Vortexbox/Squeezebox Setup for Dummies

[Falcon Eddie]

Good. You have the VBA GUI. As long as you know that the ip number is not changing you can edit that "network screen" by ticking static option and you should not have any problems down the road with changing ip numbers. You really need the rest of those entries; especially, the next 2 below ip address. Your 192.168.1.8 number goes in the top box after you tick static. You can leave this alone for now as it appears you are having no problems getting to your VBA GUI. Who set up your Verizon router and network?

That network configuration screen can be left alone for now but needs to be fixed sooner rather than later. A call to Verizon or your ISP provider is a key into opening your router admin/web pages and access to those numbers on the network configuration screen. I do not know if that router page is password protected and that may be another question for Verizon.

You may be able to pick up the next couple of entries for that network configuration by going into the "control Panel" again and going to the "Network and Sharing" selection. Then hunt around for them numbers. Mine shows up under a view status selection under the private network. If you go in and out some of those selections, screens, and access buttons, you may run across the "Gateway" address and "Subnet mask" numbers that Windows 7 is picking up. Once you have that "gateway" number you can enter that number just like you did with your "ip" number in the WIN address bar and you'll get your router access pages.

Have to try and find in Windows where you hide network connections and devices to see if this is why you can't find your "stuff" in the "usual" places.

Your best bet to edit your "unknown" cd rips is to download "MP3Tag" here http://www.mp3tag.de/en/ Make sure you download the right one to your laptop for your operating system which sounds like Windows 7. There is a learning curve to use MP3Tag, but it is not bad and just takes some getting used to.

dBpoweramp may be an option for you too sometime.

Yes you can download songs and copy them over to vortexbox. This all takes some time to get used to so you have to be patient and willing to do the legwork and learning the ropes. I'm not sure whether you mean ripping cds to your laptop or actually downloading songs from a website on the internet?

You'll need to point your squeezebox LMS to the vortexbox. This is the 2nd icon on the VBA GUI. When you get the LMS screen there is a selection in the lower right corner of the screen called "settings." You can point to any number of spots for squeezebox to look for your music files. Enter in where it says "media folders" under the "basic settings" tab /storage/music/flac and make sure music is ticked.

[sb24]

OK, setback overnight. My laptop shut off for a maintenance and closed all windows I had open, including the VB GUI. Now I can't access that screen again for some reason so I am back to square one. I tried both ways I found that screen earlier and get nothing. Also trying to find VB anywhere as suggested thru my laptop (Control Panel, Search, Network) shows nothing either. Since the VB and Squeezebox seemed to communicate earlier, can I do this temporarily as a solution to see the VB GUI again. (Meanwhile, I had ripped 2 more CDs to VB yesterday to see if THEY showed up anywhere, but didn't). If I just disconnect the VB from the router and hardwire it to my laptop in order to see what I've ripped, will that allow VB to access the internet, get file info and let me edit out what I don't want? Then I can hook back up to router so it can allow Squeezebox to access files. I can't think of another way to avoid all these problems that keep popping up.

[Falcon Eddie]

I do not know what might happen if you plugged vortexbox into your laptop; especially, if your laptop is not hard wired to your router because I had not a need to try something like that. It is probably not recommended either as the vortexbox should be hardwired to your router. You'd also, be mixing a Windows system with Linux and you may be able to see hard drive contents of the vortexbox, but other things are questionable if they would work properly.

Your system is okay and the network needs to be stabilized. The network requires tending to and this involves getting access to your router to setup a "dhcp reservation." This needs to get done or this will continue on every power interuption or restart. You also need to get those icons to display in the "network" area of your laptop because that will remove the need for using crytoterm to find what the new vortexbox number changed to. That is why I asked if your "ip address" was changing at all when power or restarting occurs. I think what has happened is that your vortexbox ip number is not 192.168.1.8 anymore. It appears your router is setup to assign new ip numbers to your devices when it resets and it apparently issued you a new vortexbox number. This causes minor problems like this especially when you can't find the vortexbox icons in "network." If you can access the command line with "Putty" Shellin the box, or cryptoterm type in "without" the quotes:

"ifconfig eth0"
(login should be "root" and password should be "vortexbox")

Does not the http://192.168.1.8 work in the browser address bar anymore? Also try http://vortexbox/dlna.php and see if the vortexbox GUI comes up that way too? If not, use "crypto" to see if you can find if a new vortexbox ip as been issued by your router. Try and cut and paste the info, if you can log in.

