Tips to avoid duplicates and stay organized

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kscrivener
Posts: 4
Joined: Sat Aug 07, 2021 11:35 am

Tips to avoid duplicates and stay organized

Post by kscrivener »

I've only briefly touched MMW5 in the last couple of years to rip the occasional CD and add it to my phone. Now, I'll be laid up at home for a few weeks so I'm looking for tips and "best practices" suggestions for my MMW5 install.

So, here are my primary questions:
1. Do I have a setting wrong or is it something I'm doing that causes duplicates when rescanning for new music? I add a CD and some or all of my previously added music doubles.
2. Should i continue using MMW5 to rip CDs and just let it do what it wants or is there some other "ideal" directory structure that I should convert to?
3. Has auto-tagging improved over the last 3 years?

I believe I also have an issue with ICloud sync causing duplicate music on my iPhone but that's an issue for another day; I've deleted all music files on my phone and iCloud and turned off syncing for now. I will work on that after I'm comfortable with MMW5.
Lowlander
Posts: 57475
Joined: Sat Sep 06, 2003 5:53 pm
Location: MediaMonkey 5

Re: Tips to avoid duplicates and stay organized

Post by Lowlander »

1. Which Build (Help > About) of MediaMonkey are you using? Do duplicates have the exact same Path, if so where (please describe) are the files stored?

2. Yes, there is no real ideal structure, but if you use external Artwork files you should have each Album in a separate folder with that Artwork.

3. Yes, what issue do you currently have?
kscrivener
Posts: 4
Joined: Sat Aug 07, 2021 11:35 am

Re: Tips to avoid duplicates and stay organized

Post by kscrivener »

Lowlander wrote: Mon Jun 17, 2024 7:52 pm 1. Which Build (Help > About) of MediaMonkey are you using? Do duplicates have the exact same Path, if so where (please describe) are the files stored?

2. Yes, there is no real ideal structure, but if you use external Artwork files you should have each Album in a separate folder with that Artwork.

3. Yes, what issue do you currently have?
It's hard to say what MediaMonkey build I was on during 2021/2022. Updated from 5.0.2.2516 to 5.0.5.2695 today.

I was really looking for general suggestions/best practices as my troubles were some time ago and most likely self inflicted. I'm basically starting over with MediaMonkey as of today and wanted to find out if there was anything I should know before I got in deep.

I MAY not have any issues. I suspect my old problems were user-errors related to rescanning the library for changes after manually replacing tags/artwork that were either not found automatically or were just wrong. I have a lot of "Best of" albums from '60s, '70s, and '80s era bands. Some of the songs have been rereleased on multiple albums over 40+ years so auto-tagging is problematic.
Lowlander
Posts: 57475
Joined: Sat Sep 06, 2003 5:53 pm
Location: MediaMonkey 5

Re: Tips to avoid duplicates and stay organized

Post by Lowlander »

If you need to manage duplicates, MediaMoney can help.
IanRTaylorUK
Posts: 558
Joined: Fri Dec 27, 2019 4:41 pm

Re: Tips to avoid duplicates and stay organized

Post by IanRTaylorUK »

kscrivener wrote: Mon Jun 17, 2024 9:57 pm I was really looking for general suggestions/best practices as my troubles were some time ago and most likely self inflicted. I'm basically starting over with MediaMonkey as of today and wanted to find out if there was anything I should know before I got in deep.

I MAY not have any issues. I suspect my old problems were user-errors related to rescanning the library for changes after manually replacing tags/artwork that were either not found automatically or were just wrong. I have a lot of "Best of" albums from '60s, '70s, and '80s era bands. Some of the songs have been rereleased on multiple albums over 40+ years so auto-tagging is problematic.
The first thing I would suggest is to define what you consider to be a duplicate (versus a different version). I personally start with DUPLICATE = Same ALBUM ARTIST + Same ALBUM + Same TRACK TITLE. This works if the title includes qualifiers for the things like Mix / Single vs Album / Year(s) / Remastered / Acoustic etc. etc. But I prefer to keep my title short to help with seeing the title fully on devices.

I therefore sometimes suffix the title with A, B, C... and put the "qualifier" (track or album) in the comments.

Track length can often be a good indicator of potential duplicate(s) that are in fact different "version(s)". After that you might also look at things like volume analysis and BPM. But to be honest you are probably getting to a stage where you might want to listen to the tracks! I have used RATING to indicate a preferred version (e.g. 3* or higher).

If you can make a distinction between "Best of" compilations / collaborations vs "Best of" by the specific artist then this helps a lot. I do this by setting the ALBUM ARTIST to Various.

However, you will still have duplicates, in my library it is:
DUPLICATE TITLES + ARTIST(S) = 30%
DUPLICATE TITLES = 45%
DUPLICATE CONTENT = 0%

All of the previous depend on correct tagging and I would say careful organisation of the files. I organise my library by <TYPE> then <ALBUM ARTIST> then <ALBUM> e.g. M:\Music\AC-DC\High Voltage 1976. Then ALL tracks have <DISC #> and <TRACK #> set.

Hope this helps.
Ian Taylor
kscrivener
Posts: 4
Joined: Sat Aug 07, 2021 11:35 am

Re: Tips to avoid duplicates and stay organized

Post by kscrivener »

Lowlander wrote: Mon Jun 17, 2024 10:37 pm If you need to manage duplicates, MediaMoney can help.
Thanks. I saved the link in a Favorites folder I've created to bookmark helpful MediaMonkey posts.
kscrivener
Posts: 4
Joined: Sat Aug 07, 2021 11:35 am

Re: Tips to avoid duplicates and stay organized

Post by kscrivener »

IanRTaylorUK wrote: Tue Jun 18, 2024 5:00 am
The first thing I would suggest ...
...Hope this helps.
I've just been reading your reponses to the thread "How to handle mult disc album?". You provide valuable information in your posts and I do appreciate you taking time to respond. Thank you.
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