Related
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...
I am having a nightmare with this hunk of brown steaming excretia!!!!! Firstly you have to load songs through Media player-WHY!!!!! What was wrong with dragging and dropping it onto the memory card like I used to do with my Touch.
Second Having waited whilst windows makes me grow older loading toons on the card, having play ok for a week, its just decided it will only play the first 2 seconds of a song any song then lock up!!! It lets me see all my songs, artists, albums, artwork, everything but the bl00dy tease wont let me play em. Worst of all the windows media player on the phone plays it all fine!!!!
Help!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
you can drag and drop the files
thats the way i do it and i usually play via tf3d , but iv never had a problem of the music stopping
Do you keep your mp3s in a particular file on the sd card and do you "treat" them in any way album art tag edit etc? Cheers for the answer, this is driving me mad!
I drag and drop directly into the storage card. I avoid WMP when possible - it seems to take forever.
The only problem with drag and drop approach is that sometimes TF3D does not seem to see the update. So, you might have to stop TF3D and restart it - this forces the music player to rescann available files.
How do you stop Tf3d, and how long does your HD take to update the list when you restart it?
even though i use tf3d when i start the music player i always go in library option then choose my music through that
I created a folder on my SD called Music and dragged albums to it. Play them via TF3D and point the library at the SD. It scans the entire card to find the music. then lists them. Only problem I had is when I removed some music from the SD and they still appeared in the TF3D.Resolved it by finding the library file, deleting it and then rescanning card........
Don't bother with the WMP
quick questions for the pro here.... how can i have only one folder showing off my storage card. for example i hate having it scan all of the card, and having ringtones mixed in there.... i wish i could have music and ring tones separate how ever only full songs on the player
marmin said:
How do you stop Tf3d, and how long does your HD take to update the list when you restart it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is not something I do often but in the settings, personal, today you can deselect TF3D and then reselect it.
It seems that TF3D does not have a special "scan" button so the best way is to stop and restart TF3D. I have also Pocket Tunes and Pocket Player - both have scan options. But, I generally use TF3D.
ahjdmarchi said:
quick questions for the pro here.... how can i have only one folder showing off my storage card. for example i hate having it scan all of the card, and having ringtones mixed in there.... i wish i could have music and ring tones separate how ever only full songs on the player
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Been looking for a way around this myself and I'm still yet to find anything. All my ringtones & music files all appear together which is annoying
Cheers to all the guys who answered the original question
Stopped using media player, wow what a relief.
Got a new problem now though After spending a night finding and adding album art, I loaded the mp3s, stopped and started TF3D, cool it saw the mp3s fine. Not so cool, it has "stuck on one of the album pics and wont move!!! the song changes, the title changes but the picture stays the same!!!
marmin you are not alone. I have the same problems with tf3d player and its almost killing me.
my k800i was perfect in this disciplin.
1.
I copied all my mp3s on my sd card (no activesync). I have 4 songs with different integrated covers and my player shows all the time the same cover.
2.
The other frustrating thing is the thing with ringtones. Somebody already mention it. I just want to say tf3D: "hey only scan this folder. the rest is none of your business. nothing else." but it scans all the time my whole device including ringtones.
Here is the file I deleted prior to a rescan (as mentioned in my previous post) .......
My Device\Application Data\HTC\AudioManager_Eng
although you could just rename it so you can change it back again if a problem arises.....
When I scanned afterward it recreated the entire music database from my SD including the assoication for image files to their respective albums.
Fallen Spartan said:
Been looking for a way around this myself and I'm still yet to find anything. All my ringtones & music files all appear together which is annoying
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i haven't tried this idea, but I think it would certainly be worth investigating (I'd check it for you guys but a bit busy till the weekend arrives). But for those that know how to edit the registry (really simple), try and add a new key to the respective TF3D music player folder called "Ignore". In the new key, add a 'string value' for your descritption (name of folder would do nicely). More importantly, set the "Data" to the full path of the folder to be ignored (something like "Storage Card\Ringtones"). I think this might work as it works with the TF3D album (forces it to ignore the folders which you tell it to and all its sub-folders). Please let me know if you try this and if it works or not (if no one tries it I'll try to give it a go over the weekend)
Good Luck (and hope it works)
Album art in the TF3D music player.
