Users of OrangeCD: Satisfied or not??

Hello:
I'm new to this forum and found it in the course of trying to buy the OrangeCD Catalog program.

But when I read this forum I see large numbers of problems encountered by users; is this a "mature" software program or is it in it's development stages, with the accompanying growing pains?

What CD cataloging software would you recommend? there are lots and I'm not sure now where to put my $30-$60.

And how does the Racks and Tags software download work? does it work well even though it's basic? or what? (I haven't been able to download it to try it, because their registration system for new users is screwed up and won't log me in.) As far as I can see, it's free, right?

Thanks very much.

Rick

I consider myself very satisfied with the program. However, I will still ask for features from time to time. I'm not sure if that's what you mean, perhaps you could cite some specific threads. I can't recall any time the program has crashed on me, which I regard as a deadly bug. I think once I managed to corrupt my database, I don't remember how because it has been a long time. I ultimately had to restore from a backup and lost a bit of work. But I've been using the program since 2004 or so without serious problems.

I have never had any problems with Orange that weren't my own fault. One of the reasons you see so many requests for new features is that Orange is a very expandable program and Andrei has responded positively to so many requests, users feel free to ask for almost anything (as I have). I occasionally check out other music cataloguing programs and have not found anything as rich as Orange. The ability to design my own display format is important to me and I am constantly finding new things I can do with it. I even find it works better with classical music cds than several programs claiming to be designed especially for classical music.

Of course, there are some tweaks to Orange I would like to see, but I have a much longer list with Excel and no one in Redmond, Washington, pays any attention to them.

I am not real happy with the track search, I have a lot of groups that have done the same song and for whatever reason Orangecd sometimes it will not find any of the tracks even if you have an artist open showing the track (This seems to happen if Orangecd has been running for a peroid of time) and sometimes it works perfect, so I have pretty much giving up on using it for track search (which was one of the important features to me) I don't know if there are any better programs out there but I wish that I would looked at other programs before I purchased this one, as far as Racks & Tags it works ok, but sometimes things don't match what you have in OrangeCd data base soI just perfer to back the Orangecd data base and album covers on a flash drive, That way I now that the Imformation and albums covers are the same,

Simply the best software for that kind of thing. Believe me i've tried it all

I also have tried countless other software. I havent found any other music archive software that would be even compareable to this one.

please bump

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bigmutt

And how does the Racks and Tags software download work? does it work well even though it's basic? or what? As far as I can see, it's free, right? (I haven't been able to download it to try it, because their registration system for new users is screwed up and won't log me in. their tech support also has not been very helpful, but .... oh well)

Thanks very much.

Rick

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Very satisfied.

Very satisfied. The product is constantly being developed and the support is excellent.

Paddy

I have used this software for about 4 or maybe even 5 years now and have encountered small insignificant problems exactly one time { fonts on a previous upgrade }.
Simply stated , this software is the best music collection software to have bar none.
Many of the " problems " you will see on the forum are usually regarding future changes to the software as far as what people would like to be able to do with it and creatimg web sites with it. The software itself is quite remarkable and well worth every penny I have paid for it.

I can not sing its praises enough.

Regarding Racks and Tags, yes its free, after adding music to your collection, simply create a racks and tags user name and upload your collection. You then have your own web page for your friends to view.

I bought OrangeCD back in 2001, even after switching to Macs a few years ago, I'm still using OCD (via Parallels on my MacBookPro).

Although OCD is not perfect, and there are many features that could/should be implemented, I haven't found a suitable alternative that meets my needs as well as OCD.

