Topic: POST IPOD SUPPORT QUESTIONS HERE (Read 52408 times)

SteveG · « **on:** October 21, 2003, 02:25:20 pm »

Hello All,

For anyone who is new to MC, please be sure to get the latest version from our downloads page or from the first thread on this board.

An excellent help file (thanks Adam) on using MC and iPod can be found here:

http://www.home.earthlink.net/~ashawley01/

For additional information, please check the previous help thread at:

http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?board=3;action=display;threadid=9539

For any issues not covered, please post below and someone will respond ASAP. Please copy and paste your system info from MC Help and include the version of the Portable Drive Plugin you use.

Thanks,

Steve
JRiver

markp99 · « **Reply #1 on:** October 21, 2003, 02:43:40 pm »

Any plans to support AAC visualizations??

udeups · « **Reply #2 on:** October 21, 2003, 03:29:57 pm »

Quote

udeups,

Try a reinitialize and make sure the data is correct in MC for some of the files with funky data.

Ok, I reinitialized and synced my playlists with iPod. Like Phil's last post in the other thread, I received the same results. The tag information on the files affected was good to begin with. To make sure, I backed up my library, cleared all last played and number plays information for all files. I then initialized the iPod, synched, played a few songs and then reimported to MC. All the files except the ones that got played had wildly erroneous values for the two fields. The ones that got played had correct information giving number plays of "1" and last played of "3 minutes ago" "7.3 minutes ago" etc.

It seems like a simple filter could be implemented (i know, I've said it before) that does the following:

IF Number Plays from iPod > 20 (or some arbitrary number that's sufficiently high enough to not be a realistic value) THEN skip update of MC tags.

IF Last Played from iPod < 0 or > (again a very very large number) THEN skip update of MC tags.

While that's not really solving the underlying problem, this would prevent people from jacking up their tags.

If I understand right, people see this same problem when they don't set the clock on the iPod. That's not the problem in my situation but, the above filter would keep those people from messing things up for themselves.

Anyway, that's my $0.02. Great work on the plugin, Steve. It's really come a long ways!

crowfan · « **Reply #3 on:** October 21, 2003, 05:23:12 pm »

my iTunes AAC file is still not playing on my iPod (build 285)

crow

bvm · « **Reply #4 on:** October 21, 2003, 06:00:23 pm »

In the old support thread, SteveG wrote:

Quote

The rating on iPod will overwrite MC only if you have the 'Sync iPod info to MC' checkbox enabled.

>> Only if I've listened to a song on the iPod should its rating be updated (assuming I listened to it prior to changing the rating).

I disagree. One can change ratings without listening to a song. Because it is possible that a user has the same song on iPod and in MC with different ratings, I think it is important to have the checkbox to give the user control over which rating should sync.

If I understand this correctly, it means I can rate songs on MC, or on my iPod, but not both (according to how I've set the synch checkbox). Indeed, today I changed some ratings in MC, and after I synched my pod the new ratings were gone. This doesn't seem like the right thing to do. Besides, in any case, I want to get the last played & nplays data from the iPod, so I have to have the box checked, which means I can never rate in MC. (I assume those two fields aren't problematic -- you should only update last played if it got newer, or nplays if it got bigger, right?)

So what's the right way to synch a rating? At the very least, I'd say a zero (absent) rating in one place should not overwrite a non-zero rating in the other. I could probably live with that. But I'm also inclined to agree with the other guy, that I only want the rating updated if I listened to the song since the last synch. On the iPod, unlike MC, the only way to get to the ratings widget is by playing the song. So the only way I can change a rating without the song showing up as having been played is if I play it, rate it, then switch tracks before it finishes playing (I'm assuming that's how it works, correct me if wrong). I am completely willing to have it be a requirement that I finish playing the song (even if just by fast-forwarding it) in order for its new rating to be seen.

How does iTunes manage this?

Phil Lee · « **Reply #5 on:** October 21, 2003, 06:31:32 pm »

Steve,

Good news to report so far. I spent an hour recreating my MC database. This reset all my play data. I then initialised my iPod and started synching music to it. After the first small synch I played a couple of tracks then synched again with a larger set of music. I then listened to some more music on the iPod and synched some more music. Both times the play data was updated successfully.

