Media library or manual folders?

[Uridium]

I currently just have a list of drives/folders manually added to the media server, this seems to work fine for me as it allows me to control exactly how the folder lists appear on the PS3 XMB making it easy for the wife and kids to find their stuff both through the PC and the PS3

What benefit 's exactly would i see by removing these manual folders and just using the Media library function ?

[meskibob]

The media library allows you to keep your current folder structure while adding some additional sorting/grouping functionality, such as All Files, HD Videos, SD Videos, etc. I don't think it's supposed to be an "either or" case where you use only one; you use which ever best fits your current needs.

[Uridium]

The media library allows you to keep your current folder structure while adding some additional sorting/grouping functionality, such as All Files, HD Videos, SD Videos, etc. I don't think it's supposed to be an "either or" case where you use only one; you use which ever best fits your current needs.

So other than extra "system" type folder views does it add anything else?

I have a 2tb media library, will it speed up page loading times/artwork generation?

[meskibob]

My understanding is that it's purely sort/group functionality, but there might be some improvements on thumbnail or browsing speeds. However, I haven't noticed a speed difference between the library and the system folders.

Edit: From the blog...

However, the media library has two purposes: to offer a view of your media files with some criterias (artist, date, etc.) and also to speedup the display of your folders on XMB, as the media library act like a parsing cache (metadata, thumbnails, etc.).

[Uridium]

OK thanks. Gave it a try last night but bizzarely as soon as i enable the media library option the media server disappears from my XMB and refuses to be found again by my PS3 until i disable it ???

I have no internal firwalle's running and have tried various TCP ports as well as forcing which NIC to use. Odd.

[meskibob]

OK thanks. Gave it a try last night but bizzarely as soon as i enable the media library option the media server disappears from my XMB and refuses to be found again by my PS3 until i disable it ???

I have no internal firwalle's running and have tried various TCP ports as well as forcing which NIC to use. Odd.

Interesting....
Try enabling it, clicking the "Reset media library" button, saving the config, and then restarting PMS. If that doesn't work, then also give the system a full restart (seems to generically solve any Windows problem )