Music sorting advice

[schmosef]

I have about 10GB of MP3 music all nicely organized by artist and album.

I'd like to make several music compilation CD-Rs to keep in my car.

I'd like the songs to be randomly organized onto the CD-Rs.

Is there a tool out there that can do that for me or am I stuck building my burn lists manually?

[Jessterw]

Well I know if you if add your entire library to a playlist in iTunes, it will automatically span the songs across however many discs are needed when you go to burn. So I assume other media players or other jukebox software will do the same. Which ones I'm not sure.

[schmosef]

Is there a limit to how many songs can be on a play list? Napster has a limit.

Can I point iTunes to the root of my MP3 directory tree and have it build a random playlist from that? Then autospan as I burn?

[Wombat]

Careful!

When iTunes absorbs your mp3 collection, it renames all the files to something unrecognizable (it uses ID3 info and its own database to keep track of song info). That's my prime reason for not even TRYING iTunes.

[Jessterw]

Erm no it doesn't. My entire music directory is organized by Artist and Album folders (the latter being a sub of the former) and with each individual track being named using a track # and song title format. Every bit recognizable. iTunes keeps track of things like ratings and playcounts using its own database (an xml file).

If, before you start adding songs to the library, you go to the preferences and deselect the options for keeping the library organized and moving files into the iTunes library (a folder you can specify above those options), your music will stay in the same place and structure you already had it in.

To do what you want to, you'd need to create a smart playlist and create any rules you'd like to govern what gets included (for everything, a rule for play time greater than 0:00 works well). You'll want to shuffle the playlist to get the random bit you want and then you can click the Burn button. It'll go through and process the playlist (for 10 GB worth this'll take some time) and then prompt you about requiring multiple discs.

Obviously if your car's CD player can do MP3 CD's then you'll be able to cram more on one disc.


Edit: I use a smart playlist to do backups, the last of which included around 5 GB of files (on DVD's of course). So pretty sure there isn't a limit to the number of songs on a given playlist. The only limitation I know of in iTunes in regards to playlists is the number of times a given playlist can be burned if it includes DRM files.


Another Edit: Just as an aside to what Wombat said. There are times when iTunes, if left to do the organizing itself, will make some odd (but logical) decisions on the directories. If you have an album by an artist and one or more songs feature another artist and that artist is also included in the related ID3 field/tag, iTunes will create an artist folder for each with the album folder inside. For example, "Billy Bob" and "Billy Bob featuring Chuckles" will appear be filed as different directories, even if they are both from the album, "Honking on Hobo".

Of course, not a problem if you don't let iTunes do the organizing.

[schmosef]

Thanks JW, I'll give it a try.

[schmosef]

Burning the first disc now...

[schmosef]

wait a sec...

iTunes made an audio cd.

I want to burn data cds with MP3 files.

Maybe I didn't make that clear.

Is there a way to do that with iTunes or am I back at square one?

[Jessterw]

In iTunes preferences, under the Advanced section again, there is a tab for Burning. Second choice is for a MP3 CD.

[Mehen]

Windows Media Player 4 t3h win.

Also check out the wmp10 beta, a bit of a vista-ish hog but I really like it.

[schmosef]

it's done. i've already uninstalled itunes too.