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Weird, This is the 2nd device I've had and both do this...
I sync music to the card, Media Centre picks the music up, but then after a reset it all goes wrong:
The next time I start MC, it doesn't even see the storage card (in the Library). Updating the library, it finds the tracks but seems to hang while adding them. Meanwhile, the free storage on the card goes down... and down... and down until there's none left. MC then says "can't add the tracks" and gives up.
Anyone else having this trouble, or am I incredibly unlucky?!
Ferg.
I have the same issue on my TyTN...
really frustrating but I found a workaround: browse the storage and delete the hidden folder MSMETADATA, then try to update media player library.
You won't find such folder using the file explorer provided with WM5: you must use an enhanced file explorer such as Resco one in order to view hidden and system files.
I have the same problem but I will try deleting that files to see if it helps.
That seems to work Nic, nice one.
I'm sure I remember doing this before with no success, but my memory is obviously playing tricks.
ferg.
I also have the same problem. It is very annoying...
However, if you go to the Library screen, then Menu > Open File and navigate to storage card > playlists, you can open any of your playlists...
Not ideal but it works.
I removed that file and it works fine now, jusy hope is stays the same for a few days.
Yeah, I've had the same problem too and I've tried all the various things suggested with limited success. The only surefire solution I've encountered is to copy all my important folders from the storage card to my desktop - minus any of the media files/folders and the msmeta data files, using resco, reformat the storage card, replace all the files from the desktop, resync and then synchronise he music through wm player again.
What a pain!
Windows Media Player (WMP) is a great application and works great for syncing to the Android platform.
The Music and Pictures application on the Android work with the file structure and playlists from WMP. It is an easy solution for managing content on your computer and having it sync automatically.
Benifits of using WMP to sync content
Sync Auto Playlists and User Created Playlists
Sync Pictures with options to resize to save space. (keeps folder hierchy for easy browsing)
You can reserve space so WMP does not eat all of the usable storage
You can prioritize your synced content giving you control over fresh content, or managing your favorites.
Sync 4 and 5 star Rated pictures and music from your computer
Examples of use:
Sync Pictures added to your computer in the last 30 Days
Sync You favorite songs first, then by playlist, and then fill the remaining space with the rest of you library and you can still leave room for other reasons like pictures taken from the G1
Researching the following:
WMP can convert and resize certain video formats and TV recorded from Media Center to a mobile sized WMV. I am researching to see if WMP can be tweaked to use another format and resolution
WMV playback on Android/G1
I have read alot of questions from users about media management. I wanted to start this thread as an awareness for using WMP to manage content. I see alot of G1 users feel like the link between the computer and android is not there. I think it is designed for an open platform, so you don't have to use one app for everything (i.e. Active Sync, itunes, ect.)
Moderators: please feel free to delete or redirect if this thread is out of place.
Jcostanza4
Reserved for How To Guides
In progress of building. 11-5-08.
Please be patient while I work on the detailed information. Please feel free to suggest or add missing information by sending me a PM.
How to Setup Windows Media Player (WMP) to sync to the G1
This guide is designed for Android version R29 or later and the use of a Micro SD or SDHC card already installed in the device.Earlier Android releases have different steps in mounting the device to the comptuer and are not in this guide.
1. Connect the Device to the Computer via USB Cable
A Notification will appear in top bar. Slide down the curtain and select the notification labeled "USB connected". Select the "Mount" option.