Were you able to see the 2 Vortexbox icons in the network in Windows area before this happened? How did you find the 192.168.1.8 number in the first place?

Try hunting around in the network area of windows and look for something called "network discovery" and see if it is turned off or on. If it is turned off, tick the selection on and the icons in the network area may become visible and make it easier to access the vortexbox.

Also, try looking for a manufacturing tag on the bottom or wherever it is located on your Verizon router. See if there is any interesting information such as "login and password" information. Sometimes router manufacturers will place this information somewhere on the outside of the device. Note any other numbers that are on the manufacturing tag also.

Has your system been powered off and restarted since that maintenance thing? I mean "no power" at all to the system.

[sb24]

OK, didn't connect them directly so I tried CryptoTerm (doesn't work for the IP address entered?), and no matter where I plug in the 192...link or the Vortexbox// link (multiple web browsers or the Start/Search window) I get either "No Results" or the web message "Internet Explorer - Windows can't find Vortexbox. If the computer or device is nearby, make sure it is turned on (YES) and connected to the network, otherwise contact your network administrator for assistance." I was told elsewhere to try to locate thru SoftPerfect network scanner, which was supposed to clearly locate and ID the VB, but only listed my computer, router and 10 peripherals with only IP addresses, none of which seem to be the VB. One is for a Blackberry(!!) which nobody here has ever even had. I know I have a VB, I can see it right in front of me, I can see my computer and Squeezebox, so why can't any of them seem to work together? I've been trying everything step by step, several of you have offered the same advice so it must be the way to go, but nothing seems to work right. Now I can't even get the VB GUI screen I had up yesterday before the computer shut down for maintenance. At least if I had that, I might be able to follow the rest of your advice.

[Falcon Eddie]

You are not supposed to enter an ip address in crypto? Enter the command "ifconfig eth0" after logging into crypto to get the ip address. That command should bring up info on your laptop display. Unless you are saying crypto does not see vortexbox.

As I said, you need to do legwork so your network comes up so it can be edited. Look in the "network and sharing" area of Windows 7 for "network discovery" and check it is turned on.

If this does not work, then you need to contact your router manufacturer for those numbers previously discussed and password to access the router. Have you even looked for the router "gateway" number I asked you to look for in network and sharing center by going in and out of the menu items and buttons looking for the words gateway?

[sb24]

I did put the "ifconfig" into the crypto, nothing happened. Checked Network discovery and it's on. I looked for the router number, have all that info from when Verizon put the router in, but nothing seems to find the VB. All those numbers came up on the SoftPerfect screen, but as I said, every time I enter any of those numbers anywhere, I get nowhere. I'll try the Crypto again. .........Just tried it again, pasted in the "ifconfig" and got error message. In "Network" there is item listed as "Network Infrastructure" 'Internet Gateway Device" which I assume is the router? It has an IP address of 127.0.0.1 that I entered in all the usual places and got nothing again. Still not sure what changed between yesterday, when I was able to get the VB GUI, and today when I can't find anything.

[Falcon Eddie]

Did you type http://127.0.0.1 into the Windows browser address bar at the top of the screen and not just 127.0.0.1? That is probably your router number. AGAIN, look on the bottom or somewhere else of your router for a manufacturer's tag. Sometimes useful information is listed on those manufacturing tags including numbers and login and password information.

If network discovery is on try power cycling ALL your devices. Make sure each one comes up in order before power up the next: router first, laptop, and then vortexbox last. See http://info.vortexbox.org/tiki-index...age=PowerCycle Make sure the vortexbox is powered off on the front panel before power cycling your devices.

After you power cycle everything try that command above in cryptoterm. Also, try downloading Putty or Shell in a box and using that same command in those programs. By the way, the command is "ifconfig eth0". You said above you typed in just "ifconfig" and that is not the correct syntax.