So, satisfied??? I guess so!! ;-P

Now a Mac OSX compatible version of OCD.... that WOULD be cool!

i'm using three programs, because every program has its assets and limitations:

OCD - for fast overwiew and search and the integration with racks and tags
Tag & rename - for fast writing and changing id-tags
helium Music manager - for playing and managing my whole music collection, changing id-tags, and information about artists etc.

heliums strength is the possibility to use mysql or sql databases or access db, so its very flexible and if you use mysql you can take these db to your website if you want. But for a simple search its to slow, so i use ocd for that. imho theres is no faster databased program.

with helium you can also tag, but it takes time for writing changes. Its no problem if you change some files, but for a larger amount its not that comfortable. So i use for that work tag and rename. it is fast and high customizeable.

ps: for searching for covers i use album art downloader :) it searches in discogs, google, amazon and so on.

well, I joined the Racks and Tags site in April but I have yet to log in: doesn't respond to my password or any of the passwords that have been sent to be by the password-reset system.
Can't get a reply to my inquiry about this from tech support, either.

I was wanting to purchase OrangeCD suite but thought I'd first check out the Racks and Tags offering of theirs, but so far I'm not too impressed.

anyone else have problems getting help from tech support to let you log in??

thanks.

Rick

Well,
everyone has explained pros & cons of OCD, but actually no one explained well one of the most important features of OCD: the great support of JavaScript language to customize OCD the way you want.

My OCD main theme and Export theme (the feature to export in html format your collection in your web site, without using Racks & Tags) have JavaScript functions that often do what actually OCD doesn't, or simply what I think is useful for me that OCD has to do (and maybe te majority of users don't consider useful).

This means that OCD is a great software for common users who don't know anything of programming and want to easily organize their collection and customize it with OCD's standard features, but then OCD could reveal itself as an OUTSTANDING SOFTWARE if you like to "program" it the way you want....

...I don't know if there are other music catalog sw that could allow you to do this, but I'm very happy I found OCD!!!!

The majority of the requests on the forum aim often to increase the built-in features or to add something new in this software... ...if bugs are found (no sw is perfect...) I always noticed Andrei gave support as he usually does for features request...

Actually I have few things left to ask Andrei that I personally would like to have in OCD, but they're "extras".. ;-)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by harleygirl

Simply stated , this software is the best music collection software to have bar none.

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I think harleygirl says it all.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by The_Mole

I think harleygirl says it all.

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And Jazz North! Above all, OCD is practical, effective and FUN! And it's great to be able to actually have an input into its development - thanks for all your efforts, Andrei - they are much appreciated.

I've been using OCD for close to 7 years. I can tell you that I've not yet found a Cataloging software where users are really the driving force behind its development, as it is in this case. I have a very small DB of +1000 CD's of mostly rare Cuban & Afro-Cuban music, and never had a a problem that I was not able to resolve.
Moreover, the forum support is excellent,and effective. So Satisfied? You bet I'm!!!! This software has mature over the years, mostly because of the input of thousands of people who believed in it. OCD is not a perfect software indeed, and I agree that you should not wait that long for Andrei to resolve this log in issues. But let's give Andrei a big thank you for his efforts to be open minded and receptive to all these enhancement requests. It is much appreciated. Hope you will have your issues resolved as soon as possible.

Cheers!!!

I searched for years to find the best CD Cataloging program. And this is it. I'm pretty picky about every aspect of my collection - which is why I think the abbreviation "OCD" is so appropriate.

I love this program. It rocks!

Hi all

after long time work with Orange CD i like to give all a short report over my experience.

The Software on self is a great intervention on Customer based expectation. Its design for Beginners and Experts.
The handling is easy and together with other tools such as Auomatic tag re-searcher or Cover Down loader the best tool on the Market.

With few clicks you get your own catalog of you Collection and can provide to your Friends and/or Publish in the Web.

The Basic Expedience is enough to handling the HTML export. for experts and Html Programmers is it easy to learn and understand the Scripting for the Export.

