iTunes & sorting ripped albums

BlizzardX · 9 Apr 2007 at 19:59

Hello all,

Before anybody says to use something else, please don't, the purpose of this thread is not to talk about which player is better worse. Thanks.

Is there anyway to make iTunes rip the albums into a single directory for each artist, i.e. Dr. Dre contains ALL the tracks from all his albums rather than iTunes splitting them by featuring artist too, for eaxmple Dr Dre Feat. Eminem etc? I've always used WMP to rip and then iTunes for other stuff but I hate having to mix and match.

marc2003 · 9 Apr 2007 at 21:11

provided the tracks are tagged correctly with the "album" tag and also the "tracknumber" tag, it doesn't matter what the artist is.

also it's best to have your music sorted logically within windows explorer. makes life easier regardless of what media player you use. best way (imho) is to sort by

\artist\album\tracknumber - track

like this

tripitaka · 10 Apr 2007 at 09:43

Yes, I think the poster roughly wants to try to get his music sorted like that.

The problem comes when ripping compilation albums, soundtracks, or, in the example given, tracks with 'featured artists'.

This results in the album being split across several folders...
Can you ty ripping into "Artist - Album\track number - trackname". FreeCD-DA extractor should let you do this, not sure if it can grab album art though.

marc2003 · 10 Apr 2007 at 13:25

tripitaka said:
The problem comes when ripping compilation albums, soundtracks, or, in the example given, tracks with 'featured artists'.
.

no it doesn't. the album should still all be ripped to the same folder. so long as the "album" and "tracknumber" tags are ok, it doesn't matter what the artist is. ok i'm using foobar but i'd imagine itunes works along the same lines.

WotDa · 10 Apr 2007 at 14:48

If only.

Infact somehow the Captain Jack folder got split into 2 even though I originally imported it into 1.

I think I can fix it by copying music from the iPod and back, but then, that could also just do the same.

Either way, I'm not bothering anymore, I just stick songs that I've given a rating of 5 in WMP on until I get my MBP soon.

marc2003 · 10 Apr 2007 at 14:54

WotDa said:
If only.

well just play around with the options with whatever you use to rip your cds. you don't have to rip the files to folders based on the artist name. when ripping an album, all tracks should be ripped to the same folder like mine above. it's not rocket science.

PhillyDee · 10 Apr 2007 at 16:17

marc2003 said:
provided the tracks are tagged correctly with the "album" tag and also the "tracknumber" tag, it doesn't matter what the artist is.

also it's best to have your music sorted logically within windows explorer. makes life easier regardless of what media player you use. best way (imho) is to sort by

\artist\album\tracknumber - track

like this
/snip

Thats exactly the way i sort all mine. I find it easier to use WMP to rip all the tracks to mp3 (256Kbit) then edit the tags the way i like them with mp3 tag tools but play them all in itunes because i like the layout and have an ipod.

marc2003 · 10 Apr 2007 at 17:07

i had a quick play with itunes and by default it's horrible. using the "let itunes sort my music" is the problem. sorting all tracks into their own artist folder. what a stupid idea....

but playing around with the browser you can get it to display ok. overall i still don't like it. foobar for the undeniable win.

tripitaka · 10 Apr 2007 at 17:46

no it doesn't. the album should still all be ripped to the same folder. so long as the "album" and "tracknumber" tags are ok, it doesn't matter what the artist is. ok i'm using foobar but i'd imagine itunes works along the same lines.

I'm confused. You said you rip to "\artist\album\tracknumber - track".
By definition, this means that a compilation will get split into several different folders, because each song has a different artist, right? :confused:

I agree, as long as the album and tracknumber tags are OK it will be fine in your chosen mediaplayer, but it will look a mess in Windows explorer, surely?

Caged · 10 Apr 2007 at 17:50

I tick the compilation box if it's genuinely a compilation, and use the "Album Artist" tag to set an overall artist if some tracks are ft. someone else. Keeps everything logical enough.

marc2003 · 10 Apr 2007 at 19:33

tripitaka said:
I'm confused. You said you rip to "\artist\album\tracknumber - track".
By definition, this means that a compilation will get split into several different folders, because each song has a different artist, right?

i think your problem is this. i think you selected the first option....

if you choose to manage yourself, then the cds get ripped into their own folder named after the album. infact i've just ripped a few mix cds using itunes on the default settings and here's what it did.......

see it's dumped the whole album named "destinations" into a folder called "compilations". it did this by itself. now looking at the default view in itunes itself is a bit crap to say the least.

now this is where itunes starts to suck. i open the browser and select the album from the right-hand most dialog but the tracks are still in alphebetical order. so to get the album to display in order, i have to add "tracknumber" as a column as it's not there by default????? rolleyes...

once that is done, it finally looks how it should....

i thought itunes was supposed be all conquering when it comes to music management. how wrong could i be... and 36mb too? wtf is all that about....