upther
Android Enthusiast
I haven't had any problems. Meridian works great for me, no skipping or anything. I haven't used my Archos 605 in months. Gonna put that up on eBay and get some extra beer money.
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Incredible as a Music Player
- Thread starter Contempt
- Start date
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- Tags
- htc droid incredible
I haven't had any problems. Meridian works great for me, no skipping or anything. I haven't used my Archos 605 in months. Gonna put that up on eBay and get some extra beer money.
Embedded artwork basically means that an image (I prefer jpeg's) is encoded into the mp3 file tag. This means it is now part of that mp3 file. No matter what program you use, it will always show the correct artwork for that music file when it is playing.
iTunes does not embed album art into the files. You can do it manually through iTunes, but there is no function available to make it automatically do it. Instead, iTunes stores its artwork in some ****ed up database folder structure that is almost impossible to figure out. It works fine if you are using iTunes, but as soon as you try another program, your artwork will not show up. That is because the artwork is stored in the weird folder structure rather than directly in the mp3 file itself.
About 5 years ago I went through the tedious process of embedding artwork in all my files, and continue to do the same today. I have yet to have one program or app not see the correct artwork. Embedded artwork is the best way to go. It is future proof and ensures that no matter what program or app you use, the artwork you want to see will show up.
Now a days there are many automatic embedders that do a good job. I prefer to do it manually using mp3tag, but there are other options. You mentioned you use iTunes. I would recommend trying something like the below link. It will use the iTunes artwork and automatically embed it for you. I have not tried it myself, but it seems to have a good reputation.
Maximized Software iCoverArt: Embed Album Cover Art Into Song Files in iTunes
For the songs that are not showing up after you drag and drop to your phone, here might be the problem:
The artwork is NOT embedded in the song but is rather just a separate .jpg file that is within the folder on your computer. When you just drag and drop the mp3 to your phone, you are not copying the .jpg as well. You either need to use an app to embed the .jpg into the .mp3 or copy over the .jpg as well. I use mediamonkey and set up a syncing profile that does everything automatically.
Cheers
Thank you SOOOOOO much for this explanation!!! I am an organization freak so when the artwork was missing, it was driving me nuts! But you and Narf hit the nail on the head most likely. My artwork isn't embedded. So I found a way to write a script into iTunes which now gives me the option to embed the artwork and i'm doing it as we speak. I will then recopy and paste onto the Inc and all will be well again!! LOL! Is there a way for me to look in iTunes to see which files are embedded? (just for future reference bc some did, in fact, sync the artwork, which means some are and some aren't.)
This info was soooo useful and will definitely help me out in the future when it comes to my organization...THanks a BUNCH!!!
rubbersoul
Newbie
i believe mp3tag can be used to check for files with embedded artwork. i prefer to keep the artwork as a single folder.jpg file in the album directory because saving the artwork 14 times (once for each track) seems like a total waste of space (valuable). most media players worth their weight can recognize both embedded or folder.jpg artwork, but some only recognize one or the other (worth noting).
also, itunes standard is 500x500 pix i believe. way bigger than they need to be for your phone (nice for the computer, though). if you save as single .jpg files, you can run a batch converter to resize all the images to a more suitable size.
also, itunes standard is 500x500 pix i believe. way bigger than they need to be for your phone (nice for the computer, though). if you save as single .jpg files, you can run a batch converter to resize all the images to a more suitable size.
Contempt
Well-Known Member
MediaMonkey is a great program for tagging and adding album art as well. You can do them in batch if you download the necessary scripts.
I removed embedded art from 12k songs last night in less than 20 minutes as I wasn't happy with the current resolution. I plan on upgrading to higher res jpegs. Too bad there are no programs that will do that for me in batch reliably but MM makes it pretty easy.
It will also encode and has a ton of options to retag in batch and clean up tags.
Best program out there imo by far.
I removed embedded art from 12k songs last night in less than 20 minutes as I wasn't happy with the current resolution. I plan on upgrading to higher res jpegs. Too bad there are no programs that will do that for me in batch reliably but MM makes it pretty easy.
It will also encode and has a ton of options to retag in batch and clean up tags.
Best program out there imo by far.
bTunes was working great for me until I got Froyo. After OTA bTunes could never find my music folder even though I had the location in the settings.
Cubed started acting funny as well. It did find my music but I could no longer see the cube.
I then installed Music Mod for the stock player. Now I am hearing some skipping.
Cubed started acting funny as well. It did find my music but I could no longer see the cube.
I then installed Music Mod for the stock player. Now I am hearing some skipping.
No, not a quick and easy way. I would suggest mp3tag. It is an amazing piece of software.
FYI - I would suggest embedding images that are 500x500 or 600x600. This seems to be the sweet spot for me. Big enough to fill up a screen if needed, and not too large to start taking up much server space. Also, I would also try to stick with jpeg too. I have found that some apps and programs do not like gifs and pngs for some reason ... probably just lazy programming.
I would suggest Mixzing. Like I mentioned above, there is an option to adjust the buffer size that will eliminate the skipping. The default setting (normal) skips, but I changed it to the next level and it now does not skip.
Not MAC compatible
Or, like in MixZing, give u the option to "scan for media"...When I add new music to my card, I have to go in MixZing and "scan for media," then go into the other app and voila, the new music is there. Pretty annoying.
lock widget for mixzing did not work for me. When I quit listening to music and had it moved to the background, the widget kept showing up every time my phone locked.
then again, mixzing loved to start playing again over and over, even if I didn't press play or anything. That player really needs a "end" button as I"m always force killing it
then again, mixzing loved to start playing again over and over, even if I didn't press play or anything. That player really needs a "end" button as I"m always force killing it
Evil Sports
Android Enthusiast
Why do people care so much about album art?? its a total waste of space. We are listening to music not looking at a screen right
Why do people care so much about album art?? its a total waste of space. We are listening to music not looking at a screen right
It is an Aesthetic thing. People like to look at pretty things. People like to show others pretty things.....especially if they don't or can't have it.
It is just one of those Function vs Form arguments. Do I wear a hat to protect my head and eyes from the sun.....or because I have a really cool hat and wanna show it off. The correct answer is probably somewhere in between the two.
Is the album art display interfering with you using the music player?
Evil Sports
Android Enthusiast
Nope because I dont waste space with useless jpegs, much rather have higher quality music files using that space.
ROFL ... yeah, those 600x600 70k jpegs are killing my server space. I may need to get a new drive soon just to make sure I have enough room for them =P
How do you do that? Using Windows, I can't see my Incredible as a network device.
Evil Sports
Android Enthusiast
Forgive me but my Incred does not have a 1TB card in it
Well the program I use is like Astro, a file organization program, but you have the ability to do things over wifi. It's called EStrong. I heard Astro has the ability to do the same thing now, with an additional application. Unfortunately, I have a MAC so can't really help you with Windows. But below is the link to another thread that may be able to help you...
http://androidforums.com/incredible-support-troubleshooting/142198-access-shared-folder.html
Hope this helps.
Forgive me but my Incred does not have a 1TB card in it
I just like my Album Art....I'll sacrifice the space for it...it really is not that much at all.
I've seen a lot of people use a simple calculation for their album art. If you have album art for every song, Album art ends up taking about 1% of your collection's space. This assumes every song is tagged with album art (decent 600x600 size) and your music averages @196kbps or so.
It's totally worth it
Contempt
Well-Known Member
Another great must have program if you are searching for album art. Especially larger resolution:
Album Art Downloader
SourceForge.net: album-art
Album Art Downloader
SourceForge.net: album-art
true
Well-Known Member
i like to consider myself something of an audiophile.
my setup is:
in my car i have 1 superventilated 10" Xplode woofer running from a 1000w Sony amp and an Xplode stereo deck with Aux input where i connect my incredible.
at home i have a Pioneer stereo deck connected to .. EVERYTHING. i have it connected to my PC, but theres also an input for Aux where i have a cable with RCA connectors on one end and a 3.5mm stereo headphone connector on the other.
from there i control what plays (if i dont opt for pc) on my incredible.
its AMAZING in my car.
its EVERY song i need, on demand. always.
Play All: i only have about 15 songs on the SD card itself where i use "play all" shortcut. bit rate of course depends on you.
RadioTime is a pay app (or not) that has realtime streaming radio stations from all over the world. i currently live in texas but am in LOVE with KROQ from the LA area. this allows me to stream KROQ (and any other station from literally all over the world.) some even stream at 128kbps (depending on source)
Grooveshark is AMAZING. it requires a monthly subscription of $3/mo. but i figure youre paying way more than that from paying per file that you download. high quality media is an option. i have mine set to always on. you can set playlists, set up a queue, set up a cache for offline songs (which is just like keeping them on your phone)
Pandora is.. well.. Pandora. its usually my last choice, but good for worry free streaming. it just goes and goes. there are also work arounds for the "changing the song 6 times per hour" limit so its no big deal.
then finally youtube. which is another good source of songs. i usually only have to use youtube for brand brand brand new stuff.
hope this helps!
my setup is:
in my car i have 1 superventilated 10" Xplode woofer running from a 1000w Sony amp and an Xplode stereo deck with Aux input where i connect my incredible.
at home i have a Pioneer stereo deck connected to .. EVERYTHING. i have it connected to my PC, but theres also an input for Aux where i have a cable with RCA connectors on one end and a 3.5mm stereo headphone connector on the other.
from there i control what plays (if i dont opt for pc) on my incredible.
its AMAZING in my car.
its EVERY song i need, on demand. always.
Play All: i only have about 15 songs on the SD card itself where i use "play all" shortcut. bit rate of course depends on you.
RadioTime is a pay app (or not) that has realtime streaming radio stations from all over the world. i currently live in texas but am in LOVE with KROQ from the LA area. this allows me to stream KROQ (and any other station from literally all over the world.) some even stream at 128kbps (depending on source)
Grooveshark is AMAZING. it requires a monthly subscription of $3/mo. but i figure youre paying way more than that from paying per file that you download. high quality media is an option. i have mine set to always on. you can set playlists, set up a queue, set up a cache for offline songs (which is just like keeping them on your phone)
Pandora is.. well.. Pandora. its usually my last choice, but good for worry free streaming. it just goes and goes. there are also work arounds for the "changing the song 6 times per hour" limit so its no big deal.
then finally youtube. which is another good source of songs. i usually only have to use youtube for brand brand brand new stuff.
hope this helps!