I am having those issues too. My problems started when I embedded the art into the MP3's. It not only hangs on the art, it also will only play about 2- seconds of the song before stopping. I can play the songs fine with the Windows media player though, so I had to put it on the programs tab so I could get to it easy.
Anothr thing about the HTC player, is it doesn't seem to go into sub folders very well, where the Windows player does. But like you said, it picks up on EVERYTHING, and that's extremely annoying.
Thought I'd give a shout out to S2P, a great freeware music player, which some of you will know of but other's might not:
http://s2p.ac-s2.com/
As others have said, Nitrogen and Pocket Player are also great players
Hi. I'm new to this so apologies if this problem has already been answered. I've bought and installed a 16GB sd card in my HD2 and have transferred a fair bit of music to listen to. However media player is playing albums in an incorrect order (seemingly random, not alphabetical). When I transfer an album from the sd card to the 'my music' folder on the device, it plays in the right order! I've tried neptune which plays in the correct order but that won't respond to my bluetooth headset (when I press play, it automatically uses media player). Now when I copied and pasted an album onto my device which was also on the sd card, media player displayed the tracks twice in the correct order 1-15 consecutively (1-15, then 1-15 again). I deleted the device version and the sd card version went back to the seemingly random order. Can anyone solve this irritating problem?
Addition
Could I just add that when I say the problem is with windows media player I am reffering to the music player within HTC sense. Please help!
I have the same issue, very irritating , could anybody help please??
A poor solution
Right, until I can better this I'm gonna cut and paste the album I want to listen to from the sd card onto the device.
No
No, that doesn't work
Have the same problem with the HTC music application and Windows Media Player. Pocket Player and Pocket Tunes don't have this problem.
A solution that works!
Right, it's like this. Got to settings>personalize>home screen tabs and uncheck 'music'. Open 'Windows media player' either by playing a song off your music folder or adding a quick link to it. Then click 'library' and get it to scan for al your files. Now use windows media player as your player not HTC sense and it will all be fine. Thank goodness!
is there the same resolution for the HTC player?
Thanks mate. Now I can see it works fine on the Windows media player. but thats a pain to use with those annoying menus. I like the HTC player as its very much like the iphone player & its easy to use. Has anyone found the fix for the HTC player or is there another good working player thats similar to the iphone player.
Cheers
Shala
Hasn't anyone found a solution to this silly problem yet?
When you transfer music to the device, it apparently removes any existing track order, yet not every album is out of order when I play it on the HD2! It makes no sense at all.
Using WMP is no solution, I'd rather play the music without order or sit for several hours making playlists for every album.
EDIT: Googling the problem, I found a thread about a problem like this for the HTC Touch Pro, where a solution was proposed:
Found a solution for you...
you will need a registry editor for your HTC Touch Pro. I recommend the PHM registry editor (google it).
Locate the following key. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\HTC\HTCAlbum\Ignored and modify the key Music Gizmo1 to the path you want the music file to be stored. I created a folder on the SD card named MUSIC and updated the path to \Storage Card\Music then rebooted the phone and all is well. Now I can turn off my phone, pop in the SD card and copy all my tunes over and bam.. I have all my songs at my finger tips. I hope this helps
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll be trying it later today.
hi,
if this does not work, i can share my application. It scans your music folder and generates playlists in the correct order.
it uses mp3 and wma tags for cd and track sequence. it works well for me but sometimes you need to clean up tags on desktop before copying music.
I have a 16 gb card as well and all my albums are ordered correctly using playlists instead.
I am sure using media monkey to synch gives you an option to push playlists as well and should give desured results.
Overlord Yuri said:
Hasn't anyone found a solution to this silly problem yet?
When you transfer music to the device, it apparently removes any existing track order, yet not every album is out of order when I play it on the HD2! It makes no sense at all.
Using WMP is no solution, I'd rather play the music without order or sit for several hours making playlists for every album.
EDIT: Googling the problem, I found a thread about a problem like this for the HTC Touch Pro, where a solution was proposed:
I'll be trying it later today.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Damn, it didn't work. Quite disappointing.
Now how about this app that you mentioned?
And I can't find such a function in Media Monkey, any ideas?
