Hi David
Its about a couple of years ago, I asked about this protocol issue (will have to drag out the e-mails) The problem then was (I was informed by support) I could not connect with Core due to my windows protocol SMB (1 ,2 or 3 I fail to remember) I was very reticent in altering windows security. Will have to look at this issue - perhaps I NOW have access? Regarding the file length - windows does extract the files after shortening the Zip file name - so that obstacle seemed to have been cleared within windows?? But as you mention, perhaps further correcting needs to be done. If more information could be supplied regarding this by you/forum members, I would be grateful . Regards John
I’m not sure when the change to the Core’s software allowing any version of SMB happened, but it was years rather than months ago. It’s definitely fine with SMB3 now anyway.
I think if you change the path and filename down to something sensible then this should be fine to add to the downloads folder in the Core, either by cut and paste with a windows PC or Mac or by importing the music from a USB stick plugged into the Core.
I will delete some of the characters within the titles for tracks 9 & 10 and perhaps some of the other tracks, just in case its a cumulative thing - see what happens. Then reload onto usb and then plug into Core.
Will also check and see if the core is now accessible on windows 10 machine - hope so then I can delete these two “faulty” downloads from what I believe will be in the D/L Folder.
Thanks
John
If you look on the Naim online guidance for the Core, it is largely pathetically unhelpful, but the method it gives for accessing the downloads folder does normally work. It’s simplest to use the IP address, although you can also use the Core’s network name, but what that is depends on whether you have renamed it.
So get the IP address for the Core by looking in the app - settings - about. Then go to Windows Explorer (which is not a browser incidentally) then type
IPaddress\\downloads\
And you should see the downloads folder contents on the screen. Note those are back slashes, not the more usual forward slash.
Hi David
Thanks for the info - standby if unable to access!
Ah sorry then. Sometimes I forget which one supports what, but I did search the forum and found many posts regarding SMB1 and the Core, I think this one finally convinced me, but apparently it was changed later in an update. Note to self for future searches: Core supports smb3 now
It may be then that it was changed after 2019. Anyway SMB3 is fine now. A firmware update some time back included the latest SAMBA library I seen to recall.
Yeah got that 
Sorry!
Actually now I am thinking back I remember during beta testing at one point they broke downloads folder access, I reported it, and a new beta with that fixed came along a few hours later on the same day. That was the point they sorted out SMB3 as well I think.
No worries. I bookmarked my own post now, so I won’t be getting this wrong again!
Hi David
Gaining access to D/L folder - I new it was not going to be straightforward, for me anyway.
Using the Network Icon in explorer and seeing Core icon within “Media Devices” - clicking initiates a "Not Secure warning " followed by the IP address of the Core. Just to see if by adding \\downloads\ to the IP address in the window will gain access. It then initiates screen with “code - 404” , “reason” : “Resource not found”
By selecting This PC you can see Core under Network locations (with a more elaborate naim design icon this time ) clicking icon then reveals a number of folders All Music , CD Collection , My Playlists , Browse by Devices and My Favourites Folders. I BELIEVE I HAVE BEEN here before a few years back. It is obvious from above, I am not particularly expert in navigation of windows 10. Advice appreciated
It’s quite hard to visualise it all remotely, but you basically want to navigate to the Core as a network device and not select the Core as a media device.
So in the search bar at the top of explorer, type \\192.168.1.34\
But replace that IP number with the one where your Core is.
That should give you a graphic which shows the Music folder which you leave alone and the Downloads folder. If you click on the downloads folder icon, it should open and display all the contents. Note that you can’t put \\downloads\ after the IP address because that isn’t what \\ is used for. You can add \downloads\ after the IP address though.
Computers! - Lap top decided to go to blue screen and restart during typing out of original message. Managed access to D/L folder this time, to instructions above THANK YOU VERY MUCH for directing me through this. I deleted 3 off faulty downloads of the offending album (as I trialled different title mods).
As for the download - I see that although I have shortened tracks and album name down (they are extremely long) - it is still giving problems - I realise now that a number of tracks have issues, not just 9 & 10. So perhaps I need to try extreme shortening. I also notice the Orchestra details come up during playing of track - assume this would have no affect on actual file length? (as it is not in the track description) .
Now that I have a clean slate - Will carry out a staged/structured plan.
