Topic: POST IPOD SUPPORT QUESTIONS HERE (Read 66454 times)

mindracing · « **Reply #100 on:** January 06, 2004, 08:13:16 pm »

Quote from: asrjcb on January 06, 2004, 08:00:19 pm

I am choosing to sync my music library which consists of about 3700 songs (versus manually doing it). I'm right clicking on my ipod drive letter in the "CD, DVD, & Handhelds" section of MC's left pane and choosing "Synchronize". In one of the check boxes, I select all. When MC shows the "Sync Progress" window, it says it's syncing playlist entry xxxx out of 14837.

I don't have 14837 songs - what does this mean? Are there duplicates? Did I select something wrong to have MC auto sync all my files?

Also, should I check the Sync info with MC box in the lower right? What does this do if I do.

asrjcb

Sync info box will transfer times played and ratings info from the iPOD to MC.

The large number of (14837) playlist entries is exactly that - playlist entries not songs.

If you have one song in 10 different playlists it will show 10 playlist entries.

Sounds like you're doing everything correctly. Welcome to the board.

rhaehnel · « **Reply #101 on:** January 06, 2004, 09:28:18 pm »

I figured it out!. It appears that MC will not play AAC/m4p/m4a songs that have filenames over a certain number of characters. I had one file:

M:\MP3\My Morning Jacket\My Morning Jacket - Steam Engine (Sessions@AOL) - Single - 01 - Steam Engine (Acoustic).m4p

which didnt play, so I shortened the filename and replayed it ... voila, it played! I shortened it to:

M:\MP3\My Morning Jacket\My Morning Jacket - Steam Engine - 01 - Steam Engine.m4p

I've tried this technique w/ several files and every one that I had problems w/ now plays w/o incident.

This also explains why I couldnt play the songs on the ipod, since MC uploaded them to the ipod w/ a 0:00 song length. My only question then is why they played w/in iTunes?!?!?!

I forgot to mention that the songs needed to be deteted from the library and reimported(so MC could recalc the song duration)for them to play on the iPod.

steve-
Is there a chance, when importing and playing AAC files, MC could send the filename in shortened (8.3 esque) notation?

bdjohns1 · « **Reply #102 on:** January 06, 2004, 09:56:46 pm »

Quote from: asrjcb on January 06, 2004, 08:12:14 pm

I have a 5 day old, 3rd generation iPod. Every time I go to sync my library of 3700 songs, I run out of battery. I only have 4 pin firewire. The battery only lasts about 2.5 hours at best.

Is this normal? I thought the ipod got 10 hours (maybe not during file transfer)?

Will I be able to fix this if I go to 6 pin firewire?

Yes. You need to supply power for any kind of extended sync. The iPod's battery life is based on maximizing use of a memory cache. Skipping around tracks and such that causes the hard drive to spin up more shortens your life from the 8-hour number (not 10) Apple quotes. You should get 8 if you load a playlist and just go straight through it (shuffle is ok - the cache works with that), but don't jump around the list.

MartinH · « **Reply #103 on:** January 07, 2004, 10:07:45 am »

Quote from: rhaehnel on January 06, 2004, 09:28:18 pm

I figured it out!. It appears that MC will not play AAC/m4p/m4a songs that have filenames over a certain number of characters.

Sorry, I could've told you that. Haven't been reading the topic lately

.

I thought it was a known issue, though, as MC uses Quicktime to play AAC files and the like and I'm sure there's an issue with QT not being happy with files with a name longer than 30 characters. Can anyone back me up on this or have I been hallucinating?

.

kdm · « **Reply #104 on:** January 07, 2004, 07:43:20 pm »

2 things:

1. MC 9 hangs or gives an error when I try to sync to my iPod. Some details are (let me know what others you might need):
MC 9, iPod plugin both updated in the last month (I'll check version #s and post when I get home to my machine tonight),
my files are in .ape format and I'm converting to MP3 on the fly,
the hanging always happens with the display showing it had just finished encoding a file, and the errors are always in some nonreadable characters (square blocks).

