

I will post the previous mails to the list...

J
================================

There we are.... Still in trouble... ;-)

Johan

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Monday, May 17, 2004 6:47 PM
To: Slim Devices Discussion
Subject: RE: [slim] Slimserver 5.1.5. service starts and stops again...
This was a bug that should now be fixed in today's build.
-kdf

information or

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom
message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer. You may be
able to use the /AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this description; see Help

and
Can't

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom
call method "HASH(0x20eb4f4)" on unblessed reference at
/PerlApp/Slim/Web/Setup.pm line 135.
.
And that is Chinese to me... ;-) Please help... By the way the player

play

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom
shoutcast and mp3's..
Thanks in advance for your time,
Johan

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Saturday, May 15, 2004 7:44 PM
To: Slim Devices Discussion
Subject: Re: [slim] Slimserver 5.1.5. service starts and stops

again...

1. Use the Event Viewer (Control Panels -> Administrative Tools) and
see if there's an application error there for when the server crashed.
Let us know what it says.
http://www.slimdevices.com/downloads/nightly/latest
A number of crashing bugs have been fixed in that release.
-dean

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom
can't get it started again. Is there a solution?
Anyone??
Johan van Dijk
_______________________________________________
Discuss mailing list
http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss

_______________________________________________
Discuss mailing list
http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss

kdf

2004-05-18 07:48:17 UTC

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom

I woudl still try to uninstall completely,erase the slimserver directory if
anything is left over and start again. I wish i could suggest somethign better,
but the only hint I'm getting from this is thta there is old data that refuses
to be removed with the current install. If you install cleanly and it works for
you, then you can at least have your music again,and us dev/hacker types will
have to keep working on the upgrade procedure before 5.2 is released.

-kdf

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom
Hi Dean and Kdf,
Yes, it seems that the problem of crashing is over, but now I can setup the
player and scan the library... but it doesn't stop scanning. And when I
select an album to play it selects it (shows the songs), but doesn't play
it. Shoutcast radio stations play though!...
What can I do?
Thanx for your time...
J
====================================
As an experiment stop the server, try finding slimserver.db and deleting it.
Under windows, it should be located in a directory named Cache in the same
folder as slim.exe. most likely c:\program files\slimserver\
once that is deleted, start the server again.
Are you using iTunes, an audiodir, moodlogic or a combination of them? I'm
currently using the latest cvs updates and can't reproduce the scanning
problem.
What I have installed will be in the May 18 build, so that may fix your
problem if wiping the cache file doesn't.
Let us know how it goes. I am suspecting that we'll have to come up with
some smart routines to properly wipe out old data if this is the solution
for you.
The system that is currently in place seems to be unreliable.
-kdf
===================================
===================================
Hi Kdf,
I have deleted the slimserver.db. I have restarted the server... And it
stopped!
The description for Event ID ( 0 ) in Source ( Application ) cannot be
found. The local computer may not have the necessary registry information or
message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer. You may be
able to use the /AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this description; see Help and
Support for details. The following information is part of the event: Perl
interpreter failed.
I am not using anything else than Slimserver, no itunes moodlogic or....
Very strange...
The description for Event ID ( 0 ) in Source ( Application ) cannot be
found. The local computer may not have the necessary registry information or
message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer. You may be
able to use the /AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this description; see Help and
Undefined subroutine &PerlSvc::stopServer called at slimserver.pl line 42.
.
This is the event-error as I stopped the server...
Can do anything with this?
If you need more info....
Johan
=================================
=================================
Hi Kdf,
If you need more info....
I just checked the cache dir and even though the server stopped it tried to
create a server.db file.. I have attached it...
Johan
=================================
=================================
it will try to create on startup. its unreadable, but its a raw dump of
the library information. I'm stumped shy it would cause your server to
crash. I can only think that the way to go on this would be to uninstall,
then delete all the entire c:\program files\slimserver directory, including
the cache. Then reinstall.
Hopefully this will work for you, if not please repost yoru results to the
list, as I have messed up and replied in person instead of the list. Dean
will want to know anything that went on as well. He's the expert on the
proper windows EXE. Soemthing may be wrong with the actual build. I use the
perl scripts only, and have ActiveState perl installed so that it runs in
windows :)
cheers,
kdf
================================
================================
No this is what i have done from the start... So I know that that is not the
problem...
I will post the previous mails to the list...
J
================================
There we are.... Still in trouble... ;-)
Johan

information or

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom
message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer. You may be
able to use the /AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this description; see Help

and
Can't

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom
call method "HASH(0x20eb4f4)" on unblessed reference at
/PerlApp/Slim/Web/Setup.pm line 135.
.
And that is Chinese to me... ;-) Please help... By the way the player

play

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom
shoutcast and mp3's..
Thanks in advance for your time,
Johan

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Saturday, May 15, 2004 7:44 PM
To: Slim Devices Discussion
Subject: Re: [slim] Slimserver 5.1.5. service starts and stops

again...

