Must be logged in to Windows to access published music/photos? (Series3/Desktopv2.3a)

[briankasper]

It appears that in order to play music files from my PC, I must be logged in to my Windows 2000 box as a user with Administrator privileges.

I recently connected my Series3 TiVo to my home Ethernet network via the wired Ethernet port. I then downloaded and installed v2.3a of TiVo Desktop on my Windows 2000 box while logged in using my Administrator account. I configured TiVo Desktop to "start when I log in" and published my music and photo folders.

As far as I can tell, if I'm logged in to my Windows box as a user with Administrative privileges, my music and photo folders show up and I can play them on my Series3. If, however, I'm logged in as a non-administrative user (or not logged in at all), no server is detected at the IP address for my Windows box.

I tried installing TiVo Desktop while logged in as a non-Administrator, and the install failed with a message saying I had insufficient rights to install.

I can understand having to *install* TiVo Desktop as an administrator, but is the software so poorly designed that I have to be *logged in* as an administrator to access my files?

Is it not possible to configure all necessary TiVo software to run at Windows startup with Administrator privileges?

If I have to be logged in to an Administrative-level account to use access my published folders, this feature is useless to me, as I only log on as Administrator when I have to -- all my other accounts have standard user-level permissions -- and normally, I'm not logged in to my Windows computer at all.

The "My DVR Cannot Find My Music or Photos Server (Windows)" page at customersupport.tivo.com says I must verify that "the TiVo icon is showing in the system tray"; this implies I must be logged in to Windows. I've found no other pages on tivo.com or via Google searches that appear to offer any other information.

-B

It looks like Galleon will do what I want; I'll post a follow-up after I test it.

[hotrodtod]

would it be possible to run tivo server as a 'service' without being logged in? just a thought.

[ggersch]

Hi,

The Tivo 'server', only runs in the in user space. It is not designed to be run as a true windows service. (And yes, I think that's dumb too.)

If you're a windows geek, there are ResKit tools (instsrv.exe and srvany.exe) to launch background apps as true services. I haven't tried yet with the TivoServer.exe, but I've had good luck with similar apps. Look at Microsoft KB Q137890.

However, I'm being hit with the high cpu bug, so I haven't pursued it yet. Waiting for either a bug fix, or an alternate solution.

I will be interested in what you find out about Galleon.

Greg

[gconnery]

Yeah, I've noticed the same thing. Tivo server doesn't come up on boot like it should, but when you log in (and are impatiently waiting for the desktop). Means if Microsoft update (or your wife) reboots your computer, the Tivo stuff won't be there, etc.

This is wrong as far as I'm concerned. I was planning to look around to see if there was some way to install this stuff to run at boot time, but ggersch seems to have the answer all ready. I may look into the ResKit approach, not sure if I have the time.

[briankasper]

I've uninstalled TiVo Deskop and installed the latest ("native") version of Galleon. Galleon definitely installs as a Windows service and runs regardless of which (or any) user is logged in.

I've installed the "Music" and "Photos" apps for Galleon and as far as I can tell they are improvements upon the TiVo Desktop versions.

I experienced one glitch using the "Photos" app: I was able to browse all the folders in my exported "Photos" directory on my PC, and the image thumbnails displayed correctly, but whenever I selected "show photo", all I saw was a blank screen. At some later time (after I rebooted my PC, among other things) the problem disappeared, so I don't really know what caused it.

I heartily recommend Galleon. It also makes good use of free Internet-based resources to download album art and song lyrics when possible.

-B

[briankasper]

A followup: I'm still happy with Galleon, and it works the way TiVo Desktop should, but I did experience audio discontinuities that were serious enough that initially listening to music wasn't pleasant. I experienced this problem to a lesser degree with TiVo Desktop, but it was much worse with Galleon.

When I listened to an MP3 from my computer, the audio "stuttered" or "jumped" with alarming frequency, often every 30 seconds or so. It sounded like Galleon wasn't supplying the MP3 datastream fast enough to keep up.

I stopped the Galleon service, logged on to my Windows box as administrator, and configured Windows to give more priority to background processes. I also reconfigured the Indexing Service not to index my music drive. I then restarted the Galleon service and logged off.

This appeared to help some, but it didn't resolve the problem completely. I then reconfigured Galleon not to "load web photos" (or whatever it's called) -- and that seems to have fixed the problem!

I'm still not sure if it was a network- or CPU-resource problem, but I'd suggest turning off all the web-based Galleon features you can if you're experiencing audio dropouts.

I'm still experiencing audio dropouts and pixellation while watching digital cable, but that's a complaint for another thread ....

-B