Album Art driving me crazy

[p3asa]

I've never really bothered about displaying the Album Art correctly but over the last couple of weeks I thought I would get it in order.

I've followed the excellent instructions at haydnwilliams but I'm still having problems and wondered if anyone else has come across similar?

I'm using Mp3Tag to make sure the Tags are correct and attaching a jpeg to the files.
I had been attaching the artwork at 500 x 500 and on the whole this album art has been showing fine but I have several albums that just refuse to display the album artwork correctly.

I also tried using Sanse MP3 art Sizer to reduce the artwork to 400 x 400 on the problem folders but I'm still having problems with certain folders.

For example. I can scroll through my albums like below and all the art work displays properly.




But taking Deacon Blues album for example if I select Disc 1 when I actually go into the album, the art work disappears





Then when I come out of the folder the art work has disappeared on the coverflow but will reappear a few minutes later





This is what is really puzzling:
I have the Deacon Blue album separated into Disc 1 & Disc 2 as above and I used the exact same jpeg for both discs and also tagged both the discs with the exact same tags at the same time using mp3Tag. The only difference between the two is the tag Disc 1 & Disc 2 yet Disc 2 displays absolutely fine.





Initially Disc 1 had a few files with (...) brackets in the tags so I thought that might have been the reason why this particular Disc wasn't showing properly but I stripped out all the special characters and still it won't display.

Like I said above I have a few albums that are similar in that the art will show when flicking through the albums but won't when actually entering the album. But with the 2 Deacon Blue albums being almost identical it has really stumped me.
Its as if the car has a cache of the folder and if it hasn't had the correct properties to be displayed the first time you try and access it, it won't display at all.  I know that's not correct but I can't think what else it could be!

I've tried putting the SD card in the different slot but its still the same.

Anyone any suggestions at all?

[valvebounce]

I'd be interested in a solution too as the display of my album art is inconsistent.

[Brenbo]

I currently have been doing the same with all my MP3 files and album art.  I have not come across this issue yet? I am also using MP3TAG.  The thing I have notice while trying to assign Jpegs to MP3 files in this software is you can assign multiple Jpegs of cover art to one MP3.  This is a little bit strange.  However I have noticed while assigning Jpegs I have accidently assigned the Jpeg cover art to cover art 2 or 3 and not as the 1st main cover art Jpeg for a couple files.  This meant I could view the cover art at times but on occasions on certain software and scenarios the Cover art would randomly not display.  Even though this may be wrong and incorrect as a solution for your scenario, it may be worth checking. 

[ajmoir36]

I did realise the other day that the system, builds a database. As I have a USB disk which I safely unplugged, added some more files to plugged back in and got duplicate folders. i.e. A, B , C , D, D, E, E, F, F G, H, H e.t.c the only way I could solve the issue is by going to the settings and doing a factory reset on the media part only. It then started to rebuild its database and solved the issue. So that might be worth a try.

[p3asa]

@Brenbo Thanks I've noticed that and am always on the look out for it now. The Deacon Blue album in question has only got one jpeg. I've even deleted it and tried a new one but still the same. I drag the 2 discs into MP3Tag at the same time, so I'm doing exactly the same to both, that's why its so confusing why one works and the other doesn't.

@ajmoir you might have something there. As I definitely think it has some sort of cache. But its strange how some folders that I know weren't displaying properly now do display properly!!

I wonder if its because the folder name has also been changed on the ones that previously didn't display properly so the car thinks its a brand new folder so reads it properly rather than taking from its Cache? This would also explain why on one of my compilation 80's album it used to be a bright red picture which was kind of annoying so I changed the files to a blue picture. But now when I go to that Album it initially comes up with the blue picture but then quickly switches back to the red one!!! It would also explain how some folders I go in, it plays the song initially then jumps straight to the first album of the SD Card. Almost as if I've initially went into an Album that didn't exist!! But that's another problem for another day 

I've been sorting my whole music collection for the car so some folders have been re-labelled correctly while others always were correct.
But now I think about the Deacon Blue Album again, that album is new so hasn't been on the car before and I think all I have done to the files is reduce the size of the album work to 400 x 400. Not unless for some bizarre reason the car is using the cache for the first folder Disc 1 and reading it properly for Disc 2.

I'll mess about with folder names to see if my theory is right.
Try ejecting the disc properly from the SD slot in case that does some form of re-set although I doubt it since I've tried both slots.
Then I'll try the reset.

I'll post back.

[p3asa]

Messed about with it most of the day and I am completely stumped.

I changed the Album name to try and fool the media system it was a different album but still Disc 1 wouldn't display.

I reset the Media system back to Factory and still it won't display.

I've taken the card and reformatted it and only put 5 or 6 albums on it and still it won't display.

I've changed the jpeg attached to the files and still nothing.

The Deacon Blue album is arranged as:
            Album Folder
Folder Disc 1    Folder Disc 2

I've taken all the files out both folders and put them inside the Album Folder. Now when I look at them on the cars media system the 2 discs are exactly the way they were previously as the media system must arrange the artwork depending on what is tagged as the album.



So now with them inside the one folder when I click on Disc 1 it throws me out and goes to the beginning of the albums. Then if I go back to Disc 1 it will at least play the songs but still no art. Also if I go in to Disc 2 after Disc 1 it also throws me out and goes back to the beginning of the albums but at least displays the art.

I've uploaded a video of what I mean. I'm sure there is something corrupt in the folder but haven changed everything apart from the MP3s themselves I don't know what else to try.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/4u56bz6kqhdv7v6/20150326_200323.mp4?dl=0

This is driving me nuts.

Anyone got any other ideas?

[ajmoir36]

Each time you modify the disc layout or number of files I believe the media needs the factory reset.

[p3asa]

Each time you modify the disc layout or number of files I believe the media needs the factory reset.

Yeah I've tried that unfortunately it makes no difference apart from take a few minutes for the art to be populated.

[ajmoir36]

Interesting. ...not sure what to say. It's a small Linux computer at heart.

[Lock_r]

Drives me nuts as well. Thought I was the only one!

I get worse.  I made sure all my art is the correct side using Sanse.  Sometimes it shows, sometimes it doesn't.

Then more worryingly it shows the wrong art, and sometimes at random times.
Like I'll play a song, the art will display fine.  Then it'll change mid song, to something else, then re-shuffle and come back to the original art. 

Sometimes the wrong art will play for the song right from the start, from another file in another directory.  I've never figured out what goes on with it, and how it works.  Proper random!!!!

I go back to the original mp3s, and look at the art and it's correct!