_______________________________________________
Discuss mailing list
http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss

Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom

2004-05-18 06:52:46 UTC

Post by kdf
This was a bug that should now be fixed in today's build.
-kdf
Hi Dean,
I have installed the latest build of Slimserver and I can now setup
the server, but as soon as I try to setup the player the server stops.
I can restart and the server stays online. But as soon as I try to
setup the player the server dies again...
The description for Event ID ( 0 ) in Source ( Application ) cannot be
found. The local computer may not have the necessary registry
information or message DLL files to display messages from a remote
computer. You may be able to use the /AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this
description; see Help and Support for details. The following
information is part of the event: Can't call method "HASH(0x20eb4f4)"
on unblessed reference at /PerlApp/Slim/Web/Setup.pm line 135.
.
And that is Chinese to me... ;-) Please help... By the way the player
play shoutcast and mp3's..
Thanks in advance for your time,
Johan

Post by Johan/Rob van Dijk/Boom
Hello,
Windows XP SP1
Slimserver 5.1.5.
The "oldfashioned" slimplayer firmware 2.3
I have cleaned up my act. my computer and installed windows XP sp1.
After installing slimserver 5.1.5. I change some setting like I
had them all the time, but when I try to play a song my server
dies and I can't get it started again. Is there a solution?
Anyone??
Johan van Dijk
_______________________________________________
Discuss mailing list
http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss

_______________________________________________
Discuss mailing list
http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss

Kenneth Watt

2004-05-17 17:33:52 UTC

Guys,

I was running Slim Server under XP for months on end until the 5.X.XX
releases and since then it is just killing the host PC. I've tried removing
it, re-installing it and I've even gone back to 4. whatever and that did
work, it was again stable!

Now, I decided to upgrade it but was short on info (sorry Dean) but I was
running 5.1.5 but I spotted the discussion about moving to the "nightly
fixes" which, frankly, is scary. Is it *that* flaky that it has to undergo
daily fixes and patching? Maybe no-one else will ask, but I feel I have to
ask that question.

The Slim Server was always pretty much stable, it just worked, why does it
not do so now? Why does it now eat resources on a Windows box and I've tried
it under XP Pro and 2K Server with the same result one box running some low
priority stuff but lots of it and the other with virtually nothing on it and
it even locks that up!

So, I upgraded it to the 5.1.6 version after seeing another similar post
here last night and it's not cured it, I still get the "Out Of Resources"
annoying Windows bubble with bugger all explanation as to why. But the only
service it stops is slimsrv so I'm pretty much 100% that's the issue. If I
run the box without Slim Server it runs like a dream, so I can only conclude
that Slim Server is the issue.

Now I'm so hacked off with it I'm even thinking on ditching the Doze version
and trying to run the server under PERL and see if that's any better. Can I
still do that on a Doze box with PERL etc on it?

But guys, please, please fix the Windows version as any new users are just
going to form a very poor opinion of the product if they are Windows users.

In case you're wondering why I don't just go back to 4.X it's because I want
the xPL support, but at this rate I don't know that it's worth the hassle.

K.

Steve Baumgarten

2004-05-17 18:07:18 UTC

Post by Kenneth Watt
I was running Slim Server under XP for months on end until the 5.X.XX
releases and since then it is just killing the host PC. I've tried
removing it, re-installing it and I've even gone back to 4. whatever and
that did work, it was again stable!

I think some versions post-5.1.1 have a problem where they grow in memory
usage over time. I've stuck with 5.1.1 and have been very happy with it on
XP. Very stable, no memory issues, and it has the MP3 tag cache so rescans
are very quick.

My impression is that some of the post-5.1.1 releases were perhaps not
quite ready for prime time, so I'd recommend dropping back to 5.1.1 and
seeing whether that works for you before giving in entirely to despair.

http://www.slimdevices.com/downloads/SlimServer_v5.1.1/

(Also I believe there's a new stable release coming soon, but as we saw
with the initial post-5.1.1 Template Toolkit-based releases, sometimes
it's best to wait a bit before upgrading unless you really need to for
some reason.)

SBB

Kenneth Watt

2004-05-17 18:19:13 UTC

Post by Steve Baumgarten
My impression is that some of the post-5.1.1 releases were perhaps not
quite ready for prime time, so I'd recommend dropping back to 5.1.1 and
seeing whether that works for you before giving in entirely to despair.

Thanks Steve, I'll give that a whirl and see what happens.

