Kodi Community Forum

SABnzbd, Sickbeard, Couchpotato and Headphones are applications that help you create a fully automated system for downloading of TV Shows, Movies and Music. It works on Windows as well as Mac and Linux. This is supposed to be a complete guide to the setup (and small part of usage) of the appropriate programs for TV Shows, Movies and Music on the Windows platform. I’m a computer geek and have been working with IT for many years. Even this did not prepare me for the nightmare of a setup this was. The guides out there are really limited and have gaping holes. So, I do this for everyone out there who is new at this, and who wants a helping hand. This guide is written with a JRiver Media Center setup in mind, but it can easily be used as a basis for XBMC or any other Media Center or player.

Disclaimer
I have not been a NZB or News group user for more than a few months, so this guide might give some misleading information and wrong statements. But if you do follow the step by step instructions it should provide you with a fully working setup, and some knowledge of how it all works. I’ll add that Headphones is my weak spot. I've just started testing it.

Contents
- First post will give you an overview of the components used in this setup and how it all works together
- Second post will show you how to install SABNzbd and Sickbeard as well Sickbeard configuration
- Third post will explain how to set up SABnzbd
- Forth gives you the basics of Couchpotato installation and setup
- Fith post will give you instructions how to get Headphones installed and running

What are NZB & News, SABnzbd+, Sickbeard, CouchPotato, Headphones and JRiver Media Center?

NZB & News
NZB is a file type used in News groups, to gather information about downloadable files. Almost like a Torrent. News groups is an old system used for discussion groups and sharing data. Today, this is mostly used to categorize, search and share data. The beauty of NZB and News is the fact that every file that is uploaded has to be categorized and tagged. This information makes it easy to search for exactly what you need, and you can be pretty darn sure you’ll end up with what you want and nothing else.
Another positive thing is that this is a service which does NOT require you to upload anything. It’s a download only service. Of course, there have to be people uploading, and there are quite a few of them. But for normal users, you can be certain you don’t get sued by USA media giants for uploading a few music tracks. Especially if you encrypt the data you download.

The only downside with NZB and News is that it costs a bit money. For News systems like this to be effective you need two things.
• One or more reliable search sites for NZB files. Like the torrent search web pages.
• One or more file server access

The search pages is normally priced at around 10$ for lifetime usage. The file service providers use mostly monthly rates of around 10$. So, you can probably calculate a startup fee of 20-30 bucks, and then a few dollars each month.

News sites normally save stuff for around 1000 days. In other words up to or around 3 years. Data older than that will be removed to save space. This means that older content CAN be hard to come by, but popular content normally gets uploaded now and then, so you can get media that is decades old.
The biggest problem with News sites is that copy right owners sometimes find their media on this news servers, and they send a cease notice to the admins. They are forced to remove parts of media, or whole files. Even though this parts of media seems to be spread and might have some duplicates(?), the result is often that this blocks or parts that the media consists of, sometimes is missing or bad. The only real option of dealing with this is to get access to News servers that is NOT of the same provider. This other sites often have the same data, but they might not have gotten the same cease notice, and the blocks you need is often available on other sites. This is where Block Accounts comes in. With a block account from another provider, you'll often be able to get this small blocks that is bad or missing, to recreate a fully functional file. With the setup I'm suggesting I find that my downloads have a success of up to and over 95%. The rest can be fixed by downloading different versions, or as a last resort, download by torrent. But be sure to use SSL encryption and delete the torrent from your torrent software as soon as it's finished, so you don't risk getting sued for millions!

SABnzbd
This is a web application that enables you to download data in several ways, and help you process this data once downloaded. It works with NZB files and Torrents. It acts like an advanced download manager, and can be integrated with other apps.

Sickbeard
This is a web application that manages your TV shows and keeps them up to data and full of Meta Data and images. In your desired quality. As soon as a Show is aired, Sickbeard searches the NZB search sites and downloads the NZB files when it finds a match.

Couchpotato
This is almost the exact same type of service as Sickbeard, but this works with Movies. You put movies in your Wanted list and Couchpotato checks for releases in your desired quality and with the meta data, subs, trailers and so on, that you have asked for.

