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Author Topic: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?  (Read 3637 times)

maruf_65

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How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« on: December 23, 2006, 12:30:47 am »

Ya i just wanna know how should i tag albums with 2/3 cd (compilation CDS).

for example a album -- Dream Dance 41. it has 2 CD should i tag the album with
        Dream Dance 41 (CD 1)  &   Dream Dance 41 (CD 2) or what else?

just need a suggestion on this.


Its a good thing that now MC12 & WMP11 has same rating compatibility.
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JohnM

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #1 on: December 23, 2006, 01:55:56 am »

I'm using the Disc# field to separate the discs from each other. The album field is the same for all the disc#:s. When ripping I try to put all the files in the same folder regardless of the disc#. I consider 1 cd case = 1 album. 1 case may have several discs resulting in several Disc#:s. I tag the Disc#-field only for multidisc albums, generally...
This is the way I like it...

HTH
John
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Mr ChriZ

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #2 on: December 23, 2006, 05:44:45 am »

I'm using the Disc# field to separate the discs from each other. The album field is the same for all the disc#:s. When ripping I try to put all the files in the same folder regardless of the disc#. I consider 1 cd case = 1 album. 1 case may have several discs resulting in several Disc#:s. I tag the Disc#-field only for multidisc albums, generally...
This is the way I like it...

HTH
John


Same here =) Unfortunatley YADB doesn't support Disc # yet,
however it's coming soon apparently!  :)

JohnM

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #3 on: December 23, 2006, 08:18:18 am »

Quote
Unfortunatley YADB doesn't support Disc # yet,
however it's coming soon apparently!
That would be great!

John
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AustinBike

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #4 on: December 23, 2006, 09:07:58 am »

It depends on whether you ever want to listen to the whole thing straight through.  I tag all mine as 1-20 instead of disc 1 1-10 and disc 2 1-10.

Most listening is on the ipod and I appreciate having it all under one album instead of 2 and also, that gives me far fewer albums to scroll through.

If you do it as separate discs you can create a playlist to pull it all together.

Part of the concept of making it 2 spearate discs is flawed.  Anybody remember when we had vinyl and had side 1 and side 2?  That went by the wayside when CD's came out.  Now with more music being sold online, the concept of 2 different discs goes by the wayside.  I am guessing the artist doesn't think of it as 2 sets, but rather one collection.

But, hey, music tagging and classification is a very personal thing.
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Mr ChriZ

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #5 on: December 23, 2006, 11:01:52 am »

It depends on whether you ever want to listen to the whole thing straight through.  I tag all mine as 1-20 instead of disc 1 1-10 and disc 2 1-10.

Most listening is on the ipod and I appreciate having it all under one album instead of 2 and also, that gives me far fewer albums to scroll through.

If you do it as separate discs you can create a playlist to pull it all together.

Part of the concept of making it 2 spearate discs is flawed.  Anybody remember when we had vinyl and had side 1 and side 2?  That went by the wayside when CD's came out.  Now with more music being sold online, the concept of 2 different discs goes by the wayside.  I am guessing the artist doesn't think of it as 2 sets, but rather one collection.

But, hey, music tagging and classification is a very personal thing.

That's exactly why I use disc #.
I tell MC to play the album, it plays all discs in the album in order.
If I want to play individual discs I tell MC to filter by disc first....

If you use a different album name however
The Wall (CD 1)
The Wall (CD 2)

Then when you tell MC to play The first disc, the second disc won't play.
If you just order them by track number 0-20 as you suggest you loose information
because you don't have any idea which disc the tracks come from.
Some multi-disc albums you may want to jump straight through to the second disc,
because it's better.

BartMan01

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #6 on: December 23, 2006, 11:04:13 am »

Personally I use the 'Disc #' field and make the track numbers match the original media.  I then keep each disc in a separate directory for multi-disc sets: [Artist]\[Album]\Disc [Disc #]\[Track #] [Name]

There are pros/cons for each method so consider your needs over what essentially is an arbitrary/media driven scheme.  To some degree, I consider my digital music an 'archive' of my physical media so that drives the process.  One thing to consider (as another poster mentioned) is how you will consume the media and what limitation those devices have.  The one LP I currently have 'ripped' was converted to 'CD' style track numbering because most digital players have no concept of 'sides'.  Most digital players also have no concept of 'Disc #', so that may drive your final decision.
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Mr ChriZ

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #7 on: December 23, 2006, 11:10:49 am »