After the third synch I did get an error message to say that 7 tracks on the handheld were not in the database. They were displayed on the iPod with no Path, just the iPod drive letter and no file type. I got an error code 5 when I tried to delete them. I rebuilt the iPod database which removed these dead tracks. I then added the rest of my music.

I will report back tomorrow to let you know if the play count data is still working. If you like I can send you mt MC database which wasn't working.

BTW the first few synchs used the 282 build. The remaining ones used the 286 build.

ashawley · « **Reply #6 on:** October 21, 2003, 07:28:55 pm »

bvm:

I'm "that other guy"

and I'm with you.

Steve is going to tell us that this is why the "sync iPod info w/MC9 is a checkbox.

What you would in the situation you described above, is rate songs in MC9, uncheck this box, to get the rating info onto the iPod and then for any changes you make on the iPod, you make sure this is checked.

This to me at least is somewhat awkward. I have to then remember, "did I change any ratings in MC9?" before each sync. Also, if I did, I have to first remember to sync the iPod to MC9 so I don't lose my playcounts and last played data that may be on their.

Get it? It gets really complicated. That's why if we could somehow manage this buy a "last modified" field in MC9's database and match that w/a similar field in the iPod's database--things would be golden.

I haven't tested how this works in iTunes, but since you don't have the option of unchecking "sync iPod info w/iTunes" then they must do something like this....

Adam

cct1 · « **Reply #7 on:** October 21, 2003, 09:01:29 pm »

Still no luck on playing AAC files on my ipod with 186. They synch ok, and they play in MC9 ok, but they won't play on my ipod--they're just skipped over--these are all tune from the Itunes music store, on a freshly restored/initialized ipod...

Kurt Young · « **Reply #8 on:** October 21, 2003, 09:23:45 pm »

Quote from: ashawley on October 21, 2003, 07:28:55 pm

<snip!>
That's why if we could somehow manage this buy a "last modified" field in MC9's database and match that w/a similar field in the iPod's database--things would be golden.
<snip!>

A 'Last Modified Data Wins' rule, tested on each entry, during data synch. Perfect.

Quote from: ashawley on October 21, 2003, 07:28:55 pm

bvm:

I'm "that other guy" and I'm with you.
<snip!>

.bvm has been assimilated
.the collective grows
.you, too will be assimilated
.resistance is futile, yo

ndhunay · « **Reply #9 on:** October 21, 2003, 11:07:05 pm »

I'm having an interesting problem.

After I sync up with MC, I then eject my iPod. When I browse through my iPod, there is nothing there at all. but if I go to the Settings, I see that half of my ipod is full, but there are 0 songs.

If I reconnect my iPod to MC, I can see all of the songs on the iPod.

Any idea what is going on? BTW...I have build 279

rwf · « **Reply #10 on:** October 22, 2003, 07:24:35 am »

I also am having some "issues" with .286 ...

I bought a handful of tunes from the store - created a smartlist in MC9. First sync only checked that smartlist - it showed up on the pod, but all other lists were gone, thought everything was still there. The .aac tunes would not play

So - ran the Apple updater & reinitialized in MC9 - synced the .aac list and one other. Both showed up on ipod but again .aac tunes don't play. On the computer they play both from within itunes and MC9.

Reading another post, I then tried to see if they would play from the ipod, from MC9. But - MC9 locks up when I connect the ipod to the computer. I've tried it three times - computer 'notices' that ipod is connected, itunes opens & I tell it to 'go away' (are there things I should do in itunes?), it sounds like MC9 is reading the ipod, but the little blue "reading ..." (or whatever it says) never appears & nothing else happens from that point on. The hourglass and cursor arrow locked up the first time, just now I could move them, but couldn't do anything - not even use Ctrl+Alt+Delete to shut MC9 down.

Appreciate all the work going on to enable MC9 and .aac to play nicely. Hope I haven't left anything out. (20GB G2 ipod, XP sp1) - can't copy the details from MC9 as I'm on another machine.

bdjohns1 · « **Reply #11 on:** October 22, 2003, 08:54:48 am »

Quote from: rwf on October 22, 2003, 07:24:35 am

I also am having some "issues" with .286 ...

