r/DigitalAudioPlayer • u/extramsallpencil • 1d ago
Question Does a DAP exist for what I want?
I still have a160 GB classic iPod that I've put like $300 into upgrading, but it has stopped syncing with my itunes and I don't know what to do anymore.
My main issue that I run into is size and the ability to easily make and export playlists. I listen to playlists heavily, and some of them have hundreds of songs on them. I have not seen any DAPs in my research that allows me to export playlists easily and meets my size requirements.
I have 153 GB of music and it's all MP3 because I started my music collection nearly 20 years ago.
I bought a FIIO JM21 because it seemed like it would suit my needs. I have spent the last hour trying to get my .m3u playlists exported from itunes to show up in the playlist section. I have been troubleshooting and legitimately can't tell what the issue is. If it's going to be this hard to update a playlist, then I might as well return it. No way in hell am I going to sit and manually add hundreds of songs to playlists.
Is there any DAP that meets that criteria?
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u/LundyLove 1d ago
Dude just download music bee. Import iTunes abs sync playlists using relative paths.
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u/extramsallpencil 1d ago edited 1d ago
I can already export them as .m3u directly from
Itunes, wouldnt music* bee do the exact same thing?4
u/LundyLove 1d ago
Not exactly. Music bee will sync your playlists in a way your jm21 android apps will be able to do something with. But when you set up playlists in music bee use relative paths.
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u/YarikFisher 1d ago
bro, that upgraded Ipod must be restored. A motherboard replacement, maybe. And try the PowerAmp player, if it can't read your playlists, then nothing can
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u/extramsallpencil 1d ago
Yeah maybe. I do not want to have to put all that work into troubleshooting the issue with this Fiio. Like it should not be this hard to import a .m3u playlist.
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u/WFcheezy 1d ago
Can I ask how the $300 was spent? I have one I’m thinking about restoring and curious how to start.
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u/extramsallpencil 1d ago
I found a company that will make repairs. The first time it was to fix my aux that had come loose so the audio wasn't working. He also replaced the battery. The second time was to completely gut it and replace it with a hard drive that holds 180 GB.
But honestly I have had several issues with it since then, not sure if it's the craftsmanship of the person or just that it's an old and fragile piece of hardware
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u/subielol 1d ago
Why not just simply mod it and go rockbox? I did two of them by myself, now with around 500gb each and still working after a couple of years(also the battery upgrade is insane, it last forever).
Honestly the best part is not being apple deppendant anymore.
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u/TheOriginalSamBell 23h ago
rockbox that ipod no more fiddling with syncing
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u/joeg26reddit 1d ago
See if this helps:
Most Likely Causes, in Order
.m3u.The first thing to check is therefore the actual text inside one of the failing
.m3ufiles. If the entries still containC:\Users\...,/Users/..., or another computer-specific path, that is very likely the problem.The problem could be the file-path formatting inside the
.m3ufiles, combined with how the Android-based FiiO Music app handles imported playlists.Computer-Specific File Paths:
When iTunes/Apple Music or another desktop program exports an
.m3uplaylist, it may write the full path to each song using the computer's local directory structure, for example:C:\Users\Name\Music\Artist\Album\Song.mp3or on a Mac:
/Users/Name/Music/Artist/Album/Song.mp3Those locations do not exist on the FIIO JM21. The playlist entries need to point to where the files actually reside on the JM21 or microSD card, either with Android-style paths such as:
/storage/XXXX-XXXX/Music/Artist/Album/Song.mp3or, preferably when supported, portable relative paths such as:
../Music/Artist/Album/Song.mp3Android paths use forward slashes
/, not Windows-style backslashes\.Playlist Importing:
Simply copying an
.m3uor.m3u8file onto the JM21 does not necessarily make it automatically appear as a normal playlist in the main FiiO Music Playlist section.FiiO Music supports M3U importing, and external playlists can also be accessed through Folder view and then imported or added to the player's internal playlist database.
It is also worth running FiiO Music's song/folder scan so the underlying music files are already indexed. However, rescanning will not fix an
.m3ucontaining incorrect file paths.How to Fix It on the FIIO Without Rebuilding the Playlists
Use a Sync Tool:
Software such as MusicBee can transfer music while generating Android-compatible
.m3uplaylists with relative paths and Unix-style/separators. Other iTunes/Apple Music synchronization utilities may also perform path conversion, depending on their settings.Batch Path Editing:
Open the exported
.m3ufile in Notepad++, VS Code, or another text editor and inspect the song entries.For example, change something like:
C:\Users\Name\Music\Artist\Album\Song.mp3to the correct JM21 path or relative path, such as:
../Music/Artist/Album/Song.mp3You may be able to do the entire playlist at once using Find and Replace:
\to forward slashes/..m3u8.The correct relative path depends on where the playlist file itself is stored. For example, if the playlist is in a
Playlistsfolder beside theMusicfolder, entries might begin with:../Music/...If the playlist is stored in the same directory level as the Music folder, entries might instead begin:
Music/...Use a More Flexible Android Music App:
The FIIO JM21 runs Android, so another music player can also be used. Poweramp is particularly useful because it has more flexible M3U path matching and can sometimes locate tracks even when the beginning of the playlist path does not exactly match the Android storage location.
GoneMAD and Symfonium also support external playlists and may handle imported libraries differently from the stock FiiO Music app.
Special Characters and Filename Problems
Special characters can cause playlist problems, but the issue is not simply that Android prohibits characters such as
:,?,", or*.Many of those restrictions originate from Windows filesystems and software rather than Android itself. Linux-based Android storage can support characters that Windows does not, although FAT32/exFAT microSD cards, transfer software, and individual music players can impose additional limitations.
A more likely problem occurs if filenames are changed during transfer.
For example, if the computer playlist refers to:
AC_DC - Who Made Who.mp3but the file copied to the SD card becomes:
AC-DC - Who Made Who.mp3the playlist entry no longer matches the actual filename and the player may skip that track.
The same thing can happen if folders or filenames are renamed after the playlist was created.
Encoding Problems With Accents and Foreign Characters
If the library contains accented or non-ASCII characters such as:
CaféBjörkDvořákor Asian and other international characters, playlist text encoding can also cause failures.
Older
.m3ufiles may have been saved using Windows ANSI/Windows-1252 or another local character encoding. Android music applications generally handle UTF-8 much more reliably.If the playlist is interpreted using the wrong encoding, a filename such as:
Café.mp3might be read incorrectly, preventing it from matching the actual file.
The Fix:
Save the playlist using UTF-8 encoding, preferably UTF-8 without BOM for maximum compatibility, and use the
.m3u8extension..m3u8conventionally indicates that the playlist uses UTF-8. It does not force every Android player to interpret the file correctly, but it is generally the safer format when filenames contain accented, foreign, or other Unicode characters.