Headphones
This is yet another web application, but this one takes care of Music Artists and Albums. You scan your library or add new artists, and Headphones keeps a lookout for new albums of your favorite artists.

JRiver Media Center
I've been a very active HTPC user for 10 years, and I've tested applications like iTunes, Foobar, Winamp, Mediamonkey, XBMC, Mediaportal, Meedios, Windows Media Center, MythTV, Plex and a few more. I've even returned to a few of this again and again in hopes of good progress, but they've allways let me down hard. In my opinion JRiver Media Center 17 is the number one media player, manager and media center ever created. I've not managed to do without it in the 8-9 years I've used it. The reason is simple. JRiver listens to the community and implements most of what people need and want. They do it in a professional way. They keep on improving existing code to do things more efficiently, and they work closely with some of the pioneers and great minds within the Audiophile and Videophile community to create a listening and viewing experience that is extremely hard to beat. JRiver MC costs 50$, but if you spend more than two hours with your video, music or photo collection each week, it will probably be a great investment, and it will most likely prove to be a tool you will quickly be totally dependent on. It's the best spent 50$ in my life, and I know there is lots of people that agree. Here is SOME of the Functions and features of MC17.

- Works perfectly for workstations in standard view, on your laptop or pad, as well as on your big screen TV with a remote control
- Unparalleled support for audiophile music features and settings
- Great database and media management possible. Supporting hundreds of thousands of media files with endless of configuration possibilities
- Blazing speeds. Database and coding is very effective. Giving speeds that is unheard of in other applications. Even with enormous amounts of media.
- Automated directshow Video codec setup, with the best possible playback Quality
- Playback of Bluray, and automatic ripping system
- Automatic meta data scraping/retrieval for Movies and TV Shows
- Client or Client/server setup for several clients with automatic data sync and many server features
- DLNA playback and control functionality. Allowing you to use devices for playback or push data to several units in your house
- Multi Zone playback for a true household media system
- Theater View display mode that is really fast, super flexible, has an intuitive and good control system and looks good
- Playback, remote functionality and zone control through a number of applications and services. Android, iDevices, web browsers etc.
- PVR functionality
- Support for many services like Hulu, Youtube and similar
- A community that is very friendly and helpful



Workflow
Sickbeard, couchpotato and Headphones all searches for NZB files and passes this over to SABnzbd when found. SABnzbd downloads the data that the NZB files points to and sends the data to a specific folder for each “media type”. When Sickbeard, Couchpotato or Headphones discover a new episode, movie or Album in this folders, it starts processing the files. Renaming, adding meta data and so on. After processing, the files is moved the destination folder that is configured in each application. JRiver Media Center automatically picks up the TV Shows, Video and Music, and everything is ready for playback. Only thing you had to do was to add the Show, Movie or Artist.

The result is a highly automated media system for your home entertainment. Amazing? Yes, I would say so.

Setup Guide

Install SABNZBd+
Download from: http://sabnzbd.org/
Choose the correct installer from the Green box.

Choose to Run at startup (under install)
After install: Choose to Start SABNZBd (hidden)

Opera Users:
When SABNZBd+ is running, you might get a connection error. SABNZBD’s way of using localhost as address is not well liked in Opera. Use [::1] instead. Example:
http://[::1]:8080/sabnzbd

Quick Start Wizard
1. Choose your preferred language
2. Click Start Wizard
3. Enter your News Server details. Example Supernews:

Host: news.eu.supernews.com
Port: 563
Username: mail address
Password: your supernews account password
Connections: 25 (recommended to set it slightly slower than maximum connections. Speed will max out anyway)
SSL: Checked. Choose this if you want your transfers to be encrypted. This SHOULD be used in most cases. Your provider/subscription have to support this!

4. Verify server details with the “Test Server” button and click Next
5. Choose if you want to access the SABNZBd web console page on the local machine only, or if you want to access it from other computers via a browser.
6. Password Protect SABnzbd (choose this if you’re concerned about security)
----- Enter the Username and Password of your choise
7. Enable HTTPS access to SABnzbd: Use this if you want a secure connection to SABnzbd. It can however cause some other problems if you don’t know exactly what it does. Not recommended for normal users.
8. Click Next
9. Click Next if you do not have a NZBMatrix or Newzbin account. If you do, fill in the details and click Next.
10. Click Next to start SABnzbd. Enter login details to access the page.

