swajames

Re the Mac discussions above, it is perfectly possible maintain and burn your content from "folders" in iTunes - iTunes playlists and (and the very powerful) smart playlists. These are maintained virtually and do not change the underlying folder structure of your music library (i.e. if you create a playlist and fill it with content then iTunes does not need to create multiple copies of that same content). Or you could just click "new folder" in the menu (but that folder is for organizing playlists, not individual songs, which you would just manage as a playlist as I mention above).

If you want to burn an MP3 disc using iTunes from a playlist containing multiple artists, just sort the playlist by artist before you burn - and the MP3 disc you create will be organized, and viewable in iDrive, by folders.

A2 BMW

Well, I've tried this and can't get it to work. All I see displayed in the car are song names - no artists. Can you tell me what settings you are using?

Thanks.

525iSE

Same here. I burned an MP3 disc using iTunes and sorted by Artists and another sorted by albums, but when I put it into my car, it just shows a whole list of 100 + songs, not organized by artists, folders, albums or anything... How did you get yours to work?

swajames

By default your playlist is sorted based on the order in which the tracks were added. Before you burn the disc, click on the "artist" column in the playlist view so your playlist is sorted by artist name in alphabetical order. This should give your disc a main "root" view showing artists and underlying tracks are organized in album folders. FWIW I use a Mac but the windows version of iTunes should be functionally identical. This also works for a playlist comprising multiple albums by a single artist, sort the playlist by artist before you burn the MP3 disc and you should also get these albums viewable as folders on the iDrive display. As an example I burned an Oasis disc with 5 or 6 individual albums and the albums were viewable as separate folders. I'm just getting over some surgery for the last couple of days but if I can I will try and get out and burn a disc tomorrow to show you guys. Good luck!

aybeesea

It's really easy with Nero under Windows...



ABC

Mz3bo

You guys are lucky, at least it does work half way...

cobradav

I can confirm swajames description of iTunes process working on PC/windows. Doing as he says organizes folders by Artist, then albums within each artist, then songs within each album. I only see the artists name at the top level, as once you drill down to the song only the song title is shown.

Here is a link previously posted by cpd1 to a Apple iTunes site that describes what swajames was saying.

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=60931

swajames

It's really easy on a Mac, too. You don't need any software other than iTunes, but if you want to try something different you can use Toast 7 from Roxio, it's broadly the Mac equivalent of Nero. Like Nero, Toast is a more heavyweight application that does a lot more than just burn MP3 discs.

aybeesea

Hmmm... Not sure I understand this.

Surely you can drag the order of tracks into any order you wish even after you've added them to the "playlist"? What is the concept of "time track was added"? And for IDrive, what is the concept of a "playlist"?

AFAICS (and please correct me) there seems to be only one order of displaying MP3s by IDrive and that's alphabetically. Can this order be changed?

ABC

swajames

The question here was really about burning MP3 discs, using iTunes, that were viewable by artist or album when played in the car. As you'll see above I confirmed that the default play order was the order in which the tracks were added to the playlist that the user sets up. iTunes burns from playlists, so that's a mandatory step, but yes you're certainly free to keep the default or reorder or sort the tracks as you prefer. "Playlist" is an iTunes concept and is nothing to do with iDrive. All we are trying to do is turn the iTunes playlist (folder) into a disc that (with some additional steps before it is burned) is easier to use and navigate when it's played in your car.

Re the order in iDrive, I'll have to check but I think it's possible to set the order that tracks apear within folders but you have do all of this before you burn. Once you've made your choice and burned the disc then that's what you get - there are no view options selectable within iDrive. That's essentially why we need to do some work beforehand to set up the folder and directory structure to make the disc more usable once it's burned.