K.

dean blackketter

2004-05-17 18:14:49 UTC

Hi Kenneth,

Post by Kenneth Watt
I was running Slim Server under XP for months on end until the 5.X.XX
releases and since then it is just killing the host PC. I've tried removing
it, re-installing it and I've even gone back to 4. whatever and that did
work, it was again stable!

Sorry that the 5.x.x releases had some serious bugs. We're working
hard to find and fix them all so the next release is at least as stable
as the 4.x releases.

Post by Kenneth Watt
Now, I decided to upgrade it but was short on info (sorry Dean) but I was
running 5.1.5 but I spotted the discussion about moving to the "nightly
fixes" which, frankly, is scary. Is it *that* flaky that it has to undergo
daily fixes and patching? Maybe no-one else will ask, but I feel I have to
ask that question.

Every night we automatically build a release that contains the latest
and greatest pre-release version of our software.

These nightly updates happen even if the software hasn't changed, but
since there's active development going on, there are usually bug fixes
included every night.

Post by Kenneth Watt
So, I upgraded it to the 5.1.6 version after seeing another similar post
here last night and it's not cured it, I still get the "Out Of
Resources"
annoying Windows bubble with bugger all explanation as to why. But the only
service it stops is slimsrv so I'm pretty much 100% that's the issue. If I
run the box without Slim Server it runs like a dream, so I can only conclude
that Slim Server is the issue.

It's possible. Could you bring up the Task Manager (right click on the
task bar to select this) and click on Processes and look for slim.exe
and check to see what the memory and CPU usage is? That would help.

Post by Kenneth Watt
Now I'm so hacked off with it I'm even thinking on ditching the Doze version
and trying to run the server under PERL and see if that's any better. Can I
still do that on a Doze box with PERL etc on it?

Sure, but since the code is the same, there should be no real
difference.

Post by Kenneth Watt
But guys, please, please fix the Windows version as any new users are just
going to form a very poor opinion of the product if they are Windows users.

Trying hard. Any feedback we get on problems that you are having with
the pre-release version helps us make it better for new users.

Post by Kenneth Watt
In case you're wondering why I don't just go back to 4.X it's because I want
the xPL support, but at this rate I don't know that it's worth the hassle.

Thanks for your patience, we'll get it nailed soon.

-dean

Kenneth Watt

2004-05-17 18:27:50 UTC

Thanks Dean I wasn't having a go as such, I just want to see it sorted.

Post by dean blackketter
These nightly updates happen even if the software hasn't changed, but
since there's active development going on, there are usually bug fixes
included every night.

Ah, I wasn't aware of that it was just the impression it gave was that there
were daily fixes happening.

Post by dean blackketter
Sure, but since the code is the same, there should be no real
difference.

So much for that plan then! ;)

Post by dean blackketter
Trying hard. Any feedback we get on problems that you are having with
the pre-release version helps us make it better for new users.

Yeah, I've sat watching the server consume the CPU totally on every release
I've tried thus far, which is fine whilst scanning and I accept that, but
once that's complete it just keeps eating resources. The problem is that it
gets to the stage where it's locking the machine up so I can't even see
what's happening.

Now for example the machine is just totally unresponsive after an hour of
scanning (there is just short of 100,000 tracks) and it's a reboot job to do
anything at all with it. Well, not a reboot, a press the reset button job as
I can't even get the menu up. :/

Post by dean blackketter
Thanks for your patience, we'll get it nailed soon.

I'm sure you will as all the other little problems have been solved in the
past I just worry for new users a lot. Whilst I and many others on this list
may well be able to resolve these issues by either switching to another PC
or another release many out there don't have the knowledge or the (dare I
say this) common sense to do so.

I'll go back to 5.1.1 as suggested by Steve and see what that gleans and if
it solves it and let you know.

K.

dean blackketter

2004-05-17 18:52:26 UTC

Hi Kenneth,

Post by Kenneth Watt
Thanks Dean I wasn't having a go as such, I just want to see it sorted.

Post by dean blackketter
These nightly updates happen even if the software hasn't changed, but
since there's active development going on, there are usually bug fixes
included every night.

Ah, I wasn't aware of that it was just the impression it gave was that there
were daily fixes happening.

There are daily fixes happening, hopefully the software is getting
better every day too.

Post by dean blackketter
Sure, but since the code is the same, there should be no real
difference.

So much for that plan then! ;)

Post by dean blackketter
Trying hard. Any feedback we get on problems that you are having with
the pre-release version helps us make it better for new users.

