Vibe and Linux - Unknown everything!

[bugbear]

I've spent a fun 4 hours learning more than anyone should really need to know about Id3.

I have set up a library of MP3 files in Rhythmbox under Ubuntu, carefully edited the tags to be tidy, and then used rsync to transfer to mounted player.

This was easy.

All the tracks showed up as Unknown Album and Unknown Artist.

I then spent lots of time finding out that "at least some" Philips players don't support ID3 v2.4, which is what the modern Linux software is writing by default.

Fair enough, with manufacturing leadtimes, that could make sense.

I found a nice piece of software (eyeD3) that has an option to take v2.4 tags and re-write them as v2.3, which was "reputed" to work.

No dice; everything was still "Unknown".

Questions:

* Can someone please tell me, for an SA3VBE08KN (aka GoGear Vibe mk 3), precisely what ID3 format is supported?

* is there a firmware update to improve ID3 support, either current or planned?

* has anybody manage to correctly tag up MP3 data on Linux for this model?

BugBear

[bugbear]

I'm guessing my SA3 is at least as modern w.r.t. ID3 the SA2 models;

http://www.p4c.philips.com/cgi-bin/d...1002&faqview=1

BugBear

[bugbear]

I'm guessing my SA3 is at least as modern w.r.t. ID3 the SA2 models;

http://www.p4c.philips.com/cgi-bin/d...1002&faqview=1

BugBear

[bugbear]

Questions:

* Can someone please tell me, for an SA3VBE08KN (aka GoGear Vibe mk 3), precisely what ID3 format is supported?

I found this, for the SA2 range:

Answer

It supports both ID3 version 2.3 and ID3 version 2.4 tags.

However, for those ID3 version 2 tags with “unsynchronization scheme” or “UTF8 encoding”, they will not be supported.

* is there a firmware update to improve ID3 support, either current or planned?

No answer yet.

* has anybody manage to correctly tag up MP3 data on Linux for this model?

The UTF8 was the killer, as it turns out. Rhythmbox uses UTF8 all the time, and that's fatal.

The following script fixed up my archive, which I then mirror to the file system mounted player via rsync.

#!/usr/bin/perl

use strict;
use warnings;
use File::HomeDir;

my $HOME = File::HomeDir->my_home();

# rewrite id3 tags so that the cruddy Vibe can handle them

my $time_file = "${HOME}/.id3_stamp";

my $src = "${HOME}/Music";

print "rewriting ID3 tags to be v2.3\n";

if(!(-d $src) || !(-w $src)) {
print "$src is not a writable directory?\n";
exit 1;
}

my $n="";
if(-e $time_file) {
$n = "-newer '$time_file'";
}

my $cmd = "eyeD3 --to-v2.3 --set-encoding=latin1 --force-update";
system("find $src $n -name '*.mp3' -exec $cmd {} \\;");
system("touch '$time_file'");



Here's my rsync script:

#!/usr/bin/perl

use strict;
use warnings;

use File::HomeDir;

my $HOME = File::HomeDir->my_home();

# N.B. in rsync trailing slash means "contents of"
my $src = "${HOME}/Music/";
my $dst = "/media/9CC0-B939/Music";
# $dst = "/home/bugbear/FAKE_VIBE/Music"; # TEST

print "syncing music to vibe player over mp3\n";

if(! -e $dst) {
print "$dst does not exist - is Player plugged in?\n";
exit 1;
}

if(!(-d $dst) || !(-w $dst)) {
print "$dst is not a writable directory - is Player OK?\n";
exit 1;
}

my $flags = "--archive --modify-window 2 -v --update --delete";
my $which = "--include '*/' --include '*.mp3' --exclude '*'";
system("rsync $flags $which '$src' '$dst'");

BugBear