Regarding media monkey please have a look at here:
http://androidcommunity.com/forums/f41/tutorial-syncing-music-and-playlists-3761/
You will need to connect the device in usb disk mode and then you can synchronise playlists when uploading tracks.
I will upload the application later on today or earlier tomorrow morning. I would however recommend the option above first as the application I have is picky on the tags and it expects track numbers and disc numbers to be set correctly in metadata.
sproxy said:
the application I have is picky on the tags and it expects track numbers and disc numbers to be set correctly in metadata.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
They are. I'm also picky.
But yeah, the Media Monkey solution does sound smoother, I will try it out.
Thanks.
Hi again,
I have attached the files to this post. I still think, if Media Monkey option works for you thats the way to go. But this little tool helped me with the track order issues I had.
If your files are not in \Storage Card\music folder, you will need to set the location using the botton next to the text box.
Then you need to point the location to save the playlists. For me "\storage card\playlists" worked with every version of manila I used (Polaris, Diamond, HD, HD2)
It only supports mp3 and wma so there isnt much point to add more extensions, however you can remove one to exclude files of that extension.
Once all set up, you need to chose file - > Create playlists and application will scan your files and save the playlists in desired location.
I am using it with 16GB card and on Hd2 its pretty fast.
Here are some limitations:
1 - Extra information is created in the palylist file but still, when you select the playlist in manila player, it does not show fields like artist.
2 - Although some tags are valid, they cause errors in the application. I have some very old track I converted from CD's records mid/late 90s and if I see the issue on the mobile, I just run an application like Musicbrainz Picard to reftesh the tags and it all working again.
3 - If you have multi cd albums and disc numbers are not tagged, the track order may not be correct.
I always use usb mode to copy tracks and for me this tool works good enough to create the playlists the way I want to listen.
Hope it helps someone.
Simple Fix that worked for me
I to had the same problem with CD coming up in the wrong order in the player in HTC sense. When I checked what CD's were in the wrong order I noticed that they were all ones I had purchased off itunes and that the track information wasn't being picked up by my windows desktop. So i converted all my itunes music to MP3s using real player converter and now all of my library is in the correct order.
Hello,
I have the same problem. However, the tags are properly showing in all of these software :
MusicBrainz Picard
Windows Media Player
Windows 7 properties
So the track numbers seem to be correctly assigned. But still, the album tracks don't appear in the correct order for several albums in the HTC audio software.
The playlist utility keeps crashing on me, too.
By the way the HTC support regarding this issue is *terrible*, they keep telling me that the player sorts the music by "last time you played it". Nope. It doesn't. If so, when I play a single track, it would either pop at first place in the album or last place, depending on what they meant in their ballistic explanation (1 sentence). It, obviously, doesn't, and a player acting like that would be the stupidest music player in the world.
Does anyone have a solution ?
Did the "MediaMonkey" solution work,Overlord Yuri ?
Thanks in advance for any anwsers,
Regards
IcePanther said:
Did the "MediaMonkey" solution work,Overlord Yuri ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I barely tried and didn't have any luck. Since then I've given up..
Oh, okay.
Thank you for your input, anyway.
This thing with the HTC support is starting to get on my nerves, especially how they still try to convince me that the problem will go away if I hard reset the phone (nope, done two times already due to FixOperaFlash ruining my config, and still the music player doesn't work)...
I have figured a work around to the track order problem.
Download mp3tag you can find it on download.com or just google it.
I opend up all my music and looked at the albums that were out of order.
They seemed fine. I just right click on the track and saved the tag. I though why not nothing else seems to work.
I resynced the album and it was in order!
I guess try it out and see if it works.
S**t man , it worked !
HUGE thanks to you !
By the way I just opened the whole library (which was already on the phone), selected all, and clicked on save so it refreshed all tags. And after deleting /Application Data/HTC/Audio Manager/AudioManager_eng.vol so it regenerates the library, it worked like a charm.
I'm interested to know how others are getting on with the music tab in HTC sense. It took me a long time to get round to buying a 16GB card, but now I have I'm struggling to get the Music tab to function.
With a small collection of music it works just fine. However as I increase the collection at some point it breaks, so that it will only play a few seconds of a track before stopping, usually accompanied by a spinning circle in the top left of the screen, when that stops spinning the music stops. Something to do with indexing I'm assuming.