SABnzbd will start and open another tab. You can test the remote connection of SABnzbd+ now, by writing http://IPadressOfServer:8080 in a browser on another client. Use port 9090 instead of 8080 if you chose SSL encryption. You can use DNS names instead of IP address if wanted. It should work if the access to TCP port 8080 or 9090 (with SSL) is added to incoming connections on the firewall.


Install Sickbeard
As Sickbeard does not have official support for J River Media Center, we’ll use a bit older build to ensure compability.
1. Some of the components require Visual C++ component. Download this from this website and install: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/de...laylang=en
If you use JRiver Media Center, you follow the instructions directly below. If you use other applications start from step 6
2. Download this JRiver compatible Sickbeard version: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/8820265/Sickbear...thJRMC.zip (this will be updated in time)
3. Unpack it in a directory like C:\Program Files(x86)\Sickbeard
4. Drag the Sickbeard.exe file the start menu, "All Programs" and "Startup" folder. This will create a link which is ran each time you log in
5. Run the Sickbeard.exe file

If you do NOT use JRiver Media Center download this instead:
6. Download the Sickbeard binary files from: http://code.google.com/p/sickbeard/downloads/list
7. Choose the highest build number
8. Unpack it in for example C:\Program Files(x86)\Sickbeard
9. Drag the Sickbeard.py file to the start menu, All Programs and "Startup" folder. This will create a link which is ran each time you log in
10. Click the file to run Sickbeard. This will open the browser with Sickbeard.

Python Alternative
There is also a Python version available, and most people use this one I think. There should be no problem installing and using this version. But be sure to go through the Python installation steps first. You will find it under the Sickbeard post. I have not tried it my self, but I think it's just about downloading and unpacking it, and running the sickbeard.py file to start it. I can however not give you any support on this. As I've not tried it my self yet.

 
Sickbeard Configuration
When in Sickbear, go to Config and select

General
1. Remove the selection in “Check for Update” to prevent the loss of J River Media Center integration.
2. Enter a Username and Password if you want to improve security or share the web site with more users
3. Save Changes and go to Search Settings

Search Options
1. Increase the Usnet retention up to the Maximum of retention of your primary provider
2. Choose SABnzbd next to the NZB Method (Pulldown menu)
3. Enter the URL for SABnzbd. Example: http://localhost:8080/sabnzbd
4. Enter User Name and Password for SABnzbd
5. Go back to SABnzbd under the Config and General settings. Generate a new API key, Save changes and copy this to “SABnzbd API key” field in Sickbeard.
6. Notice the Category field with “tv”. This keyword should be used in SABnzbd later on.
7. Hit Save Changes in Sickbeard and hit the next config page:

Search Providers
I’ve found NZB.su to be the most reliable index source, and then I use NZBmatrix if that one fails. So, put a check mark next to those, and drag NZB.su above NZBmatrix to give it priority.
You’ll need to make a user on this site. The standard membership only gives you a few downloads each day. To get more download rights from NZB.su, make a donation and get your new API key.
You’ll need to pay a small amount for the NZBmatrix access as well. Both is a one-time fee though.

After you have the API keys, go back to Sickbeard.
1. Choose NZB.su in the drop down menu next to “Configure Provider”
Remember! If there is no options of nzb.su, you can create a custom NewzNab provider (basically the same thing) with the login info and url to https://nzb.su. This might be the case on newer versions...
2. Enter your API key in the API key field
3. Save Changes
4. Choose NZBmatrix in the drop down box and fill in UserName and API key for NZBmatrix
5. Save Changes again
6. Put a checkmark next to NZBmatrix and NZB.su. Then pull NZB.su above NZBMatrix and click save changes. Then go on to:

Post Processing
1. Remove the selection from “Keep Original files”, in case you don’t want to have duplicate episodes laying around
2. Check “Move Associated Files” in case you want to move the subtitle files etc. This creates a lot of unnecessary files in the destination directory though.
3. Save Changes
4. Select JRMC (or any other Media player if you’re not using JRMC) Under “Metadata Type”.
5. Select what Meta Data and images you want with your TV Shows
6. Save Changes
7. Remove Air-By-Date selection if you want to show Episode/season instead
8. Under Episode Naming you choose whatever is normal to you. I usually select Episode Name, so this is saved in the file name as well as changing to S01E02 Number style. I leave the rest as default.
9. Save Changes

Everything should be configured in Sickbeard now. Let’s move back to SABnzbd.

