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[sb99]

I am running Media Center on Windows.

Since the latest version update of Media Center 20.0.87 playlists no longer appear on my Astell&Kern AK120Ⅱ after synching. The first synch after the 20.0.87 update removed playlists from my AK120Ⅱ but their contents (tracks) remain on the device. Subsequent resynch attempts complete successfully but Playlists no longer appear on the AK120Ⅱ or in the Media Centre synch display for the AK120Ⅱ when connected. All Playlists remain intact in Media Center. Prior to the 20.0.87 update I have been synching playlists to the AK120Ⅱ without incident since August 2014.

Today Media Center updated to version 20.0.93. Problem still not resolved. Playlists not appearing on the Astell&Kern AK120Ⅱ.

I deleted all music files from the AK120Ⅱ and re-synched again through Media Center. This did not fix the problem, playlists not appearing on the Astell&Kern AK120Ⅱ.

Looks like I will need to ditch Media Center and look for another product to synch music and playlists to my AK120Ⅱ.

It is very poor that there is no formal way to report problems to JRiver. Problem support is more professional with with some freeware products!!

3rd May 2015
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I have been able to fix this problem. Steps..
1. Help => Update Channels => Disable Automatic Update
2. Help => Update Channels => Open Download Folder (stores 5 previous versions of MC)
3. From this folder re-installed version 20.0.63 (the version immediately prior to the problem 20.0.87 update)
4. Added new music items to MC and then re-synched the AK120Ⅱ.
5. Voila - all 33 playlists are now back on my my device.

I am very happy to have all playlists restored to my device as I have over 3,500 songs, 350+ Artists and 750+ Albums on my device making it virtually impractical to play all the music I like manually.

I intend to remain on version 20.0.63 with Automatic Update disabled. Long term though this is less than satisfactory as I will not be receiving new MC enhancements.

I would be interested to here if others have experienced this problem and if it gets resolved in a future update to MC.

[jagdriver]

Actually, the problem lies more with iRiver, I suspect.

I bought an original AK120 that definitely has firmware problems. For example, when attempting to make a playlist, the AK120 only recognizes file names through the range A – G. Yet it'll individually play tracks outside of that range.

Attempts to reach iRiver through various means, including to their U.S. VP through LinkedIn InMail, have all failed. In nosing around the A&K website, it appears it's all but defunct, in that there have been no upgrades to the site for ages.

Unlike SanDisk with their Sansa line, there is no public forum for A&K units, so attempting to get support through fellow users—including here—has been a bust. I knew in advance that I was paying a ridiculous premium for my unit, as did you, and I suspect that's why you and I seem to be the only owners of these things—hence zero user community input/solutions.

[macdonjh]

That's not good news.

I have the same trouble with my recently purchased Jr: playlists I import from MC21 do not work on the Jr.  When I open the Jr in the Apple Finder, the playlists show up in the Playlist folder, but when I look for playlists on the Jr's native menu it says there are no playlists.  At least it sorts by album.

I did get some help from iRiver.  I think I sent an e-mail through the website or the A&K Facebook page and did get a response.  There are also some threads about A&K on head-fi.org.  Perhaps we'll find some help there.

[macdonjh]

Just went to head-fi.org, according to one post A&K uses pls format, not m3u.  According to the same post, MC can convert m3u to pls, but it's hard to figure out.  I guess I'll look.

[sb99]

Thanks for your posts macdonjh.

I am still running version 20.0.63 and my playlists continue to work on my AK120II. After reading your post I have checked my AK120II through Windows explorer. The playlists in the playlists folder on the device are listed with a format of .pla.
http://fileinfo.com/extension/pla

Looking this up on File Info.
"Playlist of songs saved by an iRiver portable music player, such as the T10 or iDP-100; saved in the root folder; similar to a .M3U file used by many software audio players."

I also came across this site which list the version history for MC.
http://www.videohelp.com/software/J.-River-Media-Center/version-history

I have traced the following changes in respect of playlists between 20.0.63 and the offending version 20.0.87. Version 20.0.62 added the Playlist Time Remaining new feature. This required a fix in 20.0.67. Possibly this fix is the culprit.

20.0.87 (3/24/2015)
6. Fixed: Editing a Smart List with a date range would not properly set the unit field in the UI.

20.0.68 (2/10/2015)
4. Fixed: Transitioning from an image to a video in a playlist was not working properly.

20.0.67 (2/6/2015)
2. Fixed: [Playlist Remaining Time] wasn't zone specific properly.

20.0.64 (1/29/2015)
1. Fixed: A mixed playlist of images and videos will transition to the next video from the image when flicking.

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20.0.62 (1/23/2015)
1. NEW: In the player display, you can use [Playlist Time Remaining] to show the remaining time of the entire playlist.