Windows Phone and Music: Tips & Tricks

[Muessig]

Hey sakendrick, for the Zune DRM files have you experimented with the WP8 for WP7 desktop app? There's a chance this app might sync your DRM music where WMP currently doesn't. Is it possible that out of your 300 test songs only 55 were not DRM?

 

[sakendrick]

Hi Muessig - thanks for the reply. Yes I am using the WP8 for W7 desktop app assuming you mean this one: Windows Phone app for desktop (Preview 3) | Windows Phone 8 | Windows Phone How-to | Windows Phone (United States). It does successfully sync DRM files individually. But it fails to sync playlists properly like it says it should. I have not found any pattern as to the songs in the playlist that sync and those that don't. As I mentioned - on one PC it will sync 0 files in the playlist. On another it syncs 55 out of 300 (same playlist). Some are DRM, some are not. I created a playlist of 2 songs with one DRM one not and it synced fine.

In chatting with a MSFT rep yesterday they said (quoted from the chat):
"What I have got so far is that those equipment and systems are not 100% compatible and therefore the results are the incompatibilities that you have found. If repeating the known processes don't resolve the issue, the best recommendation is to use the Windows 8 OS or for this sort of activities. My sincere apologies for not having the exactly right moves that would make you able to achieve what you need today."

So it seems this is a known issue and there is no way to sync playlists from windows 7 to windows phone 8 when you have DRM songs and non DRM songs in those play lists. So I'm stuck. Not exaggerating when I say the main reason I went with windows phone was because of Zune Pass and the music experience. And it was awesome on 7.5. WP8 is a good phone but the music experience for xbox music subscribers appears very broken.

I'm hopeful someone can suggest a way, or I guess I'm waiting for a fix, or I return the WP8 and by and old 7.5 off of ebay or something.

Curious - is it possible to edit a WP8 playlist in a text editor so I can manually migrate my playlists? I tried copying one off of the device but it didn't seem to contain any content. My other option is to rebuild the entire playlist on the phone itself which is a real pain. I want to manage what is on the phone using playlists - which is the common way to sync content to phones when you have very large libraries and small memory foot print (Lumia 1020 only has 32 G and not expandable as far as I can tell).

 

[sakendrick]

I *believe* I have solved my problems... need to test but it turns out the issue was with my playlists. Since some songs were syncing and others weren't I took a look at the playlist to find out if there was anything I could see that would distinguish the songs that did vs. those that didn't. I opened the *.zpl or .wpl files in notepad. Turns out there was a weird relative path for many of the songs that started with zunemp:// where as some had normal c:\folder\folder\song paths. The numbers didn't line up 100% but they were close enough and on spot check - those that did sync had the c: type path. I then checked my other PC where the playlist would sync 0 songs. Every song in those playlists had bogus paths to an F drive that no longer existed. The weird thing is that Zune some how compensated for all of this. Those playlists with the F: would play fine in zune.

So I did a simple CTRL H (find and replace) in note pad and insert the correct path to where the songs were stored..Presto! seems to have worked.

 

[Muessig]

Keep us up to date on this issue! It's interesting that the older Zune playlists are referencing to places that no longer exist or existed at playlist creation. I'll make sure I add a section in the OP about that.

 

[sakendrick]

This has indeed solved my issue -- I also learned that network paths (e.g. \\192.168.2.11\music\etc) in playlists won't sync using the windows phone app for desktop. Need to map a drive and make sure you update your playlists with search and replace to contain the mapped drive letter.

Can't explain why Zune was able to compensate for the different faulty paths, but it did. The other situation where this would occur is if you downloaded a song via subscription, added it to a playlist, then later purchased (for example using credits)... the playlist would still reference a WMA file but the actual file was now MP3. There were about 8 songs in my 300 song playlist that did not sync and in all cases, this was the cause.

 

[MichaelBanning]

Ok I use Windows Media Player to sync the playlists, and I also sync the "All music" playlist since I, not unreasonably, want all my music on my phone.

Now theres like a copy of each song for each "playlist" it's in?! ARE YOU ******* KIDDING ME?


UPDATE: It appears to be a false alarm. Whereas during the sync the phone was appearing to contain multiple copies of songs, after the sync they seemed to have disappear....this is bull****. Could they not have just renamed Zune and called it the Desktop Sync App? Ugh

 

[The Dez pirate]

I apologize if this has been covered. I tried to read through the whole thread, but I am not finding an answer to my specific question.