Also now that I have access to D/L folder there are a couple of title corrections that need doing elsewhere. Thanks again (made my day!) Will keep Forum updated when I can get a good up load of this album “Rimsky-Korsakov” has a lot to answer for!
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Good! I’m glad that helped.
Regarding the filenames, really they only need to be long enough so you know which is which. The orchestra etc will be in metadata which is embedded in the file. It won’t worry windows. If you want to change the buried metadata then you need a metadata editor (like MP3TAG or DBPowerAmp) which you run on your PC. You can use the downloads folder just as if it were a network folder, so you can edit stuff in the Core downloads folder. You don’t need to bring the file out, edit it and then put it back.
Update with the D/L issue.
Rather than uploading the files from this album to Core and then needing its deletion, I have trialled playing the music first from the usb stick. I have tried un zipping the original album file again and noticed on the progress graphical display, that at beginning of each track the unzip rate falls to zero for a number of seconds, not sure if this has any bearing on the issue?
Shortening file names further and also using the MP3TAG program to reduce album metadata considerably. This made no difference to the playing of the tracks and now realise the album D/L has a lot of other tracks that do not play. Some play for 10 seconds a few longer. My original test must have picked up on the two good tracks that actually played through.
The usb stick was used (original Naim formatted) for other albums AFTER this problem one was placed onto the usb stick and they have not exhibited any issues. ANY SUGGESTIONS? Further to this, since the usb stick was used with this modified metadata, I now have a Core that has lost its album covers for all of its DOWN LOADED albums. I am hoping it will sort it self out. Why playing from a usb stick has caused this is a puzzle (I did update the firmware last night but all seemed well afterwards) Any thoughts on this? John
I think shortening the track names after they have been saved doesn’t help the problem with windows computers, because the track is likely already corrupt. I’m not sure what the answer to that is going to be. As far as I know the Core doesn’t have a problem with long track names - it runs a version of Linux, not windows.
Can you try playing your USB stick on something else, like a PC for example? Do the tracks play ok there?
Regarding the Core images not displaying issue, I don’t know why that should be. I assume that you have restarted your Core? Another thing to try is rebuilding the Core’s index. You do that through the Core settings part of the app.
Ultimately you could do a factory reset of the Core, but you shouldn’t need to go that far.
I hope some of this helps.
The built-in Windows support for zip files does not support renaming the still-zipped files as far as I know. However, @CoreUser can download and install the free 7-zip program, which does. Then open the zip file in 7-zip and rename them to something sensible before unzipping them.
As @davidhendon may remember, @frenchrooster had a problem with Windows 7 and too-long file names in the past, and solved it as described here and subsequent posts:
Hi
Just for the record, the tracks play perfectly when using PC (from the usb) using what I believe to be a windows media player ie. low res.
May look at Suedkiez comment about un zipping - may go back to Web site and ask if they can send it un zipped - could be worth a try?
As for the art work issue - Assume you mean “Rebuild music database” . Does this remove favourites/playlists or any other user corrections/inputs with track names. How long would it take for say a 1TB + stored music?
I have checked the down load folder and all art work is there and the folder on the App for “No album covers” - ONLY shows the actual Down loads / cd’s which had no cover prior to the issue of lost D/L artwork. So the Core does recognise it has art work there for these D/L’s.
Has any body had any issues with the new firmware?
I do mean rebuild music database. I don’t think it touches playlists or user edits. For 1TB it might take up to an hour but I doubt longer. I did it with about 0.5 TB of music recently and it only took about 20 mins, that’s with the music stored on an SSD which I think makes it a bit faster.
There have been some examples of people finding images suddenly don’t save any more and a rebuild did fix the couple I am thinking of. But the latest Core firmware just released is OK I think.
No. If the problem is that the path and file names are too long (and I am not sure that it is), the long path and file names are not a problem as long as they are within the zip, because they are encoded into the zip format and Windows does not “see” them - it only sees the zip file as such.
However, as soon as they are moved outside of the zip, they are affected by the Windows limitation regarding the lengths. If it’s the file names that are too long by themselves (and not just the path with the folder names), you would have the same problem when you download the individual files instead of the zip.
You could, however, contact them and ask them to be less stupid and use path and file names that work on the most common computer operating system.