Zune Marketplace as a Mp3tag Source
Given that the current (and past) Zune software lacks any decent metadata editing I've been using Mp3tag to adjust the various tags as well as grab album art. One cool feature of Mp3tag is that you can look up album information from a variety of online sources, most notably Amazon. From there you can grab track listings and album art to help flush out your metadata.
Only problem is that sometimes the Zune Marketplace files an album differently than Amazon which means it won't show up correctly in your ZuneTag (see mine in the upper-right). After poking around with Mp3tag's extensible "web sources framework" and using Fiddler to watch the HTTP traffic to and from zune.net I cobbled together a Zune source that will pull down the exact album information as listed on the Marketplace as well as the album art.
There is a bonus as well, I believe zune.net just made their 800x800 album art available via the back-end service I'm using so now you can grab full 800x800 album art even on tracks you didn't purchase directly from the Marketplace.
Just download Marketplace.zip and extract the single Marketplace.src into your %appdata%\Mp3tag\data\sources folder and you'll be rocking! I'd also suggest you download the very latest beta of Mp3tag because the tag sources (what Marketplace plugs into) dialog is much easier to figure out for first timers, plus I always include the artist in the track listing and version 2.39n supports splitting this into the correct tags.
If anyone actually uses this and needs help getting it up and running just drop a comment.
UPDATE:
Thanks to Scott for catching something I should have mentioned but completely forgot. The Zune software can't read ID3v2.4 tags, instead it can only handle ID3v2.3 so after you first install Mp3tag follow these steps:
- Go to Tools | Options
- Navigate to the 'Tags', then Mpeg options in the left-hand tree
- Set Write to ID3v2.3 UTF-16
- For those that like pretty pictures:
33 Comments
Kieran said
February 27, 2008
Thanks a lot man, everything is working great for me so far, and my frustration level has greatly decreased. I owe ya one.
Jamie said
February 27, 2008
This is a great tip. I have been looking for a good way to get the 800X800 artwork for the album covers.
Scott said
February 27, 2008
Love the sources, I've been using Mp3Tag like crazy.Problem is, you guessed it, the Zune software still isn't displaying all the art, even after using the reset tool and deleting the art cache. I've embedded the album art to the mp3 files, yet the Zune software seems to not display everything.
Shawn Oster said
February 27, 2008
@Mike: Are you unzipping the file? There should be two .src files inside the zip that you need to drop into that folder. I'm running Vista at home but I have XP at work so I'll give it a test there just to double-check the steps.
Mike said
February 27, 2008
yea this isnt working for me. i have windows xp and i copy and paste the thing in there and they say they cannot find it.
Scott said
February 27, 2008
Fixed it - the new Mp3Tag beta defaults to ID3v2.4 which the Zune software does not like, so I had to re-do everything with 2.3-UTF16 and it's perfect now.
Mike said
February 27, 2008
i did unzip the files but i thought it will be added in a zune folder so it can be like the old software.
Anonymous said
February 27, 2008
How do I get the album artwork? I see it in the source files
Jamie said
February 27, 2008
To get the Zune software to not recognize the old artwork, you will need to go to the artwork cache folder and delete the file that you do not want the software to pick up. Then it should be no issue to get the newly uploaded artwork file to work. You can find the folder in a location similar to this:C:\Documents and Settings\Windows_User\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Zune
huwmorgan said
February 27, 2008
Hi Shawn,First of all, thanks very much for being such a helful source of Zune/metatagging information. I've been tearing my hair out trying to edit my metadata and get Zune to pick it up and put it in the right spot. You've given me a great clue with the artist/album artist tip.However, I'm still seeing some really funny stuff:* I get stuff the way I want it in list view, but browse view doesn't change* I can update the title tag, but all my old tags for album and album artist don't change* I delete a track entry from my collection, re-do the meta tags using an editor and re-import the track into Zune only to see the old tags show up.It's enough to make you scream. It would be helpful to know how Zune finds tags and what the settings check box (update art and file info) actually does.Does Zune over-write my meta tags with stuff that it looks up in its data sources? How else could the old meta tags keep coming back?Any light you can shed would be appreciated.Cheers,Huw Morgan
Mike said
February 27, 2008
i deleted it and the picture still comes up.
Shawn Oster said
February 27, 2008
Under Vista you can just press the Windows key then paste "%appdata%\mp3tag\data\sources\" into the search box and it'll pop up.Under XP I believe you can do the same thing, except you'll need to do it from a Run box, so just press Windows key + R, then drop in %appdata%\mp3tag\data\sources\ and you should be good to go.
Shawn Oster said
February 27, 2008
@Huw Morgan: I'm right there with you on how frustrating it is to deal with metadata information in the Zune software. Here are a few things I've learned that may help:1. Under Settings | Software | Collection make sure you've unchecked the option to "Automatically update album art and media information". I've only had that cause problems for me and until I can get a detailed history of just what it's changing around I turn it off.2. The software is very picky about when it picks up new metadata information. Sometimes it'll do it right away, sometimes if you rename the file and then rename it back that'll trigger a refresh.3. Sadly sometimes *nothing* you do will get it to refresh things like track number. The best (and only option) I know of is to reset your entire media library by following these directions. That almost always fixes things.4. Often when you start getting really weird album art issues it's because either you need to do #3 above or there are a ton of folder and albumart JPG files littering your music folders. Personally I embed all my album art directly into the MP3 and I delete *.JPG in all my music folders.These are the things that work for me. Sadly I have to do tip #3 at least a couple times a month because some metadata just gets stuck in the Zune database and only a full rebuild fixes it.Hope these tips help.