My music is organised in a fairly standard \Storage Card\Music\<Artist>\<Album>\ style format so there are no individually huge folders My favoured bitrate has been 192 so the files shouldn't be too big. I've tried syncing with Windows Media Player and with Mediamonkey. I've had mediamonkey convert all files as it syncs to WMA format or to MP3 at constant bitrate. All with the same results.
Who has the music tab functioning well with several GB's worth of music on their card? What settings did you use?
Of course I can just have WMP as a quick link on my first line whic happily plays everything and retains bluetooth AVRCP fuctionality. However the Music Tab interface is far nicer when it works.
<no longer true>My music tab isn't funtioning AT ALL, let alone well. It lists all my music (only 4 albums for experimenting, all tagged) alphabetically, and only draws the top half of the embedded albumart.
Doesn't even attempt to play, just sits there. Click next track, same - just draws half teh album art then sits there. Phone isn't hung or anything, just doesn't play.
Shame really, but i've not had it a week yet, so I'm gonna ignore it for now, and i'll look into it deeper once I have stopped playing with all the other bits.</no longer true>
See post 2 below
Hi,
Well I have to admit that my media player seems to be working well *touch wood*. I've got a few gb's of music on the 16gb card.
As soon as I got the card I formatted it on the HD2 before I put anything on it. Then I just synced my whole music collection from my laptop to the phone via ActiveSync, navigated to WMP on the HD2 and updated the library and all seems to play well (after the a little white circle spinning while it indexes the library).
Try backing up the card. Formatting it on the phone then doing it my way and see how if it helps.
**UPDATE**
OK i take back what i said in my previous post. I guess it was still reading the tags or something, because after having left it to sit for a while, it now works fine, including the albumart etc.
I didn't use sync, i rarely do for music players, so perhaps it takes longer for the player to find and scan everything using drag n drop rather than sync.
samsamuel said:
**UPDATE**
OK i take back what i said in my previous post. I guess it was still reading the tags or something, because after having left it to sit for a while, it now works fine, including the albumart etc.
I didn't use sync, i rarely do for music players, so perhaps it takes longer for the player to find and scan everything using drag n drop rather than sync.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes,
I think using ActiveSync organises the files into a more easily accessible format/location, which is why I suggested it. Good to know that everything is working ok for you now though
OK, so I backed up everything on the card. Formatted the card using the phones built in application. Copied everything back except the music files.
Used Mediamonkey and set up an auto-conversion rule to convert everything it syncs to MP3 format at 192 bitrate whether it needs converting or not.
Updated the library in Media player on the HD2.
reset the HD2 and let the music tab re-index everything.
Everything is now working perfectly. Thanks for the opinions. Whether it was the phone format or just that I hadn't actually used those exact rules for syncing I can't say as mediamonkey was origionally setup to only convert files if it had to. I had issues with Windows Media Player missing out files.
Gajet said:
Everything is now working perfectly.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Everything still perfect? I am almost able to sync without incident, but the "audio manager" crashes at the end of every sync (and, when prompted by the phone, I keep reporting the crash to Microsoft even though I don't expect them to get back to me anytime soon).
It also seems like I have to do a soft reset after each sync to shake out all of the bugs (missing album art, unplayable song files, etc.)
FWIW, I'm only syncing about 30 songs now until I have this sorted out, so having GBs worth of files isn't the problem (I was NEVER able to get 8GB of music to work in Manila's music tab on my Raphael).
id say that sounds more like an active sync issue.its never been the most stable program. why not simply connect in hard drive mode (or put memory card in card reader) and just drag and drop the music to it , then let the phone find it all itself.that'd be my preferred method.
gargon01 said:
Hi,
Well I have to admit that my media player seems to be working well *touch wood*. I've got a few gb's of music on the 16gb card.
As soon as I got the card I formatted it on the HD2 before I put anything on it. Then I just synced my whole music collection from my laptop to the phone via ActiveSync, navigated to WMP on the HD2 and updated the library and all seems to play well (after the a little white circle spinning while it indexes the library).
