USB Album Track Order

[Silverknight]

Every time I have music albums or singles on a USB drive, the system plays and orders them in alphabetical order, even though the track ID has the correct album track ordering number. Has anyone else had this problem?

[Mitchjs]

sux doesnt it!

[Silverknight]

The engineers obviously don't eat their own sh*t... Or don't test it very well... Or just don't care.

[slumkid]

The engineers obviously don't eat their own sh*t... Or don't test it very well... Or just don't care.

sounds like you're accessing the files through "folder" view. If you go in by "album", mine works just fine

[Silverknight]

Nope, tried it all ways and it still plays in alphabetical order, although in "album" view, it lists the song in track order. Here's what I do (PLEASE tell me I'm doing something wrong):

Select USB as source

Browse

Music

Album

(Songs are no listed in the correct album order)

Select first song in list (this is track one of the album, but the player screen shows it as 4/8--the alphabetical order)

The next track that plays is not album track 2 (which would be 8/8) but 5/8 (the next song in alphabetical order).

[lmartin2]

Nope, tried it all ways and it still plays in alphabetical order, although in "album" view, it lists the song in track order. Here's what I do (PLEASE tell me I'm doing something wrong):

Select USB as source

Browse

Music

Album

(Songs are no listed in the correct album order)

Select first song in list (this is track one of the album, but the player screen shows it as 4/8--the alphabetical order)

The next track that plays is not album track 2 (which would be 8/8) but 5/8 (the next song in alphabetical order).

Have you tried voice command "play album xxx"

Mine only works if I use voice command to play the album.

good luck Gene

[Silverknight]

Still no go. It plays the first track of the album but then goes to the next track alphabetically by song name. What is really strange is that in Browse, Album view, it does list the tracks in album order.

[lsnbm]

I'm having this issue as well. When I play the album in album mode, it will play the first track, but then it plays track 10 next? This is quite unfortunate, almost takes the fun out of my new car.

 

How about a Ford dude tell us how to fix this. After all it was Ford thad decided to go with Microsoft???

 

I would be nice to be able to plug in a USB stick with MP3's on it and have it "just play" the tracks in the correct order, is that too much to ask for, is it Ford. Can't even put an aftermarket radio in. Funny thing the other radios can "just play" the MP3's.

 

Frustrated in Toronto.

[brafo96874]

For clarity, so that people don't think they are going crazy:

 

As far as we all know, the MyFord Touch Sync system only plays tracks in Alphabetical Order. Some people change the Song Title meta-data to start with a number to force a certain order (not a very graceful solution for large music collections).

 

If you use the voice command to play an album, the first song it will play will be the first song of album, but it will revert back to Alphabetical Order after playing the first song. To test this, use the voice commands to play any album. Notice that it plays the first track of album correctly, BUT the "trackNumber/totalTracks" display will show something like "4/12" (or whatever theAalphabetical Order number is for that song in that album). In the case of this example, after that first song completes the system will play "5/12", not the second song of the album based on Track# Order.

 

I use a Microsoft Zune and, in browsing, it shows my music in Track# Order. But anytime I play music, whether by voice commands or otherwise, it will always revert to Alphabetical Order. This does not appear to be able to change in any settings I have found (note: I do not want to add numbers to track titles, that's not a real solution).

 

Hopefully, the new update coming out soon will at least give us sorting options.

[MSUICEMAN]

you think that is bad, mine refuses now to go to the next track, it will just play the same track over and over until i hit next on the steering wheel or head unit.... AWESOME! going to try a master reset and see if that "fixes" it. It just started doing this yesterday.

[unclemickey1]

I know the frustration.I have a file of complaints the size of a Bible.I have individually transfered songs then gone into properties of each song and assigned numerical value ie;1-200.No luck.Still plays alphabetically.Then went into properties and assigned a letter to each song.... A title,AA title,AAA-title.Still no luck.I have a job ticket supposedly escalated{what a f ing joke} to tech department and am waiting for a reply.As soon as I hear of a common sense solution I assure you I will post the solution.Sync has been nothing but a royal pain.Wish I had never bought it.Good luck to all.I was told that if playlist downloaded to ipod that would play in sequential order.

[Nutopia]

This is terrible. Ugh.

 

Anyone have a quick/easy way to implement a work around? Either playlists or renaming tracks with the track number? I have a large music colletion and want to make this as efficient as possible.

[rockchie]

to fix this problem ive herd you need to change the meta data in the songs (properties)

and change the track numbers so they are all three digits.

ex: 001 , 002, 003, ... 014, 015 ect

because SYNC recognizes the numbers in a three digit system.

 

not sure if it works but if it does let me know.

hope it helps

[Dark Side-Hazelnut]

Rockchie - I can't believe that! I have to modify hundreds of CDs that I ripped from original settings and changing each track number so it's three digits? This will take hours and is unnecessary if Ford and Microsoft upgrade the SYNC software.

 

One easy solution is for the album playback order to come from the song's file name which typically starts with the track number. My occupation is an information technology applications software project manager, and I have so many recommendations to make the SYNC software more user friendly. Is there anyone from Ford or Microsoft monitoring these forum topics? If so, please reply.

 

By the way, I love my MKZ Hybrid - I just hope that there's an opportunity to get the bugs out of the SYNC software.