I have a Nokia Lumia 820, with a 64 whatever SD card in there. I put my music on the SD card (just using the drag and drop windows method. Nothing fancy.) I realized I wasn't hearing a lot of songs, so I checked and there were about 130 songs saved to my phone, (duplicates of what was on the SD)

So I deleted what was saved to the phone. I wanted the space, I have an Xbox and I use the games a lot. Anyway, now I can't play any of my music. I am using the Nokia Music app. It says I have 800 or so songs in the "collection" but when I go to "my music" it says there is nothing.

How do I play the music from my SD card? I don't want to make a bunch of playlists and junk. I just like to hit shuffle. Help?

 

[WPhoney]

Have you tried the built-in Xbox Music+Videos app?
If it doesn't work, turn off the phone, remove the SD, then restart the phone and open both music apps. Turn off the phone again, reinsert the SD and see if the songs appear

 

[The Dez pirate]

I tried the Music + Videos app, and that did not work either.

I tried formatting the SD card (twice actually) once I used the chord to move music on to the SD. The second time I put the SD card into the adapter and put it in the comptuer (its a micro one or whatever.) Loaded the music, put it back in the phone, and it could onyl see maybe 12 songs.

I put the music directly on the phone and I can play it all (though I'm getting the doubles as other people have mentioned.)

I have the setting set for phone storage to put new music and videos on the SD card. The photos are accessible just fine. I don't understand why the music won't play. Its very frustrating. The entire reason I purchased the older model (The 820) was so I could put my own SD card in. I have absolutely no memory left on the phone itself, so no room for new music without getting rid of the old music that I still want to listen to. I like having a large selection of music to listen to.

I just don't know what else I can try. I was thinking of trying a different brand of SD card? I am using the Scandisk 64gb mini SD

 

[11B1P]

I *believe* I have solved my problems... need to test but it turns out the issue was with my playlists. Since some songs were syncing and others weren't I took a look at the playlist to find out if there was anything I could see that would distinguish the songs that did vs. those that didn't. I opened the *.zpl or .wpl files in notepad. Turns out there was a weird relative path for many of the songs that started with zunemp:// where as some had normal c:\folder\folder\song paths. The numbers didn't line up 100% but they were close enough and on spot check - those that did sync had the c: type path. I then checked my other PC where the playlist would sync 0 songs. Every song in those playlists had bogus paths to an F drive that no longer existed. The weird thing is that Zune some how compensated for all of this. Those playlists with the F: would play fine in zune.

So I did a simple CTRL H (find and replace) in note pad and insert the correct path to where the songs were stored..Presto! seems to have worked.

Holy carp. I find it awesome you figured it out. But for those of us normal users, and by that, I mean me, it sounds a bit overwhelming. I have a basic understanding of what and where you are referring to, but CTRL H in notepad? WTH!! It's stuff like that, that I have no idea even existed.

You obviously have extensive computer knowledge. But for a lot of us, that is just too much. MS has really got to make a better and easier system. I appreciate your time and effort to solve your problem and then share it with us.

Thank you.

 

[Kenneth Tejada]

ISSUE SOLVED

1. Delete song or image using PC (make it sure that your Lumia device is connected on the PC)
2. After deleting, eject the device (in this way multiplying image or song files will stop)
3. Copy or drag files again.

NOTE: every time you delete a file make it sure to remove the Lumia device then re-insert again!

ENJOY!!!

 

[irvin792]

Thanks for this

 

[vaderag]

Is there any way to use the MPA tool functionality manually on the desktop? All my album artwork is fine, but i'm missing Artist artwork. I would like to resolve this for my entire collection on my hard disk if possible... does anyone know what files/tags are required for this?

 

[vaderag]

Also, any way to sync play counts / favorites?

 

[MichaelBanning]

I have a few requests for edits to the podcast section of the OP:

1. - include this article which is recent, kept up to date and includes 12 different apps - http://allaboutwindowsphone.com/features/item/18410_Podcatchers_podcast_managers-c.php

2. - specifically mention in the OP Bringcast and Carboncast, which along with Podcast Lounge are by far the 3 standout quality podcast apps.

