What is the point of using ID3 tag sorting? I just got my second player that uses this system. Sure, I oohed and ahhed over it for the first few minutes when I first saw it. In practice, though, it really isn’t that great of a system. If you have even a modestly diverse collection of music, you’ll end up with a bewildering number of different albums, artist, and genres. I almost never use the artist or album sort because there are just too many, and the only reason I can use the genre sorting is because I changed the genre of anything that is even reasonably close in style to a generic term like ‘rock,’ or ‘country’, or ‘soundtrack’…Which is approximately how I have the folders organized on my pc (generic genre => artist=>album). So if the player just used a directory tree type folder sort, navigation would be the same as the genre sort is for me right now except compilation/ sampler cds wouldn’t complicate things. All I’d have to do is move the root folders - as is -on to the player and I’d be able to find everything. No more confusion caused by compilation, and I’d stop having to wait 5 minutes for it to refresh the entire collection every time I make a change or so much as take the microsd card out.
My collection is nearly 200,000 tracks. Every one of them is tagged properly and it didnt take too long. Its the proper way to label tracks. It might not be perfectly practical to you but it is proper.
Mojo5 wrote:
What is the point of using ID3 tag sorting? I just got my second player that uses this system. Sure, I oohed and ahhed over it for the first few minutes when I first saw it. In practice, though, it really isn’t that great of a system. If you have even a modestly diverse collection of music, you’ll end up with a bewildering number of different albums, artist, and genres. I almost never use the artist or album sort because there are just too many, and the only reason I can use the genre sorting is because I changed the genre of anything that is even reasonably close in style to a generic term like ‘rock,’ or ‘country’, or ‘soundtrack’…Which is approximately how I have the folders organized on my pc (generic genre => artist=>album). So if the player just used a directory tree type folder sort, navigation would be the same as the genre sort is for me right now except compilation/ sampler cds wouldn’t complicate things. All I’d have to do is move the root folders - as is -on to the player and I’d be able to find everything. No more confusion caused by compilation, and I’d stop having to wait 5 minutes for it to refresh the entire collection every time I make a change or so much as take the microsd card out.
I have three players that offer the folder browsing method, which it sounds like you would prefer…yet I never end up using it. I don’t think it takes long to fix tags that aren’t right, although in all fairness, I don’t have very many compilation albums…that’s one area where I will change the tags somewhat. Of course, unlike some people that rely exclusively on their tags, I still use individual album folders on my hard drive.
@mojo5 wrote:
What is the point of using ID3 tag sorting? I just got my second player that uses this system. Sure, I oohed and ahhed over it for the first few minutes when I first saw it. In practice, though, it really isn’t that great of a system. If you have even a modestly diverse collection of music, you’ll end up with a bewildering number of different albums, artist, and genres. I almost never use the artist or album sort because there are just too many, and the only reason I can use the genre sorting is because I changed the genre of anything that is even reasonably close in style to a generic term like ‘rock,’ or ‘country’, or ‘soundtrack’…Which is approximately how I have the folders organized on my pc (generic genre => artist=>album). So if the player just used a directory tree type folder sort, navigation would be the same as the genre sort is for me right now except compilation/ sampler cds wouldn’t complicate things. All I’d have to do is move the root folders - as is -on to the player and I’d be able to find everything. No more confusion caused by compilation, and I’d stop having to wait 5 minutes for it to refresh the entire collection every time I make a change or so much as take the microsd card out.
The point of ID3 tag sorting is to properly and efficiently sort large media libraries. The only reason someone would object to this is because they either have never heard of it and/or they are too lazy to use good software such as MP3tag or foobar2000 to sort their libraries.
Which one fits your description?
I take offense to being called lazy just because I don’t like this stupid sorting system, ya jerk. I have a collection of 29,225 songs (113gb). I listen to everything from classical to techno to bluegrass to hard rock to blues to jazz…basically everything except rap. My tags are correctly entered for each and every song on each and every cd - I have painstakingly maintained an orderly collection to make it as easy as possible for me to find the song I want (I’ts one of the few things I’m a bit OCD about). It has nothing to do with laziness and everything to do with having hundreds of different artist, albums, multiple versions of some tracks… Its like I said in my original post, I already have everything sorted in a logical order on my pc harddrive. My collection is just too large and diverse for the id3 tag sorting method, and has been for a long time. For example: the 1gb card I have in my cell phone has 250 tracks from 117 albums by 67 artists from 11 genres - the card isn’t even full because I saved a little room for pics. That’s a 1gb card with just some of my absolute favorite songs - now try and figure what the 16gbs I’m using on my clip+ (8gb + 8gb card) looks like. I’m sorry, but even with 1gb it starts to get a little difficult to find anything using tag sorting - except using the method I mentioned in my original post which is redundant because of the way I store music on my harddrive. I freely admit that my eclectic tastes are probably a little wider than most people’s, but I can’t believe I’m all that far out of the norm.
And for the record. I have no problem using the system. I’ve been forced to use it for the past 5 years because my last player had nothing but so I’m very familiar with the ins and outs of it. I just find it to be a needless complication. The way I use tag sorting amounts to almost the same as what my folder structure looks like. Just added complexity to achieve the same results.
“Ya jerk”
Doesn’t sound very intelligent at all. You don’t have to get angry at a post that wasn’t attacking anyone.
I have over 15 000 files myself, all which are perfectly tagged and completed with 500x500(~200kB) album art. I tag my files as I recieve them whether it be ripping CDs, purchasing online, or ripping vinyl. I use tagging databases for auto tagging incase I do not have the booklet/information on me, or I would like to tag large amounts of files.
I had to start sooner or later, otherwise you become overwhelmed when your library becomes large. I was overwhelmed at first, but all I required was patience and a couple of hours every week/weekend. ID3 or Vorbis tags offer much, much more options and variety than just using long filenames. If you can’t accept that, there isn’t really much I or anyone else can do for you at this point.
If you’re asking “Why does this feature even exist?”, the answer is: because other people find it useful, even if you don’t.
Now if would be nice if the Sansa firmware could be configured to refresh the database only when you ask it to; or if it could update the database in the background, so the device is still usable while the refresh is going on.
It would also be nice if the the f/w could be configured to take you straight to the Folders menu if that’s what you prefer to use.
But you’re not going to see the ID3 tagging/database features removed just because you and maybe 5% of other users don’t like them.
Editing tags on an ongoing basis on podcasts that will only be played once is a great nuisance. It would also be nice if a mode could be set on the player to automatically delete a podcast file after it has been played completely.
I want the option to disable tag browsing, and have cards hot swappable, so that cards can be swapped without having a database refresh, and without having to turn off the player. Ideally one should be able to switch to a song in main memory, then swap the card in the player while the song is playing.
Message Edited by JK98 on 07-08-2010 01:46 PM
JK98 wrote:
Editing tags on an ongoing basis on podcasts that will only be played once is a great nuisance. It would also be nice if a mode could be set on the player to automatically delete a podcast file after it has been played completely.
I want the option to disable tag browsing, and have cards hot swappable, so that cards can be swapped without having a database refresh, and without having to turn off the player. Ideally one should be able to switch to a song in main memory, then swap the card in the player while the song is playing.
Message Edited by JK98 on 07-08-2010 01:46 PM
