Can we go back to the Playlist problem?

[bennyb]

OK. Disappointed in the lack of reaction to previous discussion of problems with Playlists, but in the hope somebody is still reading here, allow me to talk through my latest experiment ...

I had about 30 sampler albums which were given away free with a mag called New Country in the 1990s. Half junk but I wanted a Best Of on CD to prove my case that half of it was surprisingly good before the hat acts took over altogether and started another spiral downhill.

Loaded the albums into the Brennan and edited them down one by one, then added artist names through the PC interface and added each collection to a new playlist. All good up to this point and I've got a playlist of about 200 tunes which seems to work fine just playing back through the machine.

Not sure if I have a spare USB key the right size so I decide to use a spare Toshiba solid-state drive with plenty of capacity. My Windows 10 pc does not offer FAT32 formatting but I can use something called EXFAT which is supposed to cover it. However, when I plug the drive into the Brennan I get a No USB message. Eventually I format it through the Brennan, using Drive A, then need to move it to Drive C to get it read and recognised as ready. Not for the first time, I wish the B2 had a USB port on the front.

OK. Export Playlist to C and all goes fine. But when I move the drive to my PC, the recordings have been sorted into folders which are not helpful – one slugged New Country Magazine, which contains one album; one slugged Various, which contains two albums; and one slugged Various Artists, which contains 22 albums. Drill down and the tracks appear to be all there but the file paths are complicated and include track numberings from the original albums, which creates some confusion. And I cannot find the artist info which I laboriously typed in. Everything is Various Artists. I expect the names are there somewhere but I need to simplify the cataloguing somehow.

I call up a free version of Media Monkey which I installed on the PC a while ago. I am no expert with it but I can find my way down through the portable drive and the folders to individual albums, highlight a bunch of tracks at a time and move them to a new playlist I have called Before The Hat Acts.

So all my tunes are in one place. Then what? I tried a simple Burn To CD and ended up with 22 tracks apparently transferred to my first disk and a second disk burning, presumably of similar size. Took the first disk back to the B2 and tried to play it and got a lot of random noise. Took it back to the PC stack and put it in the CD drive and the machine would not read it.

Bugger is all I can say. Another try another day maybe. Perhaps I have missed a simple trick. Perhaps I have misunderstood Media Monkey. But as I have said before, it does seem to me that it is not a transparent process to produce a copy of a B2 playlist which will play in the order I laid it down. Can anyone say where I got it wrong?

[Daniel Taylor]

Hi Benny,

My first thought is that maybe a Playlist for your best of collection may not be the best way to go.

First you need to understand the folder structure the B2 uses to organize things.  Under the music folder, they have all the folders named for the Artist.  Then under each Artist folder, they have folders with all the Album names for that Artist.  Then withing each Album folder are the song tracks.  So for example:

music

----- Waylon Jennings

---------- Ramblin' Man

--------------- 01 Waylon Jennings - I'm a Ramblin' Man

--------------- 02 Waylon Jennings - Rainy Day Woman

--------------- 03 etc.

---------- Greatest Hits

--------------- 01 Waylon Jennings - Lonesome, On'ry and Mean

--------------- 02 Waylon Jennings - I've Always Been Crazy

--------------- 03 etc.

You don't have to include the Artist name in the track name.  But the B2 depends on the track number being at the front of the track list.

Here's an idea for how to arrange the tracks in one of possibly several "albums" for your New Country in the 1990s collection.

music

----- New Country Artists

---------- Before the Hat Acts [1]

--------------- 01 Artist Name - Track1

--------------- 02 Artist Name - Track2

--------------- 03 Artist Name - Track3

--------------- 04 etc.

---------- Before the Hat Acts [2]

--------------- 01 Artist Name - Track1

--------------- 02 Artist Name - Track2

--------------- 03 etc.

You don't have to name the folder with an actual Artist name, but the B2 will handle it as if it was an Artist name.

I hope that is helpful.  If not, then please disregard.

[Daniel Taylor]

If you go with something like that, then you can put the Artist=New Country Artists in its own playlist and then when you export it to a USB stick, the songs will be organized as I've suggested, and not spread all over the place.

[bennyb]

Thanks Daniel. It is very helpful to understand how the B2 organises its filing - been looking for that information for a long time and it baffled me on the JB7 before. I'll give your suggestion some thought but it does look like a lot of renaming work to achieve a simple result?  Far as I can see, unless I include artist in the track title, every track would just be attributed to Various Artists. Hope to give you a fuller response later ...

