MP3's on a USB stick

renegadefm · 9 February 2020 at 4:19PM

Hi,
Why is it that when I put music albums on a usb stick and play it in the car the tracks play in alphabetical order instead of how an album should play, track 1, track 2, etc?

I kept them in the original folder as I ripped them, so I'm puzzled as to why the car stereo doesnt recognize this.

Any help will be appreciated

almillar · 10 February 2020 at 1:17PM

The car is probably just doing it in order of title. Depending on where the MP3s came from, or how you ripped them, they may not even contain the track numbers. When ripping, you can often choose whether to include the track number in the title, which solves this very problem. If not, you might need to do it manually. I'll guess your stick contains files like A Song.mp3, Song.mp3. What you need to do is change the filenames to 01 Song.mp3 and 02 A Song.mp3 then the songs will play in that order.

renegadefm · 12 February 2020 at 6:24PM

almillar said:

The car is probably just doing it in order of title. Depending on where the MP3s came from, or how you ripped them, they may not even contain the track numbers. When ripping, you can often choose whether to include the track number in the title, which solves this very problem. If not, you might need to do it manually. I'll guess your stick contains files like A Song.mp3, Song.mp3. What you need to do is change the filenames to 01 Song.mp3 and 02 A Song.mp3 then the songs will play in that order.

Thanks mate, but I ripped the tracks straight to usb from Windows media player which includes the track numbers when I viewed the folder on my computer. So I am a bit puzzled why it only plays in alphabetical order in the car. In other words if I play the tracks on my computer it plays in right order track1, track2, etc.
The car stereo has a proper usb port so I dont know whats going on.

mluton · 13 February 2020 at 12:08AM

The file names are only part of the (ID3) metadata of the .mp3 file. It will have info like Filename: Track Number: Album: Song Title: Artist: etc....
Depending on your Head Unit you may be able to play via one of these categories, If not then it may be playing via one of them ID3 Tags, In your case possibly Song Title.
Stick it on Shuffle

renegadefm · 13 February 2020 at 6:35PM

mluton said:

The file names are only part of the (ID3) metadata of the .mp3 file. It will have info like Filename: Track Number: Album: Song Title: Artist: etc....
Depending on your Head Unit you may be able to play via one of these categories, If not then it may be playing via one of them ID3 Tags, In your case possibly Song Title.
Stick it on Shuffle

I dont use shuffle, I ideally want them to play like a normal cd. Is there anyway around this?

almillar · 14 February 2020 at 1:32PM

@renegadefm yes there is - name them as I describe, unless you know something specific about your car.

renegadefm · 14 February 2020 at 5:43PM

almillar said:

@renegadefm yes there is - name them as I describe, unless you know something specific about your car.

But that's the confusing thing, when I view the tracks in the folder on my computer they include the number 1 before the track title. For example they look like this:
1. The boys are back in town
2. Angel from the coast
But if I play it via the usb stick it would just play Angel from the coast first and not recognise the fact the track number exists.
So would I be better off deleting the track title and call it 1, etc etc.
This is why I find it difficult leaving cds behind.

flashg67 · 17 February 2020 at 10:07PM

Every car I've had has played tracks alphabetically, regardless of any other info in the track ID. It seems your car is set the same - have you searched through the car's settings to see if this is changeable.? Otherwise, renaming the songs A, B . C etc will work I'd guess. It's never bothered me tbf, I use shuffle and wait for the tingle of excitement by trying to guess the next track...

renegadefm · 18 February 2020 at 9:21AM

I dont use shuffle, I wanted the tracks to play as the album would play. This is particularly irritating when playing live albums, or albums that play continuous, a bit like the dance cds or Bonkers albums where the tracks are incremented but play non stop with no pause.
It would be a bit painstaking to rename thousands of tracks just to make this work.
I just find it odd if the car stereo has a proper usb port why when they manufatured them do they not recognize track numbers?

almillar · 18 February 2020 at 1:24PM

We'll need some trial and error, in the absence of the car manual.

Rename those 2 tracks to:

01 The boys are back in town
02 Angel from the coast

And see if the car plays them in the right order. That would be a nice simple solution.

I just find it odd if the car stereo has a proper usb port why when they manufatured them do they not recognize track numbers?

We don't know that yet, all we know is that it hasn't worked with the way your files are SO FAR.
You could also help others to help you if you mention what car and stereo you have.

TheRightOne · 21 February 2020 at 11:52AM

Use EAC http:// www.exactaudiocopy.de to rip the CD to a continuous WAV file and then compress to MP3 as you choose.

That way you can keep a lossless copy in addition to the lossy copy for the car stereo.

https:// arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=1029333

MP3's on a USB stick

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MP3's on a USB stick

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