The MediaInfo Provider Plugin offers detailed information about your media, such as which codecs are used , aspect ratios, and HD Type
- Plugin Installation instructions can be found here.
Configuration
Hitting the “Configure” button on the MB Configurator for this plugin will produce the following dialog:
Process Rips – Checking this will cause the plug-in to analyze file rips of DVDs and BDs (video_ts and bdmv folders) as well as simple video files. This processing is very expensive (can take several seconds per rip) so it is only done during service refreshes. Additionally, it is considered a “Slow” provider so that option must be checked in the service.
Timeout – This is a value in milliseconds that, if the processing of a file takes longer than, will cause the plug-in to abort and be disabled for the duration of that session. We have had problems in the past with the mediainfo.dll hanging up on some files so this will keep that from bogging down the rest of the processing. Whenever this happens, the file that caused the timeout will be added to a “Bad File List” which will cause it to be skipped on subsequent refreshes.
Clear Bad File List – Checking this will cause the plug-in to delete the bad file list created by previous timeouts – allowing those files to be processed again. Only do this if you know an update to the mediainfo.dll or a change in the file(s) will make it work (or if you increased the timeout value and wish to try again).
How it works
MediaInfo Provider will automatically scan your media files and display detailed information about them. Please keep in mind that if and how the information is displayed depends on the theme and view you are using. You should be able to see the information on the movie details screen most of the time.
Customized MediaInfo Icons
You can download some custom icon sets and discuss any issues on the tracker here
Using custom icon sets
The default theme and most of the other themes that are available contain an inbuilt set of Media Icons or automatically inherit the monochrome set included with Media Browser. If you would like to override these internal media icons and replace them with a custom set you can use the ImagesByName folder
The MediaInfo plugin uses the MediaInfo folder in ImagesByName in a specific way:
- The plugin will first look for the theme folder in IBN\MediaInfo for custom images (Diamond for example)
- if the folder exists it will use the icons found it that directory
- if a specific icon is not found in that directory, the theme will use it’s inbuilt version of that icon
- if the theme folder does not exist, the plugin will look for a folder called “All” and use the icons found in there
This allows for great flexibility:
- Each theme can use a custom icon set
or - You can have a custom icon set that is to be used by all themes
and - You can exclude a specific theme from using the icon set used by all other themes
This might seem complicated, but the examples below will explain things better.
Example 1:
You want to use “Custom Icon Set 1” for Diamond instead of the default icons for that theme…
- Create a folder “
C:\ProgramData\MediaBrowser\ImagesByName\MediaInfo\Diamond” - Place the “Custom Icon Set 1” images directly inside the “Diamond” folder
You don’t need to put the icons in individual subfolders just put the whole set, colour or monochrome, in the Diamond folder
The end result would look like this:
C:\ProgramData\MediaBrowser\ImagesByName\MediaInfo\Diamond
\aspect_133.png,...codec_aac.png,...hdtype_720.png,...media_3gp.png,..
Example 2:
You want to use “Custom Icon Set 2” for all themes instead of the default icons that come with those themes…
- Create a folder “
C:\ProgramData\MediaBrowser\ImagesByName\MediaInfo\All” - Place the “Custom Icon Set 2” images directly inside the “All” folder
The end result would look like this:
C:\ProgramData\MediaBrowser\ImagesByName\MediaInfo\All
\aspect_133.png,...codec_aac.png,...hdtype_720.png,...media_3gp.png,..
Example 3:
You want Diamond to to show its inbuilt icons and all the other Themes to use “Custom Icon Set 3”
- Create a folder “
C:\ProgramData\MediaBrowser\ImagesByName\MediaInfo\All” - Place the “Custom Icon Set 3” images directly inside the “All” folder
- Create an empty folder “
C:\ProgramData\MediaBrowser\ImagesByName\MediaInfo\Diamond”
The end result would look like this:
C:\ProgramData\MediaBrowser\ImagesByName\MediaInfo\All
\aspect_133.png,...codec_aac.png,...hdtype_720.png,...media_3gp.png,..
C:\ProgramData\MediaBrowser\ImagesByName\MediaInfo\Diamond
In this case:
- The Default theme will look for a “Default” folder, but it will not find it, because it doesn’t exist.
- The Default theme will then look in the “All” directory and it will find and use the images from that folder
- The Diamond theme will look for a “Diamond” folder, but because the folder is empty it will use it’s inbuilt icons
In the examples above we are assuming that you have the ImagesByName folder in the default location. If that is not the case on your system, create the subfolders in the appropriate location instead.