[ldaugh]

I have a different issue using an external hd. Some albums have swapped track 1 and 2, with the rest of the album in the correct sequence. But only some. All the tag info is correct, and the files all have track info at the beginning, though not using 3 digits as suggested.

 

Has anyone seen this? My 2010 fusion never had any issues with track order (that I noticed), and this is the same drive.

[ldaugh]

Quick followup. Even though I was not seeing tracks in alpha order, I tried to fix this by following advice found here and elsewhere. I first changed the track to have 3 digits. No good. I then changed the file name to include this. No good. I also formatted my drive and tried re adding the data, as well as factory resetting the system. Still, first and 2nd track were swapped on many albums (with rest in track order...). Last thing I did was add the track number to the title. That finally worked.

 

This is in a 2014 Escape with MFT. I am happy I got it working, and the workaround once known is not that bad (I don't use sync voice to play tracks, just albums). But the complete ignorance of the system is baffling. Non of this should be needed, and was not in my 2010 Fusion (4 years older...). That and the fact that gap-less is still not supported is very disappointing. Still better than lugging Cd's around though =)

[Kelleytoons]

Okay, I found a fix but not on any official Ford forum so I'll post it here.

 

Turn off the Gracenote features (which I do believe are on by default). Then all is well, with no further "tricks" needed.

Edited July 27, 2014 by Kelleytoons

[Vlad the Impaler]

use three digits track numbered in metadata of the song

Edited May 17, 2015 by Vlad the Impaler

[JoeBrown]

I usually play my USB MP3s in shuffle mode so the actual order doesn't matter.

[TEXREP]

I have tried everything... I disable the gracenote feature which i don't know what it does anyway. I had to renumber a CD that I burned anf that seems to work but on the stick it is a nogo.I cant figure out what that hell it's looking at for the order. so I guess I am stuckk with carring CDs that is BS. Not so much on a studio album... bur a live album is the PITS when it jumps around... Especailally whe you know the album buy heart...

[JoeBrown]

If you captured the track order from the original CD as part of the title of each individual track, ie the 02, 04 or whatever, then it's going to sort all the 01 track songs then the 02 track songs etc.

 

I put all of the songs on my USB memory stick in the same folder. I guess it depends on what software you use to convert to MP3 and how you create/save it. I suppose if you had seperate folders by artist or album it would do it differently.

 

Hope this helps.

[Mike Stark]

I used a MP3 editor, (MP3 Tag), and where I wanted to keep tracks in order, I put the number in the song title (at the front) with a space between the number and title. Like this: 01  The First Day .

[Muzicman61]

I have used this technique since the days of Sync 1 on my 2008 Focus.

 

Folder in root:

Singles

Albums

Compilations

Soundtracks

 

Under the Albums folder, I have a folder for every artist and a folder for every album under that artist.  Songs are named <artist> - <album> - <track. - <title> and have matching MP3 Tag info.

• Albums/Styx/Cornerstone
• Styx - Cornerstone - 01 - Lights
• Styx - Cornerstone - 02 - Why Me
• etc..

For Soundtracks and  Compilations:

• Soundtracks/Big Chill
• Big Chill - 01 - Marvin Gaye - Heard It Through The Grapevine
• Big Chill - 02 - The Temptations - My Girl
• etc...

 

MP3 Tag is a great program and has the ability to batch process many files in Minutes.  If your metadata is accurate, you can auto rename the song's file name from the tag data and resolve this issue once and for all.  Then follow the same process moving forward on any new albums you purchase.

[pwcopy]

Great info, Musicman1. Since I'm a tech know-nothing, I need some clarification:

 

What is "Folder in root:"?

 

Do the labels in your post use the exact punctuation you are putting in the MP3 Tag info?

e.g. Artist Name(space dash space)Album Name(space dash space)Track #(space dash space)Track Name

 

Also, I've digitized a lot of music by importing them via iTunes. Do you know if your technique will work on these files?

 

Many thanks for your help, PW

[Muzicman61]

19 hours ago, pwcopy said:

Great info, Musicman1. Since I'm a tech know-nothing, I need some clarification:

 

What is "Folder in root:"?

 

Do the labels in your post use the exact punctuation you are putting in the MP3 Tag info?

e.g. Artist Name(space dash space)Album Name(space dash space)Track #(space dash space)Track Name

 

Also, I've digitized a lot of music by importing them via iTunes. Do you know if your technique will work on these files?

 

Many thanks for your help, PW

 

Folders in root just mean if you were to format the USB drive and then create those 4 folders.  Root is considered the highest level of a drive's folder structure.

 

Yes, those dashes are a part of the file name... the full filename of one example above would be "Big Chill - 01 - Marvin Gaye - Heard It Through The Grapevine.mp3"

 

Of course, without the actual quotes.

 

I have never used iTunes.  But I would suspect a mp3 file is the same on iTunes as any other system.  It is capable of storing metadata in the file header.

 

The only caveat to my naming convention is that the entire length of the song name and folder path cannot exceed 255 characters.  But that has never been a problem... example would be:

"C:\reallyreallyreallylongrootfoldername\reallyreallyreallylongartistfoldername\reallyreallyreallylongalbumfoldername\reallyreallyreallylongsongtitlename.mp3"

 

Everything in quotes above, the length cannot exceed 255.