3. - PLEASE edit the description for Podcast Lounge, as it is extremely misleading. First, it's available in the US so delete the "(United Kingdom)" part. Second, please delete the BBC comment, or mention it as an aside and start the description about how it is for all podcasts and not BBC-centric, and I think the best rated podcast app out there.

Thank you!

 

[Pavel_Y]

As it is suggested in the very first post I copied some mp3 files to my phone through the Windows Explorer to Music folder. But phone doesn't see these files... Please help!

 

[mohsin117]

Hi guys

Few days ago I moved from the Lumia 800 to the awesome Lumia 1520, it’s like the best thing that ever happened to me! But… Im having a problem (well 2 problems…) im having issues with the Xbox music

Some of my music when I move it to the phone the tile appears all weird the album title changes, even the genre changes.

Im very thorought with my music I go through and change all the details and set all the album art but when I move it over it messes up, I’ve gone through the track again and use MP3Tag to check all the details I can’t figure out what’s going wrong

Here is “After School – Bang!” on my computer and all the details:


Now here it is moved over to my phone:

The “Album Title” changed, the “Artist” changed and the “Title” has changed also the “Genres” changed to “other”. And that screen shot is from straight after moving it on my phone

And here’s some screen shot of it playing on my phone:

Iv tried everything, that I can think of to fix this redid all the details opened it in WMP and in Zune, iv durned off the retrieve album data thing from the Xbox music app one the phone, moved all the tracks back over, but still no success, this is happening to a number of tracks

I thought the Zune app on the Lumia 800 and the Zune program on the computer were really good cos it worked but, now even with the Windows Phone PC app you can’t rename the file
Any ideas people, its driving me crazy

 

[LMerin]

Found a solution for duplicate files.
Convert all the files you want to transfer to WMA format (I've been using Free Mp3 Wma Converter) and then transfer manually with the windows explorer (copy&paste) to the phone. It completely solves the problem, even with large amounts of files. I haven't confirmed if this solution works with the more problematic SD issue but so far so good.
If you sync with windows media player, when it converts automatically a file (320Kb to 128Kb), not only it reduces the file quality but it also converts it to WMA format, making the process easier.

 

[anon(8657436)]

I've been doing a bit of experimenting because the song duplication issue is really annoying for me (I always listen to whole albums, so song duplication is a deal breaker). I've come across some interesting behaviour, and (I think) a consistent way to stop it from happening.

Some background first: I have a Lumia 520 and keep all of my music on a 32GB microSD card. I sync just using drag-n-drop/cut-n-paste in Windows 7 x64. All of my songs are in mp3 format (a lot of albums are in FLAC, but I convert them manually beforehand) and I keep all of the tagging neat, tidy and consistent using mp3tag. The folder structure of my collection is Artist\Album\Track - Title.mp3. All of the Xbox Music stuff it turned off so it doesn't mess up any of my hard work.

I think the problem occurs when you try to sync too many songs at once, like dumping your entire music library onto your phone at once. My collection is only 696 songs/7.4GB and it almost always produces duplicates when I transfer all of it, regardless of whether I format the SD card beforehand or not. When I was testing out different things trying to find the cause (e.g. playing with tags, doing things in a different order, etc.) I started transferring smaller numbers of songs so I didn't waste 30 minutes at a time to see if something worked.

I'm not sure if it has to do with the number or the physical size of the files you transfer or even the number of folders, but I found that by syncing less than about 120 songs or 1.20GB at a time, duplication wouldn't occur. Whenever I did get duplicates, I deleted the files and the offending albums from the hidden Music\Albums folder on the Phone storage (not the SD card), then I disconnected the phone from USB and checked that they were indeed deleted in Music+Videos. Redoing the transfer but with less songs worked every time.

TL;DR only transfer around 120 songs/1.20GB at a time (the problem may be number of files or total size, I don't know). It's a painstaking process, but it worked for me. Maybe not so feasible for those with big libraries though.

I believe I read somewhere in a documentation about WP8 limitation on maximum simultaneous file transfers. And your solution works great.
Try mine too:
http://forums.windowscentral.com/windows-phone-8/238435-3.htm#post2393398

 

[Renee Mills]

THANK YOU!!!! This really helped and it WORKS! It was getting so frustrating with the duplicates popping up in my music. I was starting to think it was a mistake getting the lumia windows 8 phone. I had to format my sd card then everything was fine. There isn't any duplicates anymore. :smile::excited: