Topic: MC iTunes Synchronizer (using MC with an iPhone or iPod Touch) [v6.0.2] (Read 494991 times)

rjm · « **Reply #800 on:** March 02, 2012, 10:36:43 am »

Quote from: Magic_Randy on March 02, 2012, 10:15:41 am

A couple of suggestions.

If you are OK with having the whole large library in iTunes (270,000 tracks) I suggest you import everything in iTunes using the standard iTunes import to establish the initial library. Then synchronize with MCiS.

I don't use the feature, but I think you can synchronize a subset of your large library using a playlist. That may be a better approach for you. Use the /Playlist command line argument to limit the scope of the sync to one playlist. I'm not sure how it treats tracks in iTunes that are not in scope of the sync. Hopefully it does not delete them. If this is an important point for you (preserving your existing iTunes library) you may want to back it up before you try this sync method.

Thanks for the idea. Don't think it will help however since watching MC iTunes Synchronizer operate it seems that the first step it does is to load the whole MC library. This surprised me since I specified mp3 only in the options and mp3s are perhaps only 25% of my library yet it still loads the whole thing. Also, most of the balance of my MC library are files iTunes does not handle like pdfs and video.

prod · « **Reply #801 on:** March 02, 2012, 10:44:02 am »

You're on the right track - but like Randy says you need to use the /Playlist command line argument. This will set the scope of your sync - NO other tracks other than those in the playlist you specify will be touched.

You don't need to import all your MC stuff into iTunes. Just set an MC playlist up that contains only those tracks you want to sync (i.e. the 60,000 you have in iTunes), and specify that playlist in the /Playlist command line argument. That should sort your memory problem.

When MCiS starts it builds a dictionary of tracks in memory from your MC library. This is so it can very quickly correlate your iTunes library with your MC library. Anything else would slow it right down. Using the /Playlist argument means you reduce the required size of this cache considerably.

MCiS will not delete any tracks from your iTunes library (or your MC library for that matter). It WILL clear up broken links, however, if you ask it to (it's a setting in the Settings dialog).

Quote from: rjm on March 01, 2012, 11:39:25 pm

1) Fields to export from MC to iTunes

Some of the choices seem to be standard iTunes fields but non-existent fields in MC. For example: Track Count, Disc Count, Sort Artist, Sort Album, Sort Name, Sort Album Artist, and Sort Composer. I do not understand what happens when I select one of these. How can they export from MC to iTunes if they do not exist in MC?

Similarly, Mix Album is an MC field but not an iTunes field. What happens when Mix Album is selected? I do want Compilation to be set in iTunes when Mix Album is set in MC. Do I need to select Mix Album for this to occur?

Most of the fields that can be sync'd use an expression to get the corresponding field from your MC library. This expression can be viewed or modified by right-clicking the field name in MCiS.

Quote from: rjm on March 01, 2012, 11:39:25 pm

2) Import files to iTunes of types:

I have a small subset of my 270,000 MC files in iTunes. I do not want to add any more files from MC to iTunes. My understanding is that if I do not select "Import files to iTunes of types" then no more files will be added to iTunes. Correct?

Yep, that's correct.

prod · « **Reply #802 on:** March 02, 2012, 10:45:47 am »

Quote from: rjm on March 02, 2012, 10:36:43 am

Thanks for the idea. Don't think it will help however since watching MC iTunes Synchronizer operate it seems that the first step it does is to load the whole MC library. This surprised me since I specified mp3 only in the options and mp3s are perhaps only 25% of my library yet it still loads the whole thing. Also, most of the balance of my MC library are files iTunes does not handle like pdfs and video.

It iterates through your whole library looking for mp3's. Only the mp3's will be cached.

EDIT: ...and it's only iterating through your whole library because you've not used the /Playlist command line argument to tell it not to.

Perhaps start with setting up a smartlist containing only mp3's and specify that.

rjm · « **Reply #803 on:** March 02, 2012, 10:08:39 pm »

Magic_Randy and prod, thanks for your help.

I got it working and I am very pleased with the results!

For any new user reading this thread here is my take on MCiS. There are times when it is handy to have a properly tagged collection of music in iTunes, such as when AirPlay is required, or when syncing an iDevice that MC can't handle. But iTunes is brain dead for tagging and MC is a thing of beauty for tagging. So with MCiS you can do all your tagging in MC and then transfer the tags to iTunes. Also, when properly applied, the Compilation tag in iTunes can turn a mess into a nicely navigable collection. MCiS sets the Compilation tag in iTunes using the Mix Album tag in MC, which is exactly what you want.

