BPM ProScan V2

Scans and Detects BPM rates for MP3 files

This program will scan MP3 music files, detect the beats per minute if possible, and write them to the MP3 ID3 tag.

Detecting the BPM of a song is a very math intensive (hence CPU intensive) task. Doing so "on-the-fly" while a track is playing, not only introduces latency in the playback, but can be the cause of sound drops in the playback as well. Taking that function outside of the player software, allows you to scan your files ahead of time, insert the BPM in the tag, and not have to worry about it causing any problems while you are on stage. You therefore, still have the BPM available in your songs, and can sort and search using that as a criteria, and, your DJ software will be more robust at doing the task at hand - playing the songs.

How to use it

Once you have downloaded the file to your computer, you simply double-click the downloaded file to run the install, which will guide you through the quick installation procedure. Once installed, you will have an icon on your desktop for BPM ProScan.

Once in the program, you can select the folders on the left navigation pane that you are interested in. When you click on a folder that has MP3 files in it, they will be displayed in the right file pane. If they already have MP3 tags, you will see the title, artist and BPM -- if they don't have BPM tags, that field will be blank. If you want to view files from folders underneath the current one, click the Search Sub-Folders button, and the display will refresh, and also display any MP3 files in the sub-folders.

Select the files you want to scan using the standard Window's key combos (Ctrl+left click, Shift+left click), or click the Select All button on the top. You can then click the Scan button on top, and the program will scan the selected files and attempt to determine the beats per minute of that song. If the program is unable to determine the BPM for whatever reason, it will display all zeros for that track.

Once all the selected files have been scanned, you can click the Save button, and the selected files will have their tags updated with the BPM information. Please note, that if you scanned 10,000 files, and don't click the Save button, that data will not be changed in the file tags! So, make sure you save the changes before exiting the program.

If you see values that look odd (too high, or too low), the algorithm may have detected heavier half or double beats. If you right-click a song in the list that looks odd, you will get a menu with 3 options: Make Half, Make Double, or Enter Manually. They are self-explanatory.

Program Settings

SCAN TIME:

There are three options here -- 30 seconds, 60 seconds and entire file (the default). Some songs with a lot of breaks, will return a better result using a smaller scan time. For example, say you scan a folder full of songs, and a few songs return a zero BPM value -- try rescanning those songs with first the 60 second option on, then the 30 second option, and check the results.

OPTIONS:

Search Sub-Folders: Is a toggle button. If you are viewing a folder, by default it will show only the MP3 files in that folder. If you check the Search Sub-Folders button, it will refresh, and also display any songs in sub-folders underneath the currently highlighted folder.

Put Dots in Tag: This will write the tag data as xxx.xx, instead of xxxxx. RockIt can handle either/or, not sure if the other DJ software can handle the dots - try it on a couple. The ID3V2 standard doesn't really say for sure whether it should have dots, so we made both options available.

Use Fractions: The default is not to use fractions in this version. The reason, is that there is such a minor difference, that they are not really necessary. If you check this button, it will display and save the fractional part -- it will also remember the setting when you restart BPM ProScan.

Export

This will allow you to choose a filename, and export all the data to a text/CSV file for importation into MS Excel, or any other program that can read delimited files. You can then sort, print the list, etc.

Register Software

This allows you to unlock the Save and Export functions, once you have purchased the software. Once the software has been unlocked, you will no longer see that button, and you will be able to save your work, and export text/CSV lists of the items.

Sorting

Click any of the headers (Track Title, Artist, BPM or Filename, to sort on that particular field.

Searching

The search is a "find" type of operation. It will look through the title, artist and filename fields, and return the first match. It does not search left to right, so you can enter any text you like -- for example, if you want to find a Rod Stewart song, simply type in "rod" (without the quotes of course). This will take you to the first track that has "rod" in it, in any of the 3 fields it searches. It remembers what you last searched for, so hitting the F3 key, will go to the next track with "rod" in it. You can keep hitting the F3 key, until it has gone all the way through the list. You will know when you've reached the last item, because nothing will be highlighted.

Help

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