Yeah, I've sat watching the server consume the CPU totally on every release
I've tried thus far, which is fine whilst scanning and I accept that, but
once that's complete it just keeps eating resources. The problem is that it
gets to the stage where it's locking the machine up so I can't even see
what's happening.
Now for example the machine is just totally unresponsive after an hour of
scanning (there is just short of 100,000 tracks) and it's a reboot job to do
anything at all with it. Well, not a reboot, a press the reset button job as
I can't even get the menu up. :/

Aha, 100,000 tracks? What are the specs of the machine? (How much
memory, CPU?)
Can you bring up the Task Manager and look at the CPU usage and Memory
usage and let me know what you see?
That's a fairly large library, I want to make sure that if there is a
bug we fix it.

Post by dean blackketter
Thanks for your patience, we'll get it nailed soon.

I agree completely.

Post by Kenneth Watt
I'll go back to 5.1.1 as suggested by Steve and see what that gleans and if
it solves it and let you know.

Ok. If you have time, I'd love for you to try out the latest nightly
and help us figure out what the problem is so we can fix it.

-dean

Kenneth Watt

2004-05-17 22:49:00 UTC

Post by dean blackketter
Aha, 100,000 tracks? What are the specs of the machine? (How much
memory, CPU?)
Can you bring up the Task Manager and look at the CPU usage and Memory
usage and let me know what you see?
That's a fairly large library, I want to make sure that if there is a
bug we fix it.

Okay, I realise that it's a pretty big library and therefore I am in a kinda
unique position to an extent.

The machine should more than cope with it, it's a 2Ghz P4 with half a meg of
RAM on a decent Gigabyte mobo using Maxtor drives almost exclusively, I
think there may be a rouge 120Gb IBM pile of cr*p there as well but there's
nothing on that. It is running under a fully patched Win XP SP1 release.

Using 5.1.1 it's bugged out a couple of times tonight already whilst playing
back with it reading a memory usage of >300,000K at it's peak that I saw
down to just over 200,000K and it keeps on locking up. The player display
either locks or just blanks. CPU usage was normally sitting in excess of 90%
all the time whilst scanning, drops to 0 when it locks. Sometimes it will
drop to sensible levels, but not often.

Trying to start the Slim Server on the host PC it just seems to sit on the
start up screen for ages doing not a lot, but the service is alive.

Much the same happened with later versions, but the lock-ups were worse, far
worse. Also as the server ran the slower the PC would respond until it
became totally unresponsive. So far on 5.1.1 that hasn't happened but bear
in mind it takes a fair while to scan that many tracks. ;)

Post by dean blackketter
Ok. If you have time, I'd love for you to try out the latest nightly
and help us figure out what the problem is so we can fix it.

Hopefully all the above helps a bit.

K.

kdf

2004-05-17 23:10:29 UTC

A major difference between 5.1.1 and 5.1.5 is that the server needs to rescan
eveyr single time you restart in 5.1.1. The overhead of the scan is less, but
you have to keep redoing it. The latest nightly takes care of a lot of the
rescanning problems so that you can start playback as soon as possible after any
restart. The problem is, with 100,000 tracks, you may have to wait a very long
time for a full scan after wiping the cache. This wait could be painfully long,
depending on your file system and drive usage. I would try leaving it to scan
overnight. Once you have a complete scan, it should be much more responsive. My
windows setup only has 5000 tracks for testing and I tend to walk away and get a
snack if I wipe the cache. however, startup time after a full scan is under a
minute.

As there is every intention of making a new official release soon, it will help
a great deal to have every bit of input possible on the current nightly builds.
This way, 5.2 can really be the latest and greatest. I do testing on both Linux
and Windows, using iTunes, Moodlogic and raw scans, but I dont have access to
100,000 songs, or the time to try every possible feature under all conditions.
There are several others on this list who ride the crest of the wave, but having
one of the largest libraries I have know about makes your input very useful.

-kdf

Okay, I realise that it's a pretty big library and therefore I am in a kinda
unique position to an extent.
The machine should more than cope with it, it's a 2Ghz P4 with half a meg of
RAM on a decent Gigabyte mobo using Maxtor drives almost exclusively, I
think there may be a rouge 120Gb IBM pile of cr*p there as well but there's
nothing on that. It is running under a fully patched Win XP SP1 release.
Using 5.1.1 it's bugged out a couple of times tonight already whilst playing
back with it reading a memory usage of >300,000K at it's peak that I saw
down to just over 200,000K and it keeps on locking up. The player display
either locks or just blanks. CPU usage was normally sitting in excess of 90%
all the time whilst scanning, drops to 0 when it locks. Sometimes it will
drop to sensible levels, but not often.
Trying to start the Slim Server on the host PC it just seems to sit on the
start up screen for ages doing not a lot, but the service is alive.
Much the same happened with later versions, but the lock-ups were worse, far
worse. Also as the server ran the slower the PC would respond until it
became totally unresponsive. So far on 5.1.1 that hasn't happened but bear
in mind it takes a fair while to scan that many tracks. ;)

Post by dean blackketter
Ok. If you have time, I'd love for you to try out the latest nightly
and help us figure out what the problem is so we can fix it.