Here are some details of my experience.

1) MCiS can choke on really large libraries. The solution to this problem, as suggested above, is to create a smartlist in MC with the subset of files you wish to sync, and then pass this smartlist to MCiS as a command line parameter. The solution works but is fussy.

1a) Given the nice u/i for setting other options I do not understand why the clunky command line is used for such an important option.

1b) I was unable to get the command line to work with a nested smartlist like /Playlist:"Playlists\Smartlists\Tools\iTunes Sync". But when I moved the smartlist up to the root like /Playlist:"iTunes Sync" it worked fine.

1c) Even when filtering down from 270,000 to 60,000 files MCiS still choked about half way through with error: "The message filter indicated that the application is busy. (Exception from HRESULT: 0x8001010A (RPC_E_SERVERCALL_RETRYLATER))". Fortunately the changes up to that point stuck in iTunes so when I restarted MCiS it only had to finish the last half. All subsequent syncs completed to 100% without problems. So if you are going to see problems, they will probably occur on the first pass.

2) Syncing is slow. About 1 file per second. I suspect, but am not sure, that this is due to iTunes and not MCiS. Fortunately syncing is only applied to files with differing tags. It zips through those files that don't need to be synced quickly. In my case I wanted to sync Compilation from Mix Album and only 10,000 of my 60,000 files needed to be synced. About a 3 hour operation.

3) A nice presentation of media in iTunes can be messed up by obscure, frequently hidden tags. For example, if inconsistently applied within an album, Disc # and Album Artist can mess up the track sort order. Because MC is so nice for tagging you can find and fix these glitches in seconds with MC, then re-sync the offending tag with MCiS, and voila, your iTunes collection is perfect.

All in all a nice addition to my media toolkit. I will be happily paying for an unlocked version of MCiS.

rjm · « **Reply #804 on:** March 03, 2012, 12:20:32 am »

Well that's disappointing. Just did an integrity check on my media and it seems that the tags for every file that was synchronized have been rewritten. Rats.

I'm guessing that iTunes writes tags when they change. Any chance iTunes can screw up MC tags? There's no way for me to check 12,000 files for errors.

Can someone please shed light on what's going on here?

prod · « **Reply #805 on:** March 03, 2012, 03:32:03 am »

iTunes doesn't allow you to control which tags are written to the file like MC. Some it writes, some it doesn't - I don't have a definitive list. Not sure what you mean when you say the tags are rewritten - overwritten? With spurious values or same or different values? I've not heard reports of iTunes touching tags other than those it specifically uses.

Thanks for your comments, I agree the command line arguments need bringing in to the UI. Nested playlists in the /Playlist command line option seems to work fine here. Unfortunately it's beyond my ability to make iTunes fast, stable and good... I've been meaning to make general improvements for a while but day job and young family take up much of my spare time nowadays. I'll get round to it soon.

Regarding speed, the first sync is the slowest as there are some one off processes occurring. Subsequent syncs should be faster.

rjm · « **Reply #806 on:** March 03, 2012, 08:18:10 am »

Quote from: prod on March 03, 2012, 03:32:03 am

iTunes doesn't allow you to control which tags are written to the file like MC. Some it writes, some it doesn't - I don't have a definitive list. Not sure what you mean when you say the tags are rewritten - overwritten? With spurious values or same or different values? I've not heard reports of iTunes touching tags other than those it specifically uses.

Thanks for your comments, I agree the command line arguments need bringing in to the UI. Nested playlists in the /Playlist command line option seems to work fine here. Unfortunately it's beyond my ability to make iTunes fast, stable and good... I've been meaning to make general improvements for a while but day job and young family take up much of my spare time nowadays. I'll get round to it soon.

Regarding speed, the first sync is the slowest as there are some one off processes occurring. Subsequent syncs should be faster.

Thanks.

When I say tags are rewritten I mean iTunes updated changes I made to the tags in the mp3s. I told it to set Compilation hoping it would not touch my mp3s. It seems to think the mp3 tag should be updated when Compilation changes.

