Creating usb drives for new car audio?

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1

Hello fellow mp3tag users !! As a brand new mp3tag “wanna-be,” I have enjoyed learning about this tag editor, which seems to be really neat ! But, I am 76 years old, no nothing about coding etc, and I have some questions that I hope some of you can answer and provide suggestions.

First, let me identify my goal: I have just ordered a new Jeep Grand Cherokee, and it has the Uconnect Nav 4 radio etc. This will have flash drive inputs, and I need to learn more about how to set up music files/ folders, etc on a usb drive so that the Jeep will recognize the album names, artists, track #, album art, etc. Before posting my questions here, I spent several hours reading the faqs etc from this site. I must admit that when I first read the “How to use mp3tag” as part of this website, I was totally lost !! It was all very strange to me. But, I took a two day break from it, and today, I went back and studied it again. Now, I am very pleased to say that I actually understand about 70 % of it, which is a HUGE accomplishment for me !! I was also able to import a music album, and learned how to do some basic tag edits !!

SO, here are my various questions:

I want to create folders for several genres like jazz, piano solo, gospel, popular, etc. Within these several genres, I then want to create individual sub-folders for my albums….. I would like just a basic, simple folder/directory system. Again, starting with genres / and underneath, all of my individual albums. I would like for the jeep radio to “see” album art, and other tag data.

Am I correct in thinking that mp3tag is my best vehicle for doing what I am trying to set up ? If not, can you suggest other free software for this ?

After I import an album into mp3tag, and do some tag editing, how can I then use this software to create a folder with this edited info ? In other words, I want to “export” it to a new folder on my desktop, both so that I can preserve it for future use, but also so that I can create new albums on usb drives. This export process is part of the 30% that I did not understand after studying the instructions carefully. For example, I click File, Export, and then I see the new window “Export Configuration,” and here is where I am stuck. Knowing that I want to create a folder on my desktop which will contain various audio files, how do I use the “Export Configuration” process to do this ?

What is the meaning of “Save Configuration?” If I am going to export the music files and data to a new, separate folder on my computer, is there a reason to also save the configuration from the mp3tag program ?

Some of my music a pretty old, so many tracks don’t have album cover images. Is there a way to use mp3tag to update this tag data from online sources ? If mp3tag will not do this, is there a separate program that I can use for this (maybe something in Windows 10 ?)

Is there a file size limit for my flash drives in the car ? I doubt that I would need more than 32 gigs of music.

I do know to use Fat32, and it is my understanding that all new usb drives bought today use this formatting. Is that correct ? Is there any other formatting that I should consider ?

Well, I think that is about enough for one posting, and I want to thank you all in advance for any info and suggestions that you may give me !!

2

Does your player in the car really need folders? Or does it rely on the tag data? Then it is not necessary to create folders.
What you have to do, though, is fill the tag fields.

I cannot guarantee that the player can cope with tag data. If it can then it is a must to fill the tags.

To move files to a new location, use Convert>Tag-Filename
Format string: C:\Users\user-name\Desktop\%genre%\%album%\%title%

This has nothing to do with moving files around but is intended to export tag data to text based file formats.

This saves the MP3tag configuration with all its actions, columns and other settings.

There is a Menu "Web sources" with various scripts to access internet sources. It could be that you find the cover with these scripts. If you don't but you find it somewhere else, then download the cover and add it with the cover functions of the tag panel.

Please consult the specification for your player. This has nothing to do with MP3tag.

3

In addition to @ohrenkino's anwers and your

Before you dive deep into to the functions and possibilities of Mp3tag I would recommend to check the manual of your new car radio. There are many different models and many levels of functionality.
Even now 2021 not every car radio support every kind of metadata inside your music files.

I would start with one album of your favorite artist and see how it works on your car radio.
Do you see the embedded album cover art on your car screen? Do you see the complete song title? What about the year? The genre and so on.

As soon as you know for sure what kind of metadata you can see in your car, you can start filling them into all your other albums and songs.

Then you can check if you can save several albums in different subdirectories (maybe with the name of the album or the genre?) on your USB-stick. Does your car player still play the songs? Do you still see all the wanted informations?

4

Thank you for these points !!! They all make pretty good sense to me. As I noted in my post, I have just ordered this jeep, and will not have it delivered for about a month yet. But, I did find the manual for this radio system online and downloaded it, and it provides NO information about how the flash drives should be set up. This is one of the reasons why I joined this group, because I am starting out with NO information. But again, your comments seem on point to me, and I appreciate them !!! I will certainly try out your suggestions when the new Jeep gets here !!