I bought a handful of tunes from the store - created a smartlist in MC9. First sync only checked that smartlist - it showed up on the pod, but all other lists were gone, thought everything was still there. The .aac tunes would not play

I had a similar issue with .286, although it appears to only be limited to purchased M4P files. I decided to give one a try, so I got my money's worth - Rhapsody in Blue (16+ minutes for $0.99). The file imports into MC9 successfully and plays successfully in MC9. It doesn't play, however, on my iPod (3G 10GB v2.1 firmware). On the same sync, I uploaded some M4A files I created myself (using the QuickTime/iTunes encoder). These sync'd and played fine.

NB: All of these files were loaded on the first sync after I did a re-initialize of the iPod.

crowfan · « **Reply #12 on:** October 22, 2003, 09:09:10 am »

All,

As a test (just to confirm), I resigned myself to the fact that I'm going to have to Restore my iPod, and loaded my iTMS songs using iTunes. They work fine, which seems to suggest that the DRM is the issue. MC can move the files, but iTunes must somehow authorize the songs for play, which MC doesn't do (yet

). Hopefully this will change at some point, and I can go back to using iTunes solely for the music store....

Just thought I'd post my experience.

crow

cct1 · « **Reply #13 on:** October 22, 2003, 09:23:23 am »

Quote from: rwf on October 22, 2003, 07:24:35 am

I also am having some "issues" with .286 ...

Reading another post, I then tried to see if they would play from the ipod, from MC9. But - MC9 locks up when I connect the ipod to the computer. I've tried it three times - computer 'notices' that ipod is connected, itunes opens & I tell it to 'go away' (are there things I should do in itunes?), it sounds like MC9 is reading the ipod, but the little blue "reading ..." (or whatever it says) never appears & nothing else happens from that point on. The hourglass and cursor arrow locked up the first time, just now I could move them, but couldn't do anything - not even use Ctrl+Alt+Delete to shut MC9 down.

You've got to disable Itunes so that it doesn't automatically start when your ipod is connected--hook up your ipod, open Itunes, and in help or options (can't remember exactly where) there is a place where you can disable Itunes from starting up when your ipod is connected--you have to disable it, because its on by default.......Once you do this, MC9 and Itunes can coexist peacefully, although Itunes appears to be very jealous....

cct1 · « **Reply #14 on:** October 22, 2003, 09:25:42 am »

Quote from: crowfan on October 22, 2003, 09:09:10 am

All,

As a test (just to confirm), I resigned myself to the fact that I'm going to have to Restore my iPod, and loaded my iTMS songs using iTunes. They work fine, which seems to suggest that the DRM is the issue. MC can move the files, but iTunes must somehow authorize the songs for play, which MC doesn't do (yet ). Hopefully this will change at some point, and I can go back to using iTunes solely for the music store....

Just thought I'd post my experience.

crow

Crowfan:

Once they're authorized in Itunes, can you remove them from the ipod, then can you get them to synch/play on the ipod by using MC9 to transfer? Have you tried this by any chance? Just a shot in the dark...

markp99 · « **Reply #15 on:** October 22, 2003, 09:27:12 am »

iTunes stole MC9's ratings...before I disabled iTunes loading upon iPod connection !! d'oh!! (library backups can be so handy!)

iTunes does not play nicely

crowfan · « **Reply #16 on:** October 22, 2003, 09:29:32 am »

cct1,

No, haven't tried that yet, but I will when I get home from work. I hadn't thought of that.

Thanks

crow

kadish · « **Reply #17 on:** October 22, 2003, 10:18:22 am »

Steve,

FYI, I synched my iPod (did restore and init first) with MC9.1.286 and I'm seeing a problem with iTunes purchased songs.

The songs show up but they are either only 1 sec in duration or the duration looks right but it only plays the song for 1 second.

Thanks for pursuing AAC support so quickly! It's *much* appreciated not having to resort to iTunes for song mgt of AAC files.

Eugene

rwf · « **Reply #18 on:** October 22, 2003, 11:11:15 am »

cct-

I figured there must be a way to tell iTunes to "sit down & shut up!" but I'm clearly overlooking something - I don't see anything that tells itunes not to open when ipod is connected except in the dialogue box that comes up upon connecting ipod with place for its name & box (which I unchecked) for auto sync at connection. And now that I've named it (but didn't register - do I need to?) the box doesn't come up when i plug ipod in.

