[luc-mobile]

I am having a strange problem with MP3 tags I just can't summarize easily, so I guess I will have to go with a lengthy description. I hope nobody falls asleep reading my post...

I have a few MP3 folder/files on my computer. Some of them are CDs I purchased and ripped, and some of them are random downloads or purchased downloads. Most of them are definitely CDs I purchased and ripped. Every time I rip a CD, on Linux, I use a program called Kid3. It's a tag manager. It lets me edit the MP3 tags of all files in a folder quite easily. Please pay attention to every step of my routine:

1) Rip the CD;

2) Type in the name of each track as the file name, e.g. make a folder called "Beach Boys", then a folder called "Pet Sounds" then first track will be called "01 - Wouldn't It Be Nice.mp3". I always write the track number at the beginning of the file name, so the tracks will be listed in the correct order.

3) Open the folder with Kid3 and edit all the tags, including the "Track number" tag, so the media player will play all the tracks in the same order as they come in the album. All of these operations can be executed in batches, i.e. the entire folder, including guessing the song title and track number from the file names, will be applied in one fell swoop. It always works very well.

4) Search the Web for the album cover, download the image, place it inside the corresponding folder and rename the file to "folder.jpg", so the BlackBerry Media Player will display the cover when any song of that album is playing.

5) Important detail: note that if I launch the BlackBerry Media Player, select Artists, browse to Beach Boys then choose "Pet Sounds", I get a list of all the songs and the album cover is displayed very small above the song list. When I play a song, the album cover is displayed in large size. This detail may be important.

Very well.

This weekend, I decided to rip music off a Web site that serves streaming. The entire sound framework is godawful in Linux, I can't make any program accomplish that task, so I bite the dust and use Windows. I use a freeware program called Freecorder. It works very, very well. Excellent method and results. I saved three folders worth of music, about a dozen songs each, plus another three folders for three CDs I purchased recently and ripped on this same weekend. Then I moved all the songs to my Linux notebook and edited them all with Kid3 like I always do. Everything seems fine. Then I copied them to my SD card so I can play those songs on my BlackBerry. Now, here come the problems:

- The CD-ripped albums have no problem whatsoever. Everything works as expected, including the album covers.

- The streaming-ripped files/folders do not work as expected.

First, they are not displayed in the correct order. They are displayed in alphabetical order. In the hypothetical Beach Boys example, track number 13 "Caroline No" would be displayed at the top, followed by track number 4 "Don't Talk (Put Your Head on My Shoulder)", and track number 2 would be the last one, because it is the last one in alphabetical order, "You Still Believe in Me". In other words, although all the file names begin with their corresponding order number, corresponding to their original order in the album, they are all listed as if there were no number before the song title in each file name. I have double and triple-checked the Track Number tags in all the files, they all seem ok to me. Kid3 lets me edit both Tag 1 - ID3v1.1 and Tag 2 - ID3v2.4.0. ALL the tags have been checked, they are correct. But the BlackBerry completely ignores the numbering order, both in the file name and the Track Number tags.

The second problem, which doesn't really bother me but might be a clue: please read item 5) above again. This group of file/folders behave differently: if I launch the BlackBerry Media Player, select Artists, browse to Beach Boys then choose "Pet Sounds", I get a list of all the songs and the album cover is **NOT** displayed very small above the song list. But when I play a song, the album cover is displayed in large size correctly. I don't know if this is relevant, but I thought I would mention it.

I just have no idea what could be causing it. I even thought that maybe there could be some kind of permission problem, but the SD card is formatted FAT32, formatted by the BlackBerry, there are no permission attributes in them.

So I searched the entire SD card and deleted ALL the BBThumbs.dat files. All of them. When I put the card back into the BlackBerry, the device scanned the whole card again and recreated the BBThumbs.dat files. The problem persists.

I've run out of ideas. Does anyone here have any?

TIA

[Chris K]

You're right i did fall asleep so i skipped straight to the problem

Since some CDs work fine I conclude it's the software you're using

There are several ID tag methods and not all will be compatable with BB

= use different software to write the ID tags

[luc-mobile]

Well, thank you for the interest anyway, but if you had read the story, you would know that I am using the same one ID tag software for all the files, so I really doubt the problem is in the ID tag software. I tried to edit the tags in Amarok, but all the Track Number tags seemed correct already in Amarok too, so I didn't really do anything woth it.

[ricpac]

My idea: since the issue is only isolated with "streaming-ripped files/folders" then why don't you burn 'em to a CD and rip 'em again using your known-working methodologies. Long process but I'm pretty sure it'll work. That's all.

[jmwking]

Does your tagger consistently create id v1 and id v2 tags? My track problems almost always have to do with inconsistencies between the two tags.

