XXHighEnd

Download is at the very bottom.

For those without Paypal - other means of payment and Activaton are possible (nothing new there too).

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For the Release Notes of 2.00, look here : XXHighEnd Model 2.00 - New Filters & Extended Remote Control (http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=3184.0).

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Install any new version in its own folder (your 2.00 Activation could be violated otherwise).

General Remark about the Sound Quality :
We have reasons to believe that SQ has improved, possibly not even by a small margin. For us this is quite hard to test because of many changes in different realm.
On this matter, please express your thoughts (forum).

Release Notes 2.04

General

• The Renaming of Library Items (which in the end are normal Folder Names) is now working "all over" and decently.
  Now it also allows "one click only" to go into "Rename Mode" like normal Explorer behaviour.
  The Mass Rename function too, now works as should. Notice that this uses the Naming Scheme field contents from Settings (Data Locations section).
  
  
• A very general remark could be that now (and finally) all what is related to Galleries and moving and Deleting and what not, is decent. Large parts have been rewritten as well, in order to get there.
  
  
• Although several attempt have been made in the past to solve it, it still was so that the message "Waiting for LAN to come up" could stay there forever, when no LAN was present but should (or was while the system thought it was not), with no further possibility to interfere other than killing XXHighEnd.
  This now has been solved, finally.
  
  
• It could happen (only with Windows 10 and then mainly Build 10074 ?) that Alt-z (obtain Album in Demo Gallery) made XXhighEnd crash (from Unattended Mode).
  This now has been solved, and the means to do that is believed to have the Sound Quality improved !
  
  
• A Year notation of [1972] is now supported. This is about the brackets.
  You may not even have noticed that it was not, but in several functions this is used, like in finding the Album Name (knowing that you yourself put in the [1972], that not being part of the official Album Name at all. An example of where this is used : Get Coverart from Tidal (see in the Tidal section below as well).
  
  
• The Monitor Off at Unattended function (See Settings) has been eliminated for Windows 10 (all Builds);
  It is not clear at this moment what exactly the problem is - or can be with it, but it has been clear already that something is going on. Maybe later it comes back (for other OS versions it just stays).
  
  
• In the XXSettings.dat file, for an Item obtained in a Gallery and then in the Gallery folder itself, all Settings Data is registered of that moment (Q1 Value, Volume, etc. etc.); this is done since a few (1.xx) versions already. Because the OS is obtained in there too, it now appeared that the W10 Build number was lacking (eh, obviously ?) and that this is quite important (even more obviously). So now the W10 Build number is registered along with the OS version itself.
  
  

Tidal

• When using the Root Toggle buttons in the left pane (like [ M ], [ D ], etc.) the Search button remained to have the caption "Srch Tidal" or "Srch TT" with the effect that when the Search button was used after that, the Tidal Search Area was reactivated again. This is solved and now intuitively works as expected.
  
  
• In the previous XXHighEnd version it was not possible to search for Artist Names with diacritical marks etc. in them. This is now working.
  
  
• Because of a programming bug it could happen that not all Tidal-available Albums of an Artist were shown. Solved now.
  
  
• Tidal can now be used to download the Front Coverart picture/file for any random Album in your Library. Of course the Album must be available on Tidal. An example :
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/XXHighEnd Tidal GetCoverart 01b.png)
  Above : The two without picture are selected ...
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/XXHighEnd Tidal GetCoverart 02b.png)
  Rightclick (somewhere) and the menu you see above appears. Click the Get Coverart from Tidal.
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/XXHighEnd Tidal GetCoverart 03b.png)
  When done, we see that the picture in the right hand side is there now. The left one is not available on Tidal, so the cross remains.
  
