sd card organisation

[jamiebeveridge]

Ok been thinking about starting this thread for ages finally sat down to do it. My superb doesnt have mdi previous owner was using a parrot kit for the ipod instead.... neway ive been using the sd card for music and doing what i thort was the correct thing and having one large folder with all my music in with subfolders inside that. I then also have 1 single song outside this so that i can play this and select mix so that the columbus mixes between folders. However everytime the ignition is turned on it defaults back to the single song which me and better half have now heard 50 trillion times. When i skip.track the columbus usually cycles.though the first couple of folders for ages rather than mixing thoughout. At the time im sure this was the best the columbus cud do.from research here. Im noticing alot more people recently saying that they use the sd for music and i cant see everyone putting up with it as i have it so whats the secret that i havnt discovered. Im REASONABLY tech savvy but its letting the car down massivly so gotta fix it. Many many thanks for reading

[flamazine]

I put each album in a separate folder and give it the name of the album. If I turn off the ignition mid way I to an album it always starts were it was when I restart the ignition. I think single files not in a separate folder get priority over folders and thts why it always plays.

[psycholist]

If you want it to choose at random from all the mp3s on the SD card, the way that works for me is to throw everything in the root folder of the SD card. You'll have a spectacularly hard time finding anything specific once you throw a few GB on there - unless there's a search function hidden in teh menus somewhere. On starting the car the radio continues from where it was last playing and does appear to pick stuff randomly without favouring certain tracks, which is what I mostly want as if I'm not in the mood for what I'm listening to I can just hit the forward button on the steering wheel and get something else - no taking my eyes off the road to change folders on the touch screen needed.

[jamiebeveridge]

So u dont have album folders as such just one very long list of the single tracks?

[psycholist]

Unfortunately yes :(. Unsearchable, but the random track selection can't tie itself to particular folders since there are none.

[Raptor]

Interesting topic. I use separate folders then hit on the idea of using one of the folders for all my music and then thought I could select that album folder, select mix and all would be fine. Plays ok but not convinced it is randomly selecting tracks. Only did this yesterday and not the time to sit around waiting for tracks to finish and then see what comes up next. Wonderful care keeps me occupied for hours trying to sort out simple problems :0)

[jamiebeveridge]

I just find it incredible if the super clumsey way ive been doing it is the best way way that there is as so many people seem to use the sd card. As i wudnt be able to do it myself retro fitting the mdi wud be very expensive.

[psycholist]

Even with the MDI, I'm not at all sure the options for random track selection would be any better. My iRiver from back in the day acts like a hard disk drive if it's plugged into a USB source, so none of the functions of the mp3 player are available, so the selections and random options are more than likely the same as the SD card. If more up to date mp3 players can take instructions from the steering wheel controls/radio while still using their internal play options, that could be a solution.

 

I was a little disappointed that when I streamed music to the car from the phone bluetooth that the track forward and back buttons didn't work on the steering wheel (Which I know is supported by the bluetooth streaming audio standard). I was also hoping that the track name would show up on the maxidot display/radio screen, but I'm not sure if this is possible.

[Raptor]

HI Jamie, i may have misled you i do not normally use the sd card for music. There is no other option other than to use the sd card to load the music on the hard drive. I was using the sd card to experiment with the mix selection. Still not sure if the mix is working or if it only works on the hard drive. More fiddling required. Would like to know if anyone can confirm the process.

Will let you know how i get on.

John

[jozisko]

 

I was a little disappointed that when I streamed music to the car from the phone bluetooth that the track forward and back buttons didn't work on the steering wheel (Which I know is supported by the bluetooth streaming audio standard). I was also hoping that the track name would show up on the maxidot display/radio screen, but I'm not sure if this is possible.

I had the same issue. But since I have installed Poweramp app, forward and back buttons work and I also get track name on the Columbus.

[jamiebeveridge]

If i was to use the medi i would use the mdi which i would i believe allow.totally random selections but obviously beryarge cost involved over making the sd card do it. I have got a fair bit on the hdd but i fond that it has the same problem as the sd in that it wont randomise so is only any good if i want a specific artists entire album all at once. Also i try not to use hdd alot to prvent wear and failure.