-jk

[luc-mobile]

Originally Posted by jmwking

Does your tagger consistently create id v1 and id v2 tags? My track problems almost always have to do with inconsistencies between the two tags.

-jk

What do you mean by "consistently"? There are differences between the id3v1 and id3v2 formats. For example, some very long song titles won't fit in id3v1 tags, but the BlackBerry displays them correctly, so I guess the BlackBerry only looks at the id3v2 tags. Also, id3v1 won't let me create custom genres.

But, again, I use the same ID3 tag software on ALL my MP3 files, so all files should be affected, and this is not the case.

[Chris K]

Originally Posted by luc-mobile

...I use the same ID3 tag software on ALL my MP3 files, so all files should be affected, and this is not the case.

Most software is backwards compatable so it is quite possible that ID3 tag editor would write new tags as ID3 but edit existing ID1/2 tags 'as is' (not ID3)

I still suspect you have mixture of ID tags, only some of which are recognised by BB

[yahjoogooleh]

Hey I hate to "hijack" but to make the album cover show when playing music all you have to do is put the image in a folder? I been trying to figure out why some of my songs have it and some don't.... Haha if this is correct I will fix it later.
Posted via BlackBerryForums.com Mobile

[Chris K]

Originally Posted by yahjoogooleh

Hey I hate to "hijack" but to make the album cover show when playing music all you have to do is put the image in a folder? I been trying to figure out why some of my songs have it and some don't.... Haha if this is correct I will fix it later.
Posted via BlackBerryForums.com Mobile

To make album covers show on most mobiles you need to embed the image in each mp3 (linking to image in same folder doesn't usually work)

'Linking' to an image is the way Windows Media Player works by default - but you can easily embed images using WMP (i always use this method)

1/ Open WMP showing the album tracks you want to update
2/ Open up an image of the album cover (google image is fine)
3/ Right-Click the album image and choose 'copy'
4/ Right-click the album cover in WMP and choose 'paste'

Usually takes a couple seconds to embed it in every track

Note: if any tracks are playing at the time it wont embed the album image in that track

[yahjoogooleh]

Oh alright thanks I'm going to try that now.
Posted via BlackBerryForums.com Mobile

[yahjoogooleh]

Where is the album cover on WMP? I don't see anything where I can right click. Under the tracks I see something but when I right click it doesn't say paste..

[jmwking]

Originally Posted by luc-mobile

What do you mean by "consistently"? There are differences between the id3v1 and id3v2 formats. For example, some very long song titles won't fit in id3v1 tags, but the BlackBerry displays them correctly, so I guess the BlackBerry only looks at the id3v2 tags. Also, id3v1 won't let me create custom genres.

But, again, I use the same ID3 tag software on ALL my MP3 files, so all files should be affected, and this is not the case.

When I see tagging issues, I delete the track from my BB and do a battery pull. Then I go to my master library on my PC.

I use MP3 Tag Studio for tagging. I open it and check the v2 tags to make sure they are all correct. Once I'm satisfied they are, I copy all the v2 tags to the v1 fields.

Then I copy the files back to my BB, disconnect, and do another battery pull.

I don't know if the battery pulls are really necessary, but the process seems to work. I suspect there's some sort of db that has to be rebuilt, and the battery pull forces a rebuild if it detects a change in the music folder.
Posted via BlackBerryForums.com Mobile

[luc-mobile]

Originally Posted by yahjoogooleh

Hey I hate to "hijack" but to make the album cover show when playing music all you have to do is put the image in a folder? I been trying to figure out why some of my songs have it and some don't.... Haha if this is correct I will fix it later.
Posted via BlackBerryForums.com Mobile

On the BlackBerry, you just need to save the album's image in that album's folder and rename the image file to "folder.jpg". That works when you have albums separated in folders. If you keep everything strewn about in just one or a couple of folders, then you'll have to embed images into individual MP3 files.

[luc-mobile]

Originally Posted by jmwking

When I see tagging issues, I delete the track from my BB and do a battery pull. Then I go to my master library on my PC.

I use MP3 Tag Studio for tagging. I open it and check the v2 tags to make sure they are all correct. Once I'm satisfied they are, I copy all the v2 tags to the v1 fields.

Then I copy the files back to my BB, disconnect, and do another battery pull.

I don't know if the battery pulls are really necessary, but the process seems to work. I suspect there's some sort of db that has to be rebuilt, and the battery pull forces a rebuild if it detects a change in the music folder.
Posted via BlackBerryForums.com Mobile

The "some sort of DB" that you speak of is comprised of many BBThumbs.dat files all over the media card, one for each folder. Look at my original post, I have deleted all of those. Also, the device has been rebooted twice or three times since then, and the problem remains. And it only affects a certain group of folders that I recorded from Flash streaming, not the albums that I ripped from CDs.