2. I like the suggestion Nick or someone had about a way to keep files in .ape format but copy and convert them to .mp3 files to another location, for subsequent fast uploading to the iPod. I assume there's no way to do this now? Seems like MC9 kind of sort of does it anyway through the conversion on the fly method.

Thank you for your help. I am otherwise extremely happy with MC9.

asrjcb · « **Reply #105 on:** January 07, 2004, 08:29:30 pm »

I'm on my third attemp to auto sync my music library of about 3700 songs to my new 40GB iPod. I select all in the sync options and let it go.

With so many files, I have to sync some files, recharge, and go back to syncing again. When I go back, MC just copies the names of the files to the iPod, not the file itself. So I'm left with a random music library on the iPod -- some that have files and some that have only names. When I try and delete the entries without a file location on the iPod (so only a name) I get a file delete error -5. It has happend to me 3 times so far and each time I've reinitialized the iPod and started over because I can't delete the bogus entries.

Can anyone help. I'm getting ready to manually drag files over.

mindracing · « **Reply #106 on:** January 08, 2004, 02:41:44 am »

I would start by just having one playlist that contains all of your music.

Sync just that one playlist first. All your songs should transfer OK.

Then sync your other playlists, which will require no file transfer as the songs will already be on the iPOD.

BTW, start with an initialise iPOD first.

Post how you get on.

fysmd · « **Reply #107 on:** January 08, 2004, 06:30:41 am »

I have a lot of tunes on my 40GB iPod, pu there via MC9.1 which now have (Multiple Artists) for their Artist entry in the DB, looking at the tags shows that the actual artis data is intact.

What's happened and how do I get the real artist data back?

packyb · « **Reply #108 on:** January 08, 2004, 12:19:48 pm »

i just uploaded a bunch of songs to my 30GB iPod - using the 10 beta from a few days ago (I am uploading the current beta now).

A strange thing happened after the final group of files were transferred to the iPod. There was a pop-up that said "Please Wait: Saving Database", which just hung, and froze the computer. I unplugged, re-booted several times, and everything seems to work normally, but not sure what happened. (Not sure of the relevance, but I store my files on my pc in .ape, and they are converted to mp3 VBR (High) when sent to the iPod.)

rjcrum · « **Reply #109 on:** January 08, 2004, 05:55:49 pm »

Hi,

Kind of a weird situation and set of problems here, but hopefully someone can help!

We gave my son a 10GB iPOD for Christmas. He's been accumulating mp3s from various places (both legal and of-questionable-heritage) for about a year. His PC runs WinME, so iTunes and the iPOD updater software doesn't even install on his system. However, Media Center v 9.1 runs fine, and I chose that to be his iPOD music manager.

Since we left town the day after Christmas, I transferred all of his mp3s (about 400) to my wife's laptop, which runs WinXP and has a Firewire connector. While on vacation, I installed the iPOD software and iTUnes on the laptop, got the iPOD initialized and working with iTunes. He 'cleaned up' his music library (the downloaded mp3s had HORRIBLE tag information) and ripped an additional roughly 35 CDs to add about 500 more songs to his library, which now totals about 900 songs.

We got back home, and I connected the iPOD to his WinME machine via Firewire, got it initialized through Media Center (had to choose the right bloody "D:" drive to right click on to get the initialize menu. You should clean up the documentation to note the "correct" drive letter to click on in the tree...) which worked and erased his music from the iPOD.

I then transferred the roughly 900 mp3 files from the laptop to his computer, imported them into Media Center, did a right-click 'synchronize' to the iPOD, chose the "All Music" playlist...and all 900 songs went to the iPOD.

Now here's the problems and questions:

1. Many of the artist and album titles on the iPOD and in MC now have garbage in the first two or three characters. In other words, instead of "emimem" it displays as "~xxmem", where the ~xx appear to be some weird special characters from the upper reaches of the ASCII code set. Since all the tags were modified and/or created by iTunes, and the mp3s imported straight into MC, is this an artifact of iTunes not correctly writing the tags? Anybody know if iTunes has mp3 tag problems?

EDIT: This problem is fixed. I reinitialized the iPOD, resynced and all titles, etc were OK.

