[jp33pds]

I've been starting to play with the IRIS system and have been trying various USB drive set ups. The USB player works very well, in my view. However, I have not been able to get any playlists to work though the USB drive. I have made playlist folders--which the system sees without any problem and sorts the tracks in all the expected ways. The playlists folder names themselves show up as well under the playlist menu--except the tracks are not showing (even though the system found all the individual files and sorted them properly).

I added m3u files to the folders figuring it needed some navigation to the folders, and tried some other playlist file formats too. None worked.

Anyone figure this out? Or do playlists only work with an iphone/ipod (which I have used without any problem). This is not a big issue, but it would be nice to have if it is possible.

Thanks all.

 

[gripforce-mclaren]

Same here. Tried many different ways but none has worked.
Gave up on USB route and ended up using ipod.

 

[garyw]

I found it to be the same sort of setup as Itunes, as in when I sync my phone to Itunes it loses all album information if the music wasn't ripped or bought via Itunes in the first place.
On the USB which I donwloaded them as MP3 files to, it does the albums exactly the same, if it was ripped via WMP then the album info and tracks are all over the place.

I have about 1000 tracks on a stick and apart from the occasional stopped track for some reason (not so much since the updates to be fair) it works more than fine enough for me.

I certainly don't profess to know what I'm doing with the ripping and USB but it works and plays my music

and more info and I have to ask the nephews!!!!

 

[isv]

I placed all my playlists on the base drive rather than in any seperate folder and they all seems to load ok I have to admit.

 

[LimeyBloke]

.......
I certainly don't profess to know what I'm doing with the ripping and USB but it works and plays my music

and more info and I have to ask the nephews!!!!

Me too, I feel like my father did when he tried to program a VCR in the early eighties.

 

[jp33pds]

I placed all my playlists on the base drive rather than in any seperate folder and they all seems to load ok I have to admit.

If it is not too much trouble, can you tell me more? All the files are in the root with no folders? And what dictates the playlists? What file format for the playlist (not the music)?

I have tried every combination I could imagine: sub-folders, no sub-folders, playlist folders, and all of the playlist formatsI could find (m3u, wpl, zpl, mpl). I also encoded latin-1 and utf-8.

To be clear, I don't really know how this stuff really works, but figured it had to be one of the common set-ups. I couldn't find the magic combination.

I probably shouldn't be greedy: everything else works great with the USB, and the iphone works in all respects. Also, the sound with a decent source has improved vastly over time--and is very, very good. (I guess the speakers needed to break-in as others have suggested.)

Thanks.

 

[isv]

If it is not too much trouble, can you tell me more? All the files are in the root with no folders? And what dictates the playlists? What file format for the playlist (not the music)?

I have tried every combination I could imagine: sub-folders, no sub-folders, playlist folders, and all of the playlist formatsI could find (m3u, wpl, zpl, mpl). I also encoded latin-1 and utf-8.

To be clear, I don't really know how this stuff really works, but figured it had to be one of the common set-ups. I couldn't find the magic combination.

I probably shouldn't be greedy: everything else works great with the USB, and the iphone works in all respects. Also, the sound with a decent source has improved vastly over time--and is very, very good. (I guess the speakers needed to break-in as others have suggested.)

Thanks.

no probs, I would have gone bats if I could not load any music through playlists as well.

Have got the playlists in the root drive, ie no folders but the music files (mp3s) all in seperate folders. Let me double check what format my playlist files are but I am pretty sure they are m3u as I've just saved them into the usb per some ancient copy of winamp that I am using with nothing fancy.

I don't mean to suggest the obvious but perhaps try resaving the playlist files specifically references those music files in the usb drive folders? If you're finding the playlist files but not finding the linked tracks that might be why as I initially had that problem (admittedly in another car...).

 

[jp33pds]

Thanks so much. Perhaps you can take a screen shot of the first few lines of the m3u file. What I tried was every version of what you described. Must be some small convention I'm getting wrong.

 

[brotherharry]

AFAIK, playlists are basically just lists of files in sequence, pointing at the physical location of the file.
If the list is saved on your computer it could be employing absolute links e.g. the list sits under c:\music folder and all the folders containing mp3 files are below there e.g.
c:\music\madness
c:\music\michael-jackson

the play list is already on the c drive in music folder so it's code might look like this
c:\music\madness\our-house.mp3
c:\music\michael-jackson\thriller.mp3

If you just copy the playlist direct and music files direct from hard drive to the USB drive, the code of the playlist will still be pointing to the c drive, but the music is all sitting on a stick in your 12C, hence it can't find anything.

I'm not sure if winamp (or similar media managers) are clever enough to create 'relative' linked playlists on the fly which take account of the device the music will be stored on.

e.g. a relative linked playlist might look like
madness\our-house.mp3
michael-jackson\thriller.mp3

as long as the playlist file sits above all the music folders it should work.

Just guessin'

 

[jp33pds]

<acronym title="As far as I know"><acronym title="As far as I know">AFAIK</acronym></acronym>, playlists are basically just lists of files in sequence, pointing at the physical location of the file.
If the list is saved on your computer it could be employing absolute links e.g. the list sits under c:\music folder and all the folders containing mp3 files are below there e.g.
c:\music\madness
c:\music\michael-jackson

the play list is already on the c drive in music folder so it's code might look like this
c:\music\madness\our-house.mp3
c:\music\michael-jackson\thriller.mp3

If you just copy the playlist direct and music files direct from hard drive to the USB drive, the code of the playlist will still be pointing to the c drive, but the music is all sitting on a stick in your 12C, hence it can't find anything.

I'm not sure if winamp (or similar media managers) are clever enough to create 'relative' linked playlists on the fly which take account of the device the music will be stored on.

e.g. a relative linked playlist might look like
madness\our-house.mp3
michael-jackson\thriller.mp3

as long as the playlist file sits above all the music folders it should work.

Just guessin'

Thanks for this comment. Everything you say fits with my understanding of the issues.

I am using an app that is designed to create relative links. I checked the files and they looked right. I also tried with folders and without for the mp3s wondering if certain paths wouldn't resolve. No luck.

I now wonder if this is a Mac issue. I'm using a Mac and perhaps there is a missing or hidden file convention because of this. Being the stubborn guy I am--I'm still playing with this. If you have any further thoughts or suggestions, I'm game.

Thanks.

 

[jp33pds]

Problem Solved...

Thanks to all for guiding me to the solution to the USB playlist problem.

In the end, the solution was one of those strange, I've tried everything else answers: I reformatted the USB Drive. Someone else can explain why that mattered (I didn't change the format type, just redid it). But, once that was done everything worked as expected.

For those that might want to avoid my experience on this, I've laid out the steps to make playlists on a USB drive below. I added some pictures to clarify where possible.

1. Format the drive (MS DOS FAT 32--even on a Mac)
2. Set the name of the drive during the formatting process
3. Set up playlists in I-tunes
4. Use Eric Daugherty's PlaylistExport program to export files and playlists to computer
5. In this program, select the playlist you want
6, Use the "Change" button to point to the newly formated USB as "Output Directory"
7. Use simple menus, set format to m3u, set copy mode to "Copy Music"
8. Hit "Export" button

A few things to keep in mind:
--Do not change the name of the usb drive once you format the drive
--Dumping the files into the root is nice in that if two playlists use the same track, it will only show up once
--If you add music, you can add a playlist to the drive without changing anything else
--All of the other music sorting menus will work fine (no folders necessary)

Thanks to all who help lead me to an answer here.