But nothing is Perfect as anybody know.

positives:
- easy User interface
- simple handling of Import
- simple modify of Details
- useful Query Search
- creation of Box-sets
- Artist and track Details free configurable
- Notes / Biography /Artist-photo can be add
- Html and other export Format's can be use

some Problems found:
- if Tag's is saved as UTF-8 Code (Unicode) lost Lyrics
( is Fix by Andrej in the next Update )
- Track Year is not Import correct
( only if all tracks has same Date )
- some time in large Database is the Cover not import in the correct Size
(easy to maintain)
- Database becomes unstable if a large selection of Entry's is to modify
( sample: 100 Enrty's modify the Category)
- missing " search and replace" command
- no import of XLS (Excel) sheet's

wishes:
- better help file for the temp-let creator
- with samples for the script's
- more explainable "how to do"
- in Scanning of Mp3 better tag recognizing (more Fields import)

Jhonnie / Malaysia
[url]http://myi-ath.cx[/url]

well im using the trial, i have to say that im liking its functions.
a few more themes for export would be nice but thats no real big issue.

what i dont like is the lack of support. i ask a ?? and no 1 even makes a reply, more so the creator. im guessing your not that interested in getting new members to purchase your software.

Exprot and modify themes is real a questions for users without any experience. its more easy to get it done with more temples .
but still you can do on you alone with small experimental status on your self.

I use the CMI sample as my base and have modify with play around what is possible.

[url]http://myi.ath.cx[/url]

but still you can do more

I have used this software for several years and I'm very pleased with it. It has to be the best software program I have ever purchased. It never gets old and is constantly being improved. I highly recommend it.

-Tony (long time OCD user)

No! It's stopped working and no support!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Sjlamb

No! It's stopped working and no support!

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Hi Sjlamb,

I'm sorry for your experience. Please check my response in the original thread: [url]http://www.firetongue.com/boards/showthread.php?t=7561[/url]

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Tony

I have used this software for several years and I'm very pleased with it. It has to be the best software program I have ever purchased. It never gets old and is constantly being improved. I highly recommend it.

-Tony (long time OCD user)

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I agree this is a great tool for cataloging your CD's. I too have used it for years and haven't seen anything I liked better.

Ron

I’m currently using Music Collector and I’m not so happy with it (for quite a while). I’m not going into the details about it because that’s not the intend of this thread. I have been looking at alternatives and have tested Orange CD over a year ago. Of all the apps I have tried I liked Orange CD the most for its simplicity. Finally an application that does what it’s supposed to do whiteout a ton of unnecessary features and fields. It’s slim and fast.
So why haven’t I still bought it?
Well two main reasons actually:
1. I want an iPhone / iPod Touch application. I know there’s probably a work around for it today but none that I like. The iPhone application of Collectors is quite ok. The iPhone app is currently the only reason why I still use Music Collector.
2. I fear that Orange CD is a bit a “one man show”. It is not perse a bad thing but I have seen some posts that don’t get answered or things that get promised but not delivered (such as the iPhone app).

Orangecd is an absolutely awesome program, and the more I learn the better it gets. Unfortunately the biggest problem is the lack of support... I think you are right about the "one man show". The time and effort Andre puts in to this is probably an amazing amount... but when there is an issue it takes too long to resolve sometimes. I wonder if it would be worth paying more for more support?

For many years I experimented with other similar software and nothing provided the features that OrangeCD has. With that level of satisfaction it was a no brainier choice to purchase OrangeCD. It just keeps getting better and better :)

I have used OCD for many years and for what it does there is no equal.
My one and only current disappointment is I can not export all fields for an import into another database program running under Linux. Understandable though since this might potentially reduce it's uniqueness.

I'm very satisfied expecially for Discogs integration and Racksandtags.
It need only small change in BoxSet creation and in Discogs integration
thanks.

I've been using it for several years and never had any issues. The developer is very accessible and always replied fairly quickly every question I ever asked him about the program.

Partly satisfied for now. However it's been six months since the last update and there are still things that doesn't work as intended + some bugs. If nothing is done in the near future I will move on to a different application!

I have been using Orange CD Catalog since its infancy. I have made suggestions to Andrei and he has always responded. I have not found any other software out there that really does all that Orange does. I also love the ability to easily upload all of my information to Racks and Tags. I think that while there are some things that could be improved overall, I do realize that Andrei is just one man who is the brains behind the entire program. I'm sure he does find it overwhelming at times and that may lead to longer than desired times between new releases, but I am totally fine with that.

