After your evaluation, if you would like to purchase the full version of the program and unlock it to your entire music collection, please visit www.thepcjukebox.com and click on the Purchase button. After payment is received, you will receive a registration code that, once entered, will unlock your entire music collection.
Please use the following instructions as a guide map to setting up the program. If you follow these instrcutions step by step, you will be up and running in just a matter of minutes (providing you ID3 tags are setup properly on all of your MP3 files!!). You may want to print this file so it is easier to refer to during the setup process.
Please keep in mind that The PC Jukebox is designed to run full screen on a monitor set at 1024x768 resolution. The program will run properly if your monitor is set to a higher resolution, i.e. 1600x1200, however it will not take up the entire screen. Running The PC Jukebox at a resolution lower that 1024x768, i.e. 800x600 is NOT recommended.
Step 1 - Run the Setup.
IF YOU ARE UPGRADING FROM VERSION 1.0, IT IS SUGGESTED THAT YOU UNINSTALL THAT VERSION FIRST BEFORE INSTALLING VERSION 2.0. WHILE THIS IS NOT ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY, IN WILL ENSURE THAT YOUR MUSIC LIBRARY WILL BE UPDATED PROPERLY AND THE CHANCE FOR ERRORS OCCURRING WILL BE MINIMIZED.
Double click the ThePCJukeboxSetup.exe file that unzipped with the download. Accept all of the default settings in the setup, unless you have a specific reason to change a setting. The default folder where the application is installed is C:\Program Files\The PC Jukebox. After installation is complete, you should have 7 files in this folder. Those files should be the following:
The PC Jukebox Installation - READ FIRST!!.txt - This file.
The PC Jukebox.exe - This is the main application executable.
ThePCJukebox.mdb - This is the Music Library database file.
ImageNotFound.jpg - This is the image that is displayed when The PC Jukebox is unable to locate the proper album cover.
Wood.jpg - This is a background image used to frame the album covers.
The PC Jukebox Advanced Features.txt - A text file that describes some of the more advanced features of the application.
What's New.txt - A text file that outlines the new enhancements with this version.
You should also have 2 subfoldera created; One named Images and one named Logos. The Images folder is where you will place all of your album cover files so The PC Jukebox can find and display them when the application is running. This is just the default location; you can change it to whatever you want once the program starts. Another copy of the ImageNotFound.jpg file is placed here by default.
The Logos folder will contain the static and animated logos that appear at the top of the main window. Each static logo file should have an animated counterpart to avoid errors (i.e. Logo1.gif and Logo1Ani.gif). You can create your own custom gif logo files and display them as you would any of the supplied logos. To make sure your custom logos are dispalyed correctly, make sure they measure 900 pixels wide by 120 pixels tall.
Step 2 - Tag Your Songs.
Make sure all of your MP3 ID3 tags are setup properly. If the tags are not perfect, you will get unexpected results when running The PC Jukebox. Perfect, in this sense, means that if you expect certain songs to show up under a certain artist, the artist tag for each of these songs must be IDENTICAL, including case. Similiarly, if you expect certain songs to show up under the same album, the album tags for these songs must be IDENTICAL, including case. Failure to have these tags perfect and matching will result in multiple listings of artists and songs, each with an individual spelling. All MP3s MUST contain a Title, Artist, and Album tag, at a minimum, to show up in The PC Jukebox. FAILURE TO INCLUDE EVEN ONE OF THESE TAGS WILL RESULT IN THAT SONG NOT GETTING ADDED TO YOUR MUSIC LIBRARY.
New in Version 2 is support for the Track Number tag. If your songs have this tag included, you will be able to play entire albums in track number order. Any song that does have a Track Number tag will be displayed with a track number of '0'. These songs will still get added to your Music Library, unlike any songs that are missing Artist or Title or Album information.
Step 3 - Get Your Cover Art.
If your ID3 tags are all version 2 and you have your cover art contained in your files, you can skip this step. Otherwise, in order for the album cover art to appear in The PC Jukebox, this step must be followed exactly. To make sure the cover art appears for a given song, there must be a graphic file located in the Images directory with the exact name of the album from the ID3 tag, with a .jpg extension. In other words, if the album tag of a song reads 'Abbey Road', there must be a file in the Images directory with the name 'Abbey Road.jpg'. If this does not match exactly, the image will not appear. The PC Jukebox will first check to see if the MP3 file contains a Version 2 tag. If so, it will check to see if there are any images contained within the file. If so, it will display the first image. If not, it will look in the Images directory to find the corresponding .jpg file. If the MP3 file only has a Version 1 tag, The PC Jukebox will immediately look in the Images directory for the corresponding .jpg file. If The PC Jukebox is unable to locate a corresponding .jpg file, the default ImageNotFound.jpg will be displayed instead. This file can be found in the root folder where The PC Jukebox.exe is located as well as in the Images folder.
