itunes rant/question (longish)

[tentoze]

I think I mentioned already that I don't particularly care for the itunes software, but I'm kinda stuck with it for loading this ipod up. I d/l'ed it onto the home computer today and let it go find the hard drive with all my music.

After doing whatever it does to catalog the contents of the hd, the way it displays things is driving me nuts. My hd is set up with individual folders for each album, but this itunes just lists all the songs in some sort of librarian-from-hell semi-but-not-really alphabetical order.

When I got the ipod last week, i d/l'ed itunes to my laptop and put 4 cd's on it that I had bought in Pittsburgh. Each of those 4 cd's are displayed wioth the album cover in the left margin, with the tunes on each listed to the right, and a demarcation line between albums.

I realize that there's a difference between loading a cd directly into itunes and having it scan and catalog existing music on the hd, but I can't understand WHY I can't organize the stuff the way I want to. I don't see ANY options in the menus that allow me to change things. Anybody got any help or am I just SOL?

 

[usedto]

When we loaded everything from my computer into my son's mp3 player, it did the exact same thing. No rhyme or reason to the order. No help here..................

 

[Eunomians]

You can organize by date added, artist, album, genre, etc, by clicking the top tabs in the main window. If you don't have all those tabs, or tabs that you 'like', then go to preferences and add more tabs (or less tabs).

 

[Johncan]

I use Ephpod... it does not organize your files for you. It leaves your files alone and in the formatted structure you have them in.

 

[streckfu]

On my computer, Itunes saved all the CDs in a tiered folder system with the artist as the top level folder (listed alphabetically) and then folders for each CD title with individual .mp3s inside the CD folders.

 

[tentoze]

On my computer, Itunes saved all the CDs in a tiered folder system with the artist as the top level folder (listed alphabetically) and then folders for each CD title with individual .mp3s inside the CD folders.

You must have some strong juju working that I don't.

 

[streckfu]

You must have some strong juju working that I don't.

Did you create a capture folder for Itunes or did it just dump the files anywhere?

 

[tentoze]

Did you create a capture folder for Itunes or did it just dump the files anywhere?

I didn't physically copy the files from their original location, I just let itunes catalog them so I could fill up the ipod, or so I hoped. The way it is now, even though I can get them grouped using the "Album" tab, when I load them on the ipod, it appears they will just be the same semi-jumbled mess. I want to copy albums, not a bazillion files and hit the random shuffle mode.

 

[mhardy6647]

Apple generally doesn't (IMO) let folks do what they want to, ever since their early, closed architecture days. That works for some folks, not others.

The iTunes s/w drove me nuts. I have a beautiful, laser engraved iPod my kids got me last christmas that I am not using because of the s/w. The player's operation is OK, but the computer s/w is... not so hot. Not to mention that it'll run on only one computer in the house (my wife's laptop).

 

[streckfu]

I I want to copy albums, not a bazillion files and hit the random shuffle mode.

That is a limitation as you have to build playlists. I've burned whole albums just by highliting the album and dragging it to the playlist. Granted, once burned, they are single files....

 

[ozmoid]

When you let iTunes organize stuff, it has a lot more control over how the content is managed. One problem may be the ID tags embedded in the music files - they can range from no info beyond the file name to Album, Artist, Composer, year of release, etc. etc.

I would say you don't need to let iTunes move your files, just add the right ID info it needs. When you "Get Info" on a track, one of the tab areas has an option to identify a song as "part of a collection". If that box is not checked, iTunes sees it as an independent track. You need to select all the tracks for an album, then edit the tags for all the files at once (just "get info" while all the tracks are selected.) Check the compilation box, and the tracks will display as you described the albums iTunes imported. You may have to go get a copy of the Album Cover and paste it in (or use a software utility that does it for you - there are quite a few that interact with iTunes.)

*TIP* The album covers on Amazon product listings are almost perfect for iTunes... no formatting involved.

Your problem is that iTunes does a lot of this stuff automatically when you rip a CD. If you just load your existing files, iTunes won't change that info for you. Far better with iTunes to start from scratch. I've had it from the beginning, and I like it. Once you let it do it's thing, I think it's a great media file manager.