When I look at options & preferences (Edit menu) nothing jumps out at me and nothing under Help menu seems relevant ... I'm obviously missing something since iTunes keeps coming back!

Any further guidance will be appreciated - thanks

cct1 · « **Reply #19 on:** October 22, 2003, 11:18:24 am »

The only other thing I can think of is you missed something when you installed it--I made sure every single thing was turned off in the installation wizard...The problem is I don't know how to get you back to the installation wizard without reinstalling Itunes. You might want to remove it and reinstall it, and carefully go through the wizard again,as well as disabling it from automatically coming up when your ipod is plugged in.

One thing--try not to access itunes when your ipod is plugged; just use it for the Itunes music store, when your ipod is not plugged in.....

rwf · « **Reply #20 on:** October 22, 2003, 12:07:05 pm »

cct-

thanks. I thought I was being careful, (having read of others' difficulties) I know that the box was unchecked each time it came up - but it kept coming back anyway. I had it co-existing w/MC9 for a while.

Hmm ... I'll work on it, uninstall, start all over and see what happens.

crowfan · « **Reply #21 on:** October 22, 2003, 12:44:37 pm »

rwf,

The only way I know of is to let iTunes mount the iPod when it's plugged in. Then you get those iPod buttons in the bottom-right of the iTunes window, one of them is the options button. Click that, and in there is the option to not start iTunes when you plug in your iPod. Unfortunately it means a Restore/Reinitialize and resync to get it to work again in MC....

Hope this helps

crow

rwf · « **Reply #22 on:** October 22, 2003, 01:03:37 pm »

crowfan-

That options button on bottom right corner of iTunes was what I hadn't seen - that's the missing piece! Will file that little nugget of knowledge away in the memory bank.

Just did that & restored - now onward to reinitializing & reloading.

thanks-

Phil Lee · « **Reply #23 on:** October 22, 2003, 01:04:05 pm »

Steve, so far my tests with the new MC library I created last night are going pretty well. I listened to 18 tracks at work today and have just synched my iPod. The play times and counts were updated successfully in MC and no data was corrupted. Unfortunately after the synch there were 3 files listed as just being on the H: driver (my iPod drive letter). I tried to delete them but got a -5 error the same as before. I had to rebuild the iPod database to get rid of them.

SteveG · « **Reply #24 on:** October 22, 2003, 05:13:26 pm »

Markp99,

No plans for AAC visualizations at this time.

udeups and Phil,

I think I have this fixed but I don't think it made it to today's build. It will be in tomorrow.

Crow and cct1, and bdjohns1, Kadish

This may work it 9.1.287, if not, in tomorrow's build. The problem was a mistake in the duration tag during import.

Adam and bvm,

Let me revisit this tomorrow.

Phil,

Let me check back tomorrow.

I have to run.

Steve

bdjohns1 · « **Reply #25 on:** October 22, 2003, 06:02:25 pm »

Quote from: SteveG on October 22, 2003, 05:13:26 pm

Crow and cct1, and bdjohns1, Kadish

This may work it 9.1.287, if not, in tomorrow's build. The problem was a mistake in the duration tag during import.

Steve,

9.1.287 didn't fix it. Same behavior - song comes up on iPod, select it to play, and it jumps back to the main menu immediately.

--Ben

crowfan · « **Reply #26 on:** October 22, 2003, 06:59:31 pm »

That's if you get it to work at all

No playing ofmusic, no handheld plugins with 287

Looking forward to 288!

crow

ashawley · « **Reply #27 on:** October 23, 2003, 12:26:51 am »

Steve we still have issues with missing playlists. Not sure why it's happening but it seems to happen very often.

Here is what I did tonight that caused missing playlists upon sync:

1. Ripped some tunes in MC9
2. Went to my Master iPod Smartlist, excluded an artist so that the smartlist would be below my iPod's size
3. Here's where I made a mistake: I clicked the iPod Toolbar icon directly from this smartlist after making my changes, so I never actually saved the changes..understand?
4. Sync'd. Received an error at the end, that the iPod was full
5. Clicked off of the Master Smartlist, was prompted to save it. DOH! Said I do myself. Saved the Playlist. Sync'd again.
6. No smartlists on the iPod.