Your vortexbox ip address has probably changed and is why you can't get the VBA GUI. Again, you need to access your router admin/webpages. I figured it was Verizon who set up your router. They took liberties with your system they had no right to do whether they felt you had the expertise or not to use the features. Some do this for repeat service calls as they know most users do not have the technical expertise to figure out what is going on and if you do know what is going on and tell them they will more than likely tell you they did not do it or they did it for your own good. They have made this process difficult and they should have at least shown you how to access your router admin/web pages and given you login and password info. There is no reason why your devices should not be showing up on your network. You'll need to contact Verizon if this continues and ask them what they did and why you can't find your devices on your network when Network Discovery is turned on in Windows. Tell them you need to set up "dhcp reservations" for ALL your devices inside your router else these same problems are going to continue to happen. When you only have a laptop(s) coming up on your network, usually things like DHCP reservations are not necessary. It is when you have multiple devices all vying at the same time for numbers in your router and jockeying for restart positions that the randomness of it and the time it takes each device to reboot/restart all causes conflicts between devices.

I do not know why you have that maintenance thing going on automatically when all that is doing are things that can be done manually anyway. If this is left on, your system is going to go into this state again when this gets sorted out; especially, if your devices are not assigned "dhcp reservations" inside your router. Even then, vortexbox is most vulnerable if it is not given the proper time to come up on your network after a reboot or restart. The vortexbox should be one of the final devices to come up after your router and laptop are done restarting or rebooting

[garym]

This is not your router (http://127.0.0.1). Given the addresses you have reported, your router is "192.168.1.1". I believe this 127.0.0.1 address is equivalent to "local host" (that is, if you are trying to reach the LMS webpage from the computer that is running LMS, you could enter http://127.0.0.1:9000). But this is NOT what you are trying to do.

[garym]

And I see that Falcon Eddie is giving you essentially the same advice I'm giving you at the other forum. I think everything is working, you just can't seem to COMMUNICATE with the devices. This is network related. The key thing you need to do FIRST is either get a reserved DHCP address for your VBA (or, even better, just make the VBA a static ip....once you can get to the VBA webGUI, click on the network config icon (looks like a computer "card") to the left and click on the static IP box instead of DHCP and enter:

ip address: 192.168.1.8
subnet mask: 255.255.255.0
gateway: 192.168.1.1
dns1: 192.168.1.1

at the top of this page, your system name should be VORTEXBOX and the SMB workgroup name should be WORKGROUP. Also, you do want to make sure that the IP address (xxx.8) is OUTSIDE the range of dhcp addresses your router hands out. Once you are able to login to your router you can see what range of addresses it uses for dhcp...typically 192.168.1.100 to 192.168.1.254 or something similar (should be able to login from a browser as
http://192.168.1.1
and then it should want your username and password (sometimes username is blank and you only enter password)

[Jons]

Since you earlier could reach the GUI with http://192.168.1.8 your dhcp range is probably not starting from 192.168.1.100-
The only way to find out the dhcp range is to access the GUI of your router, which is likely http://192.168.1.1(some routers default is 192.168.1.254 though)
Heres few steps to take for us to help you set this up.

Step 1: Find out the brand and model of your router, this should be printed on your router. or on the manual/box that you got with it(somemthing like D-Link, Netgear, Linksys etc etc)
Then post this info here. This info is needed if you can´t manage step 3 and 4 by yourself.

Step 2: Find out the IPadress of your router. On your working laptop do this.
Click on the start button to the left.
Click on the searchfield
type cmd
click on cmd.exe
A black window should open where it says something like C:/user/*youruser*> with a blinking cursor.
Type ipconfig
Look for Default Gateway and subnetmask and post the info here.

Step3 Access your router GUI from your browser http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx where X is the numbers you found in the step above.
You need to have a password for this, if you haven´t changed it you can use the default password located in your router manual.

Step4 In the GUI you can find out the DHCP range and the assigned IPadress to your VB
Or you can just reserve the current IPadress to the VB.

Step5 Now when you have the IP of your VB you can again access the GUI in your browser with http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx where X is the IP in the step above.
If you reserved the current IP you don´t need to do anything, if you found the DHCP pool you can click the static IP box and set the IP to anything outside the DHCP pool. remember to also type in default gateway and subnet mask which you found out in step 2.

Now atleast your VB should be set up and running.

If you can´t manage the steps above by yourself its important that you post the info I asked for in each step.