2. My son created some 'special' genre descriptions, like 'hella good' and 'old rock'. After doing the transfer into MC, those genres disappeared. Again....does iTunes somehow not write the genre properly, or if MC sees a 'non-standard' genre on import, does it ignore it?

EDIT: My mistake. These were PLAYLISTS that he created. I can see how to export the playlists from iTunes in XML format, but how can I get that into MC??

3. I selected the option on the iPOD menu in MC to "Eject iPOD on close" (or something like that). I assumed that meant that the iPOD would be 'ejected' and made safe for removal from it's dock when MC closed. It doesn't work; the iPOD stays connected with the display reading "Do Not Disconnect" after MC closes. I have to select the 'eject hardware' icon in the system tray to close the iPOD and take it out of the dock.

4. I also chose the option in the options setup menus to "autosync" the handheld on connection, assuming that when the iPOD was docked, MC would start a synchronization process. It didn't work. Did I misunderstand the purpose of 'autosync handheld when connecting"?

EDIT: This now seems to work. I started MC, docked the iPOD, and got a nice message asking me if I wanted to sync.

5. I must admit that I think iTunes has a very elegant and simple interface. Is there any way to configure MC to eliminate a lot of the 'clutter' in the left hand navigation tree? We don't need video, pictures and a lot of the other stuff there, and I think the UI could be a lot friendlier if some of that stuff were optional.

Thanks in advance!

tboi · « **Reply #110 on:** January 09, 2004, 04:42:00 am »

I'm using MC 10.0.28 beta to manage my music collection on my iPod. While I have no trouble playing AAC files that I bought from iTunes in MC, when I sync them with my iPod in MC, they don't play on my iPod. When I try to play them on my iPod, the iPod locks up for a second and returns to the main menu.

I assume that the problem has something to do with copy protection. Anyone have any advice?

Thanks,
Doug

P.S. Apologies for posting twice on this thread and the MC9 board

Pepper · « **Reply #111 on:** January 09, 2004, 05:53:09 am »

Artist display: Right click on your ipod in MC, you can choose from a menu what field to use for artist tags (Album - Artist(auto)/Artist etc)

Why are people needing to stop the sync process to charge out of interest? If you are using the usb/firewire cable and syncing over usb you can also have the firewire part of the cable plugged into your mains adapter to charge whilst syncing. If you are using firewire to transfer then i'd look at getting a new firewire card that can supply a charge to your iPod, I just bought one with USB2 and firewire ports from dabs.com in the uk for 20 quid.

fysmd · « **Reply #112 on:** January 09, 2004, 09:25:34 am »

Quote from: Pepper on January 09, 2004, 05:53:09 am

Artist display: Right click on your ipod in MC, you can choose from a menu what field to use for artist tags (Album - Artist(auto)/Artist etc)

I assume this is in response to the (multiple artists) question. I've made this change and it's reduced the number of tunes shown as (multiple artists) from over 1,000 to approx 300. While this is progress, there are still a large number of tracks left in this state which are not tagged as such

Quote

Why are people needing to stop the sync process to charge out of interest? If you are using the usb/firewire cable and syncing over usb you can also have the firewire part of the cable plugged into your mains adapter to charge whilst syncing. If you are using firewire to transfer then i'd look at getting a new firewire card that can supply a charge to your iPod, I just bought one with USB2 and firewire ports from dabs.com in the uk for 20 quid.

I have the same problem with my laptop which has a 4pin FW interface and USB1.1

Not a good combination but I bought a "FireJuice" cable which resolves it nicely. It's a Y cable, tail goes into the iPod , one other end to 6pin FW for power and the other 4pin FW to the laptop.

SteveG · « **Reply #113 on:** January 09, 2004, 05:24:30 pm »

Everyone,

Thanks for helping each other out.

Pepper,

Did things work out with the new card?

rhaehnel,

We use Quicktime to play AAC, and the filelength is a limitation of Quicktime. I tried passing files to quicktime with the 8.3 conversion, and they still refused to play.