  You can do this for all your Albums in one go but it must be done with some care;
  - Existing Front.jpg files will be overwritten.
  - Whether the Album is found on Tidal, depends largely on how well you named it yourself; Although some "intelligence" has been built in, at least the Artist Name must be spelled 100% the same as Tidal has it, or otherwise the Album just won't be found because of that.
  - It more rare cases it can happen that Tidal comes up with some general Picture of the Artist and thus now the front cover is wrong. In that case you can easily delete it again :
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/XXHighEnd Tidal GetCoverart 04.png)
  Select it.
  Cause the Show Data button (right hand side at the cursor) to be active.
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/XXHighEnd Tidal GetCoverart 05.png)
  Select the wrong Coverart file in there and RightClick it.
  Choose Delete File(s) from disk ...
  
  
• Look at this picture :
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/XXHighEnd Tidal Search 00.png)
  At the mouse pointer you see an [ S ] button. Notice that at that position, previously there was a [ D ].
  When this button is clicked, a renewed Search Screen pops up :
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/XXHighEnd Tidal Search 01.png)
  Obviously we can enter an Artist Name and an Album Name in there. Either is optional and both are allowed to contain an * at any position to imply a wildcard. Do notice though that the position of the * doesn't do a thing. It is only that when it is in there somewhere, the result is going to contain anything with the words provided and those words being in the same sequence. Below you see an example with one word "Christmas" :
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/XXHighEnd Tidal Search 02.png)
  ... and you can see that all the results contain the word "Christmas" for the Album name. All are from Bing Crosby because that is what we asked for (no wildcard given there).
  
  With the wildcards, a bit of caution is in order :
  Although the output is formally limited to 250 Items (Albums), the Tidal internals cause many more to be presented without exactly knowing why (call it is bug somewhere). This means that when you ask for e.g. "the*" for Artist Name, thousands (and thousands) of Albums will be the result, because of so many Artists having "The" (Temptations etc.) in their name. In itself this isn't killing, but you will use unnecessary bandwidth (of the Tidal servers), plus that the result will be unmanagable and also will not be desired. Besides that, you can only kill XXHighEnd by means of Taskmanager once such a download of meta data is in order, that taking a "week".
  
  Watch out : While the whole Search Screen applies to all of XXHighEnd and the normal Library (your ripped Albums) just the same, the Artist Name field does not do a thing in there (at least not for this XXHighEnd 2.04 version). Or think like this :
  When we talk about Tidal Search facilities, it should be so that the Seach Button shows either "Srch Tidal" or "Srch TT". Otherwise, different rules apply. Also look below :
  
  
• This applies to XXHighEnd in general and not to Tidal Search only :
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/XXHighEnd Tidal Search 03.png)
  Above you see that a Sorting Order has been chosen (see line at the bottom). You also see that a date range has been chosen, in this case a span of one day. Now :
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/XXHighEnd Tidal Search 04.png)
  What you see here is all what was new for that one day (December 20, 2015). In this case this is about all what was "Prepared" from Tidal on that day, but this is coincidental because it just shows everything which complies to being new for the given date span.
  What functionally happened, obviously, is that some Christmas music was prepared for sue Christmas day(s).
  
  Now notice that this actually was already there since many years, but that it was quite unusable because of the lack of speed and not remembering the last choice etc. (this is largely about intuitiveness and if you tried to use this previously, you really should try it again, now).
  In the end this is the most useful a.o. things it allows you to Prepare a bunch from Tidal, which you want to play later - like in this case. All we need to remember is when about this Preparation took place (like Dec. 20 here) and ask for all of that data again.
  
  Last thing : The Apply to Gallery Data is new and it allows to NOT access the Original Locations and just the Date of Obtainment in the Gallery of concern (see your Library Area of the moment) instead. This is not only functional in itself, but it also speeds up largely, because the physical disks holding the music (the "Original Location") don't need to spin up.
  
