Use Winodows Media Player to Sync: Music, Playlists and Pictures

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Windows Media Player (WMP) is a great application and works great for syncing to the Android platform.
The Music and Pictures application on the Android work with the file structure and playlists from WMP. It is an easy solution for managing content on your computer and having it sync automatically.






Benifits of using WMP to sync content

• Sync Auto Playlists and User Created Playlists
• Sync Pictures with options to resize to save space. (keeps folder hierchy for easy browsing)
• You can reserve space so WMP does not eat all of the usable storage
• You can prioritize your synced content giving you control over fresh content, or managing your favorites.
• Sync 4 and 5 star Rated pictures and music from your computer

Examples of use:

• Sync Pictures added to your computer in the last 30 Days
• Sync You favorite songs first, then by playlist, and then fill the remaining space with the rest of you library and you can still leave room for other reasons like pictures taken from the G1

Researching the following:

• WMP can convert and resize certain video formats and TV recorded from Media Center to a mobile sized WMV. I am researching to see if WMP can be tweaked to use another format and resolution
• WMV playback on Android/G1

I have read alot of questions from users about media management. I wanted to start this thread as an awareness for using WMP to manage content. I see alot of G1 users feel like the link between the computer and android is not there. I think it is designed for an open platform, so you don't have to use one app for everything (i.e. Active Sync, itunes, ect.)

Moderators: please feel free to delete or redirect if this thread is out of place.

Jcostanza4

Reserved for How To Guides

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In progress of building. 11-5-08.
Please be patient while I work on the detailed information. Please feel free to suggest or add missing information by sending me a PM.

How to Setup Windows Media Player (WMP) to sync to the G1
This guide is designed for Android version R29 or later and the use of a Micro SD or SDHC card already installed in the device.Earlier Android releases have different steps in mounting the device to the comptuer and are not in this guide.

1. Connect the Device to the Computer via USB Cable
A Notification will appear in top bar. Slide down the curtain and select the notification labeled "USB connected". Select the "Mount" option.

2. Open Windows Media Player on the Computer
Make sure you are on the "Library" tab of WMP, if not select it. If your device is properly installed and connected, your memory card should be listed on the left pane and would be titled based on how you formated the card or set by the manufacturer. [See Figure (1) Attached Below]

3. Right Click on the memory card from the left pane and select "Setup Sync..."
[See Figure (2) Attached Below]

4. Name your device and click finish
Choose a name that will be easily recognizable for your convienence. If you are using multiple cards, you can setup different media to be synced to each card.[See Figure (4) Attached Below]

5. Right Click on the memory card from the left pane and select "Setup Sync" and choose "Sync this device automatically"

In the list on the right remove playlists that you do not want to sync to your device. You can add more playlists by selecting the "Available Playlist" drop down box and select "Sync Playlists". This section will allow you to sync your picture library and possibly video and tv in the future (not availble yet). [See Figure (8) Attached Below]

Set your Priorities: Change the priority list that sync to your preference. If you have "All Music" at the top fo the list, all of your music will sync first until the card is full. If the card is not full it will move to the next sync list and so on. I recomend syning your favorites of each categories and then use sync All Music or All pictures last. See reserving space note to leave room on your card.

Click Finish when done and device starts to sync.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

How To Set Conversion and Space limits
Right Click on the memory card from the left pane and select "Advanced Options" to set quality preferences

A - On the sync tab: if you leave the "Create folder Hierarchy on the device" select it will sync over pictures and music in the same folder layout as it is on your computer. If you uncheck this box all files will be placed into one folder. Pictures are harder to browse on the device if you choose this option because they are all grouped into the main picture folder.

To Reserve space: you may want to reserve space so that your synced content does not take all of the space available on your memory card. Move the slider to the right to reserve space in 5% increments. If you are unable to move the slider you must stop any current syncing. [See Figure (10) Attached Below]

Note: To Stop a sync in process, close or cancel the open window and right click on the memory card in the left pane of WMP and select "Stop Sync" [See Figure (9) Attached Below]

B - On the Quality Tab: if you leave the "Convert music, pictures, videos and TV shows as required by this device" selected, the computer will resize images down to save space. Uncheck this box if you want the full resolution version of the image which will take up more space. You can also set the quality of the music by checking "Select maxium quality level" and setting the max bitrate for songs to be synced.