Step 4 - Lanch The PC Jukebox.
We are now ready to launch The PC Jukebox! Click on Start-Programs-The PC Jukebox-The PC Jukebox. You will be presented with the initial setup screen. You can click on the Help button for more detail if necessary. Before you can play any music through The PC Jukebox, you will need to build your Music Library. Fortunately this is very easy to do.
Step 5 - Enter Your Music Path.
The PC Jukebox will need to know where it can find your MP3 files. You will indicate this in the Music Path text box. The PC Jukebox will search for MP3 files in the folder that is indicated in the Music Path text box, as well as any subfolders of that path. To search your entire drive, simply enter the drive letter followed by :\ in the Music Path text box, i.e. C:\. To narrow and speed your search, you may indicate a starting folder, i.e. C:\Music. Currently, The PC Jukebox will only search on one drive letter.
Step 6 - Enter Your Images Path.
Enter the path to the folder where your album cover art is in the Images Path test box. If all of your MP3 files contain Version 2 tags and your images are embedded in the files, this step is unnecessary. Otherwise, The PC Jukebox will need to know where to find the images. Refer back to Step 3 for more details.
Step 7 - Enter Your Library Path.
The Library path must point to a valid .mdb file that will contain all of your MP3s tag information. By default, this file is located in the root directory of the application (C:\Program Files\The PC Jukebox\ThePCJukebox.mdb). There should be no reason to change, but you can if you like, as long as you entered the updated path in the Library Path text box.
Step 8 - Build Your Music Library.
The Music Library MUST be built at least once before clicking the Start button and launching the program. Once all of the path information is entered in steps 5 & 7, you can build your Music Library. Click on the 'Build Music Library' button. The PC Jukebox will begin searching for MP3 files, starting in the folder indicated in the Music Path text box. It will extract all of the relevant tag information from each file it finds and record it in the Music Library database indicated in the Library Path text box. Building the Music Library may take several minutes, based on how many files it finds and the speed of your PC. Once the search is complete, the indicator will display how many songs The PC Jukebox found and then the word 'Complete'. The PC Jukebox is now ready for use!!
Any song that does not have, at minumum, an Artist, Title, and Album in it's ID3 tag will be skipped and NOT added to the Music Library. A list of these files can be found in the 3rd dropdown box for easy reference. Once the tags have been updated on these songs, the Music Library can be rebuilt and these songs will now be added.
If a song was originally added to the library and the tag information has been changed or updated (i.e. the track number was added), clicking the 'Update Music Library' button will allow The PC Jukebox to extract and save this new information. A list of updated files that were changed in the Music Library can be found in the second dropdown list.
Step 9 - Start The PC Jukebox.
Click on the Start button. The PC Jukebox will initialize by reading all of the data out of the Music Library. This should only take a matter of seconds, based on how big your library is and the speed of your machine. Once initialized, The PC Jukebox main screen is displayed and you may begin picking songs to play.
Step 10 - Play A Song
All of the available artists will be displayed on pushbuttons to the right of the screen. Click on a button. All of the songs that are available for that artist are listed in alphabetical order, again on pushbuttons on the right of the screen. All of the available albums will be displayed on the left hand side of the screen, indicated by their album cover. Clicking on any one of the album covers will filter the pushbuttons on the right side to display only songs that appear on that album. Clicking on any one of the song pushbuttons will allow you to add that song to queue. A confirmation dialog box will be displayed to make sure you want to add the song. If you clicked the button in error and do not wish to add the song, simply click 'No'. If you do want to add the song to the queue, click 'Yes'. If this is the first song to be added, the song will begin to play immediately. Otherwise it will be added to the bottom of the queue. Add as many songs as you would like for the artist. When finished, click the 'Back' button to return to the main screen. You will now see the album cover, artist name, song name, and album name displayed for the song currently playing.
That's it!! You have now successfully set up and started The PC Jukebox.
Although operation of The PC Jukebox from this point is pretty straightforward, there are a few Tips and Tricks that you can employ that might make your enjoyment of the program a little better. Please refer to the The PC Jukebox Advanced Features.txt file that is included to find out more. The The PC Jukebox Advanced Features.txt file can be found in the same folder as this Readme text file.
Again, if you would like to purchase the full version of the program and unlock it to your entire music collection, please visit www.thepcjukebox.com and click on the Purchase button. You will receive a registration code that, once entered, will unlock your entire music collection.