SABnzbd Config

General
This has been mostly chosen during the Wizard. Only addition is the API keys which you need for integration with other apps such as Sickbeard (already done), and the Download Speed limit setting that you might wish to set (there is a more elegant setting once it’s all running though). Click on the “Folders” option.

Folders
1. Enter the directory paths in Temporary Download Folder and Completed Download Folder of your choise. F.eks. “D:\Download Incomplete” and “D:\Download Complete”. UNC paths is not allowed. If you have it on a share, use the Map Network Drive function and link to this disk instead. It’s recommended to have a separate disk for this data, so you don’t use the throughput for writing and moving video at the same time as you are watching something from the same disk. Raid setups might support this though.

Important!!!
It's strongly recommended that you think about your folder setup before you go at this. In my case I have one "Complete" and one "In Progress" folder. Under both of those directories I have SABnzbd, Sickbeard, Couchpotato and Headphones directories. This will make it much less painful later on, if you need to search for missing episodes, downloads gone wrong, do some manual post processing or what ever.

2. You can also create a NZB folder and add this in “Watched Folder”. You can drop NZB files here, and SABnzbf will automatically download them at the set Scan interval.
3. Important! Post Processing Script folder: This is the folder “AutoProcessTV” in the Sickbeard install folder. Enter the path to this script folder. For example: “C:\Program Files\Sickbeard\autoProcessTV”
4. Go to the next options page:

Switches
Not much to do here. The only thing that might be worth changing is:
4. Ignore Sample Files to “Do not download”
5. Go to the next options page:

Servers
This is the place you set up your server providers. This is usually monthly subscriptions on 10$+. Block accounts can also be used when you’re missing data from other providers. Block accounts is accounts with a set number of GB available for download. You can use this limit over as long period of time as you want and is excellent for repairing missing/bad data blocks in SABnzbd. This is my recommended Servers:

Primary: Supernews (set up in Wizzard)
Backup Server: Newsdeamon Block account (remember to select Backup Server)

This is an example of a Newsdemon setup (backup block account):
Host: Europe-ssl.newsdemon.com
Port: 563
Username: p20459282
Password: xxxxxxxxxxx
Connections: 10
Retention time: 1100
Enable, SSL, Backup Server

You’ll find most of the info you need on the providers homepage. Only thing to note is that you might want to set the Retention time to a lower value than the max, if you have problem with old NZB’s with missing data. Sometimes it’s better to get a little less hits, but also avoid a lot of corrupted files and downloads. Hopefully the backup block account will fix most of this though. Click on Scheduling:

Scheduling
This is the place you set up the regular shifts in download speed. If you want downloading to happen at full speed during the night and half speed at daytime so you still can browse the Internet or do other things, this is the place to do it. Click on the Categories tab:

Categories
You remember the “TV” category from Sickbeard? That’s right. The NZB’s downloaded from Sickbeard is marked as TV when it's passed on to SABnzbd. So you need to set up the TV category for correct Post Processing of the files.
• On the second line type in “tv” with small letters, under Category.
• Under Processing choose +Delete. This will make SABnzbd do the selected choice as well as all the above. It will download files, check and repair, unpack and delete the source files after the episodes have been transferred.
• Select “sabToSickBeard.exe” under Script
• Click Add on the current line
• Click Save on the last line (strange behavior, yea I know)

Editing Script
To enable this script to access Sickbeard, you’ll have to enter some info in the scripts config file. You find this under the same directory as the script. In this example, it’s located here: “C:\Program Files\Sickbeard\autoProcessTV\autoProcessTV.cfg.sample”. This name has to be changed to “autoProcessTV.cfg and you’ll have to enter your Sickbeard login info in the file. Open it and enter the correct port, username and password for sickbeard. If sickbeard is located on another computer you’ll have to change the host address as well. Web_root can be left blank.