5

Thank you for this info ! I am learning just a little bit at a time, and here are my reply comments:

I don't know if my car player "needs" new folders, but I WANT to make new folders. As my initial post stated, this Jeep is on order, so I don't have it yet. I did download the manual for the player, but it gives NO info on usb drive formatting, structure, etc.

I still have no idea of how to export my tag editing to a new folder. As my post noted, I select File, then Export and then get a window that says "Export Configuration." Within that window, I don't know how to proceed.

As for cover art, I do try to select Tag Sources , then Cover Art, but the given fields are "dead" and render no info. I need to learn how to download current Cover Art for some tracks.

Again, thanks for your help !!

6

Please read my post again as I have already explained how to do that. File>Export is NOT the correct way.
To be honest:

To get the music on the USB device you simply copy the folder structure from your desktop to the USB drive with means of the explorer.
If you want to use MP3tag to copy files to the USB drive, try Edit>Copy...
This copies the files to the target but does not create a folder structure.

For any editing function in MP3tag you have to select at least one file.

7

Maybe this can help you:
1.) You open the songs from one album in Mp3tag
2.) You select all the songs
3.) You put the values in the left tag panel which are all the same for the selected songs, like the album name, the genre, the year, the cover art
4.) If you have entered all informations you press CTRL + S to save it into every selected song (=file)
5.) If you want you can then select a single song and change it's title or it's track number. Repeat this step for every single song you want to change. Don't forget to save it too with CTRL + S
6.) You don't have to "export" anything, the metadata remains saved in every song.
BUT
if you want to have folders and subfolders created automatically based on your entered informations in the various tag fields, you can do that with the steps @ohrenkino told you.

8

Thank you very much. What I want are separate folders of albums that I will create, so that from there, I can create flash drives. Perhaps what you have told me will do this, but I will have to sit back for a bit and study this more.

Ohrenkino's info is technically correct I am sure, but I am not advanced enough to do this. That is my fault of course, not his !!

Thanks again... I sure appreciate this !!

9

I think you will find that flash drives are older technology for automotive use, and newer cars include SD card slots for your music. Think of them as the same kind of storage for albums/songs, but the SD card is flush with the slot where a flash drive will stick out and possibly get in the way.

Also, you should find out the maximum cover size your audio system permits before you load all the tracks with over-sized covers (they will not display). My "standard" is 1000x1000 (for my computer screen), but my VW allows max 300x300 covers. I have to re-size the images for any music intended for the car if I want to see covers. You can avoid that issue (and complexity) by making your covers the right size.

A lot depends on your car's player. If you can't find documentation for tags, covers, folders, etc, you might have to discover the behavior by trial and error, once you actually get the vehicle.

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Jimmy, as noted in my initial post, this car radio uses flash drives, not SD cards. I do agree that I will know more once I get the car, but in the meantime, I need to learn how to create new music folders once I do the tag edited with mp3tag.

Thanks again !!

11

Or you create the folders as you like it in a first step, completely independent of Mp3tag. Do it like you would create it for your document or video or image folders, using your windows file explorer.

Then you can open one or more of this new and manually created folders in Mp3tag and edit the tags.

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Thanks.. and then after I edit the tags, how can I save this "edited" folder ??

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I'm not sure if we talk about the same.

Assuming you already have the 12 mp3 files from an album called "Waterloo" from artist "ABBA" from 1974 like this:

Release “Waterloo” by ABBA (Björn, Benny, Agnetha & Frida) - MusicBrainz
Release “Waterloo” by ABBA (Björn, Benny, Agnetha & Frida) - MusicBrainz1384×915 357 KB

you can manually create the folders with the help of your windows file explorer in a directory like C:\Users\James\Music as you wish. As example:
C:\Users\James\Music\A\ABBA\Waterloo\1974\
In this directory you move your 12 mp3 files.

Then you can open this 12 mp3 files in Mp3tag and edit the tags like Genre, Album etc (as I wrote above in the steps 1) to 5).

With CTRL + S you save your changes back to your files in your folders.

Then you copy the entire artist folder \ABBA or just an entire album folder \Waterloo to your USB drive. Again, you can do it (as one possibility) with the help of your windows file explorer.

What exactly do you want to achieve apart from this steps?

14

LyricsLover, I think this is what I am attempting !! It looks like you have put me closer to this goal. I will study it and practice doing as you say.

thank you very much !!!