Spin Doctor, Recovering Metadata/files: Song Titles

[Tony42]

Over many years I successfully used Spin Doctor to collect music. The version with which I started was included with Toast 7, Spin Doctor 3.1.1.304t, after a series of Roxio upgrades. The Mac operating system used at the time was 10.6. Now Mac is 10.10.

 

When I attempt to open a music file, .aiff format, using Spin Doctor, the file starts to open; I can read the titles of the few songs visible in the window at the bottom of the view while the waveform is being regenerated. When the horizontal blue action line reaches the end of its "generation" line, Spin Doctor crashes and I get a long, detailed error report that I don't know how to use to correct the crash. Apparently Mac 10.10 has a conflict.

 

I have an old Mac with 10.6. Using File Sharing, I installed Toast/Spin Doctor and a one of the .aiff music files. When I try to open the file, rather than seeing the song tiles while the waveform is being regenerated, for some reason the metadata/metafiles are not transfered; Spin Doctor generates a new waveform with no preservation of the individual intervals of songs, just one 2 hour long music file.

 

Some place on my main Mac the waveforms and song titles exist. They seem not to transfer to the 10.6 Mac, however. I bought a newer version of Spin Doctor, version 6 years ago following discussion with Roxio but version 6 didn't recognize the waveforms or songs either. I could buy Toast 12 but I'm fear that backwards compatibility has been lost.

 

Suggestions please of how to resurrect the song titles from my hard drive.

Problem Report attached.

 

CD Spin Doctor_2015-01-26-104326_Anthony-Bryhans-Computer.pdf

[tsantee]

I never thought about where CD Spin Doctor keeps its information but it certainly is not in the audio file. It records as uncompressed .aiff which does not support metadata. My best guess is for you to copy not only the app but also any plist and other CD Spin Doctor-related folders and files from the Application Support and Preferences folders in the user Library on the Mac where the tracks had been marked and named. It's odd that the tracks weren't exported when they were originally marked and named.

[Tony42]

Thank you for your reply. I am perplexed however about Roxio/Corel's "honesty". I paid $25 for a One-Time Priority Support. The reply email I received from Ralf Jayrald Corel Customer Support Services asked me to post to this Toast 12 site. I didn't understand why but I so posted.

I assumed I would have a dialog with a Roxio/Corel employee to discuss my issue/problem. Today when I checked the status on my Priority Support request I see it is marked Closed and I never had a reply from a Roxio employee, for which I paid $25. I wrote a reply to an email from their "support" asking about such but they have not replied. I see by my invoice that Roxio has an address in Funchal - Madeira, Portugal.

 

I wonder about corporate "core competency" if the only reply to my $25 request is a well meaning guess from a fellow Toast-user. I naively hoped there would be a responsible employee that would know where metadata is hidden on my computer.

 

Let the buyer beware for Roxio products....

regards

[tsantee]

That would be upsetting to me, too. You can send Ralf a private message from the Messenger link above addressed to Rox-Ralf.

 

Roxio abandoned CD Spin Doctor a few years ago. They briefly replaced it with Spin Doctor X which was written by Roxio rather than a third party as before. It was horrible and also abandoned. All that happened before Corel bought Roxio. So the technical support is now with people who probably never used CD Spin Doctor and may not have a working copy (which requires OS 10.6 or earlier). My opinion is they should refund your $25 because I believe they no longer provide support for CD Spin Doctor.

[Tony42]

Ok, that's life, no support from the current Corel staff. I called my credit card company to dispute the $25.

 

Back to your guess about files that could contain metadata. I went through all my hard drive looking for hidden files but many files have names I don't recognize and therefore I haven't been able to isolate what files might be Spin Doctor data. Have you any suggestions of file names or types for a further search?

 

I appreciate your taking time to help and obviously Ralf knows of your expertise as he passed me off to you.....

Thank you

Regards

[tsantee]

Ok, that's life, no support from the current Corel staff. I called my credit card company to dispute the $25.

 

Back to your guess about files that could contain metadata. I went through all my hard drive looking for hidden files but many files have names I don't recognize and therefore I haven't been able to isolate what files might be Spin Doctor data. Have you any suggestions of file names or types for a further search?

 

I appreciate your taking time to help and obviously Ralf knows of your expertise as he passed me off to you.....

Thank you

Regards

Hold down the option key and choose the Go menu in the Finder. There you will see a way to select your user Library. Open the Applications Support folder. There should be a CDSpinDoctor folder (this is on the computer that originally was using CDSD). Copy that to the same folder on the other computer that doesn't know the track names. Now go to the Preferences folder. See if there is a cdsd plist file or something similar. Copy it to the other computer.

 

I don't know if this will recover the data when the CDSD file was saved. Saving in CDSD was always buggy which may be one reason Roxio chose to write their own. It always was a very unreliable application. I don't recall anyone asking your question in the past so I can only give you my best guess. I did use it for a few years. It's probably one of the reasons I have so little hair now. The fact you can access the captured music at all is a blessing.

