Album Art in iTunes and Windows Media Center Solved!
I love music; I work in IT I'm able to listen to music while I work so therefore I listen to alot of music.
I have a black 60gig 5th generation iPod for my portable music needs and I have a Windows Media Center 2005 system for my primary home theater solution.
Months and months ago, maybe even a year has passed now, I came across a big problem with my music collection. It appears that iTunes and Windows Media Center/Windows Media Player like to store some of there meta-information differently, primarily the Album Art.
Anyone who has tried using their music collection on both iTunes/their iPod and with Windows Media Center they will know that the way iTunes embeds the Album Art into the files separately may allow the iPod to display the Album Art, but does not allow Media Center to show it.
Do not fear, I have the solution.
I went to the full extent of doing a re-tagging my entire music collection, not a small task and also unnecessary, the only thing you truly need to do is the following:
- Make sure that each mp3 file has not got any embedded Album Art. You can use many applications to do this (iTunes, Windows Media Player, etc); I used Tag&Rename.
- Have your music sorted into a folder per album structure, personally I have the following structure:
[Music Library Folder]/[Artist]/[Album](/[Disc #])
- Make the music 'Read-only'. To do so, select the music, right-click and tick the 'Read-only' checkbox.
This is probably the most important step! - Make sure your iTunes library is empty, then drop all the Read-only music into iTunes.
- Go through each Album in iTunes and use the 'Get Album Artwork' feature.
Must be iTunes 7 or later. - Once you have got all the Album Artwork download a program called 'iTunes Store file validator (iTSfv)', either from here or search for it.
- Run iTSfv using only the 'Copy Folder.jpg to Album Folders' setting.
iTunes must be running for this step. - Your music should now have working Album Art in iTunes, your iPod and Windows Media Center now.
If you have albums that can't get the Album Art from iTunes, you can just download the artwork elsewhere and save it as Folder.jpg in the relative folder.
Hopefully this information helps someone out there as when I first came accross this issue I spent a few weeks looking for information, posting on forums, etc, and I was offered no solution at all.
If this works or does not work for you, let me know, I kind of rushed this post and could have possibly missed something.
Deciphered.RSS
Currently, I have all my music files stored in -one- folder. This is the way I've always had it and I only use playlists to sort my music.
I only use Winamp, which I absolutely love, but I gotta say - the Media library isn't all that.
So.. I was looking through your blog, and found this post - and gawd, I've always wanted those album arts in my mp3's - And even though I've always been negative towards iTunes and how it "takes care of" all your music files, I'm wondering about getting myself another iPod again..
And since I now that iTunes can serve other computers in my network with its own library, I was thinking about starting to use it. I also have a Windows Home Server that I store all my media on. So, my question is:
How do I set all this up?
Will I need to install iTunes on my WHS, start the automatic library function, install iTunes on my laptop and stream music from the WHS, or how will this work out?
Hi Stian,
Personally I dislike iTunes greatly. The only reason I use iTunes is to sync my iPod and to download podcasts.
I definitely don't recommend using iTunes' music organization mode, if you can sort it into folders manually.
As for music from WHS, I personally use the built-in Media Connect sharing method as it allows me to listen to the music on my Xbox 360. You can also use Windows Media Player as a client to listen to the music similar to the way that iTunes does its sharing.
However it all comes down to the specific users requirements, some people prefer iTunes for their music management.
Cheers,
Decipher.
NOTE TO SELF:
Do NOT install iTunes on your WHS box.
Holy... My WHS runs slower than my machine I had back in '95..
Uninstalled everything yesterday night - of course, after I ran the iTunes organization mode.. - and have yet to see if my WHS is back at its normal speed.
Aff.. All I want is to have my music files in a WHS share and play them on my laptops from a program that does sort things out when it comes to all the metadata, playlists etc... Plus I'd rather stream it from the WHS to my laptop then to map up any shares.. *CONFUSED*
Once I get home from work I'll look into Firefly Media Server to see what functionality I could gain from it.
You seem like a person with good knowledge about WHS and media functions in a home. I'd like to discuss this further with you somehow.. I'll pop off an e-mail later today.
Stian
How are you,
Im so glad I found this web page!
I to have spent ages trying to figure out how to export all of the album art downloaded from itunes music store from the album art folder in the my music folder, to a 'album folder'\folder.jpg format.
I just have a couple of questions about the above process you went through with iTSfv and would greatly appreciate your feedback.
1) What happens if you have images embedded within the mp3
when you run iTSfv.
2) What happens you have inconsistencies with your folder naming conventions (mine is currently genre\artist\album but there are a few weird things happening with the odd random song, remixes, compilations etc)?
Hi Shane,
I am the developer of iTSfv. Thanks Deciphered for posting about iTSfv. Glad you like it.
iTSfv will export any embedded or iTunes Download Artwork to the track's album folder. It will also not replace a higher resolution artwork that already exists in the file system.
I don't think inconsistancies would matter. As long as the track is in a album folder the process will work fine. :)
You can download the latest iTSfv from http://itsfv.sourceforge.net/
Cheers,
McoreD
I have a question. I downloaded the program you mentioned called IYSfv. Could you please xplain in more detail extactly what needs to be done in this program. I do not see any setting that says exactly what you describe at the top. Could oyou go into more depth. I went through the rest of the process. I just need this part. Thanks
I have a question. I downloaded the program you mentioned called IYSfv. Could you please xplain in more detail extactly what needs to be done in this program. I do not see any setting that says exactly what you describe at the top. Could oyou go into more depth. I went through the rest of the process. I just need this part. Thanks
I have the same question as the previous person. "Run iTSfv using only the 'copy Folder.jpg to Album folders' setting." I even downloaded earlier versions of the program, but I can't find the discribed setting. Thanks.
GreetZzz Menno
Thanks a lot dude. But could you please explain in more detail exactly what needs to be done in this program. I do not see any setting that says exactly what you describe at the top. Could you go into more depth. I went through the rest of the process.
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