2. Open Windows Media Player on the Computer
Make sure you are on the "Library" tab of WMP, if not select it. If your device is properly installed and connected, your memory card should be listed on the left pane and would be titled based on how you formated the card or set by the manufacturer. [See Figure (1) Attached Below]
3. Right Click on the memory card from the left pane and select "Setup Sync..."
[See Figure (2) Attached Below]
4. Name your device and click finish
Choose a name that will be easily recognizable for your convienence. If you are using multiple cards, you can setup different media to be synced to each card.[See Figure (4) Attached Below]
5. Right Click on the memory card from the left pane and select "Setup Sync" and choose "Sync this device automatically"
In the list on the right remove playlists that you do not want to sync to your device. You can add more playlists by selecting the "Available Playlist" drop down box and select "Sync Playlists". This section will allow you to sync your picture library and possibly video and tv in the future (not availble yet). [See Figure (8) Attached Below]
Set your Priorities: Change the priority list that sync to your preference. If you have "All Music" at the top fo the list, all of your music will sync first until the card is full. If the card is not full it will move to the next sync list and so on. I recomend syning your favorites of each categories and then use sync All Music or All pictures last. See reserving space note to leave room on your card.
Click Finish when done and device starts to sync.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
How To Set Conversion and Space limits
Right Click on the memory card from the left pane and select "Advanced Options" to set quality preferences
A - On the sync tab: if you leave the "Create folder Hierarchy on the device" select it will sync over pictures and music in the same folder layout as it is on your computer. If you uncheck this box all files will be placed into one folder. Pictures are harder to browse on the device if you choose this option because they are all grouped into the main picture folder.
To Reserve space: you may want to reserve space so that your synced content does not take all of the space available on your memory card. Move the slider to the right to reserve space in 5% increments. If you are unable to move the slider you must stop any current syncing. [See Figure (10) Attached Below]
Note: To Stop a sync in process, close or cancel the open window and right click on the memory card in the left pane of WMP and select "Stop Sync" [See Figure (9) Attached Below] B - On the Quality Tab: if you leave the "Convert music, pictures, videos and TV shows as required by this device" selected, the computer will resize images down to save space. Uncheck this box if you want the full resolution version of the image which will take up more space. You can also set the quality of the music by checking "Select maxium quality level" and setting the max bitrate for songs to be synced.
Note: Video and TV are not supported at this time and is not an option that you can select.
Click Apply and then OK when finished.About Playlists on the Device
You can create as many playlists as you wish. Note that the “Recently added” playlist is a system playlist and cannot be deleted or renamed. Also, if you make any voice recordings as part of a MMS message, they will be stored automatically in a playlist called “My recordings”. Supported Playlists: Playlist formats supported are M3U, WPL, and PLS. WPL is the Windows Media Playlist format and is the default format that WMP saves to. This playlist file will sync to your device if saved in the Playlist folder on the computer.
Please ask some questions in the mean time so I can see the problems and questions that most users will have.
WMA files: regardless of how you get them onto your device, tags aren't fully recognized, nor is cover art. MP3 files work fine though...
benjimen said:
WMA files: regardless of how you get them onto your device, tags aren't fully recognized, nor is cover art. MP3 files work fine though...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
WMA Metadata:
Which tags/data is not bieng recognized? 99% of my music is in MP3 format, so I have not run into this problem yet.
About Cover Art for MP3s:
Cover art is recognized for 80% of my music. I believe it because the android sees cover art that is embeded in the metadata and not reliant on the folder.jpg placed in each album folder.
Note:
After you initially sync, open up the Andoid's Music player and choose Albums. Let the Andoid update/find/process cover art for a couple of minutes and make sure you keep the device awake. Don't switch to another application or it will stop processing the cover art.
Jcostanza4
Thanks for the great detail.
I have started to use media player as my primary music app since installing media center. Syncing with media player and my G1 is something I forgot about.
Imp
jcostanza4 said:
Note:
After you initially sync, open up the Andoid's Music player and choose Albums. Let the Andoid update/find/process cover art for a couple of minutes and make sure you keep the device awake. Don't switch to another application or it will stop processing the cover art.
Jcostanza4
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
When I open the music player in the phone and select albums, I get a list of albums without the cover art being displayed ( I have the phone set on never timeout). How long does it take for the cover art to be displayed? I let it sit for several minutes and it hasn't done anything. Do I have to initiate the update process or is it supposed to be automatic?
Not sure if this will help/work, but I've had a bit of experience working with getting mp3s with cover art in WMP.
