Search for music

HolyArrs finds each album of your artists as one Release and sends it to your Downloader as one download.

Only the owner and admins see music search. Movies and shows work the same way, see Search for movies and Search for shows.

Before you start

• A Downloader and a Source are connected, see Connect a downloader and a source.
• The artist, album, track and Version all have Keep up to date on. An album with any of these off is never searched.

Search an album by hand

1. Open the artist page.
2. Press Search now to search every album with a missing track, or press the search button on one album row. You should see the search on Home, named after the artist and album.
3. To pick the Release yourself, open the album page and press Choose a release. You should see every Release found, with its verdict and the reasons in plain words.
4. Choose one. It fills every track it holds.

Turn a Release down and HolyArrs never picks it again for this album.

What HolyArrs searches by itself

When	What happens
Feed check	While an album misses a track, HolyArrs reads the music categories of your Sources. A new Release that fits is chosen or held.
Nightly search	One search per missing album. Turn it off with Search for missing albums too.
Better copies	An album below Good enough keeps looking. A new Release replaces it only if it is better for every track you already have.

Albums that are not out yet are never searched by themselves. A hand search still runs, and each verdict says the date check was skipped.

Choices

Pick rules for music

Music has its own Pick rules. Movie Pick rules cannot judge music. New artists get Lossless first.

Set	Takes	Good enough
Lossless first	the best lossy copy until a lossless one turns up	Lossless
Lossy 320 or V0	lossy middle and lossy best, for small files	Lossy best
Any music	anything, best first	Lossless

Settings

Open Settings > Search and find the music part.

Setting	What it does	Default	Change it when
Search for missing albums too	The nightly search covers albums.	On	You want only feed checks for music.
Take whole discographies	A Release with every album of an artist may fill the album you searched for.	Off	Your Sources mostly post full discographies.
Tracks an album Release may lack	Turns away a Release whose file count falls short of the album’s track count by more than this. -1 turns the check off. Only works where a Source gives file counts.	0	Your Sources give wrong file counts.

If it does not work

Symptom: an album is never searched. Cause: Keep up to date is off somewhere, or the album is not out yet. Fix: turn it on for the artist, album, track and Version.

Symptom: a Release is turned away and you do not know why. Fix: open the album, press Choose a release and read the reasons beside it.

Symptom: a Release posted before the album came out is turned away. Cause: early and far too small Releases are turned away on purpose, see Early and fake Releases.

Symptom: a discography Release is turned away. Fix: turn on Take whole discographies.

For experts

Quality steps

Step	Meaning
Lossy, low	under 192 kbps
Lossy, middle	192 to 256 kbps, MP3 V1 or V2, or lossy with no bit rate given
Lossy, best	MP3 320 or V0, AAC 256 and up, Opus 160 and up
Lossless	FLAC, ALAC, WAV, APE or WavPack at CD quality
Lossless hi-res	24-bit, or a sample rate above 48 kHz

A CD rip, a web purchase, a rip log and a cue sheet earn points. A vinyl rip loses some points but still passes.

Always turned away: a whole album in one file with a cue sheet, a lossy transcode, samples, programs and password-protected archives.

Release names HolyArrs reads

• Velvet Cartography - Low Tide Atlas (2019) [FLAC]
• Velvet Cartography - Low Tide Atlas (2019) [MP3 320], [MP3 V0], [AAC 256], [FLAC 24-96]
• Velvet_Cartography-Low_Tide_Atlas-WEB-FLAC-2019-GROUP
• Velvet Cartography - Harbour Songs (2021) CD2 [FLAC] fills only the tracks of disc 2.

The artist is matched by name, or by another name the artist is known by. The album is matched by name among that artist’s albums. When two albums share a name, the year decides. A different year, such as a later remaster, still matches, and the verdict says so.

Related

• Downloads for music
• Organise music
• Search your library