Album Art?

[AiXeLsyD13]

Hello all,

Just found this forum while googling the Insignia Pilot, found a link to it on a CNET board.  Hope this takes off!

I just bought my Insignia Pilot 4GB yesterday, it has the SDHC slot instead of just the regular SD slot.  I noticed they had both there on the shelf at Best Buy... but didn't note a difference other than price until I read the fine print on the box.  I have an 8GB SDHC card, and some of my other SD card readers won't take it.  (...Like my damn Roadmaster VRCD400SDU mp3 player in the car.)

I wanted the Insignia because I'm all about a product that's independent of a software and/or format that's jammed down your throat... and read somewhere that I can just drag & drop my files right to the player.

I have a ridiculous CD collection, and that's where most of my music will come from (thanks to CDeX).  I also get a lot of stuff from local bands, whether it be their CD or mp3's.

I deleted the crap that came on the player, and popped in an SD card full of mp3's that I've been playing in my car stereo.  The files are all arranged i:/Artist/Album/Track.mp3, and some contain jpeg or bmp images with the album art.  I noticed that the albums with album art weren't showing up.

No biggie, I just assume it doesn't work that way.  So, I go into the latest version of WinAmp (I've been using it forever, haven't found anything that I like more yet), add the album art to the actual files in some albums on the SD card, pop it pack into the Pilot, and voila! ...still no album art for those albums.  :lol: 

However, most of them are showing up when I go to the menu & brows photos... so they're there.

What do I need to do to get the Pilot to recognize the album art?  Do I have to install/use the software that came with it?  If it's a local band, will I be able to add the art?  I really don't need more crap that I'll never use on my computer.  (Like any of us do!)

I'm anxiously awaiting any ideas/suggestions/similar experiences.  I couldn't find anything about this in the product manual.  Am I just missing something dumb?  I'm a n00b to this type of mp3 players.  My last one was a Riovolt discman-looking thing that played mp3's burned on to CD-R's.

Thanks in advance!

[Jax]

Hey, thanks. I hope this place can take off as well.

I've honestly never figured out how to save album art files so that they show on my insignia, but I do know a way to get it to work (works for me anyway). If you use an mp3 tagging program like say... Mp3tag, it will grab information from online about the tracks and albums or you can add it manually if it's really obscure stuff.

Anyway, this helps because when you add the album art, it saves it directly into the mp3 tag. Thus, you no longer need the jpg file and your insignia should be able to read it fine. Hopefully what I explained makes sense.

[Dana]

Jax,

Are you using ID3v1 or ID3v2? I seem to recall some people were having trouble with ID3v2, but can't remember if it was with some of the Sansa products or Insignia products. I think ID3v1.1 was working best for most people. Do you have to resize the album art for the Pilot?

As you know I have been using Windows Media Player to sync music to my Pilot... not that I like using WPM (I don't) but it was the easiest way I knew to get the album art embedded. If I could painlessly embed album art and use drag and drop rather than syncing I would be very happy to never use MTP again. So I am checking out MP3TAG.

Do the free databases work well enough? I am of an age that digital music is not of second nature for me, but I have been using computers for a long time so it is not much of a problem. It is enough said to say I have a large vinyl collection, large cassette collection, large CD collection, small MP3 collection... other than that ripped from other sources.

Dana

[Jax]

I'm not sure which tags I'm using, I'll check when I have time.

The free database should work well, also you can switch it with one of the buttons at the top to the amazon.com database which will have a lot of that older stuff.

I'll look into it more tomorrow. But for today, off to see family for Easter!

[AiXeLsyD13]

Hey!  Thanks for the quick replies!

I do understand what you're saying, & I did try that with the latest version of WinAmp.  (They just added that as a feature on the new one.... not sure how "new" it is.)

I'm going to try this mp3Tag program though and see what the deal is.  I'll have to let you know
how it pans out!

I do have the idv1 & idv2 tags both on though... as I think my car reads the idv1's... not sure about the Insignia. 

I did write to Insignia, but I'm sure they'll get back to me in a few days & tell me to use the bundled software or to buy mp3's through their store.  :lol:

Thanks again for the nice welcome to the forum!



Happy Easter!

[AiXeLsyD13]

D'oh!  D/l'ed mp3Tag, double-clicked the *.exe file, and got this...


(...yes, I still run Windows 2K.)

[Jax]

Dang, hmm. Well I'll look into a similar program that might work.

Also in reference to the part about which type of tags to use, I believe only id3v2 can have album art embedded in it.

[Jax]

Alright, here's a program I use in linux but they also have a windows version. It's called EasyTAG. Hopefully it works on 2000.

I linked directly to the download file because it is a little confusing to find the windows version among all the linux versions. Their main website is here if you'd like to take a look.

I've had varying success with that program, but it should be pretty easy to use.

[Jax]

Scratch that, I just realized that EasyTAG was actually causing all my album art problems. I found another great program but it was just for linux. Most programs that can embed the photo in the mp3 file should work well though.

[Dana]

I just discovered how I can get the album art to be embedded in the music files while using Windows Media Player, "without" syncing. Not a big fan of WMP but I've been ripping CDs using it. I had been syncing them to the Pilot with WMP which seems to embed the album art during the sync process.

Now, after I rip the music with WMP I go into the library and used the Advanced Tag Editor to add the album art to each track. Right click on the song, click on Advanced Tag Editor, Pictures, Add, and choose albumartsmall.jpg. Then I can drag and drop to the Pilot and the album are is displayed withing the Pilot.

Dana

[Jax]

Yeah, it can be a hassle doing it to all your music, but now that you know what works you won't have to do it again. I didn't realize WMP would do that, but it's good to know. I rarely use it in windows.

[Dana]

Jax,

A simple Tag editor that lets you embed the album art would still be my preference. It is a drag to add the art for each and every song in the WMP library if you want to use drag and drop. At home we will be running Windows since I have a five year old son and stuff for him is not found in abundance for Linux. My personal computer can run only Linux and do everything I need. I had to learn to use Qemu to run a DOS program I still use, Lotus Agenda... an oldy but a goody.

Since I hate using sync to put music on the Pilot a reliable tag editor that embeds the album art is in my future. Downloading album info and art via WMP, and ripping gives me the album art for a tag editor. Need to find the right tool with one specific goal in mind.

Dana

[Jax]

Yeah, I wouldn't have thought it would be so difficult to find a program that does it well considering the large number of people that do this. The one I used I could highlight an entire folder of songs (an album since that's how I have them organized) and have it embed the image, but even that can take a while if you have much music.

I always just find myself dragging and dropping whenever I add music or have to re-upload something. It's not much of a hassle and I like having more control than syncing.

[Jax]

Does anyone know what files the insignia will and won't take for album art. Most of mine seems to work fine, but some of them are just black boxes. I'm guessing those are png files or something that it can't read.

[Dana]

As far as I know only jpegs work? I'm not the final word on this by any means.