I find the easiest way is to update the albums in WMP using the 'Find Album Info' option. This should pull art/track info from the web and alter the embedded art and id3 tags. It can be a bit hit and miss sometimes (occasionally the art/tags won't update properly).
You should also be able to drag/drop the art (folder.jpg etc) into WMP when sorted by album.
Syncing it after this should then push out any changes.
(my G1 is arriving tomorrow, so won't be able to confirm if this works 'til then)
xavier6303 said:
When I open the music player in the phone and select albums, I get a list of albums without the cover art being displayed ( I have the phone set on never timeout). How long does it take for the cover art to be displayed? I let it sit for several minutes and it hasn't done anything. Do I have to initiate the update process or is it supposed to be automatic?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You should see the artwork start to appear one by one, if you don't see this happening it might be the way the cover art is setup in your library.
(EDIT: when I says start to appear, I mean about every second as soon as you open in Album view. If you leave it in this mode and let the device fall asleep it will still update the cover art, just don't open another application on top of that or it will stop. Scroll around and see if it is updating, it should be very apparent if its working)
We are all new to this so alot of my reasoning is just speculation at this point. The artwork that shows on my G1 is cover art imbeded into the mp3 file and not a jpg in the album folder.
Let me know if this helps.
Jcostanza4
jcostanza4 said:
You should see the artwork start to appear one by one, if you don't see this happening it might be the way the cover art is setup in your library.
We are all new to this so alot of my reasoning is just speculation at this point. The artwork that shows on my G1 is cover art imbeded into the mp3 file and not a jpg in the album folder.
Let me know if this helps.
Jcostanza4
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ok, Ill try it again.
Thanks
wassup everyone working on album art for my g1 as well anybody discovered anything new? A lot of my art won't show up after sync still even after updating all the album info.
i need of real help
i have read threw your post and its help full but what has happened is that my phone use to sync even my play list from media player, but now its only syncing the songs and not the playlist can you help?
Although I am completely against Microsoft and feel it is wrong to sync the almighty Android with microcough, it actually does work really well. I stole a bunch of music from a friends computer and was surprised how easy it was to sync with, a lot easier than ipod/itunes. Too bad I run Fedora on my laptop (well not really "too bad" but you get the point).
walliekid said:
i have read threw your post and its help full but what has happened is that my phone use to sync even my play list from media player, but now its only syncing the songs and not the playlist can you help?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have the same problem. All my playlists, both normal and smart playlists, are in my Playlists folder. But unlike what the instructions say, the playlists themselves will not sync to the G1. I can add a playlist to my automatic sync list and songs on that playlist will be synced, but the playlist file and the playlist itself will not sync. Any ideas about how to get playlists to sync between WMP and Android?
i have had issues with the cover art as well. i ripped a lot of my CD with wmp and it found the album art just fine, but when i loaded them to the sd card on the phone they never came with it. i also had a lot of music that was downloaded years ago that i put on and it is terrible for listing them in any sort of order even after redoing a lot of the tags. its not that great in my opinion and would be better if it would browse by folder like i have it on the card
Chirality said:
I have the same problem. All my playlists, both normal and smart playlists, are in my Playlists folder. But unlike what the instructions say, the playlists themselves will not sync to the G1. I can add a playlist to my automatic sync list and songs on that playlist will be synced, but the playlist file and the playlist itself will not sync. Any ideas about how to get playlists to sync between WMP and Android?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have the same problem. Syncing playlists with windows media player only add the songs onto the phone, not the playlists themself. I solved this problem by copying my playlist folder on my computer onto the memory card. Everytime you sync playlist with WMP, make sure you copy the actually playlists from your music folder onto your memory card too.
This is really stupid. Syncing playlists and it only puts the songs onto your memory card and not the actually playlists. I mean, WTF dude?
GuardianFlash said:
I have the same problem. Syncing playlists with windows media player only add the songs onto the phone, not the playlists themself. I solved this problem by copying my playlist folder on my computer onto the memory card. Everytime you sync playlist with WMP, make sure you copy the actually playlists from your music folder onto your memory card too.