Hopefully all the above helps a bit.
K.
_______________________________________________
Discuss mailing list
http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss

Kenneth Watt

2004-05-18 07:31:14 UTC

Post by kdf
As there is every intention of making a new official release soon, it will help
a great deal to have every bit of input possible on the current nightly builds.
This way, 5.2 can really be the latest and greatest. I do testing on both Linux
and Windows, using iTunes, Moodlogic and raw scans, but I dont have access to
100,000 songs, or the time to try every possible feature under all conditions.
There are several others on this list who ride the crest of the wave, but having
one of the largest libraries I have know about makes your input very useful.

Okay, 5.1.1 doesn't like it either, it has also barfed with the same error,
basically Doze runs out of puff.

Interestingly when I came down this morning it was still sitting with the
Slim Server startup screen from 8 hours ago and Windows decided to stop the
service, the players were blank. On restarting, it again sits at the startup
screen but appears to have forgotten all the settings I had entered, like
player names etc. as well as the formatting options.

I'll get the nightly when I get home later from work and try that as I
suspect that this version will fail.

K.

Jason

2004-05-17 23:33:52 UTC

Just as a data point, I have a library with about 3700 tracks. I am running
the Slimserver on a Linux RH9 box and the memory image that it needs after
scanning my library is around 43M. Doing the math it is possible that your
memory needs are something on the order of 1 GB of memory. I suspect that
you are thrashing and your swap file is getting overloaded.

You should setup and run the Windows Performance monitor before starting up
the Slimserver. Have it looking at CPU, memory utilization and commit
charge. Then start up the Slimserver and let the Performance Monitor run
until things start to go into the toilet. Save the output from the monitor
and you can post it here as a file attachment to your email, or you can
email it directly to me or others. I would love to see how your machine is
actually handling the performance aspect of such a massive library.

-J

-----Original Message-----
From: discuss-bounces-***@public.gmane.org
[mailto:discuss-bounces-***@public.gmane.org] On Behalf Of Kenneth Watt
Sent: Monday, May 17, 2004 4:49 PM
To: 'Slim Devices Discussion'
Subject: RE: [slim] More On 5.1.XX Woes

Post by dean blackketter
Aha, 100,000 tracks? What are the specs of the machine? (How much
memory, CPU?) Can you bring up the Task Manager and look at the CPU
usage and Memory usage and let me know what you see?
That's a fairly large library, I want to make sure that if there is a
bug we fix it.

Post by dean blackketter
Ok. If you have time, I'd love for you to try out the latest nightly
and help us figure out what the problem is so we can fix it.

Hopefully all the above helps a bit.

K.

kdf

2004-05-17 23:59:25 UTC

Post by Jason
Just as a data point, I have a library with about 3700 tracks. I am running
the Slimserver on a Linux RH9 box and the memory image that it needs after
scanning my library is around 43M. Doing the math it is possible that your
memory needs are something on the order of 1 GB of memory. I suspect that
you are thrashing and your swap file is getting overloaded.
You should setup and run the Windows Performance monitor before starting up
the Slimserver. Have it looking at CPU, memory utilization and commit
charge. Then start up the Slimserver and let the Performance Monitor run
until things start to go into the toilet. Save the output from the monitor
and you can post it here as a file attachment to your email, or you can
email it directly to me or others. I would love to see how your machine is
actually handling the performance aspect of such a massive library.

It shoudl be interesting data. I'm not sure it scales linearly, since I have a
small setup I use at work with 350 songs. It gets up to 55M. 10,000 songs under
Linux is only about 80M and I have another 5000-song windows setup that I don't
have numbers for yet.

-kdf

Roy M. Silvernail

2004-05-18 00:26:48 UTC

Mo' data: 5778 songs takes 37MB, Gentoo Base System version 1.4.12
AMD Athlon XP1900+, 1GB RAM. FWIW, a full rescan takes under 5 minutes.

--
Roy M. Silvernail is roy-IID2DOfhWowpa0TFVrFX/***@public.gmane.org, and you're not
Never Forget: It's Only 1's and 0's!
SpamAssassin->procmail->/dev/null->bliss
http://www.rant-central.com

Mark Bennett

2004-05-18 21:23:21 UTC

Another data point:

Machine: Celeron 2.4GHz, 512MB RAM, 200GB ATA100 Drive
SW: Linux RH9 & Slimserver-2004_05_08-1
Library: 5372 tracks (all Flac ~150GB)
Scan time: ~2 minutes
Memory usage: ~35MB (rises to ~42 MB after web interface access)
Restart (cache on): ~15 seconds

Seems pretty consistant with Roy's results.

