Winamp playlists showing up as empty on Fuze

Here is my settings from Media Monkey.

Under DEVICE PROFILE

SYNC TRACKS TO: \Music\<Album Artist>\<Album>\<Title>

Under COPY PLAYLISTS hit the OPTIONS button.

Under DESTINATION DIRECTORY: \MUSIC\

Somehow it just works :o)

Content of one of the playlists look like this:

 

\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\The Eve Of The War.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\Horsell Common And The Heat Ray.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\The Artilleryman And The Fighting Machine.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\Forever Autumn.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\Thunder Child.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\The Red Weed (Part 1).mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\The Spirit Of Man.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\The Red Weed (Part 2).mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\Brave New World.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\Dead London.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\Epilogue (Part 1).mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\Epilogue (Part 2) (NASA).mp3
 

Name of playlist: Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds.m3u

Good luck!

This is all very strange.  Are you using the .15 firmware?

I synch to \Music\<Genre>\<Album Artist>\<Album>\<Filename>

When I have a playlist like yours, and it is in the Music directory, it shows up as [Empty].

What I have had to do is to put the playlists in the root directory.  Then, on each line of the playlist, I remove the leading “/” so that the address is relative to the playlist location (the root).  (That, incidentally, lets the playlist address audiobooks as well as music, but not podcasts. )   I have so far been unable to persuade MM to omit the leading “/” itself.  It will be easy enough to write a script to “fix” the playlist files, but I’d rather not have to run a script after synching the device.

Message Edited by GuyScharf on 12-11-2008 10:15 AM

@guyscharf wrote:

This is all very strange.  Are you using the .15 firmware?

Yes!

What USB-mode are you using? (I just found out, that things can change in stange ways, depending on what USB mode you use, and everyone ought to know that).

@ripraprob wrote:

Here is my settings from Media Monkey.

 

Under DEVICE PROFILE

 

SYNC TRACKS TO: \Music\<Album Artist>\<Album>\<Title>

 

Under COPY PLAYLISTS hit the OPTIONS button.

 

Under DESTINATION DIRECTORY: \MUSIC\

 

Somehow it just works :o)

 

Content of one of the playlists look like this:

 

\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\The Eve Of The War.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\Horsell Common And The Heat Ray.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\The Artilleryman And The Fighting Machine.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\Forever Autumn.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\Thunder Child.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\The Red Weed (Part 1).mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\The Spirit Of Man.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\The Red Weed (Part 2).mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\Brave New World.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\Dead London.mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\Epilogue (Part 1).mp3
\Music\Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\Epilogue (Part 2) (NASA).mp3
 

 

Name of playlist: Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds.m3u

 

Good luck!

This definitely won’t work for a m3u playlist in MSC mode.  If the playlist file is in the MUSIC folder, the paths should look like:

Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\The Eve Of The War.mp3
Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\Horsell Common And The Heat Ray.mp3
Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\The Artilleryman And The Fighting Machine.mp3
Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\Forever Autumn.mp3
Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds (CD1)\Thunder Child.mp3
Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\The Red Weed (Part 1).mp3
Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\The Spirit Of Man.mp3
Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\The Red Weed (Part 2).mp3
Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\Brave New World.mp3
Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\Dead London.mp3
Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\Epilogue (Part 1).mp3
Jeff Wayne\Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version Of The War Of The Worlds  (CD2)\Epilogue (Part 2) (NASA).mp3

I am using MSC mode, so my experience is the same as what Skinjob says.

So far, I haven’t found a way to get Media Monkey to make the paths relative.  If I could get MM to make the paths relative, I’d be all set.  Well, I’d still be waiting for Sansa to support podcasts in playlists, but that is a different issue.

@guyscharf wrote:

I am using MSC mode, so my experience is the same as what Skinjob says.

 

So far, I haven’t found a way to get Media Monkey to make the paths relative.  If I could get MM to make the paths relative, I’d be all set.  Well, I’d still be waiting for Sansa to support podcasts in playlists, but that is a different issue.

Hmm, I can’t seem to find the option now either.  I could swear when I looked at MM a year or so ago, there was an option.  Although in reading the MM forums, it sounds like MM should be using relative paths by default.  Try setting MM to put the playlists in the MUSIC folder and see if that changes you result.

It doesn’t matter where I put the playlists.  The playlist content remains the same: an absolute not a relative address.

Switch USB-mode, and it will work, no matter where you choose to place the playlists.

To the best of my knowledge, the playlist is made correct (the path is correct), and the Fuze is doing something wrong.

Hopefully this will be fixed with the next firmware update.

Switching to MTP is not an option.  With MTP, Media Monkey cannot access the expansion card to synchronise files to it.  I had to manually drag files to the expansion card when I was using MTP.  With MSC, I can synchronize to both the internal memory and to the expansion card.

