MERIDIAN AUDIO Control: user

Sooloos Control:PC

What is Control:PC?

Control:PC is a software program that enables you to operate
your Sooloos system from a computer on the same network.
With Control:PC, you can:

• Select albums, tracks, and playlists for playback.

• Create, save, and delete playlists

• Edit album metadata

• Export albums, individual tracks, and playlists to

iTunes or a folder on your computer’s hard drive

• Import music files and CDs

• Perform manual backups from a Store or Ensemble

to a computer hard drive or manually restore from
your computer to a Store or Ensemble

Sooloos LLC

110 Grene Street, Suite 608

New York, NY 10012

tel: [phone]

Table of Contents:

1. What is Control:PC?

1. Getting Started

2. Music Selection
and Playlist Creation

5. Editing Metadata

8. Exporting Music

9. Importing Music

11. Manual Backups
and Restores

12. Settings and Info.

• Configure zones

• Check system and library status

• Connect to Sooloos remote support

Although many of these features are available directly via a Control:One, some actions such as

metadata editing, are more convenient on a PC. Others, such as music export and some of the
import functions, require Control:PC.

Getting Started

Control:PC requires a PC running Windows XP or Vista or an Apple MacIntosh computer with
an Intel processor running the Parallels Desktop or VMWare Fusion. (Windows XP sy stems mus t
have Microsoft’s .Net Framework 3.0 installed, but the Control:PC setup program will supply
that if it is not already present.) It is also essential that the computer and the Sooloos system
be connected to the same network router and that all components of the Sooloos system be
turned on.

Run the setup program, then launch Control:PC. It will search for the Sooloos system and load
after finding it. If Control:PC fails to load, the most likely reason is a network problem, since the
program must communicate intensively with the Sooloos system in order to function. Try shut­ting down everything on the network and rebooting the router. Restart the Sooloos system and
your computer, then launch Control:PC again.

If the problem persists and your computer talks to the router via WiFi, try making an Ethernet
connection instead, since wired connections are more reliable. If you have an old router, or one
supplied by your internet service provider, replacing it with a new one may also help.

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Sooloos LLC

110 Grene Street, Suite 608

New York, NY 10012

Control:PC

tel: [phone]

Music Selection and Playlist Creation

In the Music tab you can select music for playback, create, and edit playlists.

This screen has five main function groupings:

• Zone Selection. Choose the zone for your play queue from the dropdown list at the top left.

(

For more on zone configuration, see “Settings and Information,” page 13.) Multiple zones

can have their own separate play queues running simultaneously.

• Playback Controls. Play, pause, or stop the currently selected track.

• Play Status Window. Identifies the track currently playing, showing elapsed and remaining

time.

• Play Queue. Lists tracks selected for playback, including their length and whether they have

played yet. You can reorder the listing columns by dragging their headers with the mouse
and resize them by grabbing and dragging the header separators.

• Music Browser. The row of windows along the bottom where you select music for the play

queue.

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Sooloos LLC

110 Grene Street, Suite 608

New York, NY 10012

Control:PC

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Music Selection and Playlist Creation

tel: [phone]

Music Selection

Use the windows at the bottom of the screen to add music to the play queue. Begin by clicking
one of the five categories under the Browse heading: artists, playlists, album collections, genres,
or decades. Your selection will expand to a new set of options in the window to the right. (The
playlists and collections categories will expand only if you have previously created at least one
playlist or album collection.) For example, if you click Artists, the second window will list the
artists in your collection. If you then click an artist, a list of albums by that artist will open in the
third window. Clicking an album will shift the open windows to the left to open a fourth with a list
of songs on that album. (If you need to get back to the now-hidden Browse window, just click
on an item in the window at the far left, and the windows will slide to the right again, bringing it
back into view.)

The Albums and Songs windows display a button next to each entry. Clicking one of those

buttons will bring up a window with a list of playback options for you to select from.