MCiS is plenty good enough as it stands. My comments reflected possible polish.

elprice7345 · « **Reply #807 on:** March 04, 2012, 04:00:52 pm »

Quote

Have you tried scheduling it during the evening and watching what it is doing? If iTunes is in the middle of something it doesn't necessarily respond to a shutdown request. I've noticed this myself when shutting down my computer with iTunes loaded.

When the scheduled task runs while I'm logged in, it always closes iTunes. If it runs while the screen is locked, sometimes it closes iTunes and sometimes it doesn't.

Not a big deal, but certainly an annoyance.

Any suggestions?

Ed

broncodan · « **Reply #808 on:** March 29, 2012, 02:04:06 pm »

Hi,

I am getting the following error. Before this I received an error with an old plugin which I have since disabled. Not sure if this had anything to do with it or not:

Result EndDateTime="2012-03-29T12:01:53">Could not access J River Media Center. Retrieving the COM class factory for component with CLSID {572802D5-FBF6-4C30-89CA-BDF2CE4AEC2B} failed due to the following error: 80040154.</Result>
</MCiS>

Any suggestions? Thanks.

broncodan · « **Reply #809 on:** March 29, 2012, 02:09:02 pm »

Nevermind - updated MC to current version and that must have fixed the error caused by the plugin - as it works now. Thanks again for this great program.

Magic_Randy · « **Reply #810 on:** March 31, 2012, 12:59:34 pm »

Hi prod,

Quick question for you.

I'm thinking of getting an iMac with Parallels Desktop so I can still run the handful of critical applications that are only available for Windows. I would be using my media (pictures, music, movies...) with both Mac & Windows applications which I should be able to do if I have Parallels Desktop.

In this scenario I would be using MC and MCiS in Windows. Would I also have to use the Windows version of iTunes?

prod · « **Reply #811 on:** March 31, 2012, 01:21:53 pm »

Yes, MCiS will only work with the windows version of iTunes.

Magic_Randy · « **Reply #812 on:** March 31, 2012, 01:25:59 pm »

Quote from: prod on March 31, 2012, 01:21:53 pm

Yes, MCiS will only work with the windows version of iTunes.

That's what I thought. Do you know if I can use the Windows version of iTunes to sync my music and the Mac version of iTunes to sync the rest (e.g. apps, pictures, etc.)?

prod · « **Reply #813 on:** March 31, 2012, 01:56:41 pm »

I'm not exactly sure... I've heard that iTunes Mac & PC will read the same library as long as you allow iTunes to organise your files from the default itunes folder and never load the two iTunes at the same time. The database file however in iTunes Mac has no filename extension so that has to be allowed for, but the internal db structure is common in both Mac and PC. The problem lies with duplicating the path structure for both file systems - that's why you need to force it to organise from a folder where it will use relative paths.

All stuff I've read but never tried myself - if you try it I'd be interested in hearing how you get on.

Magic_Randy · « **Reply #814 on:** March 31, 2012, 03:40:44 pm »

Thanks prod.

If I get the iMac I'll report back what I find.

If it requires me to let iTunes organize my files I'd give up and just use the Windows version instead of the Mac version.

rhgh · « **Reply #815 on:** April 11, 2012, 01:04:40 pm »

If I change the sequence of songs in a mc playlist, the changes are not reflected in the itunes list.
is there a possibility, I would like to make any changes in mc

prod · « **Reply #816 on:** April 12, 2012, 12:28:47 pm »

Right-click the playlist in MCiS and turn on the Rebuild option. This will rebuild the playlist each time in the same sequence.

WayneM · « **Reply #817 on:** April 26, 2012, 10:37:40 am »

Had a few hiccups getting MCIS running, but now figured it out and I'm very happy. But I do have a couple of questions:

I've paid my registration and received my license key. But the key doesnt seem to "stick". Each time I start MCIS, I get the nag screen and have to re-enter the key.

Also, each time I start MCIS, I have to re-set all the settings (on the main screen and on the "settings" page). They dont seem to "stick" from the previous run.

Am I doing something wrong?

Thanks
Wayne

prod · « **Reply #818 on:** April 26, 2012, 02:06:21 pm »

Hi Wayne

MCiS must be having a problem saving your settings file, the license info is also saved in there. Make sure you have create/read/write access in the folder from where you're running MCiS (that's where it tries to create it).