I guess if you wanted the best of the disc# world
and the ability to use it with devices that don't support disc #
you could do both.  Set the disc #, and then label the track
numbers 0-20 style, so that disc 2 might start on track 11 or whatever.
That way no information is lost, the discs ares kept together
in the same album.  :)

JohnM

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #8 on: December 23, 2006, 01:22:54 pm »

Quote
I guess if you wanted the best of the disc# world
and the ability to use it with devices that don't support disc #
you could do both.  Set the disc #, and then label the track
numbers 0-20 style, so that disc 2 might start on track 11 or whatever.
That way no information is lost, the discs ares kept together
in the same album.
Exactly! And to take it further use 3 numbers (or more, depending on the source) for the track#:s 1st disc -> 101, 102..., 2nd disc 201, 203... and so on. This is especially useful if you rip audiobooks and/or transfer to a portable device that doesn't support playlists and sorts everything alphabetically (in this case you have to have the track number in the file name).

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maruf_65

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #9 on: December 24, 2006, 06:36:06 am »

WEll may be I'm too lame but I dont understand what do you mean by "disc #". (or May be I Understand a little).

Sometimes I use Tag&Rename 3.3 for tagging, There I saw "disc #" field. By "disc #"-- did you mean that specific field. I also found the same field in winamp/wmp11

But does MC12 has that field? Actually I am not sure

Thanks for all your information & help
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Magic_Randy

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #10 on: December 24, 2006, 10:36:55 am »

what do you mean by "disc #

Disc # is for multi-disc albums.  It let's you manage a multi CD album as a single album.

Let's say you a 2 CD set - an example would be the Beatles White Album - you can tag it as disc 1 or 2 using the Disc # tag. This lets you keep the disc number out of the album title.

So instead of indicating the disc # in the title:
White Album (Disc 1)
White Album (Disc 2)

Both CDs are called:
White Album
White Album
A separate tag is used to indicate if it is disc 1 or 2.

This feature is not yet implemented in YADB, but it should be added soon.  So my guess is that most people do not yet use this feature yet.  Without YADB support, you have to do additional manual work when you rip a CD to clean up the Album titles and fill in the disc #.

Currently I put the disc # in the title.  When YADB supports disc #, I will switch over.

Whatever you decide to do, I would suggest you focus on consistency.  MC is very powerful when it comes to tagging.  So if you are consistent, you can quickly change your strategy by leveraging the MC strengths in this area.


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JohnM

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #11 on: December 24, 2006, 01:41:34 pm »

Hi!
Perhaps maruf_65 means how to display the Disc#-field... If so, when you have a list of (music)files (like the details-view in Windows Explorer) displayed, right click on one of the list column headers (see http://wiki.jrmediacenter.com/index.php/Screen_Parts and select Columns from the opening menu. In this menu you can select Disc# if you didn't have it displayed before. See more http://wiki.jrmediacenter.com/index.php/Customize_List_and/or_Thumbnail_View or in the help file.
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grahamk

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #12 on: December 27, 2006, 08:09:40 am »



I get the songs in order CD1 -> CDX and then use "Fill track numbers from list order" and then remove any CD1, CD2, etc nomenclature from the album title.

So, "The Wall" is one album. Instead of 2 CD with 10 tracks each, it's one CD with 20 tracks, in order.

Works for me....

Graham
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lalittle

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #13 on: December 27, 2006, 08:16:37 pm »

When you rip the second of two cd's in a two disc set, if you tag the second disc as "Disc 2" before you start the rip, does MC take care of numbering the tracks correctly starting from where the first disc left off?  In other words, if the first disc had 10 tracks, does MC automatically start the second disc with track "11," or does it start back at track "1"?

Thanks,

Larry
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Magic_Randy

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #14 on: December 27, 2006, 09:52:30 pm »

When you rip the second of two cd's in a two disc set, if you tag the second disc as "Disc 2" before you start the rip, does MC take care of numbering the tracks correctly starting from where the first disc left off?  In other words, if the first disc had 10 tracks, does MC automatically start the second disc with track "11," or does it start back at track "1"?

Larry,

Sorry to answer without knowing for sure, but my guess is no.  The reason I say that is the standard sort should be:
Album Name
Disc #
Track #

So there would be no need to start the track # on disc 2 where the track number on disc 1 left off.

I have a multi disc CD in transit.  When it arrives I will test this condition.

Randy
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BartMan01

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #15 on: December 28, 2006, 12:18:44 am »

When you rip the second of two cd's in a two disc set, if you tag the second disc as "Disc 2" before you start the rip, does MC take care of numbering the tracks correctly starting from where the first disc left off?  In other words, if the first disc had 10 tracks, does MC automatically start the second disc with track "11," or does it start back at track "1"?