Try backing up the card. Formatting it on the phone then doing it my way and see how if it helps.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How do you format the card from the Phone?
kochavy said:
How do you format the card from the Phone?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I can jump in and answer that one - press the Window key (third one along on the bottom) (or press the button at the top left) and go to tools and there at the bottom is a button to format the SD card.
One thing I would like to see is the ability for the player to decode .ogg files - I love gapless playback, and really miss it with mp3's. I am trying to rip some stuff now, but it is a pain having to rip multiple tracks to one mp3 file just to avoid the hop skip and jump when playing back.
All the best.
rjstep3
When I was having issues with my music tab I followed the format SD card and organised into Artist/Album/tracks but what really worked for me was converting my entire library into LAME mp3. 1500+ songs are now working perfectly. I recommend using dBpoweramp to convert if you're willing to give it a shot.
Hoodeddeathman said:
I recommend using dBpoweramp to convert if you're willing to give it a shot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
dBpoweramp is certainly very good - but don't forget the free options as well, including foobar, Exact Audio Copy and Freerip3 - just Google for them.
rjstep3
i am also having a problem with the music.tab on the htc hd2. at first i was really plsased.with this phone but no w i am havekng countless problems with it...such as cudnt play videos with utube app installed...now this music nonsense.....i have spent toooo much mone on this phone t be getin these poblems and alsopurchased a 16gb card....i live tge hd2 .if only there was less problems
nyway has anyone found a working solution
I thought all the music needed to be in a root folder on the storage card, no sub-folders within to work well?
I had same problem. HTC music player stopped after about 4 secs of playing with every song. Put it all into a root folder and worked fine since.
Phaedrus Nine said:
I thought all the music needed to be in a root folder on the storage card, no sub-folders within to work well?
I had same problem. HTC music player stopped after about 4 secs of playing with every song. Put it all into a root folder and worked fine since.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't know why that would be, but if it works then it works!
I have a "MUSIC" folder on my SD card, and in that I have artist sub-folders and then within them I have album sub-folders. It all works fine for me. This is literally the same folder that I've had for the past 3 WM phones, and I just copied it there manually, without using any type of synch.
Phaedrus Nine said:
I thought all the music needed to be in a root folder on the storage card, no sub-folders within to work well?
I had same problem. HTC music player stopped after about 4 secs of playing with every song. Put it all into a root folder and worked fine since.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Could be because of the length of the path/filename when sub folders are used?
EG
theartistfoldernamedartist/thenameofthealbum/theartistfoldernamedartist-thenameofthealbum-thetracknumber.mp3
Perhaps the scanner struggles to cope with long path/filenames?
Ive got this problem and i was wondering if it had anything to do with the quality of the storage card?
Edit:
REASON FOUND
"One bad apple spoils the barrel"
One badly encoded mp3 will make the entire player stop. I found this while playing mp3s on music tab whilst transfering new mp3s through drag and drop (active sync) as soon as one particular mp3 was transferred the player stop and music would stop after 2-5secs. After deleting this file and reaccessing music tab library it was back to normal.
Suggestions: leave music player on whilst drag and dropping so you can figure out which are the problem files.
Alternatively: Re-encode your mp3s, either all or the problem files only.
I have been having an intermitment problem with the music tab in that it works fine for most of the time but then suddenly when I open it I get the spinning circle at the top left and the whole thing has frozen. The only way to get it working is a soft reset.
It doesn't seem to be badly formatted mp3 as after the reset the file that was in the player will work again.
I transfer music from windows media player using the sync function.
It has never stopped working whilst playing only when I open the tab and I think a few times it has been when a track has been paused for some time.
Any ideas are welcome. . .
My music tab doesn't work properly every time after the device was connected via USB in external drive mode. The last played title keeps being displayed, the album it is in is shown in the library as well (as currently played items or however this the first list in the library is called in english) but nothing else is listed. And the little white circle keeps spinning and spinning... I let it spin for hours once but nothing happened. The SD card was formatted by the phone in the first place and I never get freezes once the player works properly.
After a soft reset everything works fine instantly but shouldn't there be a way to get it up and running without resetting everytime I use USB external drive mode???
ROM 1.66 GER, problem was present on clean ROM (before tweaks and tools), too.