[jamiebeveridge]

Medi was obviously meant to say mdi

[Raptor]

Success: having put a folder onto the hard drive with 150 tracks selecting mix does randomly play the tracks.

[jamiebeveridge]

Yes thats gd that u can do that but obviously searching wont work. Im after being able to have folders so i can search and a random selection across all those folders rather than one or the other. I think that makes sense...

[Mark S Morley]

Jamie,

 

I did manage to achieve what you're trying to do back when I first got my Superb. 

 

The trick was to put all of the music into folders, as you want, and then to use a playlist which contains all of the tracks in it.  Playing the playlist and then selecting "Mix" would then randomly choose from, effectively, all the music on the HDD - or a subset, depending on what you put in the playlist file(s).

 

Now this is where my memory gets fuzzy.  I believe the Columbus was supposed to support *.m3u playlists.  However I'm pretty certain that I never got that option working properly.  However, on a whim I tried it using the Windows Media Player Playlist format (*.wpl) and this worked fine, despite not being documented as being compatible.  As I recall, the tricky thing was working out how the paths were represented on the Columbus and how to represent these in the wpl (XML) file.  I soon lost interest in keeping the wpl file manually up-to-date when adding new albums and I no longer use this approach.

 

I don't imagine that I'll be able to pull one of the wpl files off of my Columbus back on to the SD card, however, I wouldn't be at all surprised if there's an appropriately formatted file lying around on my laptop at home - I'll have a look later.

 

Hope this helps,

 

 

m.

 

p.s. edited to add: yes, here I say I got it working with .wpl - pity I didn't say how...

Edited 3 April, 2014 by Mark S Morley

[Raptor]

Still not got to grips with voice control buy I am sure I read you ask for a given song to be played?

[artichoke273]

Yes thats gd that u can do that but obviously searching wont work. Im after being able to have folders so i can search and a random selection across all those folders rather than one or the other. I think that makes sense...

 

Could you have all your music on the HDD in folders and then put all the same tracks in the root folder of an SD card.  Then, if you want random - select SD, if you want to search - select HDD.

[jamiebeveridge]

Thats prob quite a gd idea actually. I mean still a pain to do i c another afternoon gone ill never get back but better than ive got now.

[Mark S Morley]

As promised: the format of a WPL file that will work with the Columbus - either from the root of the SD card or the HDD.  The text in the title tag is shown on the Columbus when broswing through the playlist.  While playing the playlist, the "Mix" option randomly selects from all the tracks in the file.

<?wpl version="1.0"?>
<smil>
    <head>
        <meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Windows Media Player -- 12.0.7601.17514"/>
        <meta name="ItemCount" content="19"/>
        <title>Playlist for Skoda Columbus</title>
    </head>
    <body>
        <seq>
            <media src="Music\Dir1\Dir1\Track 1.mp3"/>
            <media src="Music\Dir1\Dir1\Track 2.mp3"/>
            <media src="Music\Dir1\Dir1\Track 3.mp3"/>
            <media src="Music\Dir2\Dir1\Track 1.mp3"/>
            <media src="Music\Dir2\Dir1\Track 2.mp3"/>            
        </seq>
    </body>
</smil>

Hope this helps,

 

 

m.

[adamal]

Mark

This looks very useful, and exactly what I have been trying to do. Thanks for sharing.

Adam

[flamazine]

HI Jamie, i may have misled you i do not normally use the sd card for music. There is no other option other than to use the sd card to load the music on the hard drive. I was using the sd card to experiment with the mix selection. Still not sure if the mix is working or if it only works on the hard drive. More fiddling required. Would like to know if anyone can confirm the process.

Will let you know how i get on.

John

you can put mp3 on a disc and copy to hdd from there so you don't bave to just use the sd card.

[Raptor]

Thanks for that Flamazine, I was not aware that the files could uploaded form the CD player I was convinced I had read that files could be only uploaded from the sd card

[Damo]

Ive just uploaded some mp3's from a CD to the Columbus HDD

 

Thanks Flamazine, I too thought it was SD card only

[flamazine]

You can actually burn on to dvd as well as cd.

[Damo]

That should hold a lot more tracks then

might do that

then I wont get all the dot underscore duplicate files I get on my sd card