Note: Video and TV are not supported at this time and is not an option that you can select.

Click Apply and then OK when finished.

About Playlists on the Device

You can create as many playlists as you wish. Note that the “Recently added” playlist is a system playlist and cannot be deleted or renamed. Also, if you make any voice recordings as part of a MMS message, they will be stored automatically in a playlist called “My recordings”. Supported Playlists: Playlist formats supported are M3U, WPL, and PLS. WPL is the Windows Media Playlist format and is the default format that WMP saves to. This playlist file will sync to your device if saved in the Playlist folder on the computer.

Please ask some questions in the mean time so I can see the problems and questions that most users will have.

WMA files: regardless of how you get them onto your device, tags aren't fully recognized, nor is cover art. MP3 files work fine though...

Originally Posted by benjimen

WMA files: regardless of how you get them onto your device, tags aren't fully recognized, nor is cover art. MP3 files work fine though...

WMA Metadata:
Which tags/data is not bieng recognized? 99% of my music is in MP3 format, so I have not run into this problem yet.

About Cover Art for MP3s:
Cover art is recognized for 80% of my music. I believe it because the android sees cover art that is embeded in the metadata and not reliant on the folder.jpg placed in each album folder.

Note:
After you initially sync, open up the Andoid's Music player and choose Albums. Let the Andoid update/find/process cover art for a couple of minutes and make sure you keep the device awake. Don't switch to another application or it will stop processing the cover art.

Jcostanza4

Thanks for the great detail.

I have started to use media player as my primary music app since installing media center. Syncing with media player and my G1 is something I forgot about.


Imp

Originally Posted by jcostanza4

Note:
After you initially sync, open up the Andoid's Music player and choose Albums. Let the Andoid update/find/process cover art for a couple of minutes and make sure you keep the device awake. Don't switch to another application or it will stop processing the cover art.

Jcostanza4

When I open the music player in the phone and select albums, I get a list of albums without the cover art being displayed ( I have the phone set on never timeout). How long does it take for the cover art to be displayed? I let it sit for several minutes and it hasn't done anything. Do I have to initiate the update process or is it supposed to be automatic?

Not sure if this will help/work, but I've had a bit of experience working with getting mp3s with cover art in WMP.

I find the easiest way is to update the albums in WMP using the 'Find Album Info' option. This should pull art/track info from the web and alter the embedded art and id3 tags. It can be a bit hit and miss sometimes (occasionally the art/tags won't update properly).

You should also be able to drag/drop the art (folder.jpg etc) into WMP when sorted by album.

Syncing it after this should then push out any changes.

(my G1 is arriving tomorrow, so won't be able to confirm if this works 'til then)

Originally Posted by xavier6303

When I open the music player in the phone and select albums, I get a list of albums without the cover art being displayed ( I have the phone set on never timeout). How long does it take for the cover art to be displayed? I let it sit for several minutes and it hasn't done anything. Do I have to initiate the update process or is it supposed to be automatic?

You should see the artwork start to appear one by one, if you don't see this happening it might be the way the cover art is setup in your library.

(EDIT: when I says start to appear, I mean about every second as soon as you open in Album view. If you leave it in this mode and let the device fall asleep it will still update the cover art, just don't open another application on top of that or it will stop. Scroll around and see if it is updating, it should be very apparent if its working)

We are all new to this so alot of my reasoning is just speculation at this point. The artwork that shows on my G1 is cover art imbeded into the mp3 file and not a jpg in the album folder.

Let me know if this helps.
Jcostanza4

Originally Posted by jcostanza4

You should see the artwork start to appear one by one, if you don't see this happening it might be the way the cover art is setup in your library.

We are all new to this so alot of my reasoning is just speculation at this point. The artwork that shows on my G1 is cover art imbeded into the mp3 file and not a jpg in the album folder.

Let me know if this helps.
Jcostanza4

Ok, Ill try it again.

Thanks

wassup everyone working on album art for my g1 as well anybody discovered anything new? A lot of my art won't show up after sync still even after updating all the album info.