  
• Look here :
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/Tidal EP 01.png)
  The middle one, where the mouse pointer is at, has a black border. This is new;
  In the previous version, EP's and Singles were filtered out because of, say, personaly preferences (but call it a bug). Now their metadata is downloaded just the same, but they receive a black border (until something is done with them, like you see by the green border of the second one - which one has received its Track Metadata).
  Please notice that often EP's / Singles are not denoted as such by Tidal, and thus can also not receive a black border, while they are EP's or Singles anyway.
  
  
• In the previous version, a Tidal Prepared Album, directly to the Streaming Files folder, or one which was Moved from the Intermediate Files folder te Streaming Files folder - received a message "1 Item added to the Gallery" when the field Streaming Files Gallery in Settings was filled. This is of course the most inconvenient (as it interrupts the workflow for each Prepared album) and was unintentional. This unlucky message has been removed.
  
• It appeared that it could happen that a Yellow Bordered Album received that Yellow border because just one of its Tracks was found to be in the wrong format (not 16/44.1). So because of that, the whole album was rejected;
  Now it is so that only if the first track is not 16/44.1 the whole labum is rejected right away; if a second or any other is rejected, but the first one (and more) are OK, the ones which are OK just stay and the rejected ones are not obtained.
  NOTICE : You can't see this other than not all the Track Numbers appearing in the Playlist Area. Otherwise the Log will show relevant messages (the Log needs not to be turned on for these).
  
  
• It was found that it can occur that a Track (or more of them) of an album is not allowed to be Streamed (Prepared). This produced an error previously;
  Now this is watched for, and when the case then the Track is just not obtained and it will lack in the Playlist Area. Here too, the Log will show relevant messages (and the Log again needs not to be turned on for them).
  
  
• When Albums disappeared from the Intermediate Files folder (obtained there by means of Tidal TT Search) and next they were deleted or Prepared and Moved to the Streaming Files folder, the main folders with the Names of the Artists remained; Now they are nicely deleted as well.
  
  
• Anomalies could occur with Multi Volume Albums and re-obtaining them after a first attempt; Difficult to explain but when you ran into it you'll know what we mean.
  This is now solved.
  
  
• As good as possible the "anomalies" or incoveniences showing after deleting or moving or re-attempting Albums, have been solved. So the actuality you see is far better (if not 100% now) and does not require explicit search or emptying of search fields or restarting XXHighEnd.
  One thing to pay attention to : when Items are Deleted or were just Moved, they unavoidably still show but now without Coverart. So you can still see "reality".
  
  Notice : Part of the solutions is the fact that now Double Clicking the Search Field (not the Search Button), implies a click on the Search Field. Thus, this not only empties the Search Field like usual, but it also explicitly refreshes the Library Area. For you there's now no functional difference with when you'd Double Click the Search Field when in a normal (ripped) Library. But point is, that for the Tidal Searches this can not work technically the same and thus the explicit search with empty field is applied. And, you may have noticed that you always did so yourself (in the previous version).
  
  
• It may be good to know that the Prepare functionality is completely "multi threaded";
  Suppose you selected 5 Albums to Prepare and this is running at this moment (cursor nows as a "wait" circle); At this moment you can scroll through the Library Area and find more Albums for Preparation. Found one or two ? then select 'm and again choose "Prepare".
  Now you have two processes of the Prepare function running and you can see that by means of the two pairs of Leds being on in the top of the screen, per such a process. This when 4 Leds are lit, two processes still run. Also see hereunder :
  
  
• (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/SearchField01.png)
  In the top you see the Leds, but you also see the Top Search Field (you can use that instead of the bottom one and both result in the same). This Top Search Field masks the Leds ...
  But you can now drag this aside. Here that happened :
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/SearchField02.png)
  So now you can see all the Leds and how many Prepare processes still run.
  This possibility to drag the Search Field to another position is not Tidal related at all; you can use it when you want. Notice you that its position is not remembered when Quitting/Restarting XXHighEnd.
  