Mike said
February 27, 2008
i just figured out i had to dl the mp3tag prgram but this is mad confusing. i have a zune program b4 i dl this it keeps giving me the same cd cover i put on 1 cd. so now im stuck with all my music with all one cd cover can u plz help because no one else is able to.
Mitch said
February 27, 2008
%appdata%Mp3tagdatasourcesWhere do I find that folder?I found /Mp3tag/data/sourcesI added the marketplace.src file in there but I got nothing new in the Tag Sources dialog drop down thingy.
Shawn Oster said
February 27, 2008
*Doh!!*I completely forgot about this step! I went through the same issues once upon a time with the Zune software not correctly reading 2.4 vs. 2.3 and I had utterly spaced it.Great catch!
Mike said
February 27, 2008
my zune programs keeps putting a cd cover for all my files except for a few. i took a cd cover from amazon and now instead of the default album art it keeps giving me the same cover that i took from amazon. it turned it into my default. i deleted it numerous times from my art cache yet it keeps coming back.
huwmorgan said
February 27, 2008
Thanks Shawn,I'll try running the collection reset tool tonight.Do you understand the relationship between Zune and WMP11? I know that Zune depends on WMP11 for some functions. Do you suppose that Zune gets some of its tags from WMP11? That might account for some of the weirdness I've seen where old tags just keep coming back.
Scott said
June 07, 2008
In light of the recent discovery of sorting issues related to the DISCNUMBER tag, I have my .src automatically set "1/1" as the disc number to prevent issues. I use the album source; I've never had a need to use the compilation source so not sure what that even does. If anything needs to be tweaked, go for it Shawn, this is just quick and dirty.
To the very bottom of the .src I added the following:
# Disc (setting to 1/1)
outputto "DiscNumber"
say "1/1"
Shawn Oster said
June 08, 2008
Good idea with the addition of the discnumber, I'll fold that into my download!
As far as the compilation source that is useful for when you're tagging tracks from soundtracks where there are various artists. Usually you want the Album Artist to be 'Various Artists' and the actual Artist to be the actual artist itself. The compilation source makes that a little easier.
Admiral said
August 13, 2008
I have added the file to where you say to put it... but, I still fail to get this to work.. please explain how to install this... in detail..
Admiral said
August 18, 2008
I finnaly got it to work.. lol
For Vista all you need to do is copy the files into the following folder:
*Username*/AppData/Roaming/Mp3tag/data/sources/
FINALLY! lol
ummmm said
September 21, 2008
after the 3.0 update, it doesnt connect anymore! is it a change in the web address (catalog.zune.net)? or something along those lines?!?!
Aaron said
September 21, 2008
Yeah, We need a 3.0 update!
Aaron said
September 23, 2008
Thanks for the update. One thing I notice though, the album art doesn't automatically update in the Zune software. Once the tags are saved with the album art in MP3Tag, I had to right-click copy the album art and paste it in the Zune software.
sonicbox said
September 23, 2008
By the way, Mp3tag defaults to IDv2.3 and not the badly supported ID3v2.4. So, that's wrong in your article.
Shawn Oster said
September 23, 2008
@sonicbox - At the time I wrote this article the beta version I was using *did* in fact default to ID3v2.4 (read up and read Scott's comment, you'll see he ran into that exact problem).
For the newest version you are correct, it now defaults to IDv2.3.
ummm said
September 27, 2008
GOD BLESS YOU SHAWN!!! I just checked this site to see if there was any luck and you updated it THE DAY I MADE THAT STATEMENT! GOD BLESS YOU AGAIN!
lol
ummm said
September 27, 2008
i mean i thought it wud take you a few weeks since you havent blogged on your site in over a month! but thx again
ron199x said
October 17, 2008
first of all, thanks a lot for the very useful .scr.
my problem is that
i did tag my album with mp3tag using the info from zune market.scr but the album covers in my zune card are stll unrecognized by the zune. what should i do?
Marlon said
December 11, 2008
Shawn we need a update for 3.1 or is there a way for the Zune to recognize it.
Julius said
December 18, 2008
I'm able to re write TAG info using the marketplace.src, but when I play the songs it doesn't count as a play on my Zune for badges.
Am I doing something wrong?
MDEnce said
May 01, 2009
Really want to try this, but I'm using Mp3tag 2.43 and Vista Home Prem, and copying the 2 .scr files to the mp3tag\data\sources\ directory does NOT add the Zune Marketplace as a option to "Tag Sources."
I tried "admiral"'s suggestion for Vista of copying the .scr files to "*Username*/AppData/Roaming/Mp3tag/data/sources/" but can't find an "AppData" sub-directory anywhere on my drive.
Any ideas?