Where did you get the songs files from,did you purchase/download them or rip them off a CD you currently own? If you purchased them more then likely they are protected, but there is a way around that. The easiest way to un-protect them is to burn them to a cd as an "Audio CD" format. In Media Player go to the Burn tab,put the songs in there and click burn. Once you create your cd you will have to re-import them into Media Player, at that point they will no longer be protected. You will have two copies of the song, one protected and one un-protected. I ususally remove all the protected ones at that point so there will be no confusion. I also chaged the setting in media player to always import as an mp3 that way I can play them on any player.

If you need more help on changing the setting let me know, by default it is set to wma.

 

Thanks for the replys guys. Chromebeard as for the 1gb card to late alreadywent and gotone. Ponesma as for unprotecting the songs what you said is what I will do. As for changing the settings I will have my 13 year old daughter do that seing as she figure out how to get the 50 or so songs on there so far.
Thanks again Rick

 

While we're on this type thing, can anyone tell me why my iPod will only keep around 200 tunes on it now? I've been loading and deleting songs based on Michelle's likes, and used to have nearly 400. WTF?!

 

The card that came with mine programmed but would not play,purchased a card at Office Max and walla! Bites because it takes forever to program.

 

ok.... if you have 'purchased' music (say from iTunes) it is in m4p format.
It can also be (ripped music) in MP3, WMA, M4A, AAC formats (and more).

If you are 'interested' in software that can convert music into MP3 files I would recommend a very inexpensive piece of software called SoundTaxi.

It can convert Protected iTunes music and so much more into MP3 format. Just an example. It can convert the following formats into MP3 format for your use: wma, mp3, rax, mp4, m4p, ra, snd, aac, ogg, aa, aif, audio books, any format Windows Media player can play.

LINK For SoundTaxi

License is all of $14.90


Now .... onto hdbiker1450. a few years ago when people were doing a lot of 'music ripping' on their own and there weren't as big of Hard Drives out there the standard to rip a CD was 128kbps. This is equal to about 1mb per min of play. Now that people have much bigger Hard Drives on their computers I see a LOT of the music being ripped at 192kbps which is more than 1mb per min. Used to be a 4min song was roughly 4mb in size. Now a 4min song (if they are ripping at 192kbps or higher) is about 6mb per song. So you don't get as many songs on an ipod but they are better 'quality' songs than they were. 128kbps was the 'standard' for CD quality music but that wasn't really true. The music sounded good.... but if you were listening to some good acoustical guitars you would miss out on some of the string slides in 128kbps but could hear 'em some on 160kbps rips and best on 192kbps rips.

Sooooooo You might want to see what the music is being ripped at to determine why you aren't getting as much on your iPod. I'll bet it is more because the music you are loading on it is higher quality than what it was in the past.

I use a general rule that you can get roughly 250 songs per GIG of iPod/MP3 player storage. with higher rips it is more like 175-190.

One thing you can check (if you are using an iPod) is to see what other 'stuff' is on it. like all of your contact information (it can usually link up with your mail program such as outlook for your address stuff) or calendar information... pictures, videos...etc. That will affect how much music you can hold on the device. You can usually, on the different MP3 players, do a full blown RESET which can reset the device back to original and maybe there were some 'hung' tunes on it that were never really removed. This can also clean it up by really clearing everything off of it and then reloading the tunes you want back on.

Just some suggestions.

 

Thanks, Iceman. I'm stoopid when it comes to this chit! Had to have my 14 yo son set me up with iTunes.
One question--since I have all of the songs saved through Limewire, can I just delete the iTunes and start all over?
I have done the reset a couple of times. All of the songs (close to 400) are still listed, but I'll be dam*ed if I can figure out how to get em back on the 2G pod![:@]

 

I'm not familiar with limewire at all so I don't know what you can and can't do with your itunes. Wish I could answer that one for you but I'm not able to.

If you have reset your ipod and the tunes still show up on it then something is kinda 'jacked' with it. I'd do a true 'reset' on the ipod and start all over with it. The normal 'resets' are just like 'reboots' of your computer. It just starts it all over again but nothing changes. There are resets to basically 'blank out the ipod' to start 'fresh' as if it was brand new. I'd definately look at doing that. 2gb should hold up to 500 tunes if they are each about 4mb in size. so gettin only 200 songs means you are only using about 1/2 of the ipod's storage space.

 

Yeah, that's what the iPod says, that I'm only using half. That's why I was wondering about deleting iTunes and starting over.

 

if you wanna 'start itunes' over and 'restore' your ipod to factory settings.... I would first copy off your current iTunes music folder somewhere so it is 'safe'. Then you can re-import the library so you don't lose any tunes.