  

Internal Boot Menu

• RightClick on the Stop Button now show this :
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/XXHighEnd BootMenu 01.png)
  The new option "Boot Into ..." allows us to Reboot into one of the Multi Boots as defined for our system.
  Warning : This is to be considered software in beta stage, as it has not been tested on systems others than ours plus that it was created for a specific purpose : The OS from RAM boots. However, for the more normal environment it can work just the same so it is now offered as explicit functionality.
  What does it do for you :
  
  -> On the Remotely Controlled system (like with RDC/RDP) it allows to choose which Operating System to boot into, which normally is not possible without connecting the Monitor, Keyboard and Mouse and possibly even the Video card (to be inserted). In the end it is the most convenient, assuming that people remotely control their Audio PC indeed.
  
  Meanwhile it actually allows for pre-selecting the OS to boot into, meaning that the selection happens when the current OS is still running. Thus : Select OS to boot into - Reboot.
  
  Keeping in mind that this is part of the OS from RAM boots and necessary control, this is the screen coming up when a physical "BASE DISK" is mounted in the PC (Phasure provides such a disk/ssd) :
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/XXHighEnd BootMenu 02.png)
  This is the sitation as per end of December 2015 and later we will see other Operating Systems / versions appear.
  
  At this moment (XXHighEnd 2.04) only the OS to boot into can be chosen. These are the Radio Button in the "Default" column. What you see above is what comes up at first. In this case it is the "booted from RAM" version of Windows 10, Build 10074. And, when you'd select e.g. the BASE version of that same OS, like here :
  
  (http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/XXHighEnd BootMenu 03.png)
  ... then you see the Apply button now being available, and when you'd click Apply the system is ready to Reboot into that W10-10074 BASE version. Use the Reboot button or any other means which implies a Reboot (including Shutting Down and Boot the next day), you will be in the newly chosen OS.
  Remember, you can do all this from behind your remote control - also iPad etc.;
  Want to check the SQ of that other OS ? well, what's implied above will take maybe 30 seconds and you are up and running again, listening to the same OS but now running from HDD/SSD and not from RAM.
  Side note : A Boot from a HDD/SSD takes maybe 30 seconds, while a Boot fram RAM takes about 2 minutes when from a "fast" SSD (Phasure provides that).
  
  Below some more general functionalities, most of them running under the hood, but taking well over 1000 hours to program anyway.
  
  
• The BASE version of any OS booted from RAM will always be accessible on drive X:. That is, when the BASE DISK has been mounted (injected in its removable bay). The "Attaching" of its Volume goes automatically and intuitively.
  Notice some terms :
  
  BASE Disk : The HDD or SSD containing the Operating Systems like you saw in the above screen shots. It must be mounted before any of its BASE Volumes can be reached.
  
  BASE Volume : Say a Partition holding an Operating System. More of them can exist on a BASE Disk. An example is the W10-10074 BASE you see in above screen shots.
  
  RAM Boot : A term which is not explicitly used in the Program but is in order anyway, once the OS of concern has been booted from RAM. An example is the W10-10074 RAM Memory you see in the screen shots above.
  The "Memory" you see behind the "RAM" lines, is superfluous and added by XXHighEnd. Thus, might you yourself have named these OS Menu Entries, then you had named them like W10-10074 RAM. This is just your indication "hey, this is my RAM entry". XXHighEnd added the "Memory" because it has detected that it runs from Memory (RAM).
  
  TRIAL : The one and only normal volume on the BASE Disk. FYI : If the BASE Disk is phyically 240GB then the TRIAL volume can be that size too (its partition is as large as the Disk), but anyway it is about the fact that all of the other OSes are contained *within* that TRIAL version as "files" (insiders are allowed to think these are virtual OSes, but in the end they are not.
  
  
• Booting can be :
  From BASE to BASE (like from W8 BASE to W10-10074 BASE);
  From BASE to RAM (like form W8 BASE to W10-10074 RAM Memory);
  From RAM to RAM (like form W8 RAM Memory to W10-10074 RAM Memory);
  From RAM to BASE (like from W8 RAM memory to W10-10565 BASE);
  From TRIAL to any of the others;
  From any of the oithers to TRIAL.
  