BartMan01 · « **Reply #819 on:** May 13, 2012, 04:52:58 pm »

Suddenly getting this for every track during the read in of the MC tracks.
<MCCacheError Name="TrackName" Album="AlbumName" Artist="Artist">Values length is 1</MCCacheError>
...repeated for every track in library...
<Result EndDateTime="2012-05-13T16:47:39">Could not find any tracks in MC.</Result>

TrackName/AlbumName/Artist are the actual values, not those words.

Any thoughts/suggestions. Can't think of anything that changed except maybe the MC update to 17.0.147.

Edit: Tried re-running the install of MC, also rebooted. No change after either.

Edit: Looks like there was an expression editor change. The expression:

If(IsEqual(FilePath(),\\ZEUS\Audio\iTunes Downloads,

, [Filename], C:\Music\iTunes Library\Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace([Artist]|||[Album],<,_),>,_),:,_),",_),\,_),//,_),?,_),*,_),|||,\),|,_)\Replace(Replace([Filename (name)],.flac,.mp3),.ac3,.mp3),.\,\)

Going to post in the main forum to see if anyone can help with what changed in the expression editor.

Now gives the return of 'Expression Error (Unknown)'

Final edit: There was an issue with the expression. Not sure why it worked prior to .147 - but .147 didn't like it. New and working expression is:

If(IsEqual(FilePath(),\\ZEUS\Audio\iTunes Downloads,

, [Filename], Replace(C:\Music\iTunes Library\Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace(Replace([Artist]|||[Album],<,_),>,_),:,_),",_),\,_),//,_),?,_),*,_),|||,\),|,_)\Replace(Replace([Filename (name)],.flac,.mp3),.ac3,.mp3),.\,\))

olinbg · « **Reply #820 on:** May 21, 2012, 08:45:02 pm »

One small suggestion would be to show the # of tracks importing in to iTunes - something like "Importing files into iTunes (40 of 208)..."

I never know how long the imports will take. Like I said, it's a small thing.

prod · « **Reply #821 on:** May 22, 2012, 03:50:38 pm »

Hi importing files is done in one batch call to iTunes and it doesn't give any feedback, so it's not possible to give a status unless I split the batch into chunks. I suppose I could do that, it'd be slower but maybe it's worth the performance hit.

BartMan01 · « **Reply #822 on:** June 18, 2012, 01:32:37 am »

Suddenly having a weird issue. Getting lots of error messages like:
<FileNotFound Pathname="C:\Music\iTunes Library\TV Theme\\TV Theme ~ Mission Impossible.mp3"/>

The iTunesFileKey for that track is "C:\Music\iTunes Library\TV Theme\TV Theme ~ Mission Impossible.mp3" and the file exists as "C:\Music\iTunes Library\TV Theme\TV Theme ~ Mission Impossible.mp3"

What am I missing/doing wrong? Seems to be happening to all tracks without an 'album'.

prod · « **Reply #823 on:** June 18, 2012, 01:57:23 pm »

Quote from: BartMan01 on June 18, 2012, 01:32:37 am

<FileNotFound Pathname="C:\Music\iTunes Library\TV Theme\\TV Theme ~ Mission Impossible.mp3"/>

There are two consecutive backslashes between "TV Theme" and "TV Theme ~ Mission ...". You probably need to test for that empty value and not return the duplicate backslash.

BartMan01 · « **Reply #824 on:** June 20, 2012, 01:30:50 am »

Quote from: prod on June 18, 2012, 01:57:23 pm

There are two consecutive backslashes between "TV Theme" and "TV Theme ~ Mission ...". You probably need to test for that empty value and not return the duplicate backslash.

They were only there in the log, not anywhere else. Just as weird - it stopped just as suddenly as it started with no changes.

raphnix · « **Reply #825 on:** June 27, 2012, 01:28:44 pm »

I'm an iTunes user and I want to use MCiS for the first Time to move to MC. Just to make sure MCiS works as expected:
When synchronising for the first time MCiS will sync all my iTunes ratings to the new field iTunesratingssync in MC as long as there weren't any ratings in the usual MC rating field, right? Do the ratings from the iTunesratingssync field show up in the usual rating field too after the first sync? Or will this field show up 0 stars for each song? Since I want to use JRemote on my iPad it's quite important to me that the ratings show up on the device's remote. Did anyone try this or know for sure?