Am I the only one that doesn’t make playlists?:wink:

Store the M3u playlist in the music folder and it will work for content at that level and below.

Relative paths are in development for playlists.

@marvin_martian wrote:
Am I the only one that doesn’t make playlists?:wink:

No.

Sansafix, I’m glad to hear that relative paths are in development.  More important to me, though, is playlist support for podcasts.  Is there any hope that I will be able to mix audiobooks, podcasts, and “music” all in one playlist?

While at first glance that need may seem odd, I have mostly dharma talks on my player, some of which are organized as audiobooks, some come in as podcasts, and others get categorized as music.

@marvin_martian wrote:
Am I the only one that doesn’t make playlists?:wink:

I have just started to work with playlists.  I have thousands of talks in my audio library.  I can use search functions to find all talks on a specific subject, then I can create a playlist with that common topic.  That’s very handy for some uses.

I just found the issue by chance - as so often, it is the path separator!

Using the dos / windows \ (backslash) in the (relative) playlists works fine but using the unix (linux) / (slash) seems not to work on my fuze, even with the new firmware.

So, all you have to do is take your favourite text editor and replace path separators…

I would not have expectet a player that works that well in a linux environment to have an issue with path names :-(  perhpas it might change with the next firmware?

I believe Sansafix has said that the relative vs. absolute path issue is being addressed in a future update. I can’t remember if he said it would be the next one though.

This worked like a charm!  Finally, a relatively easy way to fix the Winamp/Fuze playlist-being-empty problem.  Thanks!

(Is this supposed to be fixed, though?  I have the latest version of Winamp and the latest firmware on my Fuze)

Thanks, Skinjob, worked like a charm!  Gonna look into FART to automate this process.

(but is this empty playlist problem supposed to have been fixed?  I have the latest firmware installed and the latest version of Winamp)


The Fuze requires relative paths in m3u playlists.  In other words, if you save the playlist in the MUSIC folder, the paths in the playlist would begin with subfolders of the MUSIC folder (like Artist\Album\Song.mp3).  Unfortunately, Winamp portable sync always uses full paths from the root of the player (like \Music\Artist\Album\Song.mp3).  The full paths confuse the Fuze and cause the “empty” playlist problem.

 

So after syncing you need to fix the paths in the playlists on the Fuze.  If the playlists are in the MUSIC folder (that’s where I keep them), then you need to remove the "\MUSIC" from the beginning of the paths.  You can do this with a good free text editor like Notepad++.  Just drag all the playlists from the Fuze into the text editor and do a search and replace in all open files, replacing "\MUSIC" with nothing.  Or you could use a free command-line tool like the amusingly named FART (Find and Replace Tool).  This would let you create a batch file to automate the process.  Then after syncing in Winamp, just double click the batch file and you’re done (this is what I do).


@oreosmeow wrote:

Thanks, Skinjob, worked like a charm!  Gonna look into FART to automate this process.

 

(but is this empty playlist problem supposed to have been fixed?  I have the latest firmware installed and the latest version of Winamp)

 

You’re welcome.  Was it supposed to be fixed? - Yes.   Was it actually fixed? - Nope.  Sansafix did post a very long time ago (2008?) saying a fix was in the works, but it never appeared.  And I’m guessing at this point it never will.

I’ve since moved on to Rockbox, so it’s not really an issue for me anymore.  The Sansa FW does a lot of things very well and very simply, but Roxbox kills it if you’re looking for something more advanced.  You do sacrife some simplicity, but the features are just incredible.  Of course you have to have a V1 to use it.


You’re welcome.  Was it supposed to be fixed? - Yes.   Was it actually fixed? - Nope.  Sansafix did post a very long time ago (2008?) saying a fix was in the works, but it never appeared.  And I’m guessing at this point it never will.


Ahh, so I wasn’t going crazy, thinking it was supposed to be fixed and I was just being stupid.  :wink:


I’ve since moved on to Rockbox, so it’s not really an issue for me anymore.  The Sansa FW does a lot of things very well and very simply, but Roxbox kills it if you’re looking for something more advanced.  You do sacrife some simplicity, but the features are just incredible.  Of course you have to have a V1 to use it.


V2 here, so I guess I won’t be trying Rockbox anytime soon.

Still, your workaround is simple enough to do.  Tried FART, couldn’t get it to work (I probably WAS being stupid when it came to that) so I got Notepad++ and its ability to open multiple files in one window and do the global search and replace makes it even simpler.

Now that I’m using Winamp instead of WMP and have the playlist thing down, I’m a happy camper with my Fuze!  Thanks again.

Message Edited by oreosmeow on 02-11-2010 07:05 PM