[EXPLANATION] How to sort songs in USB car stereo

[ishwar]

Hi
I have a problem with my Panasonic usb car stereo. Whenever I plug-my usb it starts playing songs in a particular sequence. but i want to create my own sequence like first English songs(first 20) that instrumental(next 30) and that hip hope(next 50). this just an example.
i have sort them according to their file name but does not work

how does it play song on particular sequence?

More info Starts at https://www.mediamonkey.com/forum/viewt ... 00#p460200
FACTS on USB Storage and most devices https://www.mediamonkey.com/forum/viewt ... 90#p460590
Theory behind USB FAT System https://www.mediamonkey.com/forum/viewt ... 71#p460671

[rovingcowboy]

i am guessing how the car stereo plays it because i don't have that one.

but it seems it would use an m3u playlist.

try this.

make an m3u playist for the songs in the order you want them.
and then load it on to the usb drive.

m3u playlists are just txt files with the location and file name of the songs you want played.
then the txt is changed to .m3u

so on the usb drive you would just need an m3u that has the file names of the songs in the order you want them.
because the location for the songs is in the same place the m3u is.

unless you put the songs in folder directorys on your usb drive.? if so then you will need just the folder dirctorys included
in the m3u list. not any drive letter because the m3u is on the same drive as the songs its auto id'ed by windows. or by the usb car stereo. oh if you do use folders on the usb drive then you must have the m3u file the first file seen so it will be played, which means just load it on the usb drive and don't put it in a folder.

[Lowlander]

You would need to know how the stereo sorts to be able to achieve a particular sort. I believe some have run into the issue that their device sorted on the time tracks were added to the USB and MediaMonkey doesn't do this in the order their listed.

[justsomeguy6575]

i use MM to sync to my flashdrive for use in my car stereo as well. I sort my files on the flashdrive in any order I want. I Started using MM for this reason, as well as being able to volume level during sync. All car stereos (that I've ever seen) do not read m3u or any type of playlist. It's playback order is determined by the actual file structure on the drive. So basically everything is played back alphabetically. That's why you loose your order unless you put a number at the beginning of the track that corresponds to the order in the playlist. Here's what I do....

1) In MM right click on your flashdrive and select Configure Device.
2) Now I only sync certain playlists to my drive, so check each playlist you want sync'd in the Playlists tab.
3) Then select one of the checked playlists and click edit.
4) In the "Synchronize track to:" box I enter: <Playlist>\<Auto Number> - <Artist> - <Title>
This creates a folder on my flashdrive with the name of the playlist being sync'd. Then all files that belong to that playlist are sync'd to that folder.
The <Auto Number> adds a number to the beginning of the filename being sync'd based on the order it's in in the playlist. This makes the order on the
drive identical to the playlist.

Do that for each playlist you want sync'd to your flashdrive.

I also have a playlist called Albums I sync that is complete albums. For that playlist I use: <Playlist>\<Album Artist>\<Album>\<Track#:2> - <Artist> - <Title>.
This gives me a folder called Albums with a sub-folder of the artist name and a sub-folder in that with the album name, then the tracks for that album go in there.

[marteenex]

Okay. Here's how I did it with MM 4.0.6.
Select TOOLS
-> OPTIONS
-> Portable Audio Devices
-> USB Thumb Drive (whatever that happens to be)
-> Click the configure button
-> Select the Options Tab
-> In the "Sync Music Files to" field enter <Playlist>\<Album Artist>\<Track#2> - <Artist> - <Title>
Right click in your playlist. Select Edit and make sure the playlists is viewed as Music.
Perform a send to your thumdrive (synchronize).

This is basically the same procedure but I couldn't find the options you were talking about.

[Gregski]

had the same problem a while back also with a silly Panasonic head unit (terrible units by the way) car stereo's play the songs in the order they were copied to the USB stick, now don't think that if you grab 12 songs names 01 Song, 02 Song, 03 Song in your Windows Explorer that that's the order that they will be copied to the USB stick, the process does not work like that, essentially there is no hard drive intelligence on the USB stick like ie OS, so the FAT or FAT32 (File Access Table) needs sorting somehow, however there are utilities that will allow you to like this one called FAT sorter http://fenux.net/story/fatsorteroneohfour if you ask me it's a pain in the butt and I can't wait for the day car stereos will come equipped with built in hard drives

[pramod]

If anyone wants to preserve the sequence of your playlists from your music collection while playing them via USB drives in your car, please do the following;

1. Download media monkey(MM).

2. After you install it in your computer either let it scan your music or skip that step if you just want to drag some playlists from your iTunes into media monkey.

3. Create and name few playlist folders in MM. Then drag each of your playlists from iTunes one at a time into "now playing" column on the right side then drag from there into each play list you created in MM. (Somehow MM won't allow direct drag and drop into the playlist field compared to iTunes).
Once each playlist is created, delete songs from the now playing field (only from playing list) so you can drag the next playlist there to create the subsequent playlists in MM.