This is really stupid. Syncing playlists and it only puts the songs onto your memory card and not the actually playlists. I mean, WTF dude?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll try this, but on my phone, it actually synced the playlists as well... the only problem is that when I tried to play the playlist on the device, it can't find any of the files! I have to manually play them.
jcostanza4 said:
Benifits of using WMP to sync content
Sync Auto Playlists and User Created Playlists
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
To the best of my knowledge, WMP uses .asx or .xml and Android can only read .m3u. Am I missing something, 'cause I'd LOVE it if syncing lists with WMP was as simple as all that.
Just picked up the Samsung Capitivate a couple of weeks ago. I'm a heavy playlist user as this is how I manage my various Podcasts daily to keep them playing in the order received. First thing i did was sync up my Android device with WMP as that's what i've been accustomed to for years now. I'm a recent WM convert.
Syncing is just as straight forward as any other media device as far as i can see. Playlist, album art, mp3 and unprotected wma are syncing. However my playlist are synced in reversed order for some reason. anyone else seen this?
HTC, Motorola, and Samsung all have options to sync with WMP that will also allow the syncing of playlists... but if you mount just as a "Mass Storage" device, then the playlists will not sync properly.
A work-around is apparently to copy your playlists folder to the Music folder on your SDCard... testing it shortly and will let you know.
If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know!
Copying over the playlist folder didn't work...
Hi all,
This may be a dumb question but as a "newbe" to he HD can someone tell me the correct method and or directory structure required when copying music files to the storage card? I tried puting them in Music/"album name"/ but my HD did not find them. I followed the manual and used actisync and WM11 but it still did not work. Have done a hard reset as after trying these two methods the original two songs did not show either. Any help would be appreciated.
You need to add the Music Tracks to the Windows Media Library - once you've copied the files across onto the Memory Card (it really doesn't matter on the Directory Structure) go into Windows Media - it normally takes you straight to the Library - then from the Menu select "Update Library ..." and wait a while.
Many thanks
Hi Paul,
Thanks for the quick response, I new it had to be something simple.
Adding Music to TF3D music player.
Hi there,
I was struggeling with the same thing.
Remove; Application Data\HTC\HTC Album\AudioManager_Eng\'Audiomanager_Eng.vol' and softreset.
If you can't remove this file softreset first and try again.
After the file is removed and a softreset is done TF3D will add your music automatically to the library when you scroll to the today music player.
It is music/artist/album.
You might want to get a small piece of software on your PC to check the music ID tags. I had alot of problems to start with and found that deleting the album no and comments gave no problems.
You dont have to use active sync through WMP11. You can simply use the explore on active sync to find your music folder and then drag and drop.
To delete audiomanager.exe you will have to disable touchflo.
I'm having the same problem with the TouchFlow3D media player. However I don't seem to have the folder structure you mention. I have ...
"Application Data\HTC\HTC Album" but there's no "AudioManager_Eng" folder. My "AudioManager_Eng" folder is located at "Application Data\HTC\AudioManager_Eng" and in there I DO NOT have "Audiomanager_Eng.vol".
Any other suggestions?
Thank you,
Mike
1. if you add a lot of music files it will take a long time for your HD to find them. a very long time!
2. to test, start with 1 or 2 albums in mp3 format
3. take care that each of the mp3 files to have the same album name on the Id Tag
4. on your card you can have any structure. i use something similar to my PC: music/artist/album
5. you can add a picture (artwork) within the respective folder for each album and it will be displayed on the tf3d player (the name should be folder.jpg for each picture)
if you respect these steps for sure it will work. you can also use s2p and the albums pictures will look very cool when you wil slide them
good luck!
Any update on this? Mine doesn't work..
Help!
