Hey all

I was wondering if there is another approach to scanning through iPod lists besides twisting the ****?

I am a self-confessed music junkie, and I have tons of music on my iPod but twisting that **** incessantly just to get to the "N" or "R" section is reaaaaally time consuming and somewhat annoying. There there a button I can push and hold...or...?

Any help (besides telling me to only put a few things on the ipod) is much appreciated

 

Unfortunately that is the only real way to do it. MFSW controls don't really help either.

EDIT: BTW there are a bunch of threads already about this problem.

 

I had an Alpine deck in my last car with an iPod hookup and it had the same problem. When the salesperson told me "iPod hookup", my wife and I looked at each other and thought "Crappy interface!". It's a problem few companies have solved well.

Playlists will help some, but aren't the perfect solution. The only other alternative is to just use the Aux jack in the car right from the headphone jack on the iPod and then the iPod's controls are available. This doesn't charge your iPod, but they stay charged for a long time, so this would only be a problem on long trips.

 

sorry, peeked in the related threads and didnt see much..didnt do a forum search though

 

I don't mind the interface, it works relatively well actually..I like how you can get a next song on the ready if youre doin some live mixing

however, scanning quickly is a lame non-feature..oh well..aux plug isnt a bad idea though, thanks

 

Yep it's a pain in the azz. I do not plug in the USB cable and just use the screen on my iPod Touch...works a lot faster that way.

 

I'm waiting on my Clubman, which has the USB in it. I'm planning on skipping the iPod altogether and just putting a 16 or 32GB USB drive in it. Hope the interface on that is better than the iPod.

 

Easy workaround, just change the genre to reflect the artists first intial and search by genre not artist. (E.G. Grateful Dead and George Harrison would be grouped under "G" artists in the genre field) and of course you can combine low frequency intials such as U-Z. Works great for me using an 80gb ipod.

 

Great workaround. Thanks

 

I am doin that now... soooo tired of trying to find a particular song... especially if it's down low in the alphabet.

Thanks a bunch!

 

Somebody's thinking out there. That's a great idea dude. It drives me nuts to use peoples' headunits with ipod and my unit with 9,000 songs. If I had to use one I'd do that.

 

+1 for this workaround.

I modified my Itunes library and updated the iPod yesterday. I've had a chance to check it out in the car. It works great! I can finally play artists from the middle of the alphabet!

I have a large iTunes library and old school music selection habits. I tend to pick by artist and play a whole "album" all the way through. (I've owned records!)

I didn't really use the Genre too much, but did use it a little. I found a way to retain that information. You can add any keyword to the "comment" field of a song. Using smart playlists, you can create a playlist of songs with that comment by select "comment contains <keyword>" in your smart playlist editor. The comment section can contain more than keyword and other comments too. Be sure to use keywords that aren't used elsewhere in the comments of other songs or the filter "comment contains...." will find them too.

For example, you could add the keyword "GENRE_ROCK" to the comments section of every song in your ROCK genre. Later you can put them all in a smart playlist using the filter "comment contains GENRE_ROCK". Since "GENRE_ROCK" is a made-up word, it is unlikely to appear as part of any other comments. Smart playlists let you combine filters too.

Thanks for the tip! I've been wanting a way to manage this for a long time.

 

So are you saying that if I have 6000 songs on my iPod that I will have to set the genre of 6000 songs to the first letter of the artist name? Am I missing something – sounds like a lot of work.

 

WOW this is a great idea. it works great. And yes you have to go through and change each songs genre (I think) but it is definatly worth it. Think of all the time you will save in the long run!

 

Some work is involved, however using a program like Winamp (free) you can highlight all artists with the same first initial and then make wholesale changes in the genre field.

 

If I'm hunting for a particular album or if I want to use a playlist. I unplug my iPhone, look for on it on the iPod app, and plug it back in. This still allows me to use the next/previous song controls on the steering wheel and get the satisfaction that I'm using everything that I paid for .

 

You don't have to download a new program to change multiple genre. Just use itunes. First highlight say all the D's with the mouse while holding shift. then right click on any of the highlighted tracks and select get info. A warning box will appear and say something like "are you sure you want to get info on multiple tracks", click yes. Then a box will appear with different song info like artist, album, etc. Click on genre and put in a D, then click ok. That's it!

 

That was one AWESOME trick. Thank you very much!!!

 

Not bad, but then you're stuck listening to other songs brought to you by the letter "G" until you go find another specific song or artist.

I have playlists set up based on song rating. If I'm on 'random' in my 4-star playlist, but then get an itch for a specific song, I'm still stuck scrolling forever. (actually, I just jump ahead until 'random' puts me on an artist in the right neighborhood... but still)

 

If you know the artist and album, it's easy.

List
scroll to letter of the alphabet, click
scroll to artist, click
scroll to album,click
scroll to song, click

Even with a large library (I have 10K+ songs), I can find an individual song pretty fast if I know where to look. Because the artists are divided into 26 (29 for me) groups, each group is very manageable in size. Each step of the scrolling above is a couple of turns at most.

If you are thinking about using the Genre in this way and you haven't yet updated your library, remember iTunes will let you sort and group highlight. You only have to update the Genre 26 times (once for each letter of the alphabet) if you sort your music by artist and update them in groups.

 

Right... but what I'm saying is that you can't go find a particular song, then set 'Random' and have it shuffle through your other songs. If you do that, then it will only play other songs filed under that same letter. In this manner - unless you want to only play songs filed under 'G' (for example) - you have to hand-pick each and every song that you want to hear (which you can do, of course... but sometimes I'd rather have my attention on driving).

 

That's a bummer that is doesn't work for you. It's a home-run solution to my listening issues in the car. But then, I don't use random. I buy and play mostly whole albums and I don't pick song-by-song (it's too much work and too distracting).

For me and my listening habits, this is the perfect solution.

 

Whoopie!! I can now, finally, efficiently use my iPod in my car and listen to the songs I want. After becoming frustrated with how it worked when I first got the car almost 2 years ago, it is SO nice to have found out about this "work-around." I don't feel like I wasted my money now and will actually put my iPod back into the car when we go on trips.

 

Than you so much to the brilliant mind that came up with simple, elegant solution!

 

It's the same...except the flash drive is slightly faster and sounds better...but still takes a LONG time to scroll thru the alphabet.