MediaInfo and local metadata
As of Media Browser 2.2.8 (codename Orion) it is possible to add your own MediaInfo data by adding values to a mymovies.xml metadata file. This is particularly useful in cases when the MediaInfo Provider Plugin cannot retrieve some or all the information from a certain file type.
Storing the info in local metadata is especially useful for ISO images as without local metadata only the media type icon is shown, this is because the MediaInfo Provider plugin can not (yet) read the info from within an ISO.
MediaInfo tags in xml
Below is an example of a mymovies.xml for a Blu-ray in ISO format with only the necessary values added for Aspect Ratio, Audio Codec, Video Codec, HD Type and Media Type:
<Title>
<LocalTitle>A Blu-ray in ISO format</LocalTitle>
snip
<Type>Blu-ray</Type>
<AspectRatio>1.78:1</AspectRatio>
<RunningTime />
snip
<MediaInfo>
<Audio>
<Codec>DTS</Codec>
<Channels>6</Channels>
<BitRate />
<Language />
</Audio>
<Video>
<Codec>AVC</Codec>
<BitRate />
<Height>1440</Height>
<Width>1080</Width>
<FrameRate />
<Duration />
<ScanType>Progressive</ScanType>
</Video>
<Subtitle />
</MediaInfo>
And here is how it will look using a coloured MediaInfo icon set:
If you wish to add additional values the correct format is:
Video bitrate: insert value in bps example <BitRate>764177</BitRate>
Audio bitrate: insert value in bps example <BitRate>127994</BitRate>
Framerate: insert value in fps example <FrameRate>25.000 </FrameRate>
Duration: insert value in minutes example <Duration>89</Duration>
Note: bitrates can also be entered in Kbps up to a value of 9999 Kbps.
Examples:
<BitRate>764177</BitRate> will be shown as 764 Kbps
<BitRate>10000</BitRate> will be shown as 10 Kbps
<BitRate>9999</BitRate> will be shown as 9999 Kbps
<BitRate>764</BitRate> will be shown as 764 Kbps
Adding MediaInfo values to the xml file
Below is a list of the accepted values that can be added to the MediaInfo tags in your xml file.
You can use an application like MetaBrowser v2 to add these values but sometimes you may wish to add them yourself.
Here is an example using the audio codec Dolby TrueHD and filling in the Audio Codec tag in your xml file manually.
<MediaInfo>
<Audio>
<Codec>Dolby TrueHD</Codec>
<Channels />
<BitRate />
<Language />
</Audio>
By filling in the value you tell media browser not to use the MediaInfo plugin to determine the audio codec of this video but instead to use the value you have just added to the xml file.
Now media browser will show the icon for Dolby TrueHD even if you were to remove the MediaInfoProvider plugin completely.
Now you can also add the channel information.
If your video has 5.1 surround sound that is a total of 6 channels so you add the number 6 to the Audio Channels tag
<MediaInfo>
<Audio>
<Codec>Dolby TrueHD</Codec>
<Channels>6</Channels>
<BitRate />
<Language />
</Audio>
Before you added the value and the channels tag was empty (or not even there) mediabrowser was using the MediaInfo plugin to find the channel information now it is using the value from the xml file instead.
In the list below are the accepted values to use when filling in the xml tags.
If you find that an icon is not showing you can check this list to make sure that the values have been entered correctly.
After changing a value you may need to navigate to that video in mediabrowser so that you can see the MediaInfo icons and use the red button on your remote or CTRL+R on your keyboard to tell mediabrowser to refresh that view.
After a short pause as the icons are reloaded the MediaInfo icons will appear.
Naming conventions for MediaInfo values by xml file
In the sections for Audio, Video and Media Type you will see 2 columns, The column on the right is the one which contains the exact values that should be used.
