[JohnMarch]

With regard to my comment about the metadata, its contents in each file are displayed top-left in my Foobar set-up, while all the track/file information appears top-right. If I begin playing from the beginning of the album - which is my usual approach - the metadata information for that first track/file appears as explained above. When that file finishes and moves on to the next I would like the metadata to do the same but it doesn't. It continues to display that initial track metadata throughout.
 
I know it's a small point but sometimes the artist information as well as the track info involved in an album changes from track to track so it would be nice if the metadata that's being displayed could change to reflect that.
 
Incidentally, I'm in the process of writing an article, with screen dumps, explaining what I've done in setting up both EAC and FB2K to work together in case I have to go through the process again at some stage. At my age I need visual reminders!
 
You're right about the driver updater. The problem is that I've paid for a year so I might as well stay with it. I've always found WinZip to be excellent at decompressing ZIP files so I assumed this updater from the same source would be of a similar quality. Of course, the problem could have been due to something entirely different. I really have no way of knowing. So far this morning and early afternoon I've had no problems.

 

[PleasantSounds]

 
. I've always found WinZip to be excellent at decompressing ZIP files so I assumed this updater from the same source would be of a similar quality. Of course, the problem could have been due to something entirely different. I really have no way of knowing. So far this morning and early afternoon I've had no problems.

 
The problem is that the WinZip app loads third party drivers, so the quality standards of the updates may be all over the place. I often see the recommendations to "always make sure to have the latest drivers", but if the PC is stable and I'm not missing any features, then I see no benefit in doing so. I have worked in software development for long enough to know that bugs are introduced with the updates nearly as frequently as removed.

 

[JohnMarch]

My EAC problem is now well and truly solved.
 
I haven't mentioned that I decided to write to Andre Wiethoff personally a little while ago but his first reply didn't come up with any clues as to why I wasn't seeing those plug ins. I decided to write again with a little more information and something I mentioned second time around - that I was still using XP perhaps - gave him the clue that maybe I was missing NET Framework 3.5 and its SP1 update. Initially I wondered why my system would be without it as I had often seen updates for it in the past and then the penny(?) dropped. Having to reinstall XP recently would have been the reason - in addition to the fact that the O/S is of course no longer being supported by Microsoft, although I admit I did see some XP updates from the company after the reinstallation. However I think under normal circumstances it would have sent me the NET Framework runtime files too.
 
Anyway, ALL the plug-ins are now present in both "EAC Options...>Metadata Options...>Selected metadata provider" drop-down box AND in the drop-down button on the main page, as you intimated.
 
The beauty of having this working properly now is that if the metadata for a particular CD isn't available in one of the databases I can always try one of the others. I haven't had that luxury until now.
 
Phew... what a performance. Still it's been worth it in the end.
 
Your comment about the third party drivers is spot-on and I should have considered that. I have to say the computer has been on for a good half-day today - I was out for much of the morning -  and I haven't had a moments problem. I also do quite a lot of Visual Basic programming (purely for myself)  and I know how easy it is to fix one problem only to create another. Some of my programs are so complex now I can't find my way around them or if I can a debug can take hours!!!

 

[PleasantSounds]

Good to see that you have found the solution. I had no idea that the .net framework is required to run EAC.

 

[JohnMarch]

I appear to have lost the message I just wrote. I'm now using my new computer with Windows 10 and I've set up blockers in my browser as I was seeing screeds of ads whenever I went on line. This site was blocked so I set it up to allow scripts and that's when I lost the message.
 
Anyway, I think I'm now ready to sign off on this topic as both EAC and FB2K seem to be working well. I'm even seeing the metadata  track numbers changing when I'm playing an album so that's excellent too.
 
I've also downloaded Tagscanner so that I can easily alter any metadata that's not correct. It seems like an excellent program.
 
Once again, thanks to all for your help.