The list presented will depend on the category you’re in. Genres and Decade offer only Swim

mode, for example. Options offered may include:

• Queue (Albums and Songs). Add to the end of the play queue.

• Play Next (Albums and Songs). Insert in the queue after the current song.

• Play Now (Albums and Songs). Insert after the current song and begin playing immediately.

• Queue Album Picks (Albums). Add the album’s best songs to the play queue. (For more on

Album Picks, see “Editing Metadata,” page 5.

)

• Play Album Picks Next (Albums). Insert the album’s best songs into the queue after the

current song.

• Play Album Picks Now (Albums). Insert the album’s best songs into the queue after the

current song and begin playing them immediately.

• Replace Play Queue (Playlists). Replace the current play queue with the contents of the

selected playlist.

Music Selection and Playlist Creation

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Sooloos LLC

110 Grene Street, Suite 608

New York, NY 10012

Control:PC

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Music Selection and Playlist Creation

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• Append to Play Queue (Playlists). Add the contents of the selected playlist to the end of the

queue.

• D e l e t e (Playlists and Collections). Delete the playlist or collection. (This does not delete the

music in the playlist or collection from the system, only the listing.)

• S w i m (Collections, Genres, and Decades). Play albums from the selected collection, genre,

or decade.

Working the Play Queue

Along the bottom of the play-queue window in the middle of the screen are two checkboxes and

four buttons for controlling it:

• L o o p . Checking this box causes the play queue to repeat instead of stopping at the end.

• S h u f fl e . Checking this box plays songs in the queue in random order. If you check both Loop

and Shuffle, all songs in the queue will play before it starts over (in a new order).

• Save Playlist. Saves the contents of the queue in a playlist for future use. When you click

this button, a window will open containing two dropdowns for selecting a group and name
for the playlist. If this is your first playlist, or if you want to put it into a new group, type a new
group name in the top box. Then type a name for the playlist in the lower box and click Save.

(

Or if you want to replace an existing playlist, select its name from the dropdown list, then

click Save.)

• Remove Selected. Deletes from the queue any songs that are highlighted. Note, however,

that you cannot remove a song that is currently playing; you must stop it first.

• Remove All. Clears the play queue. If a song is playing, you must stop it before you can re-

move it.

You can jump directly to any song in the play queue by double-clicking it.

Music Selection and Playlist Creation

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Sooloos LLC

110 Grene Street, Suite 608

New York, NY 10012

Control:PC

tel: [phone]

Editing Metadata

The system stores metadata for each album, normally downloaded from All Media Guide. It

contains a variety of information, including track titles, artist credits, genres, record label, rating,
and so forth. Control:PC enables you to modify that data, enter your own, or import new data
from another source.

When you click the Edit Metadata tab, the screen displays two panes.

The one on the left lists the artists in your collection. Clicking on one of them lists the associated

albums in the right pane. To edit an album’s metadata, select it from the list and click the Edit

Album Metadata button at the bottom of the screen. This opens a new Edit Album window

containing the metadata (example included on the following page).

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Control:PC

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Editing Metadata

Sooloos LLC

110 Grene Street, Suite 608

New York, NY 10012

tel: [phone]

Manual editing on the opening display is mostly a matter of typing new information into the avail­able fields, but a number of items bear further explanation:

• C o v e r . You can delete the existing cover image by clicking the Clear Cover button. And you

can replace it by dragging an image from your hard drive or Web browser into the space.

Clicking the Revert Cover will bring back the original image.

• Media #. These fields are important primarily for multidisc sets, to keep track of the contents

of each disc. The second disc of a three-disc set would be listed as “2 of 3,” for example.

• R a t i n g . You can move the slider to adjust the album rating in half-star increments from 0 to 5.

• Album Pick. A mark in this box indicates that the album was a hit (or one of your favorites).

• P i c k . These checkboxes next to the entries in the Songs panel indicate the album’s best

tracks. Together with the Album Picks options for the play queue, they make it easy for you to

play only the songs you want to hear and avoid the ones you don’t like. (See “Music Selection

and Playlist Creation,” page 2, for more details.)