MartinH,

Yes this is a Quicktime limitation. I can't speak to whether or not you are hallucinating

kdm,

Can you confirm the versions of MC and plugin you have? If you can, test with MC 10 (latest build) I reworked this code recently.

asrjcb,

I did not design MC to allow for the possibility of an unplug and reconnect of iPod during an extended sync. What do you think of the other suggestions here?

fysmd,

What field have you selected for the Artist field when you right click on your iPod drive letter?

packyb,

Not sure. Were you able to repeat it?

rjcrum,

item 3 - I will have to double check this on ME next week.

item 5 - Right click on the item in the tree and select 'Delete View Scheme' to remove items you don't want.

Doug,

Try sending one file to iPod with iTunes. Then reinitialize and send files with MC. There is a copy protection file which must be written to your iPod from iTunes to allow playback. Do this one time and you will not have to do it again.

rjcrum · « **Reply #114 on:** January 09, 2004, 05:58:49 pm »

Steve,

Thanks for the response on items 3 and 5. Sorry I missed the "Delete View Scheme" thing!

As for Item 2...how do I import an iTunes generated XML playlist into MC???

RemyJ · « **Reply #115 on:** January 09, 2004, 08:40:12 pm »

After installing 10.0.31, a sync attempt causes MC to disappear. Went back to 10.0.30 and it works again.

btvillarin · « **Reply #116 on:** January 10, 2004, 02:22:41 am »

Been awhile to post back, but I just realized something...

I was out tonight, and I was listening to this one song. I must've listened to it all the way through twice even.

I just synched right now, and checking that same song, it didn't update, saying I haven't played it in days.

I'm going to eject my iPod and play another song all the way through and see if it updates. But yeah, I thought something was fishy...I heard the same song twice in my smartlist that shouldn't contain songs played in the last 7 days.

Thanks!

btvillarin · « **Reply #117 on:** January 10, 2004, 02:43:13 am »

I double checked my iPod, and it was more than a few minutes off. I changed that and made sure that it was no more than a minute behind my computer. (I think that's what ashawley suggested.) I made sure my iPod wasn't set to DST. Using MC 9.1.316, and iPod plugin 9.0.89. Now, the playing time is over an hour off when I just played the song 2 minutes ago.

Steve?

btvillarin · « **Reply #118 on:** January 10, 2004, 03:15:00 am »

Just to top it off, I initialized my iPod (since a rebuild messed things up, and I had to restore a previous library backup). Then, I sync'd my songs back onto my iPod, played that same MP3 all the way through, and sync'd again. No dice, the songs showed that it wasn't played in over an hour. (It wasn't exactly an hour, it was an hour and like 4 minutes.)

neo · « **Reply #119 on:** January 10, 2004, 07:48:13 am »

Steve, all:

Well, I am reporting back. Basically, I have had no discernable problems with syncing to date. Only once have I been able to cause the disappearing playlists problem, as follows:

* Init pod
* Sync pod
* Every change you can imagine, on both sides, including:
Import files
Delete files
Modify library information (same file on both sides)
Modify smartlist criteria
Create smartlists
Delete smartlists
Rename smartlists
* Sync pod

In all other cases, syncing has been perfect (I have not specifically checked the time issues).

Thanks Steve!!! :)

n

mindracing · « **Reply #120 on:** January 10, 2004, 09:53:27 am »

Steve,

For about 4 weeks I have had nothing but success with the iPOD plug-in.

Today I downloaded 2 more Audible books and synched them to the iPOD.

The non-playing problem occurred. Not only did the new files not play but none of the AA files that were already on the iPOD would play either!

I deleted them with MC and then uploaded with Audible manager. Files played OK but MC wouldn't recognise iPOD.

Formatted iPOD and initialised from within MC. Transferred Audible files - all play.

This must have something to do with Audibles security checking.

Incidentally, after formatting the iPOD and then opening MC the 'not formatted for MC' box opened. On clicking OK MC closes (this is with Auto sycn enabled. MC won't open with the iPOD connected if the iPOD has not been initialised by MC.

I had to remove iPOD, open MC, uncheck Autosync and then connect iPOD before I could initialise it.

