MIB 2 and playlists

[GeoBog]

Just picked up my new GTI PP DSG today and although the interior is familiar from my previous 2014 GTI PP manual the car is a blast.

Have been messing about with the new MIB 2 and compared to previous generation it is a step forward however I can't get my head around it with the Media player and playlists. Basically I have used the same SD card from my previous GTI into the new one and my playlists don't work. When I try to start a playlist, the infotainments cycles through all the titles in the playlist as if the songs are missing and it does not play any of them. If I play the songs separate from their folders they work no problem. The playlists are in m3u format and as I said they worked ok on MIB 1 from my old GTI and also they play ok on my laptop.

I have been reading the manual as well but no joy. In the MIB 2 manual it says it plays M3U, PLS, WPL, etc formats however it doesn't seem to like my M3U playlists.

Has anyone had the same issues or am I doing something wrong?

[Brenbo]

I also now have the MIB2 unit.  I also have M3U playlists which I created on my PC for each of the albums on the music library.  I can confirm the MIB2 unit does play playlists saved as M3U files.  Did you create the M3U files yourself or were they already with the albums when you sourced/bought your albums?  If you did create the M3U playlist files yourself, did you specify Absolute URL paths or Relative? This may not be the cause but could be a factor to look in to.  I could suggest for you to maybe get a test M3U + corresponding music file from one of us on this forum and try it on your MIB2 unit to see if it is the file or the unit which is to blame? 

[GeoBog]

I have created the playlists myself on my laptop and they work ok on any Windows player. Also they worked on my MIB 1 from previous GTI so nothing has changed. Yesterday I literally took the SD out of MIB 1 and inserted it into MIB 2 when I did the car swap-out at the dealer. Checking now one of the playlists, the path to each song is relative. For example:

Code: [Select]

#EXTM3U
#EXTINF:630,AC DC - High Voltage (Donington Live)
\Rock\AC DC\AcDc - 1992 - Live At Donington\AC DC - High Voltage (Donington Live).mp3
Maybe MIB 2 uses another format like two dots for the root directory:

Code: [Select]

#EXTM3U
#EXTINF:630,AC DC - High Voltage (Donington Live)
\..\Rock\AC DC\AcDc - 1992 - Live At Donington\AC DC - High Voltage (Donington Live).mp3
Brenbo could you please check one of your m3u playlists and post what your relative path for a song looks like so that I can compare to mine?

[Brenbo]

I have checked my m3u files and the paths are as follows:

#EXTINF:270,Rudimental feat. Max Romeo, Earl 16 & Spee - System

#EXTINF:230,Rudimental - Home

#EXTINF:324,ODESZA - Bloom (Lane 8 Remix)

I do have the odd one or two files which have different URL structures to them (similar to URL address on a PC i.e. K:/Rudimental/Home).  This would state they were probably Absolute paths but these files all worked fine as well on my MIB2 unit.  I have had the odd bit of trouble in the past with random music files not working on specific devices but OK on others but this problem is mainly album art not showing. 

The way I create my M3U files so you can replicate is to use AIMP 4 music player.  I add music to a playlist tab on the player as If were to play the music then select the music files in the tab pane and then RMB on the mouse > export playlist > M3U.  Hope this helps

[GeoBog]

Cheers Brenbo. I use Winamp for my music. I believe I cracked it.

The MIB 2 seems to like this format for the song path:

Code: [Select]

#EXTM3U
#EXTINF:630,AC DC - High Voltage (Donington Live)
..\Rock\AC DC\AcDc - 1992 - Live At Donington\AC DC - High Voltage (Donington Live).mp3

LE: I can confirm that the playlist works now with the 2 dots added to the path of each song. All I had to do is open the M3U playlist generated by Winamp into Windows Media Player and save it again. Windows Media Player added the 2 dots for each song.

[Brenbo]

Where are you saving the M3U files, in the same folder as each corresponding album or in the root folder of your music library separate to each corresponding album folder.  The reason i ask is I have no problems with M3U files as I have saved each M3U in the same folder as the MP3 files the playlist is for i.e. Rudimental - Home folder contains MP3 and M3u file for the album and Rudimental - We Are The Generation folder contains MP3 and M3U files for the album. 

Saving the M3U files in this way you do not have to ensure the ../URL address for the music is correct.  All of my devices read and find the M3U files fine and by saving the files in this manner in the same folder as relevant MP3 files for each M3U playlist/album you ensure the M3U is moved with the album as one. 

Please advise if you have saved each M3U file in the corresponding folder with MP3 of the playlist each M3U is for. 

[GeoBog]

I have my music structured a bit differently. On the root of the SD I have separate folder for each genre of music, i.e. Rock, Trance, Dubstep, etc. Then in each of these folders I have other folders with the artists/bands, then in each artist folder I have other folders with the albums and finally in each album folder I have the relevant MP3 files.

Regarding playlists I have a Playlists folder on the root of the SD, next to the music genre folders. Each M3U file is saved in that Playlists folder so when I load the SD card into the infotainment, I play the playlist easy. I assume MIB 2 reads the file path differently than MIB 1 because I never had issues with that. Anyway Windows Media Player has sorted that problem for me so everything works ok now.

[Brenbo]

Ah! I see where your difficulty with the M3U files came in.  If you place the playlist M3U file and relevant MP3's in the same folder as each other for each album.  Regardless of the parent folder hierachy/structure (i.e. Root > Music > Genre > Artist > Album > (M3U & MP3's)), most devices will disregard the parent/child relationship of folders and just dump the folders all together at the same level as a bunch of folders when  looking for playlists. Also when a device searches for a M3U file more often than not they will find all M3U files regardless of which folder they are in Parent/child etc,.

Everyone to their own with how they backup their files and the folder hierachy they use.  But if you want to save yourself some extra time you could place the M3U file for each album in the same folder as each of the Mp3 files for the ablum the M3U files correspond to.  This will eradicate the need to ensure you have the correct URL path on the M3U file with the "../" as the root of the URL for each. By having the M3U file and MP3's in the same folder there will be no need for a path to find the Mp3 files on the playlist. Try to keep it simple