Streaming to SB and also to SoftSqueeze (external benchmark DAC1),
both over wireless link. Server is rock solid with no bugs that
affect my listening pleasure anymore. (Just wish I could get
Alienstream going so I can listen to BBC radio over ADSL -
trplayer problem of some sort.)

Post by Roy M. Silvernail

Mo' data: 5778 songs takes 37MB, Gentoo Base System version 1.4.12
AMD Athlon XP1900+, 1GB RAM. FWIW, a full rescan takes under 5 minutes.

Kenneth Watt

2004-05-19 07:03:30 UTC

Okay I whapped another 512Mb of RAM in my XP box that runs Slim Server so
now I have:

P4 2Ghz with 1Gb of RAM running on a Gigabyte board with 5.1.1 on it.

Commit/Charge on Task Manager shows as 214M/2305M, Slim was using >700,000K
and running constantly above 90% of CPU usage.

The box was dead this morning. Will changing to the latest nightly make any
difference or help?

K.

Martin Goode

2004-05-19 10:11:22 UTC

slashdot :

http://apple.slashdot.org/apple/04/05/19/0450216.shtml?tid=107&tid=141&tid=185&tid=187&tid=188&tid=190&tid=201

"Apple's recent release of an iTunes SDK for Windows provides the
ability for third party programs, such as WinAmp and Windows Media
Player, to support the AAC file format. Ars Technica has additional
commentary. The SDK uses the COM interface and supports iTunes 4.5 only."

Would this ever be any use to us ? I have been trying to decide if this
is going to give us any advantages for intergration :)

.martin

Lukas Hinsch

2004-05-19 11:28:27 UTC

looks promising. according to the help file, there are even methods for
write access to rating and play count. this should allow for integration of
these into slimserver, a feature which has been asked for quite a few times.

lukas

-----Original Message-----
Martin Goode
Sent: Wednesday, May 19, 2004 12:11 PM
To: Slim Devices Discussion
Subject: [slim] Apple Releases iTunes SDK for Windows
http://apple.slashdot.org/apple/04/05/19/0450216.shtml?tid=107
&tid=141&tid=185&tid=187&tid=188&tid=190&tid=201
"Apple's recent release of an iTunes SDK for Windows provides the
ability for third party programs, such as WinAmp and Windows Media
Player, to support the AAC file format. Ars Technica has additional
commentary. The SDK uses the COM interface and supports
iTunes 4.5 only."
Would this ever be any use to us ? I have been trying to
decide if this
is going to give us any advantages for intergration :)
.martin
_______________________________________________
Discuss mailing list
http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss

kdf

2004-05-19 15:57:21 UTC

Post by Lukas Hinsch
looks promising. according to the help file, there are even methods for
write access to rating and play count. this should allow for integration of
these into slimserver, a feature which has been asked for quite a few times.
lukas

a great bonus for OSX and Linux users to be sure ;)
-kdf

Phil Barrett

2004-05-19 19:52:08 UTC

Post by Lukas Hinsch
looks promising. according to the help file, there are even methods for
write access to rating and play count. this should allow for
integration of
these into slimserver, a feature which has been asked for quite a few times.
lukas

a great bonus for OSX and Linux users to be sure ;)
-kdf

I'd love a iTunes rating feature, where pressing 0-5 during playback
sets the iTunes rating. That way I might stand a chance of getting more
than the current tiny fraction of my songs rated!

OS X iTunes has been able to set ratings through AppleScript for ages -
now Windows offers a COM API too there's a chance of a cross-platform
solution.

Do we have a mapping from SlimServer songs back to iTunes database IDs?

Phil

PS Linux users won't have iTunes at all without a Windows or OS X
server. And I'm sure somewhere there's a remote COM interface from
Linux to Windows, maybe even from inside Perl... or was I dreaming?

kdf

2004-05-19 22:46:08 UTC

Post by Phil Barrett

a great bonus for OSX and Linux users to be sure ;)
-kdf

I'd love a iTunes rating feature, where pressing 0-5 during playback
sets the iTunes rating. That way I might stand a chance of getting more
than the current tiny fraction of my songs rated!

this feature request is already filed:
http://bugs.slimdevices.com/show_bug.cgi?id=142

Post by Phil Barrett
OS X iTunes has been able to set ratings through AppleScript for ages -
now Windows offers a COM API too there's a chance of a cross-platform
solution.
Do we have a mapping from SlimServer songs back to iTunes database IDs?

so far, itunes access is read only.