So now I'm rebuilding the ipod database and I'll do another sync which should get the playlists on there.

I'm still on .286 BTW, running 2.1 firmware, but it worked fine last night.

Adam

SteveG · « **Reply #28 on:** October 23, 2003, 11:09:51 am »

Everyone,

When MC 9.1.289 becomes available, the AAC playback on iPod should be all worked out. You will need to reimport files AAC files that are in MC back into MC. The problem was that the Duration was listed as 0 which caused the files not to play on iPod. Keep in mind that if you reimport these files you should either reinitialize iPod or at least delete these files from iPod.

In addition, I found a bug based on Adam's post regarding playlists being deleted. His example pointed towards an error when the maximum space on iPod was exceeded. For anyone who was having a problem of disappearing playlists after exceeding the maximum space on iPod, I think this should be better now.

Also, the checking for valid data is improved when synching from iPod to PC.

Phil,

The '5' error means access denied. Check the permissions on those files. The fix that is included in build 289 may also resolve the files listed on a drive that you are seeing.

Adam, bvm and Kurt,

I am not crazy about the Date Last played filter on Ratings, because one can change Ratings without playing files all the way through which is the requirement for Date Last played to modify. With this solution users who modify ratings while not playing will have an incorrect result. The checkbox allows the flexibility for the user to either have MC control tag info on iPod (box unchecked) or to have iPod info control Rating and Date Last played in MC (box checked). I like the flexibility (but am on my last breath of fighting before assimilation

).

Steve

PS Can anyone tell me how you are getting the On The Go playlist to appear in iTunes?

Ric · « **Reply #29 on:** October 23, 2003, 11:15:57 am »

I still can't get MC9 to co-exist peacefully with iTunes. I tried setting iTunes to not load when the iPod is connected and to manually manage the iPod rather than autosync, but still whenever I highlight the iPod drive in MC9 it first gives me a dialogue saying I need to initialize the ipod, but when I click OK to that it hangs for a while then crashes.

If iTunes is installed, can MC9 no longer be used to manage the iPod?

Also, is there any way to synchronize ratings between iTunes and MC9?

Thanks,
Ric

gpvillamil · « **Reply #30 on:** October 23, 2003, 11:35:23 am »

Pls leave the checkbox for choosing whether to sync iPod data back to MC or not. The current functionality works fine for me. Maybe re-label it to make it clearer.

Hope this helps you hold your breath a little longer...

SteveG · « **Reply #31 on:** October 23, 2003, 11:56:34 am »

Ric,

iTunes and MC should coexist, but iTunes is a very controlling wife

. Seriously, iTunes does try to dominate the connection to iPod in subtle and not so subtle ways. At a minimum you should deactivate the iTunes 'Open iTunes when attached' checkbox (found when you click on the taskbar iPod icon in iTunes).

I am not sure why you are crashing after the dialogue telling you to initialize if you are successfully connecting with iTunes. If you are having problems there as well, try formatting your iPod from Windows (you will lose all data on iPod) and then disconnect and reconnect your iPod. After this you should be able to initialize and be OK. The next build of MC should handle whatever iTunes is doing better so that you won't see the crash.

To sync ratings, click on the iPod in the taskbar of MC and you will go to the synchronization dialogue. If you sync files with the 'Send iPod data to MC' you will get what you want. Alternately, you can right click on your iPod drive letter in MC and select 'Import iPod data into MC.

Kurt Young · « **Reply #32 on:** October 23, 2003, 12:09:53 pm »

Aye, Steve,

I agree that it's not possible to leverage the already-existing "date last played" field as a test to see which rating wins in an iPod vs MC contest -- for all the reasons that you've mentioned.

I think, and Adam can correct me if I'm wrong, that we're suggesting checking the last modified date of the file in MC vs the date/time that the rating was changed on the iPod.