Whenever a data item in the Edit Album window is changed, Control:PC highlights the entry in
green.

Editing Metadata

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Sooloos LLC

110 Grene Street, Suite 608

New York, NY 10012

Control:PC

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Editing Metadata

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Genres, Moods, and Credits

The information contained in the panels opened by these tabs is important for the Sooloos

Focus feature, which enables you to select a set of albums with particular characteristics either
to play immediately or to create a collection for easy retrieval later.

Clicking the Genres tab switches the panel to a list of AMG’s standard genre categories.

And if you click the button next to a genre listing, it will expand to a listing of all the subgenres.

(

Clicking the button again collapses the list.) Select or deselect entries by clicking on the check-

boxes. When subgenres are checked, the master genre row indicates the number chosen.

The Moods tab switches the panel to a list of moods, which you select or deselect by clicking

the checkboxes next to them.

Clicking the New Mood button at the bottom right opens a window in which you can name and
save a new mood category.

The Credits tab switches the panel to a list of credits for the album. You can determine which are

displayed on the album-information page by selecting or deselecting the checkboxes beside
them. And clicking the New Credit button at the bottom right opens a window in which you can
enter a new credit line.

Clearing, Importing, and Saving Data

If you plan to reenter or re-import all the metadata for an album, you can click the Clear Data
button at the bottom of the Edit Album window to remove the existing entries. And it is impor­tant to click the Save button after you have finished your edits. Clicking Cancel reverses all
unsaved changes and closes the Edit Album window.

Clicking Import Data pops up the Import from External Site window. Enter the requested infor­mation for the source you want to use and click Go. For multidisc albums, be sure to enter the
correct disc number in the Media # field.

Editing Metadata

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Sooloos LLC

110 Grene Street, Suite 608

New York, NY 10012

Control:PC

tel: [phone]

Exporting Music

The Export Music tab can allows you to transfer music from your Sooloos system to iTunes or

to a folder on your computer’s hard drive.

It opens with a listing of the artists in your collection. Clicking on any of them opens a list of that
artist’s albums in the next pane, and clicking on any of those opens a list of the songs on that
album in the final pane.

You can then select individual songs by clicking on the checkboxes next to them, entire albums

by clicking the checkboxes next to them, or all the music by an artist by clicking the checkbox
next to their name. Or you can choose all the items in a pane by clicking the Select All link in its
header (clicking the link again deselects all the items).

You can also export the contents of playlists. Start by clicking the Playlists tab, which will switch

to a screen with two panes, Playlist Groups on the left and Playlists on the right.

When you have selected all the music you want to export, click the Export Selected Songs
and Playlists button at the bottom right of the screen. That will open the Export Destination
window, where you choose the export format

(

MP3 or WAV

)

and the target — your iTunes library

or a directory on your computer’s hard drive.

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Sooloos LLC

110 Grene Street, Suite 608

New York, NY 10012

Control:PC

tel: [phone]

Importing Music

Control:PC can import MP3 and FLAC music files from your computer or CDs from your
computer’s CD or DVD drive. It can also manage the Import:One, a 25 disc auto-loader that
connects to your PC by USB. Begin by clicking the Import Music tab, which will switch to the
import screen.

Importing Files

To pull in loose MP3 files, click the Import Files button at the lower left of the screen. This

will pop up the Browse for Folder window, where you can select the folder on your computer
containing the files. Once you’ve chosen a folder, click OK, and an animation will appear as
Control:PC attempts to assemble one or more albums from the files. (Although the program can
often parse a mixed collection of files successfully, it works more reliably when files from com­mercially released CDs are already segregated into separate folders.)

After successfully assembling an album, Control:PC will display its metadata, including cover art,

in the left-hand panel and indicate that it is selected for transfer. Files that it could not assemble
into an album are listed in the right-hand panel.

In some cases the program may assemble one or more partial albums with incomplete meta­data.

