"Play-to" network device keeps repeating same song

Songs are standard mp3 file hosted on a Home Server system, when playing the songs they are referenced via the UNC path (ex: \server\music\artist\album\song.mp3).  Both systems have access to the network location that the files are stored on, and can play media, wpl & m3u playlists, etc no problem, however when queuing songs to the "play to" list from computer A to computer B, it will just repeat the same song over and over, despite having other items in queue and the repeat option not being on.  When I say playlist I mean the queue within the "Play to" window, not a specific playlist file. 

When watching both systems at once, it looks like there is a disconnect between the "play to" list on computer A, and the "now playing" list on computer B.  If I queue up a wpl playlist or drag any number of songs into the "play to" list, all the songs appear on computer A, but on computer B only the first song shows up.  Once it is finished, it repeats, because as far as computer B is concerned there are no more songs in the queue.  Even stranger, if I drag another song on computer A to the "play to" list, it will show up as the song that is currently playing on computer B (the only one on computer B's now playing list) rather than the song that I dragged over.  If I manually skip the current song and select another one, it will show up as the next song/last song on computer B's now playing list, however if I click the previous button in the "play to" dialog, it will append that song to the list on computer B rather than move backwards in its current list.

Interesting.. I am going to see if someone from Microsoft can looks at this

thread and comment.

On Wed, 27 Oct 2010 03:47:17 +0000, dbreviu wrote:

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>Songs are standard mp3 file hosted on a Home Server system, when playing the songs they are referenced via the UNC path (ex: \server\music\artist\album\song.mp3).  Both systems have access to the network location that the files are stored on, and can play media, wpl & m3u playlists, etc no problem, however when queuing songs to the "play to" list from computer A to computer B, it will just repeat the same song over and over, despite having other items in queue and the repeat option not being on.  When I say playlist I mean the queue within the "Play to" window, not a specific playlist file.

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>When watching both systems at once, it looks like there is a disconnect between the "play to" list on computer A, and the "now playing" list on computer B.  If I queue up a wpl playlist or drag any number of songs into the "play to" list, all the songs appear on computer A, but on computer B only the first song shows up.  Once it is finished, it repeats, because as far as computer B is concerned there are no more songs in the queue.  Even stranger, if I drag another song on computer A to the "play to" list, it will show up as the song that is currently playing on computer B (the only one on computer B's now playing list) rather than the song that I dragged over.  If I manually skip the current song and select another one, it will show up as the next song/last song on computer B's now playing list, however if I click the previous button in the "play to" dialog, it will append that song to the list on computer B rather than move backwards in its current list.

Barb Bowman

http://www.digitalmediaphile.com

Guys,

I think the discussion got into two different directions. First, is the issue with the PlayTo repeating the same song over and over again. I do not know the Denon device, but I would suspect it is not updating the item every time when PlayTo tries to set a new URI for playback. However, more intriguing is that the WMP DMR does the same thing, which I have never encountered before. I have only one explanation for this: WMP DMR Repeat control is ON, so it does things on its own, regardless of what PlayTo is trying to do. The Denon may have a similar settings though, but I am not sure. To nail them down, it would be probably better to get WireShark traces and discover how the devices are talking to each other. 

For doing that, you need to install Wireshark on the PlayTo machine, start capturing traces while doing your scenario and then stop capturing. It would be great if you could sent those to me for analyzing. (Barb, do you think you could help me out with this?)

If not, then you will need to analyze traces by yourself, looking for #SetAvTransportURI, #Play and #GetPositionInfo requests. However, lets make sure first that WMP has no repeat option on. Could you verify that for me?

Thanks a lot

ccazang@msft

Yes, the client/target PC does not have the repeat option on, however shuffle was on...turning that on had better results than before.  These are the tests I've done so far:  

I queued up 36 songs on the host machine and clicked "play to" to client.  The client showed only song 1 in the playlist, and Song 1 played.  When it was finished, song 2 was added to the client playlist and song 2 played.  When song 2 was over, no additional song was added to the clients playlist, and song 2 repeated, showing both on the client machine and the host machine, despite another song being in queue on the host (I have a wireshark capture of this).  I clicked "next" on the host machine, song 3 was added to the client's playlist and it started to play.  After song 3, song 1 started to play on the client machine, and the host machine did not update to show that another song had started.  I looked at the client machine and noticed that "shuffle was turned on", so i shut that off and repeated the test (I usually have shuffle on when playing music through media center, so i suspect that media player just inherited that setting as being on with the "play to" playlist).  

With the shuffle setting off, the songs played correctly in sequence up to song 7, at which point playback stopped, the client machine looked as if it had finished the playlist and no more songs were left to play.  I clicked the next button on the host and music continued in sequence.  So far I am up to song 25 with no unexpected behavior, other than issues using the next/previous buttons on the client PC, but I suspect that is just a limitation of play to.  I will continue to run tests when I get the chance throughout the week while running wireshark and post any abnormal behavior.