I appreciate that the AA support is not a top priority as most MC and iPOD users probably don't need it but it is just all that is stopping <C from being a OneStop ipod app.

serf · « **Reply #121 on:** January 10, 2004, 10:01:41 am »

So the key to AA files for now seems to be download through Audible Manager first, then reformat iPod, reinitialize iPod in MC & transfer via MC?

mindracing · « **Reply #122 on:** January 10, 2004, 10:25:21 am »

It seems that way but then I have to re sync the whole thing which takes a couple of hours.

Not ideal.

mindracing · « **Reply #123 on:** January 10, 2004, 01:41:29 pm »

See this thread for plug-in wish list.

http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?board=3;action=display;threadid=18359

jhelmus · « **Reply #124 on:** January 10, 2004, 02:38:40 pm »

I have had no major problems using my ipod until today. I am using build 10.028.

I did a sync of my ipod and i had a power surge in my building. after i rebooted there were a couple of files that are in my MC library that will not play. all of them are .aac files. when i play them in itunes no problem.

i tried deleting the files from MC library and then reimporting them. they show as bit rates of zero and they wont play...they just skip to the next song.

it is not that this happens with most of the other 200 .aac songs...just these few.

i next initialized my ipod and then used itunes to drag and drop these songs to my ipod. they play just fine on my ipod and in itunes. they just seem to be unrecognizable in MC.

i am not sure what to do now. i love MC--there has to be a way to get this working again...the files worked before as they got on the ipod originally that way via MC.

Media Center Registered 10.0.28 -- C:\Program Files\J River\Media Center\

Microsoft Windows XP Workstation 5.1 Service Pack 1 (Build 2600)
Intel Pentium 4 2658 MHz MMX / Memory: Total - 523 MB, Free - 172 MB

Internet Explorer: 6.0.2800.1106 / ComCtl32.dll: 5.82 (xpsp1.020828-1920) / Shlwapi.dll: 6.00.2800.1276 / Shell32.dll: 6.00.2800.1233 (xpsp2.030604-1804) / wnaspi32.dll: N/A
Ripping / Drive D: Copy mode:Normal CD Type:Auto Read speed:Max
Digital playback: Yes / Use YADB: Yes / Get cover art: No / Calc replay gain: Yes / Copy volume: 32767
Eject after ripping: No / Play sound after ripping: No

Burning / Drive D: HL-DT-ST RW/DVD GCC-4240N Addr: 1:0:0 Speed:24 MaxSpeed:24 BurnProof:Yes
Test mode: No / Eject after writing: Yes / Direct decoding: Yes / Write CD-Text: No
Use playback settings: No / Normalization: None

sirshambling · « **Reply #125 on:** January 11, 2004, 04:46:36 am »

MC Build 31 crashes when attempting to synch Ipod.

Confirming contributor to main Build 31 thread - but thought it ought to be posted here as well to let Ipod owners beware.

gpvillamil · « **Reply #126 on:** January 12, 2004, 04:45:42 am »

I'm using MC9.1.316 - can I continue to update the iPod plugin from the J River website? How do I find out what version I'm using on my PC?

mindracing · « **Reply #127 on:** January 12, 2004, 05:10:31 am »

The latest plug-in is now always bundled with the latest MC10 beta and is often posted in the plug-ins page too, once it is known to be stable.

To check, go to tools/plug-in manager/handheld/portable drives. This will show the iPOD plug-in details.

Mine shows 9.089 running MC10.0.30.

Dave T · « **Reply #128 on:** January 12, 2004, 08:30:16 am »

I'm trying to transfer about 18 gig of mp3's to my 20 gig IPod. I'm transcoding them to VBR Normal/Low, in order to get them to fit. I also have "Normalize" set.

After running about 14 hours, it's only transferred about 4 gig of files. At this rate, it will take more than two full days to complete.

So, my question is - is this normal? I assume the slowness is from the transcoding. Does anyone else transcode their files while transferring? I haven't seen any other complaints about this, but I can't imagine that others are seeing this kind of speed and finding it acceptable...

- Dave

SouthsideIrish · « **Reply #129 on:** January 12, 2004, 11:35:26 am »

Quote from: serf on January 10, 2004, 10:01:41 am

So the key to AA files for now seems to be download through Audible Manager first, then reformat iPod, reinitialize iPod in MC & transfer via MC?