I don't know what's wrong with my HTC Diamond. I got the Sprint version. It was working fine until a few days ago. Everytime a play a song on the TF3D player, it plays the songs, but then it stops the songs halfway thru, and then it wont continue playing unless I restart the whole song. I tried doing the Hard reset, soft reset, follow the steps above and it still does the same thing. On the WM player, they work fine, but not on the TF3D player. Pls help
Ok...so yesterday I was really bored and decided to go through all the music on my storage card. I used to have a ton of tracks in a folder for "Unknown Artist". I went through that folder and looked at every file and placed it in the correct folder for the artist. My logic was that I would be able to find the tracks easier in the Mdedia Player library. However, even after making these changes the library remains the same. I even tried deleting the XMEMediaLibrary.mlb file and the library is still the same, even after switching to a brand new phone! What am I doing wrong? Is there a way to get my library "fixed"? Thanks for the help!
AFAIK,
Media Player retrieves the ID Tag information from each track and adds it to the library database. Try using a tagging application (ex: TagScanner) to edit the tag metadata in your audio files. Once you're done, try indexing the library again.
HTH,
hilaireg said:
AFAIK,
Media Player retrieves the ID Tag information from each track and adds it to the library database. Try using a tagging application (ex: TagScanner) to edit the tag metadata in your audio files. Once you're done, try indexing the library again.
HTH,
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1
miked, you're simply trying to organize your music by what folder it's in, but the media player (WMP as well as most others) does it by what's in the ID3 tags...and obviously you have a bunch of mp3's that don't have the artist filled in there. Like hilaireg said, your best bet is to use a batch-tagging app, TagScanner, TagRunner, Media Monkey, etc...that will get at least most of them done for you automatically, you may still have to go back and clean up a few manually to get them all (and any of those apps make even that part easier)
Thank you for the suggestions!! I have spent the day "fixing" my music collection and now it is perfect!
Location for playlists is in a database in the /dbdata directory:
/dbdata/databases/com.android.providers.media
Maybe a unique file for each person:
external-6e84080b.db
Numerous tables that store the location and attributes of all media on the phone - videos, music, sounds, pictures.
There is a table that has titles of playlists (custom ones, not the default) and links to another table of the actual playlist contents. The default playlists are probably a view. There is a also a hash value generated for each song - I assume it is an actual hash generated by media scanner and stored in table.
Anyway, it looks like a lot of work to find a solution to sync playlists - I see the following effort required
1. Playlists would have to be created on PC (M3U) but converted to SQL script
2. Directory structure on phone, must be known for script to create proper paths
3. Must run after media scanner on phone
4. Tool must run as root on phone that creates playlist in DB file
On the phone I see something like this:
1. Media scanner runs - creates entries for all music in DB file
2. Playlist script runs, creates playlist in playlist table for each playlist in M3U
3. For each file in M3U playlist, SQL script must find song in Media DB file, and create a record in playlist table with correct entries (path, hash, etc.)
Anyone see any issues with this or this logic?
I guess maybe a utility would not have to run as root - since somehow the music app creates the playlist. Maybe the file doesn't root access - need to check.
Is there a way to wipe the media database and have the media scanner build it from scratch?
I have my music in /Music and my WMP Playlists in /playlists (as synced by WMP) but the Android media datbase can't find some mp3s, duplicates certain mp3s in playlists, and have two copies of some playlists...
It's completely corrupted! I want to just restart.
I simply copy over the .wpl files and use PlayerPro instead now... but would be ideal if the .pla files are automatically generated through the WMP sync process more consistently (sometimes it works fine... normally the first time only)
I finally discovered a solution to this whole issue with playlists. Just use Songbird along with the FolderSync addon. This Songbird addon easily syncs your entire library along with your playlists into one simple folder onto any storage device. This folder can be read by any music player on your phone and properly displays your entire library and playlists.
I used this addon with my external microSD card and transferred my library and playlists via a card reader. This addon also creates a playlist named 'library' containing your entire library in addition to your other playlists.
Hopefully this will address any issues related to playlists.
This is the tutorial where I found the solution:
http://arashpayan.com/blog/index.php/2010/05/23/sync-music-and-playlists-with-android-using-songbir/