Burning Cds And Tracks In Specific Order Onto Mp3 Disc(s)

[mindyammons]

I recently purchased Roxio Easy Media Creator 8. I have been transferring files from CDs to create an MP3 disk. Everything has gone well except for one thing--and yes, I've checked the tutorials. I think I've figured out how to keep my tracks from the individuals CDs in the same that order that they're in on the CDs (I did this by selecting "rename tracks to ensure playback order" under MP3/WMA Disc Project Settings), but when I burn the CDs to disk to create an MP3 disk, it places my CDs in alphabetical order, not in the order I added them in and in which they are listed. How can I fix this? (I was told by a technical rep. to create new folders for each of the CDs and rename them either numerically or alphabetically, keeping them in the order that I want them.) Has anyone else had this problem?

[d_deweywright]

I think what were asking Roxio is to figure out a way that we can arrange our files as we see fit. When we burn a 'normal' music cd, we can arrange the tracks...why not use the same routines.

 

I have Nero-7 and Musicmatch-10 and neither allow you to arrange your mp3 tracks (musicmatch will not even allow you to add multiple directories...everything is in the root)

 

W

Umm... an "MP3" CD and an Audio CD are completely different entities. An MP3 CD is simply a data CD full of .MP3 files, and maybe a playlist (.M3U) file. An Audio CD has tracks, not files, and the directory is quite different than what you get with a Data CD. So, "arranging" the files, is, as much as anything, getting them to list properly in the directory.

 

(Earlier versions of ECDC version 3 did let you actually order the files, but they'd still display in alphabetical order.)

 

don't know how to resolve the problem... but, realPlayer allows you to select the order the files are recorded and does not refile them alphbetically.

 

so - i disput the claim that this is a Windows issue

 

(too bad this board doesn't have a spellchecker)

 

g

 

When you write your CD, are you making an MP3 CD, or an Audio CD? For an Audio CD, yes, you can arrange the tracks. For an MP3 CD, what do you see when you list the files in Windows Explorer? Are you sure RealPlayer isn't simply creating an M3U playlist file that you're ordering? Or is it creating an Audio CD? It makes a difference.

[garyblot]

Umm... an "MP3" CD and an Audio CD are completely different entities. An MP3 CD is simply a data CD full of .MP3 files, and maybe a playlist (.M3U) file. An Audio CD has tracks, not files, and the directory is quite different than what you get with a Data CD. So, "arranging" the files, is, as much as anything, getting them to list properly in the directory.

 

(Earlier versions of ECDC version 3 did let you actually order the files, but they'd still display in alphabetical order.)

When you write your CD, are you making an MP3 CD, or an Audio CD? For an Audio CD, yes, you can arrange the tracks. For an MP3 CD, what do you see when you list the files in Windows Explorer? Are you sure RealPlayer isn't simply creating an M3U playlist file that you're ordering? Or is it creating an Audio CD? It makes a difference.

 

I made an MP3 disc in EMC8 with JukeBox disc - in Windows it depicts the folders, by title, and the individual files in each folder...

 

I have no control over the sequence of the folders - but the songs are as they are in the albums...

 

I did figue out how to arrange the tracks in Audio CD - files or tracks, whats the difference

 

g

[d_deweywright]

I made an MP3 disc in EMC8 with JukeBox disc - in Windows it depicts the folders, by title, and the individual files in each folder...

 

I have no control over the sequence of the folders - but the songs are as they are in the albums...

 

I did figue out how to arrange the tracks in Audio CD - files or tracks, whats the difference

 

g

That's good to know about RealPlayer, thanks for the follow up. I still have to wonder how they do it, since Windows doesn't care about physical location of the files on the disc.

 

There's a great difference between files and tracks. It's essentially the difference between an Audio CD and a Data CD, Red book and Orange book (different CD specifications).

 

When you write a Data CD, using sessions, all of the files are written in a single Data track. Each block holds 2048 bytes of data, and 304 bytes of ECC (Error Correction Code). Each file is written in contiguous blocks. On an Audio CD, each block holds 2352 bytes of music information (1/75th second). The ECC isn't created for Audio CDs, but then, the data isn't contiguous, it is spread out and intermingled, so the likelihood of a piece of dirt corrupting enough bytes in a row to cause an audible defect (after the playback circuitry masks anything like that) is minimal. Basically, it's a different form of error correction. Each song is a separate track, and the standard format is 44,100 samples of 16 bits each, stereo. So, for the casual listener and user, they don't know nor care, but there's a big difference.

 

Also, if you look at an Audio CD in Windows, you'll see that Windows Explorer shows each track as being only 1K in length, a having a "file type" of .CDA. That's just a handy way for Windows to display the separate tracks, they're really much longer. And it doesn't use the track names, even if they were written with CD-Text. That's because the tracks don't have "names" in the directory. (Another difference.)

[wardl]

I think what were asking Roxio is to figure out a way that we can arrange our files as we see fit. When we burn a 'normal' music cd, we can arrange the tracks...why not use the same routines.

 

I have Nero-7 and Musicmatch-10 and neither allow you to arrange your mp3 tracks (musicmatch will not even allow you to add multiple directories...everything is in the root)

 

W

[ryorko1@msn.com]

I recently purchased Roxio Easy Media Creator 8. I have been transferring files from CDs to create an MP3 disk. Everything has gone well except for one thing--and yes, I've checked the tutorials. I think I've figured out how to keep my tracks from the individuals CDs in the same that order that they're in on the CDs (I did this by selecting "rename tracks to ensure playback order" under MP3/WMA Disc Project Settings), but when I burn the CDs to disk to create an MP3 disk, it places my CDs in alphabetical order, not in the order I added them in and in which they are listed. How can I fix this? (I was told by a technical rep. to create new folders for each of the CDs and rename them either numerically or alphabetically, keeping them in the order that I want them.) Has anyone else had this problem?

Yes. The rename tracks doesn't seem to work except for the display, as when I burned my MP3 disc the order on the disc didn't come out as displayed, but alphabetically. One of the reasons I bought EMC8 was that Roxio claimed you could reorder and rename MP3 tracks. All other programs you have to do it manually-so Roxio doesn't work in this regard as advertised.

[garyblot]

don't know how to resolve the problem... but, realPlayer allows you to select the order the files are recorded and does not refile them alphbetically.

 

so - i disput the claim that this is a Windows issue

 

(too bad this board doesn't have a spellchecker)

 

g

[d_deweywright]

Yes. The rename tracks doesn't seem to work except for the display, as when I burned my MP3 disc the order on the disc didn't come out as displayed, but alphabetically. One of the reasons I bought EMC8 was that Roxio claimed you could reorder and rename MP3 tracks. All other programs you have to do it manually-so Roxio doesn't work in this regard as advertised.

Well, I haven't seen the claim about "ordering" .MP3 files, but I wonder if that wasn't relating to being able to control the order in the "Playlist" (.M3U) file. The whole alphabetizing "problem", is simply how Windows handles data discs. (In other words, it's not EMC that's ordering things that way.) And an "MP3 CD" is nothing more than a Data CD full of .MP3 files, and possibly including a playlist file as well. The files must be named appropriately to be sorted properly by Windows. If you want to group them by "album" then indeed, you'll either need to put them into separate folders, or come up with a naming/number scheme to do something similar.

 

Don't know if that helps or not.