Everything was working fine until .30 or .31 when I lost the ability to transfer Audible files. I don't plan on doing the above procedure every time I want to transfer so I fixed it by going back to MC9.

Bill McNair

SteveG · « **Reply #130 on:** January 12, 2004, 12:14:25 pm »

rjcrum,

In regards to the XML, MC can import XML in asx format. I do not think iTunes can export in that format.

RemyJ and sirshambling,

10.0.31 broke the synchronization. 10.0.32 should repair it.

Bryan,

Did the time change from before to after the sync ( even if incorrectly)? If so it is a clock issue. I just tested this and it seems to be working OK. Yes you can continue to use the plugin. To verify the version on your PC, go to Tools->Plugin Manager->Handheld->Portable Drives.

Ash,

Almost certainly this is a security issue. I will try to create a workaround.

jhelmus,

Are the filenames for these files greater than 50 characters? Try playing them from within Quicktime. My guess is they won't play. We use Quicktime for importing and playback of files and quicktime has a filename length limitation.

Dave,

Quote

So, my question is - is this normal? I assume the slowness is from the transcoding.

Yes. Try doing a similar conversion within MC (not on the fly) and let me know if the speed is different.

Steve

jhelmus · « **Reply #131 on:** January 12, 2004, 12:27:54 pm »

Quote from: SteveG on January 12, 2004, 12:14:25 pm

jhelmus,

Are the filenames for these files greater than 50 characters? Try playing them from within Quicktime. My guess is they won't play. We use Quicktime for importing and playback of files and quicktime has a filename length limitation.

Steve

the thing is that these files played before...now they don't. i will check the filename. one thing to note is that when i am clicking on the E: drive (ipod) and find the songs that are the culprits, i can listen to them by double clicking on the song name there--it plays in media center.... but media center skips by the song when trying to play it from the music library, not the E: drive.

Dave T · « **Reply #132 on:** January 12, 2004, 01:31:48 pm »

Quote from: SteveG on January 12, 2004, 12:14:25 pm

Dave,

Quote
So, my question is - is this normal? I assume the slowness is from the transcoding.

Yes. Try doing a similar conversion within MC (not on the fly) and let me know if the speed is different.

Steve

So, "yes" - this is normal? Over 2 days to transcode mp3's to fill a 20 gig IPod? Is this something that most people find acceptable? Or, is it something you plan to fix? I can't imagine that people would be ok with this - perhaps most people aren't transcoding. I find it neccessary - I rip at a very high bit rate for playback on my stereo, but don't mind higher compression to fit more songs on the IPod.

Thanks.

- Dave

SteveG · « **Reply #133 on:** January 12, 2004, 01:32:37 pm »

jhelmus,

Did you by chance delete and reimport these songs into MC? That could explain what you are seeing.

Steve

rhaehnel · « **Reply #134 on:** January 12, 2004, 01:35:35 pm »

jhelmus-

I just recently ran into this problem also. Do the offending files have a '0' for both a bit rate and a length? If so, make sure that the file names are less than 30 characters and delete them from your library and remiport them(this forces MC to recalc the length and bitrate).

<<
the thing is that these files played before...now they don't. i will check the filename. one thing to note is that when i am clicking on the E: drive (ipod) and find the songs that are the culprits, i can listen to them by double clicking on the song name there--it plays in media center.... but media center skips by the song when trying to play it from the music library, not the E: drive.
>>

bvm · « **Reply #135 on:** January 12, 2004, 03:26:06 pm »

Quote from: SteveG on January 12, 2004, 01:32:37 pm

Did you by chance delete and reimport these songs into MC?

Steve, you've mentioned this several times over the last few months as a possible source of synch problems. Could you elaborate a little about what it is we need to avoid doing? I assume you're at least talking about the simple case of (1) user deletes file from MC, but not from the disk, then (2) changes mind and imports that file back into MC, all without having done a synch between (1) and (2).