 

[Negotiableterms]

The fault seems to be that iTunes has no way of getting info off of files already stored. Unless it does the original load, all it sees is files with little info.

It's a huge pain to have to reload all your music...

 

[streckfu]

My mother had a similar issue when she tried to rip CD without an internet connection. Itunes was clueless and she had to name each file individually.

 

[ozmoid]

The fault seems to be that iTunes has no way of getting info off of files already stored. Unless it does the original load, all it sees is files with little info.

It's a huge pain to have to reload all your music...

iTunes reads standard ID3 tags. If it's an older version, go to the "Advanced" menu and select "convert ID3 tags". If the info is there, iTunes will find it. If your music was originally ripped with that info, no sweat. If not, you'll have to add it. I don't know if there's a way to force it to get the CDDB info for already ripped files, I've never tried, like I said I started from scratch.

One nice thing is "editing multiple tracks". Select and album's tracks, get info, and add album/artist/compilation etc. (all the generic stuff that is the same for each track). All that info will be added to all the tracks selected. No need to do each one individually.

Once you have all that information in, there are dozens of ways to sort your library, AND you can use the "Smart Playlist" feature. Make a new smart playlist, tell it to add any songs it finds in the library with X criteria, and you're done. When you rip more music, if it meets the criteria, it is automatically added to the playlist.

iLounge seems to be the place for good info-

Free book here: http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/ne...the-free-ipod-book-22-for-immediate-download/

Tutorials here: http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/tutorials/

"Tagging" Tutorial: http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/comments/tagging-songs-in-itunes/

I think the iPod will do a better job for you with the correct tags in place for each track.

 

[tentoze]

The fault seems to be that iTunes has no way of getting info off of files already stored. Unless it does the original load, all it sees is files with little info.

It's a huge pain to have to reload all your music...

No way I'm re-ripping over 1,000 albums. This software is a POS.

 

[CarlV]

I feel much better about my mini disk software now if it is any consolation to you.


Carl

 

[ozmoid]

No way I'm re-ripping over 1,000 albums. This software is a POS.

If you know which version of ID3 tag your original software is using, iTunes will "harvest" the info for you. See my previous post.

There's also a shortcut for compiling tracks into an album format: With all the tracks selected, go to Advanced>Join CD Tracks.

You don't have to re-rip. If your previous software did not support standard ID3 tags, you may need to re-enter the Album/artist info.

 

[tentoze]

If you know which version of ID3 tag your original software is using, iTunes will "harvest" the info for you. See my previous post.

There's also a shortcut for compiling tracks into an album format: With all the tracks selected, go to Advanced>Join CD Tracks.

That command is greyed out (not available) when I follow those instructions.

You don't have to re-rip. If your previous software did not support standard ID3 tags, you may need to re-enter the Album/artist info.

A sampling of files I looked at are all ID3v1.1 or 3.2.

 

[redcoates7]

The software doesn't seem to be the problem here...I've got about 20 GB of music from all sorts of sources (some originally burned using Phatnoise software, some using Windows Media, some using iTunes and have NEVER experienced the sort of issues you're having)

If the data for your files was good originally it's going to show up jkust fine in iTunes. If the files information was corrupted in some way originally and you're getting blank fields, you can easily ad/change album, artist and song information in iTunes...Just click on "File", "Get Info" and then left click the tab labelled "Info" you'll now be able to change artist, album or track information as you see fit. If you've selected multiple tracks (say from an album or compilation you will be able to change all tracks at the same time.) Once the information has been changed, the "Artist", "Album", "Name" fields and so on at the top of iTunes screen should now sort by category...when I click on "Albums" I get an alphabetical listing of all albums in my library...same things for artists, or even song names (although the song names seems to be pretty useless)

I've used a bunch of mp3 management software in the past, and have found iTunes to be at least as good (and IMHO better) than any other...

Good luck, and don't let the initial learning curve frustrate you...iTunes is a very powerful tool!

 

[ozmoid]

OK, Toze, I'm stumped. Troubleshooting is really hard long-distance. I know there should be a simple fix for you, but without some hands-on with your computer I'm at a loss. Dammit! :nono: