Holy crap, syncing with WP8 is a trainwreck.

[brmiller1976]

"Downloaded" music is so 2001. Make playlists on your old device with the same account and start streaming -- problem solved.

 

[lordofthereef]

Re: Zune Music and the disaster that is WP8

"Downloaded" music is so 2001. Make playlists on your old device with the same account and start streaming -- problem solved.

Can you say band-aid? :unhappysweat:

Also, not everyone has unlimited data, not can justify dropping $10/GB just to stream music...

 

[Bryan_J]

Re: Zune Music and the disaster that is WP8

"Downloaded" music is so 2001. Make playlists on your old device with the same account and start streaming -- problem solved.

I suppose that works if you listen to mainstream music, have the data plan with enough allowance to stream everything and have very reliable service. About half of my collection isn't in the Xbox Music catalogue so I'd have to cloud store. I could get my playlists on to SkyDrive and stream them - they'd fit (there's no way my collection would fit though, it is about 15x too big for SkyDrive) but I leave my playlists running on repeat/random in the background all day every day at work so local playing is the only thing that makes sense for me. I don't particularly feel like paying at&t a lot more than I already am for data just because Microsoft (whose products I love except for this one) has botched music management.

The whole metadata debacle is also stopping me from trying to cloud store and stream with them - the only thing that is keeping my collection from transforming itself into something filled with artists I've never listened to is having it on local lockdown with about zero online service interaction.

 

[mcherrick68]

Re: Zune Music and the disaster that is WP8

how do you tell your pc to disconnect from xbox cloud? What program is that in?

 

[Bryan_J]

Re: Zune Music and the disaster that is WP8

how do you tell your pc to disconnect from xbox cloud? What program is that in?

There's a setting in the Windows 8 modern app, along with one to stop overwriting metadata. There's also the same setting on the phone. On the Zune side it would only add missing metadata.

 

[dainla]

"Downloaded" music is so 2001. Make playlists on your old device with the same account and start streaming -- problem solved.

Not an option for those of us without unlimited plans.

 

[dainla]

Re: Zune Music and the disaster that is WP8

I suppose that works if you listen to mainstream music, have the data plan with enough allowance to stream everything and have very reliable service. About half of my collection isn't in the Xbox Music catalogue so I'd have to cloud store. I could get my playlists on to SkyDrive and stream them - they'd fit (there's no way my collection would fit though, it is about 15x too big for SkyDrive) but I leave my playlists running on repeat/random in the background all day every day at work so local playing is the only thing that makes sense for me. I don't particularly feel like paying at&t a lot more than I already am for data just because Microsoft (whose products I love except for this one) has botched music management.

The whole metadata debacle is also stopping me from trying to cloud store and stream with them - the only thing that is keeping my collection from transforming itself into something filled with artists I've never listened to is having it on local lockdown with about zero online service interaction.

For cloud I use Google Play. Just puts all your music into the cloud and you can listen where ever you want. I just can't use it often because I don't have unlimited data

 

[eric12341]

Seems like all is good if WMP is used. WMP can also sync automatically if a partnership is set up.

 

[mcherrick68]

Anyway I put music on my phone, It's a mess. Either duplicate songs, random albums, or things like that, but I've tried the metro and desktop app, WMP, and drag and drop and have gotten similar results. I hope this is something that they know of and can fix, and not just something I'm doing wrong

 

[gar216]

When I left Blackberry and went with WP7 it was because I wanted the Apple experience of easily syncing all my music PODCASTS and photos... oh and managing apps all in one place but im not an "Apple Guy". I was happy with my zune, love my xbox and decided to keep it all in the family and get a windows phone. Then I upgrade to WP8 and the feature that brought me to the Windows Phone dance left me with a rod in the bathroom.

Simply put syncing on WP8 is a mess, they gave us more ways to sync but took away the best way by stopping support for the zune software. I get it, zune is dead, that still doesn't explain why xbox music doesn't support the same great functions that its predecessor had.

Big epic fail, Microsoft. Im sure they will get it right sooner or later, right now it just feels like I have a lot of cool **** with windows phone 8 and windows 8 but its all 90% complete.

 

[anon(5373980)]

I'm using a 920 with Windows 8 Pro and an Xbox Music Pass, and I deleted my entire Zune collection and re-downloaded it in W8. I have two problems and one fix - for the DRM problem, I've found that once I try to play the song on the phone once and I get the DRM error, I can play it fine after that. So, after I download a new album, I just head over to the phone and give it a run-through to make it work normally. Strange, I know, but it works in my case.

The only other thing that annoys me is that the "Cloud Collection" music doubles up with my Xbox Pass music. So, if I leave Cloud Collection turned on, I get to see everything twice, and Play All and Smart DJ will pick out both local and cloud music at random.

Did the exact same thing you did and have the same two issues, but my songs still won't play after running through the DRM error on them. Man I hope they get this stuff fixed soon!

 

[Piratelooksat40]

Here is a way to get your Zune Playlists on to your Windows 8 phone. It certainly is not pretty, but it will solve your most of your problems and it will identify what songs your are going to have DRM problems with. (Note I am using windows 8, but it will work with Windows 7)

First off you need to download a program call ZPL to WPL it converts your Zune playlists to Windows Playlists, you can get it at this link. ZplToWpl - Home I used to use this program to convert my Zune Play list so they would show up on my Windows Media Center PC. Your Zune Play lists are located where ever you have your music downloaded, there is a directory there called "Playlists". I just point the From and to directory to the same place.

Once you have run that program, your Zune playlist are now visible in Windows Media Player. You can edit and work on your playlists from there. Once you plug in your windows 8 phone you can then drag and drop your play list to your phone. Any songs that have a DRM problem will show up on the playlist with a blue exclamation point next to them.

I will still have to use the Zune client to get my 10 free mp3's each month, but from now on I have learned my lesson. Products come and go, but Windows Media Player seems to be the one product that sticks around in all products. (Note, I have not found it yet on my Surface)

 

[Digital Moe]

Using WMP is just horrible I added a so h to a playlist but to get that song onto the phone in ten playlist I had to add the entire playlist and watch as it processed each songs realise it was already on the device and then move on to the next one. There is no way I can recommend a WP to anyone right now I know we mock Apple but boy did they make music syncing easy.

 

[runam0k]

There might be some progress being made on the music front: some people are quoting MS support as saying "we are aware of the issues and are working on it". On guy says he got 4000 MSP for his troubles! Master List Of Issues With XBox Music On WP8 - Microsoft Community

 

[kevinxb]

Adding to the list of those having issues with the sync software. Running on my Windows 7 laptop, trying to sync three iTunes playlists. I am able to get the sync completed without crashing, but there are a few songs missing from the playlists on the phone. The songs are on the phone and show up in the list of all music, but they do not show up in the playlist they're under in iTunes. Anyone experience this?

 

[vedichymn]

Adding to the list of those having issues with the sync software. Running on my Windows 7 laptop, trying to sync three iTunes playlists. I am able to get the sync completed without crashing, but there are a few songs missing from the playlists on the phone. The songs are on the phone and show up in the list of all music, but they do not show up in the playlist they're under in iTunes. Anyone experience this?

What kind of files are they? If they have any kind of DRM, the sync software will skip them.

 

[kevinxb]

What kind of files are they? If they have any kind of DRM, the sync software will skip them.

They're not DRM files, just standard mp3s. The files get synced to the phone, but they are missing from the playlist, i.e. my Top 25 playlist only has 23 songs in it even though those 2 missing songs can be found/played by looking in the artists, songs or albums menu on the phone. The only place they don't show up is in the expected playlist.

 

[D0gsballs]

The only real issue I'm having is getting the album art to show. For some of my albums it just will not show. It shows fine in the Xbox Music app on Windows 8, but on the Windows Phone (Windows 8) app the art is missing and this is transferred to the Music app on my Lumia. No idea how to sort it at the moment. Anyone help? Cheers.

 

[Squatting Hen]

It?s obviously not ideal or full featured but I had no problems adding songs on a Win 7 Laptop with the Beta App, nor on a Win 8 PC using WMP. I despise playlists, so I prefer to use WMP out of the two options. Here, I just drag the songs I want on my phone over to where the sync device (phone) is located.

 

[Matthew Mazzenga]

I just spent over an hour trying to get a playlist from my win8 laptop to my L920. Tried Xbox music, the wp8 sync app on win8, the desktop app, I even tried the old Zune desktop app, no luck. Decided to try Windows Media Player and start from scratch. Created the playlist and synced it to my phone in about 5 minutes. Seriously, it's ridiculous that I have to go "old school" for something like this, but now at least I know I don't have to mess with all this new broken crapware MS is trying to push on us. If it ain't broke don't fix it.