Thanks,

Larry

No, it starts back at 1.  MC's default sort is Disc# Track# so the tracks all sort in the correct order.
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lalittle

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #16 on: December 28, 2006, 03:50:58 am »

No, it starts back at 1.  MC's default sort is Disc# Track# so the tracks all sort in the correct order.

Thanks.  Given this situation, my next question is whether or not the iPod utilizes the disc # field.  (I am not able to test this myself at the moment.)

Thanks again,

Larry
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BartMan01

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #17 on: December 28, 2006, 08:23:14 am »

In MC, my albums are tagged as disc #, track # (1-n for each disc).  Looking at the albums on my iPod, the tracks for multi-album sets appear in the correct order.
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Magic_Randy

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #18 on: December 28, 2006, 11:40:15 am »

Thanks.  Given this situation, my next question is whether or not the iPod utilizes the disc # field.

Larry,

You are correct, the iPod does use disc #.  I'm not using disc # myself yet.  I've been waiting for the YADB support before I switch over.  I did find the following as evidence.  J River fixed a bug in 11.1.194.

11.1.194 (8/16/2006)

1. Fixed: File ordering inside albums on an iPod could show up alphabetical instead of in disc # / track # order.

Randy
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Magic_Randy

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #19 on: December 28, 2006, 12:25:05 pm »

Thanks.  Given this situation, my next question is whether or not the iPod utilizes the disc # field.  (I am not able to test this myself at the moment.)
Larry,

OK, I tested it all the way through.  I changed existing albums in MC to use disc #.  Everything shows fine in MC (default sort works correctly).  When I sync the iPod, it works as expected. 

On both MC and the iPod, the sort is:
Album, Disc #, track #

So depending on what other projects come up over the holiday season, I may change everything over this week (and not wait for the YADB update).  I think this is a multiple step process.
1) Add disc # to all of my custom views
2) Fill in disc # for everything (most of mine are blank).  I don't think this is required - I believe MC treats blank as 1, but I will probably do it anyway.
3) Change the Album Title for all multi-disc albums - add disc # at this time
4) Raname files based on tags - this will move the files to the correct folder structure and delete the folders with Disc # in the name
5) Fix Cover Art - The cover art in the image directory needs to be corrected.  I keep cover art in the tag also, but like keeping it in the image directory as well.  I'm not sure if there is a way to take the images in the tags and automatically put them in the images directory, I'll figure that out when I get to that step.
6) Sync iPod

If I'm missing something, I would appreciate the feedback.

Randy
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Magic_Randy

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #20 on: December 30, 2006, 08:58:34 pm »

I finished converting my library to be based on Disc # instead of having disc # in the album title.

Everything went pretty much as planned, except the folder cleanup was more labor intensive. When I renamed files, the old folders were not deleted.  I had to manually clean them up.  I think this is because of iTunes adding cover art to these folders, so MC did not delete them - they were not empty.

I'm having trouble with one album now when I try to sync.  I get the message:

"You are attempting to transfer multiple tracks with duplicate information.  Would you like to remove the duplicates and continue with the transfer?"

This album is Thirty Days, a 17 disc set by the Beatles.  It's the making of Let It Be with lots of duplicate track information.  I don't know why MC fights me on this one.  This should, in my opinion, only be a warning message.  It should not stop me from syncing.  Also, I did not have this message when it was treated as multiple albums.  So maybe the checking logic is not checking if they are on different discs.  I can't imagine trying to fix the track/tag information.  I'll probably convert this one back to 17 albums instead of 17 discs for a single album.
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lalittle

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #21 on: December 31, 2006, 01:28:07 pm »

I'll probably convert this one back to 17 albums instead of 17 discs for a single album.

It would still be nice to know why it happened.  Is there perhaps some limit to the number of "disc numbers" the iPod can handle?

Larry
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Magic_Randy

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #22 on: December 31, 2006, 03:37:00 pm »

It would still be nice to know why it happened.  Is there perhaps some limit to the number of "disc numbers" the iPod can handle?
Larry,

I did change it back and the problem went away.  I reported it as a separate issue.  I don't think it is an iPod issue.  I think the problem is the MC checking logic.  I believe the check is based on duplicate tags and it is not considering the disc # tag. 

I also had issues with 2 other albums after I converted over.  They were smaller (typical 2 disc sets) so I just manually changed the tags to make them unique across discs.

