Have loaded tracks, and playlists, onto my clip by drag and drop, and by synching with winamp, and windows media player. The player does not acknowledge their existence and so I cant play them. Have spent so much time trying to fix this. Anybody have a solution?
What kind of files are they? Are they a supported format?
| What kind of files are they? Are they a supported format? |
I have LITERALLY the EXACT same problem. I just barely re-formatted the device, then installed the newest firmware.
I can plug the device in, the computer recognizes it just fine, but when I put music on whether it’s through dragging and dropping or through WMP, it doesn’t actually show up on the device. The space is definietly taken up, but there is no playable music on it.
Not sure what to do about this. I’m a fairly tech savvy person, and I can’t seem to figure this one out. Any help SanDisk?
EDIT: Yes, they are supported files, and yes the ID tags are filled in correctly, in case you were wondering. 
Message Edited by mosesport on 04-15-2010 02:15 PM
mosesport wrote:
I have LITERALLY the EXACT same problem.
EDIT: Yes, they are supported files, and yes the ID tags are filled in correctly, in case you were wondering.
Humor us . . . what exactly is the file type and what format are the ID3 tags?
File type is .mp3. I guess I don’t know what you mean by ID3 tag format… They’re formatted like a normal ID3 tag is formatted. They’re not ID3v2 if that’s what you’re getting at…
mosesport wrote:
File type is .mp3. I guess I don’t know what you mean by ID3 tag format… They’re formatted like a normal ID3 tag is formatted. They’re not ID3v2 if that’s what you’re getting at…
OK, file type is alright (we gotta ask).
ID3v2 is exactly what I was getting at . . . ID3v2.3 ISO-88459-1 to be exact. That’s the format of ID3 tags that works best on all Sansa mp3 players. MP3TAG, an awesome, free dedicated tag editor can help you check, and if necessary make quick work of changing your tags.
Check out a few and let us know what you find. You can set the above tag format up to be the default in the settings and change them ‘en masse’. 
I’ll try that when I get home and let you know. Thanks for your help.
So I checked using that app you recommended. My MP3s are already using that ID3v2 format that you stated…so I guess there’s not really anything else I can do at this point to get my songs working, unless you can think of anything else :\
The files can play back, I have loaded the files from the same source onto the same player before. Regular mp3s. First time I put them on the Clip with Windows media player they were OK, but I had no playlists.
now it seems hopeless. I can see them when I look with the pc but they dont show up at all when I use the clip itself. I see I am not the only one who is having the problem. Thanks for all the suggestions, will post if I find a solution other than buying a different brand
just to put this in some perspective - I have spent the best part of 10 hrs loading, reloading, relisting, checking, clearing, reloading files on this piece of junk.It is an interesting technical problem, bu if I have to learn to use a tag editor to play my files, then there is a rather fundamental problem with the product…
It’s not a piece of junk, it’s an mp3 player (although it will handle other formats) and thousands if not millions of users are happily using it. You are doing something wrong, if you care to explain how you are loading the device (like where are you putting the files), what usb mode you are using etc. perhaps we can help. Note: doing the same thing over and over in the expectation of getting a different result is given a name.
Actually I did email Sansa customer support but I never heard anything back from them.
Thanks for all the suggestions. I checked the current and prior files on the clip and I am pretty much certain that a number of the files I loaded first time I used this (which worked just fine) are included again in the new list of files I tried load and that dont work. So while I will try to tag the files as has been suggested, I wonder if there is some other issue.
Will post if I get it to work in any event.
So now I tagged all the files as recommended and synched all the playlists to the Sansa. Media player says the synch is complete. Now the files dont show up on the Sansa OR when I look directly in the folder using the PC. I despair…
Oh yeah - and now Winamp has suddenly stopped recognizing the Sansa, I tried reformatting it and also all three of the settings for USB mode. Seems OK in windows Media player though
I have very good luck using Winamp with my players, however . . .
I only use MSC mode, and I do not use the Portables setting on Winamp. Just set Winamp to see your ‘library’ as your E:\Music and F:\Music folders (assuming E & F are the drive letters that Windows assigns your player and card slot. That depends on how many other drives you already have).
Done it.
The solution was:
switch off and restart pc
format the Sansa (about the tenth time I have done it)
Tag the files
Use windows media player
There was another playlist of equivalent files from the same source that would not work - turned out the sound drivers were faulty on all of them - couldnt play them on the pc. Had to redownload, retag, resynch. now they all seem to be there
Have no idea which of the steps was the real problem as I had tried all of them separately or in some permutation before but now I seem to have the right result.
Thanks to everyone for all their suggestions.
Actually I wasn’t doing “the same thing over and over again” I tried a number of different solutions gleaned from this thread and a number of searches on google. I rejected the ones that didnt work, did more research online, and tried various combinations until eventually, and with the kind assistance of other contributors I found a combination of fixes that got me somewhere.It’s called scientific method.
In any event. We seem to be back on track now.
Glad to hear you are in business. These things can be very frustrating which is why groups such as this exist. Take comfort in the fact that we have all had similar problems, if not with the clip then with some other device or software, that’s the way it is with computers and complex devices. Decent user manuals would help but vendors have long ago learned few read them plus they are costly to produce so I wouldn’t expect that situation to improve.
I seem to have a similar problem to this person and have been emailing back & forth with the Sandisk support desk, but to date, nothing they’ve suggested has made any difference.
I’ve read through all the posts on this thread and they seem to match my issue, only none of the suggestions have worked for me.
When I first got the player last week I was able to drag & drop to the Music folder - although they are podcasts that I am loading, I discovered that putting them in the Podcast folder on the player didn’t work, as the player doesn’t ever show Podcasts in the playlist, after I disconnect from the computer. But only some of the podcasts would play and not others, yet the very same podcasts play perfectly well on my older SanDisk player (which I had planned to pension off when I bought this new one).
The podcasts are downloaded via the same software, i.e. Juice and all have the correct ID tags (I’ve checked them using the Mp3tag program suggested here) and bit rate of either 65 kbps or 128 kbps. I’ve also tried loading via Windows Media Player and all the files show up on the player while it’s connected to the computer, but as soon as I disconnect, only a few of them are showing in the playlists.
The help desk person suggested that I might have added the files in the wrong mode, i.e. MTC instead of MSC, but I’ve tried both modes and neither makes a difference. I’ve formatted the player numerous times and reset to factory defaults. I can’t believe this has become so complicated when my old Sandisk player is so simple and worked like a charm.
Because I don’t live in the US, I can’t ring Sandisk support (they don’t have phone support in Australia) and the company I purchased it from hasn’t even replied to my emails.
I’d appreciate any new suggestions.