Of course... ratings changes don't get saved to the .mp3 on the iPod, it's appended to a separate file. Does that file put time/date stamps on its appends? If not, or if there's no other way to get a "date/time rating was changed on the iPod" then we could use "date/time of last synch" to use as a test instead.

.kurt the unclear (having a bad day today)

Ric · « **Reply #33 on:** October 23, 2003, 12:20:06 pm »

Maybe I'll wait for the next build and try again.

As far as syncing ratings, when you tell iTunes to sync if the files were synced previously with MC9 rather than iTunes it will erase all the files on the iPod and copy them back rather than syncing, so whatever ratings had been put on the iPod by MC9 would be lost. I don't know if the converse is true. If not, ratings by iTunes should be transfered back to MC9 but not vice-versa.

It would be nice if MC9 could extract iTunes ratings directly from the MP3 file rather than relying only on the iPod to provide better syncronization between iTunes and MC9. Or ideally, if MC9 could use the same tag as iTunes such that both will always be in sync. (Although, iTunes doesn't seem to refresh tag info unless you remove the songs from the library and add them again, so this might not work all that well anyway...)

Snuffy2 · « **Reply #34 on:** October 23, 2003, 12:36:44 pm »

Repost from October 01, 2003:

I have a feature request associated with that:

I personally use MC at home to listen to music and rate songs, and I also use the iPOD. Right now, if I rate things on both MC and the iPOD and then sync I lose one or the other (usually the MC ratings because I want the Playcounts & Last Played to apply). So I'd propose Ratings Optioms for synching so that you can keep get the Playcounts & Last played, PLUS keep all your ratings.

I think there should be a set of three to five options for how you want to handle ratings and iPOD Synching. It could be another right click option similar so select artist field or in the sync options.

The ratings options should be (similar to a palm sync):
1. iPOD Overwrites MC
2. MC Overwrites iPOD
3. Highest Rating is Kept
4. Lowest Rating is Kept (Maybe)
5. Don't Transfer Ratings (Maybe)
And if your feeling ultra motivated add a feature like the palm to do an option once and then go back to your default (ie. if you normally keep your highest ratings, but this time wanted to overwrite all MC ratings with iPOD, it would do it once then revert back to highest for future syncs)

A Palm Sync Options Screenshot:

I think with those options, you could make everyone happy with the ratings.

Anyone else think it's a good idea?

SteveG · « **Reply #35 on:** October 23, 2003, 01:32:21 pm »

Kurt,

The problem is that iPod never updates the last modified date. You can play a file on iPod, change the rating, whatever and the last modified date apparantly doesn't change.

Quote

Does that file put time/date stamps on its appends?

No.

If I use the time of last sync, I will know when the Rating was sent to iPod, but still do not know which one to assign when synching data to MC.

For example..

Rating on iPod is different for file AAA on iPod compared to MC. Sync time is earlier than Modification time in MC. How do I know that iPod Rating should not be chosen?

It is possible that a user changed the Rating on iPod and wants it to overwrite MC, but no way to know that it was the last changed (because modification time does not update on iPod).

Ric,

Quote

It would be nice if MC9 could extract iTunes ratings directly from the MP3 file rather than relying only on the iPod to provide better syncronization between iTunes and MC9. Or ideally, if MC9 could use the same tag as iTunes such that both will always be in sync.

iTunes does not save the Rating information to the tag but rather to a database so extracting it from the tag is not an option.

Snuffy2,

Thanks for the suggestion. I do am not totally opposed but I wonder if it is necessary. We already have these options. Perhaps I should just try to make the options clearer.

1) iPod Overwrites MC (check 'Sync data to MC')
2) MC overwrites iPod (uncheck 'Sync data to MC')

"Do nothing" (regarding tags) used to be possible with the 'Update Tags' option deselected in the dialogue which would prevent Tag info from overwriting iPod. I could put this back (but Adam would be pissed

)In your example "Synchronize the files" is ambiguous. I would still need to decide which tags to use.

Snuffy2 · « **Reply #36 on:** October 23, 2003, 01:43:30 pm »

Quote from: SteveG on October 23, 2003, 01:32:21 pm

Snuffy2,

Thanks for the suggestion. I do am not totally opposed but I wonder if it is necessary. We already have these options. Perhaps I should just try to make the options clearer.