You may be able to fill it out manually by dragging the appropriate files from the right pane into

place. (Just grab the button next to the file you want and pull it over.) And you may also need
to enter or modify some of the metadata. You can even drag cover art into position from your
computer or Web browser. Once you’re done, click the Verify Album Data button. If Control:PC
is now able to identify the album in the Sooloos database, it will fill in missing data and mark it
as selected for transfer. Even if it can’t, you can check the Select for transfer box manually to
force the import.

If you wind up with just a collection of files in the right pane and not even the beginnings of an
album, you can still generate one from scratch by clicking the Create new album link in the
header for the left pane. Drag files over from the right pane and enter metadata as necessary,
click Verify Album Data, and then if necessary check Select for transfer to force the import.

The last step is always to click the Transfer Selected Albums to Sooloos Store to move the files

into the system.

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Sooloos LLC

110 Grene Street, Suite 608

New York, NY 10012

Control:PC

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Importing Music

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Importing CDs

To import a CD via your computer’s CD or DVD drive, click the Import CD button at the lower

right of the window. If you have not already loaded the CD, Control:PC will prompt you to do so.

After you have inserted the disc, the system will indicate that it is retrieving the metadata, then

display the album information after it is downloaded. If you want to edit the metadata, you can
do so at this point (see “Editing Metadata,” page 5). When you are satisfied with the metadata,
click the Save button, and Control:PC will begin extracting the data from the disc. Once the sys­tem indicates the import is complete, click the OK button at the bottom of the window to finish.

The Sooloos Import:One 25 disc autoloader can also be used for automated bulk import through

Control:PC. For more information, see the Import:One manual.

Impor ting Music

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Sooloos LLC

110 Grene Street, Suite 608

New York, NY 10012

Control:PC

tel: [phone]

Manual Backups and Restores

Control:PC can back up the contents of a Store or Ensemble to a hard drive in or attached to
your computer, as well as restore previously backed-up data from a hard drive to a Sooloos sys­tem. Start by clicking the Manual Backups tab, which will bring up the Save screen.

This screen has two panes, with the one on the left listing all the artists in your collection. Click-

ing an artist name lists the associated albums in the right pane. You can select individual albums
or artists by checking the boxes next to their listings. Or you can click the Select All link in the
header to back up everything.

Next, click Backup checked albums. A Browse for Folder window will pop up, where you can
select a destination drive or folder for your backup. Then click OK and the backup will com­mence.

Restoring from a Backup

Click the Restore tab, then the Restore directory of previously backed up albums button. A
Browse for Folder window will pop up, where you can select the location of the data you want
to restore. Then click OK and the restore operation will begin.

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Sooloos LLC

110 Grene Street, Suite 608

New York, NY 10012

Control:PC

tel: [phone]

Settings and Information

System information and zone configuration are located under the Settings & Information tab.

The following settings are available:

• Zone Name. Enter whatever identifying name you like.

To edit a zone’s configuration,

double-click its name on the list.

That will bring up an Edit Zone

Settings window.

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Sooloos LLC

110 Grene Street, Suite 608

New York, NY 10012

Control:PC

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Settings and Information

• Volume Normalization. The system can even out the level from album to album or track to

track, preventing abrupt volume changes. To ensure best sound quality, Sooloos applies
an intelligent gain adjustment at the start of each album or song rather than compression.
Select the setting you desire from the dropdown list.

• Gain Adjustment. The master gain setting for the zone. You may find it convenient to turn

this down for a zone with unusually sensitive speakers or where lower volumes typically are
desired.

• Crossfading Time. Length of the crossfade between tracks, adjustable from 0 to 10 sec-

onds.

• Zone Linking. Zone linking allows you to play the same music in multiple zones. You can link

and unlink zones whenever you want.

Clicking the Link Zone button

brings up another window where

you can select another zone as the

master for the one you’re config-

uring. Then whatever play queue is

set up for the master zone will

apply to the slave zone(s) as well

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