Cheers, R

prod · « **Reply #826 on:** June 27, 2012, 04:46:46 pm »

On the first sync if the track is rated in iTunes but NOT rated in MC the rating in iTunes is used. Otherwise the rating in MC is used. i.e. the MC rating takes priority.

TXgary · « **Reply #827 on:** July 27, 2012, 01:34:46 pm »

Suddenly started getting the following error
<Result EndDateTime="2012-07-27T13:31:52">Could not access J River Media Center. Retrieving the COM class factory for component with CLSID {572802D5-FBF6-4C30-89CA-BDF2CE4AEC2B} failed due to the following error: 80040154.</Result>
</MCiS>
MC17 Rel 182 is open and running
Just started. Was running 6.0 and it failed with this msg, so upgraded to 6.0.1 with same error???

Thanks for your help

prod · « **Reply #828 on:** July 27, 2012, 01:56:16 pm »

Have you uninstalled any version of MC recently? Just run your MC17 setup exe again.

prod · « **Reply #829 on:** July 27, 2012, 01:58:45 pm »

Hi everyone, I'm away for a couple of weeks so any queries/license keys will have to wait till I get back.

Cheers!

TXgary · « **Reply #830 on:** July 27, 2012, 02:18:05 pm »

Thanks for the quick reply. Worked like a charm....
Enjoy your time away.
It is a great product.

Magic_Randy · « **Reply #831 on:** August 09, 2012, 12:56:58 am »

Anyone have experience using MCiS with iTunes Match?

Magic_Randy · « **Reply #832 on:** August 10, 2012, 07:47:32 pm »

Quote from: Magic_Randy on August 09, 2012, 12:56:58 am

Anyone have experience using MCiS with iTunes Match?

I finally got iTunes Match set up and synchronized (took almost a week) and ran MCiS for the 1st time sine getting it set up. Not sure they get along well.

After MCiS successfully completed, I was logged out of iTunes (and therefore iTunes Match). When I logged back in iTunes no longer recognized my library and asked if I wanted to match this library saying something like only one PC can be matched. I said OK and it then had to re scan everything to establish the match. This did not take too long (compared to the week it initially took).

In my first test I had no new tracks in MC to add to iTunes. Also I had no iTunes tracks to delete. The only changes were last played dates and counts.

Any feedback from others is appreciated. As I learn more I'll report back.

EDIT: findings from additional tests
1) Another test and iTunes Match was not logged out
2) Deletions to clean up orphans works fine - there are individual prompts to delete from iCloud

bspachman · « **Reply #833 on:** August 10, 2012, 11:05:24 pm »

Seems to work fine for me. I followed a similar procedure when iTM went live. I turned on Match for my iTunes library and it took forever to match & upload. Since then, however, it seems to have worked flawlessly with MCiS--that is to say, the problems I've had with Match I can't attribute to MCiS.

I've seen the unrecognized library fairly often--but mostly on my 'client' machines (ie. they don't have any local music, it's all streamed from Match). Otherwise, tracks seem to upload and update properly, and although I don't pay too much attention to play counts, those numbers also seem to be increasing at a reasonable rate.

brad

Magic_Randy · « **Reply #834 on:** August 11, 2012, 12:20:02 am »

Quote from: bspachman on August 10, 2012, 11:05:24 pm

Seems to work fine for me. I followed a similar procedure when iTM went live. I turned on Match for my iTunes library and it took forever to match & upload. Since then, however, it seems to have worked flawlessly with MCiS--that is to say, the problems I've had with Match I can't attribute to MCiS.

I've seen the unrecognized library fairly often--but mostly on my 'client' machines (ie. they don't have any local music, it's all streamed from Match). Otherwise, tracks seem to upload and update properly, and although I don't pay too much attention to play counts, those numbers also seem to be increasing at a reasonable rate.

brad

MCiS is a great product and I don't expect any issues from it. If anything I expect issues with iTunes Match which is still very young in it's product evolution and the iTunes APIs which will need to adapt to properly support iTunes Match. That's why I'm soliciting input from others using this combination. I'm pretty confident I can work around any limitations in iTunes Match once I figure out the behavior.