1) iPod Overwrites MC (check 'Sync data to MC')
2) MC overwrites iPod (uncheck 'Sync data to MC')

"Do nothing" (regarding tags) used to be possible with the 'Update Tags' option deselected in the dialogue which would prevent Tag info from overwriting iPod. I could put this back (but Adam would be pissed )In your example "Synchronize the files" is ambiguous. I would still need to decide which tags to use.

The "Synchronize the files" is a graphic from the Palm sync. I know it would need changes it was just a graphical example of what I was referring to.

I understand that
1) iPod Overwrites MC (check 'Sync data to MC')
2) MC overwrites iPod (uncheck 'Sync data to MC')
Exists, but the best one i think would be:
3. Highest Rating is Kept
I would use this a lot!

So I guess maybe just changing the Sync data to MC checkbox to a 3 option radio with:
1. iPOD Overwrites MC
2. MC Overwrites iPOD
3. Highest Rating is Kept
Would satisfy most users.

Possibly adding these would take care of everyone:
4. Lowest Rating is Kept (Maybe)
5. Don't Transfer Ratings (Maybe)

I know that unchecking the Update Tags (When it existed) option would have prevented the ratings from being transferred at all, BUT it would also have prevented the Last Played & Playcounts from transferring. I can see no reason why you wouldn' t want to transfer those over. However in order to transfer those over, you need to overwrite all of your ratings on MC with those of the iPOD.

So if you listed to 300 songs on your iPOD and rated 150 songs on MC and wanted to Sync and get the playcounts & last played from the iPOD and the ratings from MC, you couldn't do it. You could get 1 or the other. I'd like both!

ashawley · « **Reply #37 on:** October 23, 2003, 02:56:01 pm »

Well, my personal believe is that "last rated value" needs to win. Always. And I'll bet that this is what iTunes does.

Steve, would it be possible for you to get iTunes on a box at work and test with it? See how the iTunes DB is structured and how the iPod's database is handled?

I'm not using it anymore so I can't test this...but if anyone out there is still using it, it'd be nice to see how it handles rating changes and syncs.

Adam

bvm · « **Reply #38 on:** October 23, 2003, 03:23:53 pm »

Quote

If I use the time of last sync, I will know when the Rating was sent to iPod, but still do not know which one to assign when synching data to MC.

For example..

Rating on iPod is different for file AAA on iPod compared to MC. Sync time is earlier than Modification time in MC. How do I know that iPod Rating should not be chosen?

Can you tell when the rating (or anything?) was changed in MC? If so, then if it was changed in MC since the last synch, use the rating from MC. Sure, it's possible that the rating was changed in both places since the last synch, but if so, then you're worrying about a very low-frequency occurrence (assuming people synch relatively frequently), and besides, it's a case where you can't know what the right thing to do is (on the Palm, the software duplicates the record and tells you you need to pick which one to keep, but you don't have that option here :-)).

As for elaborate Palm-synch-like checkboxes, that's not the answer. It might give you lots of control, but no ease of use. I don't want to have to think hard about whether I've changed ratings on the iPod or MC (and remember that I can't do both!). And I still always want to synch the last played and #plays data back to MC, since they're not problematic.

For a short-term solution, I'll repeat my earlier suggestion that a zero (no-stars) rating on the iPod should never overwrite the MC rating. That would take care of 99.95% of my current objections. Once I have much more of my library rated, then I'll need a better solution, and hopefully you'll have come up with one by then :-).

(And since iTunes must have a way to do this right, surely there must be a solution.)

ashawley · « **Reply #39 on:** October 23, 2003, 03:54:56 pm »

Well, I take back my earlier suggestion...I'll put that nasty beast back on and play with it and see what iTunes does. Gonna take a while...but I'll do it..

Adam

Kurt Young · « **Reply #40 on:** October 23, 2003, 03:55:48 pm »

Steve,

I see where you're comin' from. I can dig that.

To tell you the truth, I'm perfectly content with 2.0.1 and 9.1.280. And the MediaOne skin,

crowfan · « **Reply #41 on:** October 23, 2003, 08:43:57 pm »

I posted this in the main build thread, but I'm posting here too.

iTunes AAC files still don't play on my iPod in build 289. After installing 289, I deleted the AACs from my library, reimported, Restored the iPod, reinitialized the iPod, synced my library. When I try to play the iTunes AAC files on the iPod, they skip to the next song.