Randy
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lalittle

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #23 on: December 31, 2006, 08:10:42 pm »

Larry,

I did change it back and the problem went away.  I reported it as a separate issue.  I don't think it is an iPod issue.  I think the problem is the MC checking logic.  I believe the check is based on duplicate tags and it is not considering the disc # tag. 

I also had issues with 2 other albums after I converted over.  They were smaller (typical 2 disc sets) so I just manually changed the tags to make them unique across discs.

Randy

I'm a bit confused.  I thought you were saying that some albums worked with the "disc #" tag and some did not.  If so, can you think of anything that seperates the albums that didn't work from the ones that did?  I don't understand the idea of MC "not considering the disc # tag."  Are you saying that "sometimes" it didn't consider the disc # tag?

Thanks,

Larry
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Magic_Randy

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #24 on: December 31, 2006, 10:01:57 pm »

I'm a bit confused.  I thought you were saying that some albums worked with the "disc #" tag and some did not.  If so, can you think of anything that seperates the albums that didn't work from the ones that did?  I don't understand the idea of MC "not considering the disc # tag."  Are you saying that "sometimes" it didn't consider the disc # tag?
Larry,

I converted about 50 multi-disc albums over.  Before the change, none of them used the disc # tag.  The disc # was part of the album name.  None of these albums created any problems during sync (e.g. they were not reported as having duplicate information).

After I converted the ~50 albums to use disc # in the tag, and not in the album title, I had trouble with 3 albums.  1 of the three is the 17 disc album I referenced before.  The other 2 albums were 2 disc sets.  Each of these albums had two versions of the tracks, one in mono and the other in stereo.  The mono was on one disc, the stereo on the other disc.  When I tried to sync, they were reported as having duplicate information.  For these 2 albums, I changed the track name to indicate they were xxxx (mono) and xxxx (stereo).  This fixed the problem.  This is why I assumed that the check is comparing tags but not including the disc # tag.

So when I say MC is not considering the Disc # tag, I just mean it is not using the disc # tag when trying to identify duplicate information.

Randy
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lalittle

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #25 on: December 31, 2006, 10:56:17 pm »

So when I say MC is not considering the Disc # tag, I just mean it is not using the disc # tag when trying to identify duplicate information.

Randy

Thanks for the clarification Randy -- I see what you're saying now.

Larry
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Magic_Randy

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #26 on: December 31, 2006, 11:19:49 pm »

Larry,

I wanted to let you know that I'm really happy I changed my tagging strategy to use the Disc # tag instead of using disc # in the album title.  It really helped to clean up my library and makes it easier to play these multi-track albums.  Everything works as expected, with the one exception I reported regarding the duplicate information check.  If you are planning on using the Disc # tag, I would say it is safe to proceed.

Randy
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lalittle

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #27 on: January 01, 2007, 04:30:11 am »

Thanks Randy.  Based on the information here, I plan to switch over to the "disc #" method of multi-cd album organization as soon as I get a chance.

Larry
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Magic_Randy

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Re: How should I tag albums with 2/3 CD?
« Reply #28 on: January 01, 2007, 12:14:29 pm »

1) Add disc # to all of my custom views
2) Fill in disc # for everything (most of mine are blank).  I don't think this is required - I believe MC treats blank as 1, but I will probably do it anyway.
3) Change the Album Title for all multi-disc albums - add disc # at this time
4) Raname files based on tags - this will move the files to the correct folder structure and delete the folders with Disc # in the name
5) Fix Cover Art - The cover art in the image directory needs to be corrected.  I keep cover art in the tag also, but like keeping it in the image directory as well.  I'm not sure if there is a way to take the images in the tags and automatically put them in the images directory, I'll figure that out when I get to that step.
6) Sync iPod

Larry,

I'll update you on my procedure.  This is based on what I actually found when making the change.

Step 1 - I also had to update the sort for my custom views. 
Step 2 - No change
Step 3 - I combined this with step 4 and made a manual list of albums being changed as I progressed.
Step 4 - as noted, this was combined with step 3.  However, I had to do some folder cleanup.  I did this as a separate step.
Step 4a - New step.  Using my manual list, I went back and verified if the old folders were deleted.  Most of them were still there.  They were not deleted by MC because they contained some cover art .jpg files.  I don't know how these files came to exist (Maybe iTunes or something like that). All of my Cover Art is in a separate images folder, so I just manually deleted these old folders.
Step 5 -Using my manual list, I went to my images folder and manually cleaned up the cover art.  Of course I had multiple files for each album, one for each disc as disc # was part of the album name.  So I renamed the first on to eliminate the disc # and deleted the rest.
Step 6- No change

Good luck - I think you will like it.

Randy
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