I'm glad to hear it's working well for you. I'll do more testing as well. For me the last played dates and play counts are important, so hopefully I can get these to work. I'm also suspicious of what's going to happen when I rename/move tracks resulting in deletes and adds in the iTunes library. I'm not sure how iTunes Match will deal with this, especially the deletes.

raphnix · « **Reply #835 on:** August 13, 2012, 07:03:22 am »

Loaded Tracks vs. Analysed tracks:

During the sync process the MCiS loads roughly 21.000 tracks from the MC library. But it only analyses about 8.000 of which several are beeing synchronized subsequently. Why does the software loads more tracks than it analyses?

Thanks

BartMan01 · « **Reply #836 on:** August 27, 2012, 06:50:54 pm »

I've been having lots of issues with iTunes Synchronizer and iTunes Match. Specifically when iTunes Syncronizer decides an existing file is 'new' and deletes the old file and adds it back again. When that happens, iTunes stops and asks if you want to delete the file from iTunes match for EVERY file. I've also ended up with random 'duplicate' files in iTunes Match after a sync. The only way I have been able to use it 100% successfully is to do the following:
Turn off iTunes Match.
Run iTunes Syncronizer.
Turn on iTunes Match.

BartMan01 · « **Reply #837 on:** August 27, 2012, 07:00:08 pm »

Anyone else have issues with iTunes Syncronizer wiping out ratings on tracks? I've yet to figure out where or why it is happening, but frequently I lose ratings when sycnronizing. Sometimes it is just a few tracks, but sometimes it is thousands. I keep a backup of my ratings in a custom field, so getting them back only takes a few minutes - just trying to figure out why this is happening.

Some additional info that might help:

I have a mix of FLAC/APE, MP3, MP4 (from iTunes), and a few AC3/DTS tracks. I use the 'sync to handheld' method for everything but the MP4 tracks to create/copy an MP3 for iTunes so for those the actual file that iTunes sees/uses is not the original file in my MC library. The MP4 tracks are in a shared location (both use the same file).

I don't listen to much music on my only i-device that syncs to that library directly, it is mainly used for podcasts (handled directly in iTunes) - so I my go a couple of months at a time between syncing libraries.

prod · « **Reply #838 on:** August 28, 2012, 01:14:45 pm »

Quote from: raphnix on August 13, 2012, 07:03:22 am

Loaded Tracks vs. Analysed tracks:

During the sync process the MCiS loads roughly 21.000 tracks from the MC library. But it only analyses about 8.000 of which several are beeing synchronized subsequently. Why does the software loads more tracks than it analyses?

Thanks

MCiS will only iterate through tracks that are in the specified playlist or viewscheme. It will only cache the details of tracks with a file extension that is set in Settings. So it may iterate through many more tracks than it actually syncs.

prod · « **Reply #839 on:** August 28, 2012, 01:27:30 pm »

Quote from: BartMan01 on August 27, 2012, 06:50:54 pm

I've been having lots of issues with iTunes Synchronizer and iTunes Match. Specifically when iTunes Syncronizer decides an existing file is 'new' and deletes the old file and adds it back again. When that happens, iTunes stops and asks if you want to delete the file from iTunes match for EVERY file. I've also ended up with random 'duplicate' files in iTunes Match after a sync. The only way I have been able to use it 100% successfully is to do the following:
Turn off iTunes Match.
Run iTunes Syncronizer.
Turn on iTunes Match.

It may be that MCiS doesn't co-exist with iTunes Match. I'm a little skeptical that MCiS would delete files from your library. It will fix broken links, but iTunes would have to be mistakenly reporting broken links. In this case deselect the option if you have it set. I suggest reviewing your settings or sticking with your workaround - i don't believe Apple expose Match functionality via the SDK.

Quote from: BartMan01 on August 27, 2012, 07:00:08 pm

Anyone else have issues with iTunes Syncronizer wiping out ratings on tracks? I've yet to figure out where or why it is happening, but frequently I lose ratings when sycnronizing. Sometimes it is just a few tracks, but sometimes it is thousands. I keep a backup of my ratings in a custom field, so getting them back only takes a few minutes - just trying to figure out why this is happening.

Some additional info that might help:

I have a mix of FLAC/APE, MP3, MP4 (from iTunes), and a few AC3/DTS tracks. I use the 'sync to handheld' method for everything but the MP4 tracks to create/copy an MP3 for iTunes so for those the actual file that iTunes sees/uses is not the original file in my MC library. The MP4 tracks are in a shared location (both use the same file).

