yet another entune thread (usb browse not selectable?)

When I insert my desired USB stick, audio plays, but 'browse' is not selectable [greyed out] so I can't really search/select anything. I can put other (smaller) USB sticks in and get access to browse, so I suspect it's something weird about my files or layout it does not like.

Desired stick is 32GB Fat32, 21.7GB of mp3. 3502 files, 113 folders. I've made sure the are only supported files types (mpeg 1 layer 3), less than 9999 folders, less than 9999 files, less than 255 files per folder.

I'm pretty saavy, using Foobar2000, made sure to get rid of [nearly all] excess ID3 tags, etc.

I've iteratively tried adding files to see when the process shows up but this is a bit exhausting. Any ideas on how to narrow this down? For example, are there known charaters in filenames to avoid?

 

Sheepishly replying to my own thread; I figured it out. I've been testing in ACC mode. I need to turn the system ON in order for Entune to scan my ID3 tags.... Doh. All is well.

I'm sure others have figured out a system that works for them, but here is what I've gone with

folders: one per year - to keep files per folder under 255
genre: (whatever makes sense)
Composer: I override this with a decade [1950s, 1960s, 1970s] -- let me shuffle per decade
Album: I actually format this as %artist% - %album%, unless it's just a few single tracks, then the album is called "zzz No Album zzz".

Working well for me.

 

I've learned a few more things since my 2/20 post.

There is a lot of info on the internet regarding Entune annoyances, agreed, I'll try not to rehash those topics.

I'm not quite so sure testing in ACC vs ON mattered. It seems instead that I have to tap the icon where the album art should be to force Enture to rescan the USB stick/ID3 tags. For me this process takes 30sec+ every time I start the car, with the first scan seemingly taking about 2 minutes. I leave my USB stick inserted at all times. I'm using a 64GB micro stick.

I haven't noticed any other limitations with respect to the ID3 tags, I've read elsewhere online Entune assumes ASCII not UTF-8 for example (if that matters to you).

Some of my composers (decades) have 500+ songs and shuffle is fine, as is shuffling all tracks (not in front of the car but for example, I think if you go to albums -> all tracks and randomize it'll shuffle every song on the stick, which for me is a few thousand). So my experience here matches what others online have noted.

"in the name of safety" some of the touchscreen interface gets disabled/neutered when the car is in movement regardless if you have a passenger. It's annoying. I tried messing with the voice recognition for navigation but the system told me it was going to take awhile to build the database. I haven't tried it again, maybe his weekend. I put "in the name of safety" in quotes because, for example, they'll do this

* grey out skip-to-by-letter and force you to push down arrow
* after pushing down arrow ~15 times it pops up a warning saying there is more info to show but the interface is limited until you stop the car
* you can hit the back arrow and tap down 15 more times, repeat, etc.

So if you want to listen to an artist that begins with a =W=, for example, you better plan ahead...

 

Learned something new this week. I am still organizing with folder=year. However some of my compilations I noticed were playing back in incorrect order. Turns out these were compilations where album tracks were split across multiple year folders. In this case it didnt play back in alphabetical title order. I resolved this by making a few "various year" folders and moving entire as affected albums into a single folder. This affected about 600 files and the database rescan took less than a minute. Spot checked a few previously problematic albums and all looks well.