-kdf

Richard Purdie

2004-05-19 12:06:02 UTC

Post by Kenneth Watt
Commit/Charge on Task Manager shows as 214M/2305M, Slim was using
700,000K
and running constantly above 90% of CPU usage.
The box was dead this morning. Will changing to the latest nightly make any
difference or help?

I think certain cache changes were made after 5.1.1 which would halve memory
usage if you are using the Tag Database. The cache routines have been
extensively worked on in recent CVS as well so that may also help.

It should certainly be different and I'd like to thing it would help! :)

--
RP

Kenneth Watt

2004-05-20 00:12:59 UTC

This could be a problem...

Your music library contains 5 albums with 2686 songs by 4 artists.

Yet the next page reports...

Browsing 61 albums with 2686 songs by 44 artists

Hmmm, something is broke methinks, but what?

K.

Kenneth Watt

2004-05-20 00:41:49 UTC

I've downloaded the latest build, totally uninstalled the Slim Server and
re-installed the new version from the nightly, so far I'm glad to report
that all seems well.

I'll see how it goes and report as soon as I have a result on it.

K.

kdf

2004-05-18 04:18:14 UTC

And to finish mine: Win2k 5500 songs.
just under 4 minutes for a complete scan, under 30 seconds for a startup or
rescan. For the record, this is a huge speed increase over earlier builds.

if you use iTunes, it will be faster. If you run iTunes at the same time as you
run slimserver, you will trigger a lot of rescans. Eash time iTunes changes the
library, it server will reload the itunes library file. There is a server
setting in the additional-itunes section which allows you to set the minimum
time between rescans so that you can minimise the amount of rescans.

-kdf

Post by dean blackketter
Aha, 100,000 tracks? What are the specs of the machine? (How much
memory, CPU?) Can you bring up the Task Manager and look at the CPU
usage and Memory usage and let me know what you see?
That's a fairly large library, I want to make sure that if there is a
bug we fix it.

Okay, I realise that it's a pretty big library and therefore I am in a kinda
unique position to an extent.
The machine should more than cope with it, it's a 2Ghz P4 with half a meg of
RAM on a decent Gigabyte mobo using Maxtor drives almost exclusively, I
think there may be a rouge 120Gb IBM pile of cr*p there as well but there's
nothing on that. It is running under a fully patched Win XP SP1 release.
Using 5.1.1 it's bugged out a couple of times tonight already whilst playing
back with it reading a memory usage of >300,000K at it's peak that I saw
down to just over 200,000K and it keeps on locking up. The player display
either locks or just blanks. CPU usage was normally sitting in excess of 90%
all the time whilst scanning, drops to 0 when it locks. Sometimes it will
drop to sensible levels, but not often.
Trying to start the Slim Server on the host PC it just seems to sit on the
start up screen for ages doing not a lot, but the service is alive.
Much the same happened with later versions, but the lock-ups were worse, far
worse. Also as the server ran the slower the PC would respond until it
became totally unresponsive. So far on 5.1.1 that hasn't happened but bear
in mind it takes a fair while to scan that many tracks. ;)

Post by dean blackketter
Ok. If you have time, I'd love for you to try out the latest nightly
and help us figure out what the problem is so we can fix it.

Hopefully all the above helps a bit.
K.
_______________________________________________
Discuss mailing list
http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss
_______________________________________________
Discuss mailing list
http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss

Kenneth Watt

2004-05-18 07:37:02 UTC

Post by Jason
scanning my library is around 43M. Doing the math it is possible that your
memory needs are something on the order of 1 GB of memory. I suspect that
you are thrashing and your swap file is getting overloaded.

That seems logical and ties to what I'm actually seeing here, I may well
just get another memory stick and see if that cures it. In fact I have one I
can use to test it, I just need time to stick it in the box.

Post by Jason
You should setup and run the Windows Performance monitor before starting up
the Slimserver. Have it looking at CPU, memory utilization and commit
charge. Then start up the Slimserver and let the Performance Monitor run
until things start to go into the toilet. Save the output from the monitor
and you can post it here as a file attachment to your email, or you can
email it directly to me or others. I would love to see how your machine is
actually handling the performance aspect of such a massive library.

I'll see what I can do with it. I do run Task Manager obviously but I've not
used the performance monitor, is that a Windows component? Is it just screen
grabs you want or the data?

K.

Jason

2004-05-18 10:28:10 UTC

The performance monitor can be found under control panel --> administrative
tools. Once you launch it configuring it and saving the data to a log file
is pretty self explanatory.

Post by Kenneth Watt
I'll see what I can do with it. I do run Task Manager obviously but I've

not used the performance monitor, is >>that a Windows component? Is it just
screen grabs you want or the data?