-
ASPECT RATIO:
Example <AspectRatio>1.78:1</AspectRatio>If you enter any of the values below the correct icon will be shown
1.33:1 or 4:3 1.37:1 1.43:1 1.44:1 1.50:1 or 3:2 1.56:1 1.66:1 1.77:1 or 16:9 1.78:1 or 16:9 1.81:1 1.85:1 2.00:1 or 2:1 2.20:1 2.35:1 2.39:1 2.40:1 2.55:1 2.59:1 2.66:1 2.76:1 4.00:1 or 4:1 -
HD TYPE:
This is determined by the values entered for width and height
Example of HD Type 720
<Height>720</Height> <Width>1280</Width>Example of HD Type 1080
<Height>1080</Height> <Width>1900</Width> CODEC:
Audio:
Example <Audio>
<Codec>DTS</Codec>
<Channels>6</Channels>
<BitRate />
<Language />
</Audio>
There are audio icons for the following audio codecs
AAC AAC
FLAC FLAC
OGG VORBIS VORBIS
PCM PCM
WMA WMA
Dolby Digital
Dolby Digital Dolby Digital (or AC-3)
Dolby Digital Plus Dolby Digital Plus (or E-AC-3)
Dolby TrueHD Dolby TrueHD (or AC-3 TrueHD)
DTS
DTS DTS
DTS 96/24 DTS 96/24
DTS-ES DTS-ES
DTS-HD High Resolution Audio DTS-HD HRA
DTS-HD Master Audio DTS-HD MA
MPEG Audio
MPEG Audio MPEG Audio
" MPEG Audio Layer 1
" MPEG Audio Layer 2
MPEG Audio Layer 3 (aka MP3) MPEG Audio Layer 3 (or MP3)
Video:
Example <Video>
<Codec>AVC</Codec>
<BitRate />
<Height>1440</Height>
<Width>1080</Width>
<FrameRate />
<Duration />
<ScanType>Progressive</ScanType>
</Video>
There are video icons for the following video codecs
ASF ASF
DIVX DIVX
MPEG Video MPEG Video
MPEG-1 Video MPEG-1 Video
MPEG-2 Video (aka H.262) MPEG-2 Video (or H.262)
MPEG-4 Visual MPEG-4 Visual
MPEG-4 AVC (aka H.264) AVC (or H.264)
OGG THEORA THEORA
ON2 VP6 ON2 VP6
SORENSON H.263 SORENSON H.263
VC-1 VC-1
WMV WMV
WMV HD WMV HD
XVID XVID
-
MEDIA TYPE:
Example <Type>Blu-ray</Type>
Here only the media types DVD, HD DVD, Blu-ray. HD and 3D are used when adding the media type by xml. This is so that you can change the media type for an ISO image to show the media it contains or to indicate the original source material from which the video has been created or in the case of HD and 3D you may prefer your Media to show these Media Type icons. All the other media types are recognised by Media Browser from the file extensions or folder names even without the mediainfo plugin installed.
3D 3D
3GP
ASF
AVI
BluRay Blu-ray
DVD DVD
DVR-MS
F4V
FLV
HD HD
HDDVD HD DVD
ISO
M2TS
MKV
MOV
M4V
MP4
MPEG
MPG
OGV
TS
WMV
WTV
A good tool for storing the MediaInfo tags in xml is MetaBrowser v2. It can retrieve the same MediaInfo as Media Browser, and will save the info in the local metadata file. It can also be used to edit that information if you wish to.
Want to create a MediaInfo Icon Set?
The correct naming convention for a full set of MediaInfo Icons is:
ASPECT RATIO:
aspect_125.png =5:4
aspect_133.png =4:3
aspect_137.png
aspect_143.png
aspect_144.png
aspect_150.png =3:2
aspect_156.png
aspect_166.png
aspect_177.png =16:9
aspect_178.png =16:9
aspect_181.png
aspect_185.png
aspect_200.png =2:1
aspect_220.png
aspect_235.png
aspect_239.png
aspect_240.png
aspect_255.png
aspect_259.png
aspect_266.png
aspect_276.png
aspect_400.png =4:1
HD TYPE:
hdtype_720.png
hdtype_720i.png
hdtype_720p.png
hdtype_1080.png
hdtype_1080i.png
hdtype_1080p.png
CODEC:
Audio
codec_aac.png
codec_flac.png
codec_mp3.png
codec_mpegaudio.png
codec_pcm.png
codec_vorbis.png
codec_wma.png
Dolby Digital
codec_ac3.png
codec_ddplus.png
codec_ddtruehd.png
DTS
codec_dts.png
codec_dts_9624.png
codec_dts_ds.png
codec_dts_es.png
codec_dts_hd_hra.png
codec_dts_hd_ma.png
Video
codec_asf.png
codec_divx.png
codec_h262.png
codec_h264.png
codec_mpeg1video.png
codec_mpeg4visual.png
codec_mpegvideo.png
codec_on2_vp6.png
codec_sorenson_h263.png
codec_theora.png
codec_vc1.png
codec_wmv.png
codec_wmv_hd.png
codec_xvid.png
MEDIA TYPE:
media_3gp.png
media_3d.png
media_asf.png
media_avi.png
media_bluray.png
media_dvd.png
media_dvrms.png
media_flv.png
media_hd.png
media_hddvd.png
media_iso.png
media_m2ts.png
media_mkv.png
media_mov.png
media_mp4.png
media_mpeg.png
media_ogg.png
media_ts.png
media_wmv.png
media_wtv.png