Test Run
Everything SHOULD be working now. Let’s test it.
1. Go to Sickbeard
2. Select Home and Add Show
3. Choose add a new show (it’s a little less that can go wrong here)
4. Test with a new show. Click Search and next when you have found the correct Show
5. Click New and choose the Series/TV Show parent Directory. This can and should be the same as your current TV Shows. I’ll use mine called “E:\Series
6. Use the “Set as default” button to make this the standard choice from now on. Click Next
7. Select Wanted as the initial status.
8. Select “Season Folders” to get cleaner folder structure
9. Select Custom under Preferred quality. This works in the following way: Initial is the first download of the file. You can choose a lower quality for the initial download, and after this is downloaded, Sickbeard can search for higher quality episodes for "Archiving". It will only download a file if the quality is higher than it was. This is not always logical for everyone. Some would like it the other way, but that is impossible.

I usually select:
Initial: HD TV, 720p BluRay and WEB-DL
Archive: Nothing

Also Set "Initial state" to “Wanted”, and then hit save.

Tip: You can select and deselect multiple items by holding CTRL button in while you click on each item.

10. Click Add Show
11. Sickbeard will use some time to gather data from online sources and to fetch NZB files from NZB.su and NZBmatrix.
12. You can click Home to see the status. Click the TV Show title for more details. You can change the status of the files here, if they are wrong.

STATUS – What does what?
1. Wanted – this option will make Sickbeard search for the episodes
2. Skipped – This drops the episodes from searches. Perhaps you’ve seen it or don't want it
3. Archived – This does the same thing, but indicates that the episode IS downloaded
4. Ignored - This also gives the same result, but it indicates that you just don’t bother downloading it.
5. Downloaded (Quality) – this is used for marking episodes as downloaded. It’s useful is you have selected a higher quality Archive settings, and want new downloads of higher Quality
6. Snatched (Quality) – It shows that the NZB have been found and are possibly being downloaded/processed by SABnzbd.

CouchPotato
Download CouchPotato source files from:
https://github.com/RuudBurger/CouchPotato/downloads
Remember! There's also a version 2 out now, which you should use.

Select download and select the tar.gz option. Unpack this in for example C:\Program Files(x86)\CouchPotato

Python
Download Python from here:
http://www.python.org/download/releases/2.6.5/

Choose the Windows x86 MSI installer for easy Windows installation. Click and run the file when it’s downloaded. Choose the standard option and install.
2.6.5 is the recommended version in the README of Couchpotato, but you can probably use some newer versions as well. But 3.2 does NOT work. Not sure about other 3.x versions.
Drag the Python.py file in the CouchPotaty directoy to the Start Menu, All Programs and Startup. That way the program will start each login. Or you can manually run the CouchPotato file.

CouchPotato Configuration
If you are asked to update, you can do this.
1. Click on the Gear icon to enter the Config menu
2. Click on General

General
1. Change port to 8082 if you want it to be in the same sequence as SABnzbd and Sickbeard
2. Enter the same Undername and Password as the previous apps
3. Under ignore words you can enter things like “SCREENER”, “German” or “Spanish” to be sure not do download bad quality or dubbed movies. You can add things here later if you experience bad downloads.
4. Click save
5. Select “Downloaders” options

Downloaders
1. Set retention as the same as you did in SABnzbd
2. Copy the Apikey from SABnzbd under General and paste it into the Apikey field
3. Enter the username and password you set on SABnzbd
4. Write “movies” under category
5. Click Save
6. Select “Providers” options

Providers
1. Enable Newznab and enter URL. For example: https://nzb.su
2. Enter API key
3. Enable NZBMatrix.com and addUsername and API key
4. Enable #alt.binaries.hdtv.x264@EFnet
5. Click Save
6. Select “Quality” options

Quality
1. Under Default qualities you can drag and drop the quality to the desired position. I like to download 720P first, then BR-Rips and then 1080P. The rest I leave as default. This is highly user dependent though. Do whatever you want.
2. You can Create a new Quality Profile under Quality Profile to make CouchPotato wait x number of days for this quality and then go to the list on the right side. I like to add 720P as a quality profile and wait a few days before it searches for 1080P and down.
3. Click Save
4. Select “Renaming” options