[Daniel Taylor]

The B2 doesn't get the Artist name from the track filename.  It gets it from the name of the Artist folder.  That's why, in my example, I gave the Artist folder something general other than Various Artists.  Then I put the actual Artist name in the track filename.

In a case such as yours, I really think it would be easier to rip the discs on your computer.  Do your edits, track deleting, and track rearranging, and then Import it all into to B2 via USB.

[Nick Hickson]

My only gripe with the Playlist function (don't use it that much) is that if I make a temporary one, which is the only way I use it, and then play it it doesn't stop when it comes to the last entry, instead it goes back to track one thus repeating the list ad infinitum.

[bennyb]

OK. Digesting. Many thanks.

It would be useful if the B2 allowed artist info to be changed on the track info? But really all I want is for my info to stay there and tracks to be kept in order of recording to playlist. Could just be a numbering job. Thinking on.

[bennyb]

Yes, but you only have to go to Playlist menu and choose Playlist Off?

[Daniel Taylor]

Nick,

Does it still do that if you set Classical Mode = On ?

[Daniel Taylor]

Benny,

I have a group of sampler discs that I've loaded under the Artist name = DMP (which is the record label).  Then within that folder are three folders for the three albums, each folder named for the album.  Then the tracks for each album contained within the folder for each album.  Each track filename has <track number, Artist - Song>.  Seen in this picture is the Now Playing window on upper left, Playlist on lower left, list of Albums for the Artist on upper right, and track list for the current album on lower right.

[Nick Hickson]

Hi Daniel.

Yes it does. I'm currently playing four movements of a Symphony from ripped CD with 8 tracks. I have dragged the 4 tracks I want to play over to the Playlist window and expect, when having got to the end, it will start playing from the top again. Will report back if it doesn't .

[Daniel Taylor]

That was the first time I tried to post a picture.  And I see that it's too small to be of any use.  I've seen other people post pictures, but you can click on them and they open in a new tab and large enough to see what's there.  I'd appreciate it if someone would tell me how to do that.

[Daniel Taylor]

I see that if you right click on the picture, and click on View Image, it opens up large enough to see it clearly.

[Daniel Taylor]

Nick,

If I had a classical work that included movements from multiple discs, I would group the pertinent tracks into an Album folder named for the work and put that folder under the Artist.  That would make it available to play whenever you wanted, and without the need for a Playlist.  And it would stop at the end if Classical Mode = On.

[Tony Wyer]

I have ordered my compilations similar but dropped the track number from the start without any issues.

[lesliebr...@gmail.com]

Hi Daniel, on my Windows 10 laptop I use screenshot by pressing the Windows button plus the PrtSc button. Saves the image in a folder named screenshots from which you can retrieve it for editing or attaching to posts.

[Daniel Taylor]

Thanks Leslie.  I do similarly.  Then I use the icon that says insert image to upload the picture to the post.  But apparently there is another way to upload the picture so that when you click on it, it will open up in a new tab.  My work-around now is to tell people to right click on the picture and then click View Picture - seems to work okay.

[Tony Wyer]

Why do that.

On Win10 go to the apps list and look for Snipping Tool.

Drag it to your app bar at the base of the desktop window.

The use the snipping tool to exactly copy the area you want.

You can either paste it direct into the thing you are doing or save it as a jpg (for instance)

T

[Daniel Taylor]

Tony,

I don't have Windows 10, but what you describe is essentially what I do.  I see that the picture you posted has the same properties as the one I posted, namely that when you click on it nothing happens.  There are folks here who post their pictures to the forum in such a way that when you click on them, they automatically open in a new tab, larger so you can see them.  That's what I'm asking about.

[bennyb]

Daniel - I guess it's about posting a picture as a link? 

[lesliebr...@gmail.com]

Windows 10 screenshot > Press Windows button plus PrtSc button. Screenshot is saved in a folder called Screenshots in the quick access section in File Explorer on my laptop. To add a screenshot to your post click on "attach file" on the post page. (See image). A  box requesting "select files from your computer" opens (see image) and if you click on that another box opens showing folders on your PC. Find the folder your screenshots are in. Double click on the image you want and it is attached to the post (see image) Attachments can also be removed. These screenshots should opened in your post when someone clicks on them. Seems long winded, but is fairly easy once you've tried it.

[Daniel Taylor]

Leslie,

That's it!  I was uploading by clicking on the picture icon (just to the left of Link).  You use the Attach method.  Thanks!

[lesliebr...@gmail.com]

No problem. Happy to help.