Does the issue only come up if it's the exact same file? Exact same file name on disk? Some important tags being exactly the same? You've talked about each track on iPod being assigned some unique ID internally, but no indication of where that ID comes from. I doubt I'll ever be doing what I described in the previous paragraph, but I can certainly imagine re-ripping a CD, in which case I might delete the old files, re-rip, and adjust the tags in such a way that they somehow look like the same file to you.

rhaehnel · « **Reply #136 on:** January 12, 2004, 04:16:40 pm »

steve-

Would it be possible to write a plugin for MC that would update play counts on the iPod when MC plays songs from an iPod that is listed under the 'Drives and Devices' tree?

A large percentage of my music listening is done at work w/ the iPod via the 'Drives and Devices' tree and it would be great if my play counts and last played data could be updated on the iPod.

I'd be willing to write the plugin if its possible(or the API's could be enhanced so it was possible).

Pepper · « **Reply #137 on:** January 12, 2004, 06:19:54 pm »

Steve,

Yes my crashes appear to have stopped since using the new fire wire card, but have to admit to not running the full syncs from empty I was doing before. If I'm feeling brave I may do one this weekend...

RemyJ · « **Reply #138 on:** January 12, 2004, 06:48:38 pm »

New - Date Opened: 2004/01/12 Priority: Medium
(Also posted in Beta thread) If 'Show files at root' is unchecked for iPOD, only the Playlists tree is populated. Artists, Albums, and Genres are all empty.

jhelmus · « **Reply #139 on:** January 12, 2004, 07:23:07 pm »

Quote from: bvm on January 12, 2004, 03:26:06 pm

Quote from: SteveG on January 12, 2004, 01:32:37 pm
Did you by chance delete and reimport these songs into MC?

Steve, you've mentioned this several times over the last few months as a possible source of synch problems. Could you elaborate a little about what it is we need to avoid doing? I assume you're at least talking about the simple case of (1) user deletes file from MC, but not from the disk, then (2) changes mind and imports that file back into MC, all without having done a synch between (1) and (2).

Does the issue only come up if it's the exact same file? Exact same file name on disk? Some important tags being exactly the same? You've talked about each track on iPod being assigned some unique ID internally, but no indication of where that ID comes from. I doubt I'll ever be doing what I described in the previous paragraph, but I can certainly imagine re-ripping a CD, in which case I might delete the old files, re-rip, and adjust the tags in such a way that they somehow look like the same file to you.

Well i finally got the files to play by going in and renaming them to get below the 30 character limit...the weird thing is that there is another file that had more than 30 characters that was working alright.

Basically i needed to go back in and change my rename files from properties settings for MC.

Thanks Steve and bvm for your help.

Dave T · « **Reply #140 on:** January 13, 2004, 08:41:02 am »

SteveG:

You replied to some earlier questions without answering mine. If you don't mind... Please?

Meanwhile, I now have a more insidious problem. Sometime during the day yesterday, during the 15'th - 20'th hour of copying files to my IPod, MC crashed. About 5 gig of files were transferred.

Now, when I go back into MC and try to copy my playlist again, it sits there for about 10 seconds, skipping through the files already on the IPod, and then MC shuts down. It doesn't "crash", the window just goes away, as if it was exiting cleanly on purpose.

So, boy, this is getting frustrating. All I'm trying to do is transfer enough mp3's to fill the IPod. Nothing fancy, except perhaps for the transcoding, but surely lots of others want to transcode too. I can't get it to work at all, and even if it did work, it seems like the time it would take would be unacceptable to anyone. Is anyone else transcoding? Can you get MC to copy all your files to your IPod without crashing?

Thanks.

- Dave

mindracing · « **Reply #141 on:** January 13, 2004, 09:08:32 am »

Certainly it will fill an iPOD without crashing.

The iPOD is sensitive (I have found - and others) to the firewire connection. It was only after upgrading my firewire firmware that I could synch with confidence.

I would reformat if you had a crash and go from there.

WRT transcoding I know it can be slow. Synching is not particularly slow however. I would try a couple of format conversions with MC and THEN sync them to the iPOD. See if it is any quicker.

Whatever program you use will take time to transcode AND synch.

The first time is always the worst as it involves thousands of songs. After that it's just synching a few.

Dave T · « **Reply #142 on:** January 13, 2004, 11:13:42 am »

Mind:

Thanks for the suggestions!

