Getting LibreELEC 8.2.1 Settings to Work Again

    Years ago, I set up LibreELEC 8.2.1, on a Raspberry Pi 3, and have been using that Raspberry Pi as a great media player. In order to ensure that I would always have this solid media player, I kept the .img file for version 8.2.1, as well as saved two folders. I saved "skin.conflunce" and "visualization.spectrum"; which reside in the .kodi/addons directory. I thought this would allow me to archive my two important settings. I always use the Confluence skin, and I use Spectrum for visualization.

    As expected, my micro SD card, eventually, wore out, and the Raspberry Pi would no longer boot. So, I installed that .img file, for LibreELEC 8.2.1, onto a new card, and placed the saved Confluence and Visualization folders into the .kodi/addons directory.

    After doing this, everything booted up fine, and I was able to switch the skin to Confluence, and enable Spectrum for my visualization. Unfortunately, setting up these changes has given me a system that doesn't work the way that it did before.

    First of all, visualization doesn't work. If I try to play a song, I consistently get an error message, which states, "Visualization: Spectrum. Add-on couldn't be loaded. Can't load shared library".

    In addition, changing the skin to Confluence, only works for the current session. If I reboot, it resorts back to Estuary, and I receive a message which states, "Incompatible add-ons: The following add-ons are incompatible with this version of Kodi and have been automatically disabled: Confluence".

    If I go to add-ons, and enable Confluence, I'm able to switch to it, as my skin, for the given session. However, like I've said, if I try to reboot, I get the error message, and it reverts back to Estuary.

    Normally, I wouldn't be so adamant about sticking with version 8.2.1. However, I've learned that, the newer versions take an extremely long time to boot. Not to mention the fact that the drop-down menu, that appears when I try to add a song to my playlist, is out of order. In 8.2.1, "Queue Item" appears at the top of the list. This is extremely important, since it's the selection that I consistently use, when adding songs to my playlist.

    In the newer versions, "Queue Item", appears lower on the list. Unfortunately, based on all of my research, this order is hardwired into the program, and can't be changed; which is why I'm trying to stick with 8.2.1.

    If anyone knows how to get the Spectrum visualization to work with an older version of LibreELEC (8.2.1), and how to make it so that my skin change won't revert back to Estuary, I'd love to hear from you.

    Thanks for your time.

    I have a hunch that Confluence gets updated from the Kodi repo, but the version that's updated-to is no longer compatible with the Kodi version you are using. That's probably a mistake/oversight on the Kodi side (the incompatible add-on shouldn't be added to that Kodi version's repo) but developers are rarely testing old versions so things can happen.

    I would update to LE 9.2.6 - if things like optimised software decode are important, or newer. The position in the menu will change, but better to have a less buggy and working Kodi than no Kodi. You can probably hack the skin to change the position if it's a really big deal, although then you need to redo the change with each Confluence bump. These days there probably aren't many.

    Quote from evansste

    So, I installed that .img file, for LibreELEC 8.2.1, onto a new card, and placed the saved Confluence and Visualization folders into the .kodi/addons directory

    After writing the image you have to boot LE once with unmodified second partition to get the partition expanded to full size.

    You now do have only 32MB which get filled in almost no time.

    Thanks for both of your responses.

    mglae, I apologize for leaving out the step that you mentioned. I did, indeed, boot it up, first. Otherwise, the .kodi directory doesn't exist until you do.

    Ultimately, I was able to fix my entire situation by making a copy of my original micro SD card --the one that stopped booting. I used the Linux "dd" command to copy all of the contents, bit-by-bit, directly onto a new micro SD card. It worked beautifully. That new card boots fine, and I have all of the settings that the original card had.

    I've, also, decided to make an image of that original card; which allows me to have all of those settings stored into an .img file.

    Thanks, to both of you, for the suggestions that you've given. I always appreciate it when anyone is willing to take the time to help, and offer suggestions. On behalf of everyone who uses this forum, I thank both of you.