Hi all
Uploading songs to HTC was a messy affair initially.Following are the lessons i learned the hard way.Hope these may come handy for a new user of this amazing phone:
Mistake 1:First i created a folder in Storage Card-->Music-->English and uploaded around 500 songs into it.The result was that the music player took ages to load and was extremely sluggish.
Lesson learned:Never upload more than few(20-25) songs in a single folder.
Mistake 2:Next i used Windows Media Player to sync the music with HD2.The syncing was super fast with songs automatically organized into artist folders.Neat.But wait,when i opened my music player,the albums were blank.The songs where there all in the storage card but some how the music player was unable to read them.
After many unsuccessful tips gathered from net,i finally solved this by copying all files from HD2 back to my PC and pasting them back to Storage Card-->Music-->English (of course after deleting all files from there first)
Lesson learned:Never sync with Windows Media Player(this also leads to few other problems)
Mistake 3:Use ID3v2.4 UTF-8 in Mp3tag.When i did this,HD2 was unable to show the album/file cover art.
Lesson learned:Use ID3v2.4 UTF-16 to tag the files if you want the album art displayed.
Why not use Automatic album art update?:The Automatic album art update in HD2 works like a charm but it always go for the lowest quality image.
Finally:
This is how i upload music files to get the album art display correctly:
Tag files with Mp3tag using ID3v2.3 UTF-16 (Tools-->Tags-->Mpeg.Check ID3v2.3 UTF-16 in "Write".Leave other options unchanged).
Active Sync HD2.
Explore-->My Windows mobile based device-->Storage Card-->Music.
Create a artist named folder in Storage Card-->Music-->English (or any other name of your choice).
Just copy and paste the song/songs of your choice into this.
It works just fine for me
Hope u too will find this useful !!!
very useful post thanks for sharing
should be made a sticky because it is actually a very common problem
thanks again
right no offence here but surley my method is easier, if your tracks are tagged properly which most peoples are create folder on storage card called music, i have mine like this
storage card >band name>album
pop them on the card.
album art rename the picture in the album to folder.jpg
works simple
I must be lucky. Never had a problem using Windows media Player to sync music to my HD2. Works flawlessly syncing to my MicroSD card. No extra steps required. Album art transfers fine for me too but I have noticed that the Update Album Art feature does sometimes provide better quality features.
trev666 said:
right no offence here but surley my method is easier, if your tracks are tagged properly which most peoples are create folder on storage card called music, i have mine like this
storage card >band name>album
pop them on the card.
album art rename the picture in the album to folder.jpg
works simple
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Isnt this exactly the same as what i said (minus the last step of renaming the picture)
over 60gig's worth of music is album art tagged (mp3 tag) and levelled out (mp3 gain) on my pc and using sync is sweet for me. after uploading an album to my phone i always refresh the sync button though as i once bricked my phone after putting 20 albums on all at once...
donwhann said:
over 60gig's worth of music is album art tagged (mp3 tag) and levelled out (mp3 gain) on my pc and using sync is sweet for me. after uploading an album to my phone i always refresh the sync button though as i once bricked my phone after putting 20 albums on all at once...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How much memory r u usin?
Also,an album may contain few singles with a diff cover art.But once we upload,the album art over writes it.U kno anyway 2 avoid this without putting singles into individual folders?
I have to completely dissent
The only sane way is trashing the builtin eye-candy media player and disable its tab, install mortplayer and copy your music over, wherever and however you prefer, then simply add it and press play
It's not like you're watching the animation of albums and songs passing by when you listen to your MP3s, you're most likely keeping it in your pocket with the display off.
If that's only for the sake of impressing friends, you may just keep the music tab and use it with 10 songs to show off the graphics
well,using a 3rd party software is the easiest way out....but i want to use the default player with full features on.
Also I want to see the album art while selecting a song and it completes the experience....nothin 2 do with impressing friends.
In btwn,Mortplayer indeed is a good player..... I liked GSplayer too...
nessqn said:
Hi all
[*]Tag files with Mp3tag using ID3v2.4 UTF-16 (Tools-->Tags-->Mpeg.Check ID3v2.4 UTF-16 in "Write".Leave other options unchanged).
[*]Active Sync HD2.
[*]Explore-->My Windows mobile based device-->Storage Card-->Music.