I'm not confident that a reformat will change anything - I'm already on my third "reformat and try again" iteration. But, perhaps transcoding first and then synching has merit. So, if you don't mind - could you tell me how to do that? How do I tell MC to transcode my entire library and create new mp3's in a different directory, while leaving the originals alone, and then add the files from that library to my IPod? Seems that I'd be creating dups of all my songs in my library. I guess I'd want to have it create a seperate library, so I'd have two libraries - "normal", and "shrunken". Is that what you're suggesting?

- Dave

mindracing · « **Reply #143 on:** January 13, 2004, 11:28:25 am »

Dave T,

You could make a second library but it's not really necessary as the files will be of a different type so can be easily found and deleted later, if necessary, or filtered out in views.

Select the file you wish to convert and Right Click choosing Library Tools/Convert format.

Click options and ensure that Send Original to recycle bin is unchecked. This will preserve your original.

Click OK and then choose your format and away you go.

Dave T · « **Reply #144 on:** January 13, 2004, 11:51:26 am »

Mind:

Thanks for the guidance! But, I'm still not there yet.

First of all, in what sense would the files be a different type? I'm talking about taking "Highest quality VBR" mp3's, and converting them to "Normal/Low quality" mp3's. The format is still mp3? And, since they're VBR, you can't look at the bit rate either - MC shows different bit rates for VBR files.

Secondly, since I want to convert ~all~ my mp3's, having MC put them in the same directory as my existing ones, and then having to put filters on all my views to hide the dups, sounds pretty messy. Even assuming that there would be a way to identify the new files with filters, etc, I think I'd want to keep them seperate. Is there a way to have it make the copies in a different place?

Finally, how would this work going forward? You implied that it would only be time consuming the first time, and that it would be ok going forward as I added songs. That would imply that there would be some way to selectively tell MC to only make transcoded copies of songs that it hadn't already transcoded.

Thanks again.

- Dave

mindracing · « **Reply #145 on:** January 13, 2004, 12:58:47 pm »

Once you have your library on your iPOD you can then revert to 'on the fly' transcoding without converting first.

Once you're in the convert options dialogue you can click Encoding and choose you file type and bit rate.

Once the files are on the iPOD just deete the converted ones and then use on the fly conversion thereafter.

This won't actually speed things up but is likely to be more reliable if your firwire is playing up.

You can easily filter them in any view by filtering on bit rate and or date created as the down rated ones will be newer.

btvillarin · « **Reply #146 on:** January 13, 2004, 01:19:59 pm »

Quote

Did the time change from before to after the sync ( even if incorrectly)? If so it is a clock issue. I just tested this and it seems to be working OK. Yes you can continue to use the plugin. To verify the version on your PC, go to Tools->Plugin Manager->Handheld->Portable Drives.

Steve,

What should the clock be set to on my iPod and computer? Both are set to PST, and the iPod is a minute slower than my computer. Should it be the other way around? With the current settings, it's still an hour off or so.

Bryan

rjcrum · « **Reply #147 on:** January 13, 2004, 01:46:14 pm »

Steve,

Any word on MC being able to 'eject' the iPOD on Windows ME?

Bob

TarbhUisge · « **Reply #148 on:** January 13, 2004, 08:06:29 pm »

Is there a method for getting the playlists on an iPod back into MC?

Example: I am using my iPod as a drive (so I've imported all the songs into MC) and I can view the iPod playlists from the Handhelds section but I would like to 'bring' those PLs back into MC. The origin of this is because I noticed that is I play a song on the iPod via the Handhelds section is does NOT recognized the analysis settings of the file (it does it I import them but I can't seem to 'easily' recreate the playlists...)....

Any help is greatly appreciated...

Thanks-Tim

bbogart · « **Reply #149 on:** January 14, 2004, 12:23:22 am »

Maybe it's just me but I am having a lot of trouble getting anything onto my iPod in the first place. I send the files to the iPod. Go to the manager and hit transfer. MC says it's doing it, and claims success... but when the process finishes there are no files on the ipod. I have tried formatting, but I don't know what else to try. I though maybe synching would work better but I can't figure out how to do that either. Any help appreciated. (MC 9.1)

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