All in all, I feel that Orange is a high quality program with many amazing high end features. My kudos to Andrei for his great work!

Despite a few minor changes I'd like to implement (and...really... who doesn't have some of those on occasion LOL), for the most part, this software works like a charm, and it does what I need it to do...which is catalogue my media...and of course, as the mediums always change, there's always a need to add new formats (I nominate player piano rolls, 8-tracks, DVD's, Blu-Ray discs, 78's, laserdiscs, cereal box records, flexi-discs, reel to reel discs, Beta tapes, and Edison cylinders-didn't see those listed-but then again, I'm picky, I guess...). It's odd that they haven't been able to go above and beyond the MP3's, and that more people are returning to vinyl again, but I digress...

In any case, as long as there are new items to add (and I need not worry about running out), I am absolutely positive that I'll be using Orange CD well into the future!!!

Good work, Andrei!!!

OCD (Orange CD) is the perfect music organizer, even for those of us who have OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder)http://www.firetongue.com/boards/ima...ons/icon12.gif

No need to wait for Andrei to add new format names - as long they fit into the disc & track model. Format type names can be easily added by going to View -> Preferences -> Database
Highlight Format, click on Edit and add whatever you wish

Of course there's no guarantee OCD or any program will read some of these formats directly - so manual addition might be required

Quote:

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Originally Posted by vinylmaster

Despite a few minor changes I'd like to implement (and...really... who doesn't have some of those on occasion LOL), for the most part, this software works like a charm, and it does what I need it to do...which is catalogue my media...and of course, as the mediums always change, there's always a need to add new formats (I nominate player piano rolls, 8-tracks, DVD's, Blu-Ray discs, 78's, laserdiscs, cereal box records, flexi-discs, reel to reel discs, Beta tapes, and Edison cylinders-didn't see those listed-but then again, I'm picky, I guess...). It's odd that they haven't been able to go above and beyond the MP3's, and that more people are returning to vinyl again, but I digress...

In any case, as long as there are new items to add (and I need not worry about running out), I am absolutely positive that I'll be using Orange CD well into the future!!!

Good work, Andrei!!!

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I love Orange CD. it has revolutionised my CD collecting, as well as allowing me to combine my music DVD collection as well. I have spent many happy hours cataloguing my collection, adding group website details, buying info etc. It is a never ending job, but one I really enjoy doing. If I could have one feature added it would be a "to play" tag, where you can flag up albums for future play. Of course this may already be possible and I just haven't found it, if so let me know! Anyway a great program, and one that has improved my enjoyment of my music collection. Thank you.:)

I have previously posted very positive reviews of this software. However, over the last 12 months or so, I feel that the developer become less and less interested in the development of this software.

We have recently had announcements about the un-useability of new functionality being announced by junior members of this forum, RATHER than the software developer himself!

We are getting fewer and fewer updates.

AND, the developers responses to customer queries in these forums have become less and less frequent (almost as if, "I have nothing to say about your needs/feedback, but now I have something to say"... which is a pretty poOr model for customer service).

So, "Users of OrangeCD: Satisfied or not??", well, some of us are become increasingly dissatisfied, although judging from recent feedback, this is likely to be of less interest to the developers than should be the case!

While I don't expect any positive response to these comments, I do hope that Andrei will be able to derive something positive from these words.

Since I only got about 6 months worth of use out of it before it crapped out on me AND due to the fact that its been 100% impossible to get it to work on my computer again, I'd say I'm VERY disappointed in the program. In terms of cost/benefit, its one of the single worst investments I've ever made, at least as it stands now. I loved it when it was working but a program that doesnt work isnt much worth singing the praises about, is it?

Well .... it looks as though this program is winding down to the end of its useful life, eh?

I suspect it's because there are so many freeware programs out there that do as good a job or better than this OrangeCD program.
Or .... the developer has just lost interest or gone on to more lucrative endeavours.

It's too bad; it had a good following for a number of years, and even with it's tempermental nature it did a decent job.