4. Once all your playlists are created, edit the song sequence as you like in each playlist field of MM.

5. Now insert a FAT32 formatted flash/USB drive of your choice and capacity you like to use in your car. It will show up in the left column of MM under playlists and media servers.

6. Click on the USB drive and it will show 4 tabs on the top named "summary, autosync (device), autosync (library) and options".

7. Click on "autosync device" and choose if you want to sync all 3 collections (music,podcasts, playlists) or a single one (playlists).

8. You can either skip autosync library or enable it if you like!

9. MOST IMPORTANT STEP:Now click on "options" tab and select "file locations". On the top field of "Sync files to" look for "music" tab and change the default to <Playlist>\<Auto Number> - <Title>. This assigns a automatic incremental number to all the songs in your playlist in sequence so it will play in the same order in your car.

10. Also check the box "Enforce use of sync mask for files already on the device".

11. You can click on "playlists" tab (last one in options)and check box for "sync playlists" which will do automatic syncing each time you plug the device. Make sure to change the default in the "destination directory" to <Playlist>\<Auto Number> - <Title> just like before.

12. Following these steps may take longer for the first time but once all your playlists are dragged into MM next time updating few songs is lot easier. If someone wants to just play the songs in random sequence it is also possible to incorporate into the directory field as well.


I hope music lovers will find this method useful.

Good luck
Pramod

[bobbyjhurlbert]

Works perfect! Thanks

[nerdybaldguy007]

marteenex's post from 2012 got me going on this. I was trying to get this set up this way without haveing to write a program or something for like a year. I had never used Media Monkey before but Googling it I found this thread. Very cool..... BUT..... c'mon Media Monkey developers.... this is WAY, WAY, WAY too complicated. Should be able to do this in a few clicks. I bet 90% of your users just wanna make a USB stick that behaves like their their old CD burning software. Write some wizard code or something and make this easier to do.

[Lowlander]

Nothing complicated, all you have to do on top of regular sync is adjust the Location Mask to include <Playlist>\<Auto Number>.

[nerdybaldguy]

Well sure, I suppose if you have been using the product since 2003 you would think it isn't complicated. Weird menus, odd action names, many many clicks to get there. For somethign that in the modern world, everyone wants to do all the time. Should be a simple way to say "sync this playlist to this device and order the files". Software shouldn't be that hard to use for new users like me. I basically bought this program for ONE function, and that was it. I have been writing software for 41 years for a living. This is hardly intuitive to a new user, even one that has used a dozen different media manager programs in my time, and who writes software for a living. If J River had Auto Number I couldn't find it. It's my fave media manager at the moment. But I got Media Monkey for that one task, since it seems to be the only one who can do it at all...... even though you have to have the right phase of the moon and still takes you a gazillion clicks. Media Monkey needs to move into the 21st Century where we are using pretty stupid digital media systems in our cars instead of CDs. CDs were easy.... pick a playlist..... burn it. Now they don't even make (as far as I could find for my model of car) a system with both CD and digital media. And the car systems, for whatever reason, don't seem to support .m3u playlists. What is up with that?

[Lowlander]

In that case the blame would be with devices that can't present files in either Album sort or Playlist sort from a USB stick. Luckily MediaMonkey is flexible enough to provide a workaround for this.

And yes, as a user you'll need to set this up in MediaMonkey as one size doesn't fit all. Most would expect an Artist/Album organization for synced files, not a Playlist organization.

I'll concur that MediaMonkey seems daunting at first. However in most cases it's simpler than it seems to get to the desired result.

[Guy Turner]

You would need to know how the stereo sorts to be able to achieve a particular sort. I believe some have run into the issue that their device sorted on the time tracks were added to the USB and MediaMonkey doesn't do this in the order their listed.

I have a Pioneer car stereo and also had issues with song order. It seems that the stereo reads the songs in order that they were put on the drive. If you copy files in bulk to the drive it will play them in seemingly random order. The only way to get the songs to play in the order you want, (album order, which is important on albums that should play in a certain order), then you have to copy the songs one at a time to the drive. It's the ONLY way I have found to make it play in the correct order. BIG pain but it works. The problem is Not with MM but with the stereo.

Master Foo

[Peke]

Hi,
I now have Android Head Unit but while I was using LG Stereo in previous car. I always used https://www.anerty.net/software/file/DriveSort/ and it always worked flawlessly.

For MMW to USB I manually synced Playlist by Playlist using this mask "<playlist>\<Auto Number:4>. <Title> - <Artist>" so that even display crop Artist I know partially title and can navigate thru folders that are named by Playlist name.

[Guy Turner]

I contacted Pioneer about the song order issue with my stereo and they confirmed that it will Only play in the order that the song was put on the drive. It doesn't matter what number the song is or how the name of the song is listed alphanumerically, it will still play in the order that the song was copied to the drive. It reads the 'time stamp Only'. I asked them if they intend to put out a fix for that and they said No.

Master Foo