[Tony42]

I'm trying to keep what's left of my hair too and only work on this frustrating project in small doses. I've worked off and on for about 5 years trying to figure a way to recover the lost data. This is one of my New Years Resolutions for 2015--to follow this to the end or just pretend all was lost in a fire.

I appreciate your help and will get back to you.

Warmest Regards

[hermie54]

Have you searched with for instance EasyFind for file or folder names from the companies that made up CD Spin Doctor? Below is a sorta listing found in Spin Doctor's Manual.

 

BTW I also used this one a long time ago and since its demise switched to Amadeus Pro for doing the same thing. So I tried opening some files made with Spin Doctor in Amadeus. They do open (of course), however the track names window stays blank. Bummer for me too.

 

Here's some legal text with names to search for like Sonic or Algorithmix. Best of luck!

 

 

 

 

Legal Information

© 1994-2009 Sonic Solutions. All rights reserved. Use of this product is subject to your agreement to all of the terms of each of the license agreements included in this package. This product may be protected by one or more of the patents listed at www.roxio.com/en/ patents.

Trademarks

Roxio, the burning disc logo, Sonic, Sonic Solutions, Toast, the toaster with discs logo, CD Spin Doctor, Fit-to-DVD, Jam, and Toast It are registered trademarks owned by Sonic Solutions in the United States, and other jurisdictions.

Third-Party Trademarks and Technologies

Mac, the Mac logo, QuickTime, iLife, iPod, iTunes, iMovie, iPhoto, iPhone, iDVD, DVD Studio Pro, Final Cut, and Apple TV are trademarks of Apple, Inc. registered in the U.S. and other countries.

PowerPC is a registered trademark of International Business Machines Corporation. Audio effect engine licensed by Algorithmix, www.algorithmix.com.

VST is a trademark of Steinberg Media Technologies GmbH.

[Tony42]

Thank you for your comments. The frustration of not being able to find the song title metadata for ~31Gb of music, on my OWN hard drive has distracted me from further music editing. I'll look at Amadeus Pro when this problem is solved or I accept defeat.

[Tony42]

Hold down the option key and choose the Go menu in the Finder. There you will see a way to select your user Library. Open the Applications Support folder. There should be a CDSpinDoctor folder (this is on the computer that originally was using CDSD). Copy that to the same folder on the other computer that doesn't know the track names. Now go to the Preferences folder. See if there is a cdsd plist file or something similar. Copy it to the other computer.

 

I don't know if this will recover the data when the CDSD file was saved. Saving in CDSD was always buggy which may be one reason Roxio chose to write their own. It always was a very unreliable application. I don't recall anyone asking your question in the past so I can only give you my best guess. I did use it for a few years. It's probably one of the reasons I have so little hair now. The fact you can access the captured music at all is a blessing.

 

 

 

 

Looking in Library I see CDSpinDoctor. Within it is Scratch and opening that I see iTunesTemp. Clicking that shows an empty column.

Further down in Library is a file Roxio. Within it is an application Roxio Restore.app size app 1.1MB created 10/25/06, Version 1.0.3. I don't know its function.

Looking in Preferences I see cdsdd.plist. The file is 71 bytes. Also in Preferences is CD info.cidb and CDDB Peferences.

Does any of this seem useful to finding the song names?

I haven't yet copied the files as you suggested. Tomorrow if I get time....

Thank you again

[hermie54]

Hmmm, looks like the track names are in the actual file itself as meta data, there's just nothing else to have them show up. I opened Leonard Cohen's Songs from a Room AIFF in Tex-Edit Plus and did a search. Sure enough in a bit of gibberish right at the end my track names are hidden:

 

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ˇyˇ{ˇsAPPLsPiNÀtypedstreamÅËÑ@ÑÑÑDSSTrackAndProcessingInfoÑÑNSObjectÖíÑÑÑNSMutableArrayÑÑNSArrayîÑi

íÑÑÑDSSAudioTrackInfoîíÑÑÑNSStringîÑ+SuzanneÜíÑÑÑNSNumberÑÑNSValueîÑ*ÑÑqûǶÜíÑùùüûÇÆèÄÜíÑùùÑÑcüÜÜíÑôíÑõöMaster SongÜíÑùùüûÇÆèÄÜíÑùùüûÇ£O¿Üí°ÜíÑôíÑõöWinter LadyÜíÑùùüûÇ£O¿ÜíÑùùüûÇN@Üí°ÜíÑôíÑõöThe Stranger SongÜíÑùùüûÇN@ÜíÑùùüûÇ‘.†Üí°ÜíÑôíÑõöSisters of MercyÜíÑùùüûÇ‘.†ÜíÑùùüûÇhÙêÜí°ÜíÑôíÑõöSo Long, MarianneÜíÑùùüûÇy‰ÄÜíÑùùüûÇdπ∞Üí°ÜíÑôíÑõö!Hey, that's no way to say GoodbyeÜíÑùùüûÇdπ∞ÜíÑùùüûÇfi}êÜí°ÜíÑôíÑõöStories of the StreetÜíÑùùüûÇfi}êÜíÑùùüûÇúÎêÜí°ÜíÑôíÑõöTeachersÜíÑùùüûÇúÎêÜíÑùùüûÇnêÜí°ÜíÑôíÑõöOne of Us cannot be WrongÜíÑùùüûÇnêÜíÑùùüûÇ—sÜí°ÜÜíÑñóíÑÑÑDSSAudioProcessingRangeInfoîíÑõöSound EnhancerÜíÑùùÑóóÜíÑùùüûÇ÷ÄÜíÑÑÑNSMutableDictionaryÑÑNSDictionaryîóíÑõöWidenessÜíÑùùÑÑf£É>(`7ÜíÑõö DSS_FILTER_APPLICATION_TIMESTAMPÜíÑÑÑNSDateîÑdÉA¢¿√$·ÜíÑõöExciterÜíÑùù”£É>(`7ÜíÑõöSub-BassÜíÑùù”£É>

 

FYI, a couple of years ago when I switched I put this up on Amadeus' forum:

 

http://www.hairersoft.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=5410

 

The idea is the same but the app functions a little bit different. However, when you get the hang of it, it's great and rock solid.

[Tony42]

SUCCESS! Thank you both for helping. Having my wife's old Mac Book Pro (10.4 operating system) and your suggestions of files to move allowed me to see the titles of my old music. What a relief.

Thinking further, I've struggled off and on for over 10 years to access this data.

 

Warmest regards to you

Tony Bryhan

Sebastopol, CA

[hermie54]

Good to hear you somehow figured it out!

 

BTW I remembered how I exported seperate tracks from Amadeus Pro in one go. You can give markers a different colour, so the one at 00.00, the one for flipping the record over and the final one I coloured Red, while the actual track name markers are Black. Then, when exporting you can tell the app which markers to consider, in this case Black. Et voila, all tracks exported to disk or iTunes without the unwanted bits.

 

I lost interest in digitizing, probably cuz of updating my old broken HiFi with going Sonos and listening to CDs with Sennheiser headset. Still, loads of records left and I'm slowly getting the urge again. Oh well, we'll see how things pan out.

[Tony42]

Hello, now that I can see the song data, a recurring challenge is that Mac system changes the order from the sequence in which they appeared on the record. They are resorted into alphabetical order.

They appear in proper sequence in iTunes but after exporting them from the iTunes music file into my external terabit drive they are no longer in the original order. Have you found a way to over-ride this challenge with Mac's ordering system? I tried numbering them but that didn't work either; getting to number 11, Mac's change the order from 1, 2, 3... to 1, 11, 12.... 2, 21, 22, ..... very annoying

[hermie54]

Well, I always number the tracks and include the leading zero, like 01-Whatever, 02-NextOne and so on. When I check lossless stuff that came to me from some obscure dark alleys of the Interweb's Usenet with Jaikoz it seems that Musicbrainz and whatnot also do that. Sorry, can't think of anything else at the moment.

[bohalloran]

Not sure if this app (name mangler) will help in renaming files and reordering/sorting, I have used it with much success. The following link takes you to the app store where you can read abut it. If you think it might work, you can d/l an older version for free by googling it. Hope it helps.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/name-mangler-3/id603637384?mt=12

[hermie54]

FWIW the file names you actually see in the Finder can be different from the ones used as tags in the song meta-data. My tagger of choice is Jaikoz, which does just about everything imaginable. I always start of on automatic, which most of the time does what I want. For difficult stuff there's manual, which requires a small learning curve. Experiment on a copy of the file or folder etc.

 

Jaikoz can be found on MacUpdate for reviews or straight here:

 

http://jthink.net/jaikoz/jsp/overview/startup.jsp

[Tony42]

I entered numbers at the start of each song, 01, 02, etc. as you suggested, looks ok so far. I'll look at the other suggestions too. Thank you

[realelvspretzl]

Hello All, 

Has everyone abandon Spin Doctor, or is anyone using it successfully?  I gave up on it a few years ago after going back and forth with Corel about whether or not they were going to upgrade the software. I know now that they've abandon it all together. It would be helpful if they removed the Roxio link that implies Spin Doctor is still a product that's viable and operable. 

I see from earlier comments that some of you have switched to Amadeus Pro. How well does that software suit your needs. I'm trying to rip some old vinyl (for personal use), and found the Spin Doctor filters highly effective ... when they worked. 

Any advice would be appreciated. I've had no difficulty locating all of my files and have them backed up.  

Best,   Peter

[Guest Rox-Ralf]

We do not support CD Spin Doctor, instead of making some wild guess, it is best to consult someone who knows Spin Doctor. I also told you that we will Refund your Priority ticket if it is a known issue (if you remember it) I push you here in forums as tsantee will be able to help us to confirm if your issue is unsolvable or not.

 

Refund for Priority take some time as I will need the approval of my Supervisor and CSS Manager for the refund.