Incidentally, I don't know if this matters, but just before the song skips, the remaining time shows up in the bottom right corner of the iPod screen, and it's one second longer than the duration of the song in MC. It's not seen as 0 seconds or 1 second (I'm thinking of Matt's comment about the iPod seeing the song duration incorrectly -- I don't know if the display matters though). Just thought I'd mention it.

crow

cct1 · « **Reply #42 on:** October 23, 2003, 09:11:13 pm »

Same thing for me on the AAC as Crowfan--this was on a freshly restored/initialized Ipod....

kadish · « **Reply #43 on:** October 23, 2003, 09:54:05 pm »

For what it's worth, same results with iTunes AAC files for me too. Cruises through each file (<1/sec) and then takes me back to main menu (I chose to play my 'all AAC files' playlist).

Eugene

ashawley · « **Reply #44 on:** October 23, 2003, 10:48:19 pm »

Steve (and everybody else that cares)

I did the test in iTunes:

I rated a song in iTunes, gave the same song a different rating on the iPod. Sync'd. iTunes rating one (i.e. it was applied to the iPod).

This happened regardless of the timestamp. Meaning, if I changed the rating on the song on the iPod after I changed the rating on the song in iTunes, iTunes still won.

So, the results are: iTunes wins when the rating is changed on the same song.

I personally think this is a good implementation...what say you folks?

RE: AAC. I've been able to upload and play AAC (M4A) songs on the iPod no problem. For what it's worth. These are tunes I ripped in iTunes.

Adam

bdjohns1 · « **Reply #45 on:** October 23, 2003, 11:10:46 pm »

Quote from: kadish on October 23, 2003, 09:54:05 pm

For what it's worth, same results with iTunes AAC files for me too. Cruises through each file (<1/sec) and then takes me back to main menu (I chose to play my 'all AAC files' playlist).

Same for me as well. Per Steve's advice over on the 'lounge, I even re-initialized. Still no dice on iTMS songs. Good news is that bitrates appear to be working on iTMS songs (and M4A as well) in MC9...

vph · « **Reply #46 on:** October 24, 2003, 01:50:00 am »

Everything works for me except the iTunes AAC files on the iPod (the ACC files do work on MC). Is it b/c I don't hold Galactic Citizenry?

Jonny5 · « **Reply #47 on:** October 24, 2003, 05:41:54 am »

Quote from: SteveG on October 23, 2003, 11:09:51 am

PS Can anyone tell me how you are getting the On The Go playlist to appear in iTunes?

Steve,
I did it by having my iPod set to automatic sync mode in iTunes.
I just created an on the go playlist on the iPod, docked it and it appeared in iTunes as On-The-Go 1 or something.

I'm still getting my playlists appearing as blank after syncing and unmounting the iPod. I'm not convinced this is MC though. Once I've got the ok to disco message up on the iPod if I press the play button it goes to the iPod main menu. If I then select the playlists option they are all blank. If I then reset the iPod (menu+play) it restarts and all my tunes & playlists are there correctly. I think this could be a problem with the 2.1 iPod software. Is anyone else getting this?

kiwi · « **Reply #48 on:** October 24, 2003, 07:07:01 am »

When you guys are playing with your AAC files, do the tags appear properly in MC?

If they don't, do they appear properly in the iPod after you've synced with MC? If yuo change the tags in MC, does the iPod choose the MC tags or the iTunes tags?

kiwi

waltercr · « **Reply #49 on:** October 24, 2003, 08:53:18 am »

When I sync, all my files get copied to teh IPOD. However, none of my playlists. All I have in my playlists is 2 entries. The first 1 is blank, and the second one is on-the-go. HOwever, I was trying to sync 5 playlists.

When I reset the ipod, I still dont have the playlists.

This just started happening (2 days ago). When I first syned the ipod with mc it worked fine (i was using the latest firmware on my new 40gb ipod). However, now it does not..

The only thinig I can think that changed was I installed itunes (therefore the ipodhelper service is running also)

Thanks!

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