[*]Create a artist named folder in Storage Card-->Music-->English (or any other name of your choice).
[*]Just copy and paste the song/songs of your choice into this.
[/LIST]
It works just fine for me
Hope u too will find this useful !!!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So if I'm reading your instructions right, I have to create a folder of each artist then transfer the music over? Even if I do that which takes a lot of time, when you transfer the music over using activesync it tries to reformat the songs and that could take forever. Am I doing something wrong? Thanks, I'm brand new to WinMo.
I think to make the transfer of the files faster, use a card reader, load all the songs on the memory card, pop it back in, and off you go.
nessqn said:
well,using a 3rd party software is the easiest way out....but i want to use the default player with full features on.
Also I want to see the album art while selecting a song and it completes the experience....nothin 2 do with impressing friends.
In btwn,Mortplayer indeed is a good player..... I liked GSplayer too...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ok then, I stand corrected you alone can decide what you want your phone to be doing Me, I tried using manila player, but gave up after couple minutes, realizing that it just picked up the mp3s at its own leisure without me being able to control it in any way. Another manila tab off the hook
so i simply cannot put all my music into storage card>Music? i have to make new folders within music folder of each band name and album?? i guess my question is.. whats changed?? from touchflo 3d to sense??
because i uploaded my music just like that... on ym fuze.. and everything worked perfectly... and it was all under the music folder. no individual band names necessary... so did they change up something or what??
~~Tito~~ said:
I think to make the transfer of the files faster, use a card reader, load all the songs on the memory card, pop it back in, and off you go.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How is removing the SD card, load the songs then pop it back in different from connecting the phone to the computer and selecting the Disk Drive option instead of ActiveSync? Also, do you have to remove the back cover of the phone, not the batter cover, to remove the SD card? I had a hard time trying to pull that sucker out. Thanks.
wiggindude said:
So if I'm reading your instructions right, I have to create a folder of each artist then transfer the music over? Even if I do that which takes a lot of time, when you transfer the music over using activesync it tries to reformat the songs and that could take forever. Am I doing something wrong? Thanks, I'm brand new to WinMo.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ActiveSync-->Tools-->Options:see whether box for Media is unchecked.
wiggindude said:
How is removing the SD card, load the songs then pop it back in different from connecting the phone to the computer and selecting the Disk Drive option instead of ActiveSync?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think its the same...
nessqn said:
ActiveSync-->Tools-->Options:see whether box for Media is unchecked.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I checked the the Media box is checked. It got stuck at 89% transferring so disconnect the phone, connect using Disk Drive, delete everything under the Music folder and I am going to retry again. I have also put a movie under the Video folder but I couldn't locate it anywhere. I tried Pictures & Video, I tried looking at the document folder, nada...sigh.
wiggindude said:
I checked the the Media box is checked. It got stuck at 89% transferring so disconnect the phone, connect using Disk Drive, delete everything under the Music folder and I am going to retry again. I have also put a movie under the Video folder but I couldn't locate it anywhere. I tried Pictures & Video, I tried looking at the document folder, nada...sigh.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
keep the media box unchecked.otherwise the folder will be formatted each time u active sync with pc.
if u find it hard to create artist named folders on your own,sync using media player;it will do the job for you.But then sense music player may not detect the songs.If that's the case,try opening a single song with file explorer or phone media player.then soft reset.the songs may appear.for me it dint work as i mentioned in the first post.so i copied all folders in "music" to pc and deleted the folders in "music" and re pasted the folders to "music" from pc.
nessqn said:
keep the media box unchecked.otherwise the folder will be formatted each time u active sync with pc.
if u find it hard to create artist named folders on your own,sync using media player;it will do the job for you.But then sense music player may not detect the songs.If that's the case,try opening a single song with file explorer or phone media player.then soft reset.the songs may appear.for me it dint work as i mentioned in the first post.so i copied all folders in "music" to pc and deleted the folders in "music" and re pasted the folders to "music" from pc.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks. I will give this a try and report back.
OK. I followed nessqn's instruction and all the songs are there along with the album arts. But it freezes everytime I go to Music. I have to take out the battery or do a soft reset. Is it because it's trying to compile the library therefor it's slow?