Renaming
1. Click Enable
2. Enter the SABnzb movie download folder
3. Enter the destination folder of your choise
4. Select what Folder and File renaming
5. Select the Cleanup option if you like clean folders (this might remove subtitles as well, which might be a bad thing)
6. Click Save
7. Select “Extras” option

Extras
This is the place where you can enable subtitle download, download trailers and automatic downloading of movies of a certain score on IMDB, Metadata download and so on. Play with it if you want.

Notifications
This is where you configure if you want Couchpotato to be configured for Media Centers. JRiver Media Center has no support here yet, but I will try to modify the source files when I have the time.

SABnzbd Configuration
1. Go to SABnzbd and enter the Categories option.
2. On the blank line you write “movies” under Category
3. Under folder/path you enter the directory you added as SABnzbd movie download folder under Renaming options in Couchpotato.
4. Click Add and save


CouchPotato Test Run
1. Go to CouchPotat and click Wanted
2. Click the search field and write a movie name and click add
3. The status is updated with Snatched when a movie is sent to SABnzbd for downloading

Headphones
This app also require Python, but as we have already installed it, we’ll skip right to the best part.
The guide is written for Version 1 of Headphones, but version 2 is now out. At least in beta, and it works great according to users. I would recommend using the version 2 of the program, but I can not guarantee that the config is the same.

1. Go to https://github.com/rembo10/headphones/downloads and choose to download the zip version
2. Unpack for example together with Couchpotato, SABnzbd and Sickbeard in the Program Files directory
3. Create another shortcut under All programs and Startup which points to the file “Headphones.py” under the headphones directory
4. If there is any problems with file association, you have to select what app to open it with, and choose to Always open py files with python.exe from the Python installation folder
5. Run the Headphones.py file and let’s configure this thing

Headphones Configuration
Let’s go through some more or less necessary steps.
1. Click on settings
2. Change HTTP port to 8083 (if you want it in the same sequence as before)
3. Enter the Username and Password on the right side. This can be the same as used on the other apps, or different ones. You can also leave it blank.
4. Enter http://localhost:8080 under SABnzbd host (if it runs on another machine, you’ll need to enter another IP or DNS address of course).
5. Get the API Key from SABnzbd under General again, and copy it in the SABnzbd API key field
6. Write “music” as category
7. Enter the username and password for SABnzbd (if you have one)
8. Enter a directory for temporary downloads under “Music Download Directory”
9. Under search providers you’ll select the ones you use, and enter the details as previously example shows. I usually select NZBmatrix and Newznab/NZB.su
10. Under Quality and post processing you’ll have to select what you prefer. There is no right or wrong here. Just remember to add the destination directory in the Path field. This is the place where your new albums should end up. Example: “Z:\Audio\Albums”
11. Under Advanced Settings you have some special options. You can choose how to rename the folders and files, as well as what extras you want with the albums.

MusicBrainz has done some changes to their scraping policies, and we're now forced to connect to other servers. This is how you correct this.

Important!! This is the OLD way of fixing the problem! Look further down for recommended solutions (I just keep the old one for reference).

1. Find the Headphones Directory. It can be placed under for example "C:\Program Files(x86)HeadPhones"
2. Browse to the folder "\lib\musicbrainz\
3. Edit the file "webservice.py"
4. Make sure you use a program that does not remove the formating of the file. Like Notepad ++
5. Search for the class "WebService(IWebService)"
6. A few lines under this, you'll see host= and port= on the same line.
7. Replace the content with host='tbueter.com' and port=3000
8. Go to Settings and select Restart

MusicBrainz fix 2 and 3:
There's added 3 options of MusicBrain servers and mirrors to the configuration in later Headphones 1 builds. So, you might be able to fix the problem by changing the server.

Another way of dealing with this is to pay 10$ for the VIP server access. According to users, this gives huge benefits (but I can not verify that yet). Follow these steps:

1. Go to settings > advanced and under musicbrainz select headphones and then tap on "Get an account"
2. Follow the steps, donate, and plug in that user and pass back on the headphones settings.


