Music files on SD card

[meb90]

Hi all,

 

This may be a very stupid question, but I am struggling to get music files on my SD card to play when in my car.

 

I have had a look through the file formats, I have some m4a, and mp3 files but only some of the m4a files are playing.

 

Is there a specific file format that I need to be using?

 

If there is, what audio file converter do you recommend?

 

Thanks, Matt

[Svensken]

I know that .m4a files downloaded from itunes store a while back won't play. They have some sort of built-in protection. Maybe this is the case?

Edited 22 July, 2014 by Svensken

[lfc958]

In summary

 

SD card must be formatted @ FAT32

To guarantee music files will play, strongly reccommend MP3 format only, this has been pain free in my previous Octy & my current Yeti.

 

If you are using a PC & use Winamp - this usually can convert, otherwise look around for one of the many free conversion programs & find one that suits,

 

I have a MAC & use All2MP3, as it is a simple drag & drop & suits my needs ( i think there is a PC version )

[harrysprout]

In summary

 

SD card must be formatted @ FAT32

To guarantee music files will play, strongly reccommend MP3 format only, this has been pain free in my previous Octy & my current Yeti.

 

If you are using a PC & use Winamp - this usually can convert, otherwise look around for one of the many free conversion programs & find one that suits,

 

I have a MAC & use All2MP3, as it is a simple drag & drop & suits my needs ( i think there is a PC version )

Best solution I think. 320 kpbs is fine for a car. I also have a mac and use 'Tagger' to strip out artwork created with itunes and put it back again. That way all cover art shows on the Amundsen. When adding to the sd card via the usb reader I also have free 'Blue Harvest' running which removes those pesky Metadata files and folders such as Spotlight 100 etc.

[spacenase]

I'm running an SD card with a mix of m4a and MP3 files in a Columbus with no problems. It includes tracks downloaded from iTunes. There can be a delay displaying the cover art, but I suspect this is to do with the image size as some are over the recommended size.

[meb90]

Hi all,

 

Thanks for your responces! I have been looking at this over the last few days. lfc958, I have decided to use All2MP3 as indeed there was a PC version. Quick question, I paid for the upgrade so that I can do more than 5 files at a time, but did you ever have problems with the programme crashing when you added files. The first time I used it, I put 300 files and it was happy with that. Yet last night I could only get it to accept 50, anymore and it just crashed. Has this happened with you? I am going to get in touch with the makers tonight I think.

 

In summary

 

SD card must be formatted @ FAT32

To guarantee music files will play, strongly reccommend MP3 format only, this has been pain free in my previous Octy & my current Yeti.

 

If you are using a PC & use Winamp - this usually can convert, otherwise look around for one of the many free conversion programs & find one that suits,

 

I have a MAC & use All2MP3, as it is a simple drag & drop & suits my needs ( i think there is a PC version )

[StevenB]

My car with Columbus comes in about 6 weeks and I have 2 64gb cards already. I'll be using FLAC as i've converted all my C.D's to this format and put them on a NAS at home and stream via Synology into an old but good Arcam DAC and into HiFi. MP3 sounds terrible on this system as it's too compressed.

i'm hoping the same will be true in the car and i'll have near CD quality but much more user freiendly...we will see.

 

To covert for itunes (for the mrs on her iphone) I use Dpoweramp and that's excellent.

 

Steve

[MidVRS]

Does anybody know where the system gets the cover art from?...I have a folder on my SD card with (as a test) two albums each in individual folders...They are mp3 format so should be fine but I took them down from my google play music account and I don't see any cover art files with them...just wondering if I should create another folder somewhere else with cover art in it?...Cheers

[mannyo]

The images are held in the ID tags contained in the file itself, you don't need any album pictures in folders. If the files do not have the image embedded then you'll need some tagging software to add them.

[kitset]

I could be wrong, but if you've downloaded them from your Google Play account (either uploaded previously or bought from Google) they may have been creating a link to the album art, rather than allowing it to be embedded - creating "virtual" album art when you look at it on the computer or phone. For the shear volume of peoples music they have stored all the little album art pictures would take up serious (and unnecessary) server space for them.  Anyhoo, mannyo is right, the art needs to be embedded in the song - I don't believe putting a .jpeg of the album art in the folder with the music would work. I don't have my RS yet so can't check for you sorry.

[MidVRS]

Cheers All, like I say I've just stuck some files on an SD card to check the functionality on an overnight test drive tomorrow...No biggie if it doesn't work, I'll have plenty of time to figure it out while I'm waiting for my car

[Daveinuk]

Does anybody know where the system gets the cover art from?...I have a folder on my SD card with (as a test) two albums each in individual folders...They are mp3 format so should be fine but I took them down from my google play music account and I don't see any cover art files with them...just wondering if I should create another folder somewhere else with cover art in it?...Cheers

My Columbus gets the album covers from the Gracenote Database embedded in the unit itself by using the ID tags in the files. According to the Columbus User Guide, you can also use jpg, jpeg, png, bmp and gif files, so long as the image resolution is not greater than 500 x 500 (200Kb) pixels. Before I found out about the Gracenote Database, I created some jpeg files and included them with the album tracks. The system completely ignored them, but they could have been greater than the permitted size.

[Yogi-Bear]

My Columbus gets the album covers from the Gracenote Database embedded in the unit itself

 

Ooh, that's interesting, thanks.

 

However, I'd still rather it didn't have the Gracenote DB and had loads more space for me to put music etc. on...