I don't listen to much music on my only i-device that syncs to that library directly, it is mainly used for podcasts (handled directly in iTunes) - so I my go a couple of months at a time between syncing libraries.

What is the 'sync to handheld' option? The file name and location as set in the iTunes library must be exactly the file name and location as set in the MC library, otherwise MCiS can not match library entries (unless you are using alternative iTunes file keys in Settings).

BartMan01 · « **Reply #840 on:** August 28, 2012, 09:01:46 pm »

Quote from: prod on August 28, 2012, 01:27:30 pm

What is the 'sync to handheld' option? The file name and location as set in the iTunes library must be exactly the file name and location as set in the MC library, otherwise MCiS can not match library entries (unless you are using alternative iTunes file keys in Settings).

The 'lossless sync' process using the iTunes file key. Really not sure how it happens since it seems random when it does - just seeing if anyone had any ideas as to what might be causing it.

datdude · « **Reply #841 on:** August 31, 2012, 12:51:13 am »

Quote from: BartMan01 on August 27, 2012, 07:00:08 pm

Anyone else have issues with iTunes Syncronizer wiping out ratings on tracks? I've yet to figure out where or why it is happening, but frequently I lose ratings when sycnronizing. Sometimes it is just a few tracks, but sometimes it is thousands. I keep a backup of my ratings in a custom field, so getting them back only takes a few minutes - just trying to figure out why this is happening.

Had this same issue. Eventually gave up, but would love to find out what was going on.

TXgary · « **Reply #842 on:** September 11, 2012, 08:23:46 am »

Prod
Running 6.0.1 is there a newer version?
Having problems with my playlists being synced correctly, did select rebuild, and that took forever but did not solve the problem. The itunes playlists do not match the MC playlists, some are dropped, but cannot figure out why... Have removed the rebuild and chose "shuffle" instead.
The problem I am having is that the itunes playlists do not contain all of the songs in the MC playlists and they are all mp3's.
Thanks Prod, for a great product.

TXgary · « **Reply #843 on:** September 11, 2012, 10:20:48 pm »

I answered my own question. Had some itune database issues, all is good with the product.
thanks for a great product, it makes my life much easier.

prod · « **Reply #844 on:** September 12, 2012, 02:35:24 am »

Thanks Gary.

With regards to new versions ... There are some tweaks I'd like to make in terms of user interface, simplifying the configuration and getting rid of command line arguments (putting them in settings). Plus perhaps a console that gives a running detailed log of syncs.

Obviously if iTunes or MC somehow break their respective SDK's then I'll need to correct that also, but they are both quite stable. In fact, dare I say a little too stable - neither seem to make any changes to the SDK to take advantage of new features (e.g. JRiver's stacks feature and Apple's iTunes Match).

I've recently been testing in Windows 8 and everything is working fine.

BartMan01 · « **Reply #845 on:** November 06, 2012, 12:39:00 am »

Sometime recently (may be related to iTunes Match), I've started to get duplicate playlists on sync. Playlists that already exist in iTunes are being left as-is and the sync is adding a new playlist appended with a 1 (or 2, 3, etc). So if I start the sync with:

PlaylistA
PlaylistB
PlaylistC

I end up with:
PlaylistA
PlaylistA1
PlaylistB
PlaylistC
PlaylistC1

Seems to happen when the contents of the playlist changes, the sync adds it as a new playlist instead of replacing the existing.

Any suggestions?

bspachman · « **Reply #846 on:** November 30, 2012, 10:56:12 pm »

Anyone taken a deep breath and tried MCiTS with iTunes 11?

brad

simonmason · « **Reply #847 on:** December 01, 2012, 07:00:18 am »

Not yet!

M2P · « **Reply #848 on:** December 01, 2012, 05:02:57 pm »

Can some one please guide to the correct thread/sub forum etc. for issues with jremote.

It was working fine last night but now there is no access via the ipad. "connection failure"
The ipad's browser/email/app store etc. is still working but rremote can't connect.

Checked the computer and it's functioning fine, the servers still on the network and accessible.

Regards.

JimH · « **Reply #849 on:** December 01, 2012, 05:48:59 pm »

It's on this same board. Try a search if you can't find it.

INTERACT FORUM

Author Topic: MC iTunes Synchronizer (using MC with an iPhone or iPod Touch) [v6.0.2] (Read 494991 times)