K.

Stuffed Crust

2004-05-18 12:34:02 UTC

Post by Kenneth Watt
Okay, I realise that it's a pretty big library and therefore I am in a kinda
unique position to an extent.

I've been running SlimServer from the 3.0 days with a song library
that's somewhere in the 114k range now. SlimServer 5.1.5 is taking up
some 310 megs currently, and I have it on a dual celeron-500 on a RAID5
array hanging off a 3Ware card. Oh, on Linux. :)

One thing worth mentioning is that I haven't touched the web interface
under this instance yet; I usually see it hovering in the 390 meg range
when I do.

The problems I've seen aren't anywhere near as bad as you've described,
but I've seen the symptoms too -- but they seem to be getting better
over time though.

Any searching effectively kills the music stream for a while. Browsing
into a large directory (or "Browse by XXXX") also causes the thing to hiccup
for a bit. CPU usage under normal playing isn't too bad -- I'm using
the SliMP3 with its relatively high-overhead UDP streaming.

I can try and quantify the numbers a little better if anyone cares; or
if there is some specific test someone'd like me to run with the nightly
or whatnot..

- Pizza

--
Solomon Peachy ICQ: 1318344
Melbourne, FL JID: pitha-Josq/***@public.gmane.org
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur

Charles Stanton

2004-05-18 14:50:15 UTC

Hi -

We support a bunch of slims on XP/W2K and for what it is worth we have had
good performance and stability on the 4/22/04 nightlie release of 5.1.5

You might want to give it a try (completely uninstall the other versions
before reinstalling).

-----Original Message-----
From: dean blackketter [mailto:dean-SBQ2+***@public.gmane.org]
Sent: Monday, May 17, 2004 2:52 PM
To: Slim Devices Discussion
Subject: Re: [slim] More On 5.1.XX Woes

Hi Kenneth,

Post by Kenneth Watt
Thanks Dean I wasn't having a go as such, I just want to see it sorted.

Post by dean blackketter
These nightly updates happen even if the software hasn't changed, but
since there's active development going on, there are usually bug fixes
included every night.

Ah, I wasn't aware of that it was just the impression it gave was that there
were daily fixes happening.

There are daily fixes happening, hopefully the software is getting
better every day too.

Post by dean blackketter
Sure, but since the code is the same, there should be no real
difference.

So much for that plan then! ;)

Post by dean blackketter
Trying hard. Any feedback we get on problems that you are having with
the pre-release version helps us make it better for new users.

Yeah, I've sat watching the server consume the CPU totally on every release
I've tried thus far, which is fine whilst scanning and I accept that, but
once that's complete it just keeps eating resources. The problem is that it
gets to the stage where it's locking the machine up so I can't even see
what's happening.
Now for example the machine is just totally unresponsive after an hour of
scanning (there is just short of 100,000 tracks) and it's a reboot job to do
anything at all with it. Well, not a reboot, a press the reset button job as
I can't even get the menu up. :/

Post by dean blackketter
Thanks for your patience, we'll get it nailed soon.

I agree completely.

Post by Kenneth Watt
I'll go back to 5.1.1 as suggested by Steve and see what that gleans and if
it solves it and let you know.

Ok. If you have time, I'd love for you to try out the latest nightly
and help us figure out what the problem is so we can fix it.

-dean

Kevin Walsh

2004-05-17 22:23:06 UTC

The daily "fixes and patches" are as much a result of constant development
as they are for actual bug fixes. The SlimServer core doesn't remain
static and new features are added all the time.

To counteract this, I would advise that the main (head) CVS trunk be
used for development, and that periodic branches be created for stable
versions. If a bug is found and fixed in the CVS head, it could also
be merged into the current stable branch. Releases and windows builds
could be made from the current stable branch. "Stable," in this context
would mean "bug fixes only."

I run my SlimServer on Linux and update the installation daily from CVS.
The SlimServer happily runs from the CVS hierarchy without having to
perform an "installation" step every time, which is a bonus.

I have found the SlimServer to be extremely stable, and only keep it up
to date daily because I like playing with the new features that are
added all the time. I can only speak for my Linux installation here;
MS Windows users should be used to bugs, crashes and daily reboots
anyway. :-)

--
_/ _/ _/_/_/_/ _/ _/ _/_/_/ _/ _/
_/_/_/ _/_/ _/ _/ _/ _/_/ _/ K e v i n W a l s h
_/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/_/ kevin-pBYbZovPH+***@public.gmane.org
_/ _/ _/_/_/_/ _/ _/_/_/ _/ _/

Ron Thigpen

2004-05-19 15:42:04 UTC