  You might think "logic !", but do notice that each of the combinations requires its own attention and code and that testing them all is a requrement which took a large part of "yesterday" and the reason that 2.04 comes about on Christmas Day instead of Christmas Eve, what has been the plan.
  Also notice that all is quite moot for "you" not having the BASE Disk yet, but, it requires some live testing as well. So the most important functionalities - and even useful, is the rebooting "into". It must work glitchlessly.
  In 2.05 we will see that the Descriptions of the OSes can be changed and probably quite some more things, all required to amend the list of OSes, later.
  
  
• For all to work as mechanisms expect, the active OS you work with, should be on Drive C:. Notice that this is the most normal, but not necessarily so. And if not, you (probably) won't be able to use the Boot Into functionality of XXHighEnd.
  
  
• At this moment, all Logging regarding the Rebooting is performed in "hard fashion", or IOW without the necessity to switch on Logging.
  
  

Issues

• It appears to be so that a very first XXHighEnd install on the Windows 10 Operating System takes a rather long time before the XXHighEnd screen appears (this first time). Think 6 minutes !
  What you will notice of this is a taskbar icon for XXHighEnd (hovering it will show the screen in grey colour) and all you need to do is wait.
  It is not clear what is happening during that time; it is a Windows 10 quirk.
  
  
• It looks like it can take ages for a Tooltip emerges; If you hover a new field and nothing happens, hover another one of which you know that ot works (has a ToolTip) and after that go back to the new one. Now just wait.
  When nothing happens and you don't trust it, please announce it on the forum (then we can look and confirm either truth).
  

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Reminder for Windows 8 users : As an option, don't forget to install the Windows 7 Shell provided with XXHighEnd. See the Windows7_Shell folder in your XX folder and don't forget to read the readme's in there !
Notice that this Windows 7 Shell does not work for Windows 8.1 and Windows 10 and instead it will render your OS Install useless (black screen) when you install it anyway.
New since XXHighEnd 2.03 the Windows 7 Shell is mentioned "as an option" because Windows 8 now just runs as well on the Metro Desktop *IF* you get the habit of selecting the Windows Desktop first from where you do all with XXHighEnd.

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Just start the XXHighEnd.exe file; no Install as such is needed. See below at the mouse arrow.

(http://www.stordiau.nl/XXHighEnd/XXHighEnd04.png)
However, when you are running Windows 8 or higher - have not used XXHighEnd before - and are not connected to the Internet, first read this : Windows 8 Tutorials - Install .Net 3.5 (http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=2348.msg23844).

Without this Tutorial you won't be able to obtain an Activation Code for XXHighEnd : Windows 10 Tutorials - Make Internet Explorer available (http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=3240.0).
Also, we urge you to read this : Windows 10 Tutorials - Wallpaper, Core Schemes, Q4,5 and more (http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=3228.0).
It is mandatory to read this : Windows 10 Tutorials - Start XXHighEnd.exe (first time) (http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=3227.0) (this is also about Activation).

Please report as much as you run into but do so in a dedicated topic with a catching title.

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Edit, Dec. 29, 2015 : An issue was found that caused the Settings not to be saved when XXHighEnd is used from a RAMDisk. The below XXHighEnd-204a-x.rar solves that;
Unzip it over your 2.04 install (and only 2.04). Thus first unzip the main file (first one below) and after that the 2.04a-x.
Edit, Dec. 30, 2015 : And because we also found a stupid "Search" bug in the Tidal part of the program (search for Album Name alone appeared to impossible), 2.04c solves that edit : plus 32 bit support for Tidal and replaces 2.04a (2.04c also contains the 2.04a and 2.04b patch which has been available for download earlier on)
Same procedure : always unzip the 2.04c over the already present 2.04(a/b) install.