Headphones Test Run
1. Go to SABnzbd and enter the Categories config page
2. On the empty line enter “music” as a category and enter the folder where SABnzbd should place the albums after download
3. Click Add and Save
4. Go back to Headphones again
5. Go to “manage”
6. Add the directory where you have your artists and albums. Example: “Z:\Audio\Artists”

You have two choices here. To automatically add new artists or not. The "Automatically add new artists" options enables all artists scanned in the directory to be added to the watch list for new albums. Some might want this, but those of us with large collections might want to leave this option off, and rather add new artists that you really want to update. The choice is yours. If you’re a JRiver Media Center user like me, you might have used the Album Artist fields for a lot of compilations. Headphones do not always pick up compilations if there is different Artists in the Artist tags of one album, and this might create a bit messy scan list. That is why I would recommend for most users to leave this option OFF and select the Artists that you want to subscribe to.

7. Save and wait for the scan
8. Go to the Manage tab
9. Select Manage new Artists
10. Select artists you want to subscribe to, and go to the home menu to check what albums have been found. This can be a very time consuming job.


I'll add some more usage hints later when I have the time.

Posts updated and layout edited. The guide should be complete. I've installed it 3 times just to be certain that it's working. Missing some introduction text for some of the parts for this setup, but it will be added shortly.

Please tell me if there is errors, or room for improvement in my walk-through. I'll update it when I can.

Great post.

I thought Headphones was practically dead as the developer isn't working on it any more and musicbrainz has blocked the app (although I believe there are workarounds to that).

Darn. That explains why it did not work that great yesterday. It worked a few months ago, but I did not have the time to really test it out at that time.

It seems like there is still some life in this project. The author is in contact with the music services to make it work again, and meanwhile there is people looking into some quick fixes. Looks like the solution to the problem is rather simple. I can't test it now, but I will try to do it later this weekend.

HenryFord Wrote:Just a wild guess into the blue:
It should reside in headphones_root/lib/musicbrainz2/webservice.py

There you should find a class "class WebService(IWebService)" with an init-method. This init-method should define the musicbrainz-host + port (probably also the realm which is uninteresting because there is no auth on my server needed). Change it to the following:
host=tbueter.com
port=3000

thanks for this

MrHaugen Wrote:It seems like there is still some life in this project. The author is in contact with the music services to make it work again, and meanwhile there is people looking into some quick fixes. Looks like the solution to the problem is rather simple. I can't test it now, but I will try to do it later this weekend.

Jap, the project is still not dead - the dev. is still working on it (but probably currently has not much time at his hands) and there are other people also looking into the code of hp - I'm hopeful that it will be developed further
However - to work around the musicbrainz-block, I set up a mirror for the musicbrainz-server which is publicly available - you can use that one, headphones will then work again.
However - it can be that headphones needs a little bit longer to retrieve the information from my server since it is pretty slow at the moment (since it is running with the musicbrainz-server already built-in rather than an external one which should speed things up. But I can't configure that right now as that takes a lot of time and there is a lot of Trial&Error involved.

Nevertheless - thanks for the guide, although I wrote my own one (see my signature), your work is greatly appreciated

HenryFord Wrote:Nevertheless - thanks for the guide, although I wrote my own one (see my signature), your work is greatly appreciated

Yea, I saw that earlier today. Nice work! I skimmed through it. A shame I did not find it months ago when I had real trouble

Anyway, I think the two guides address the problems at bit differently. Yours seems to be focusing a lot on cross platform usage and XBMC setup, while mine is just for Windows and a bit more generic when it comes to media player. Perhaps a bit easier to get through for those with windows as a platform? I hope that someone might find this detailed step by step hand holding to be helpful


*EDIT*
I tried the Headphones solution now and it works perfectly. I've added it to the guide.

Thanks for this, just getting started on my end and need a good guide. The Sickbeard download link is dead.

The link should be working now. The original link is dead, so I had to share my own version. Remember to read that paragraph again. I've added a link to a JRiver compatible version as well as a generic version for other apps.

Thanks for the guide. Just started using usenet helped a lot.