Can I create Ipod auto-playlists in mediamonkey?

[westi2002]

It should be a supported feature. Here's the reason why. I have an 18,000 track flac library, all of which will not fit on my 80gb iPod. So I sync a subset of my library to my iPod. I have also created playlists under MM. If I select my playlists for syncing more tracks get selected than I have space. For example In MM I have a playlist named Rock that includes all tracks with rock in the genre. I should be able to have the same playlist on my iPod that only includes the tracks on my iPod with rock in the genre.

I purchased MM Gold about 3 - 4 weeks ago to sync my library with my iPod. I use SqueezeCenter to play my music at home since it is stored on a nas. I have to say that after hearing so many good things about MM that I am very disappointed in the application. Here are my issues:

• The album art on the iPod is all messed up. I posted this in another thread but no solution yet.
• Transcoding/syncing is slow. Maybe I am expecting too much but on a dual core 2ghz/4gb memory laptop I expetected it to be faster (yes I am running 3.1 with multi core support)
• MM hangs (becomes unresponsive) and has to be canceled via the task manager. I opened a high priority ticket on the 19th but have not received a reply nor has the ticket been updated by support.
• Cannot have playlists on the iPod that don't include every track from the playlist on the laptop.
• Not all new tracks or updated tracks are picked up by MM even though I have File Monitor turned on

Will these issues be addressed/fixed soon or does anyone know another application that does these and doesn't hang.

The problem of the playlist is easy to solve. Just create an auto playlist with the selection you want. At the advanced tab, you can simply limit the size of this playlist to the size of your device. Since this is random, every time you select this playlist, other songs will be selected if your database is larger than the max size selected.
This auto playlist you have to synchronize with your iPod by selecting it in the synchro menu.

I synchronize several auto playlist to my iPod and everything works fine. I have to add that for my iPod I do not the option to limit the size since my iPod is large enough. On my phone however I use this option and it works fine.
The only problem I have with auto playlists on my iPod is that they are not updated automatically. If I have a auto playlist for all songs with 5 stars and I change the rating for 1 song to 4 stars, it still will be in the playlist on the iPod untill next synchronization.

Concerning your other problems:
- Album art was once messed up on my iPod as well. After complete reset it is still fine now for over 10 months
- MM hangs, never had this problem in 3 years time
- file monitor works fine, no problems noticed
- "Cannot have playlists on the iPod that don't include every track from the playlist on the laptop" - please explain what you mean by this.

[wiz]

I don't want to sync based on a playlist. I want the playlist to be based on what is on my iPod. I want to create a playlist on the iPod that includes all genre rock. When I sync a new rock album to the iPod I want that playlist to be updated automatically. If I delete a rock album from the iPod I want it be removed from the playlist. To me this seems like it should be a pretty easy thing to do especially since there is a database of what is synced to the iPod. There should be a way to create device specific playlists. I know this is not a bug but it should be an enhancement request.

• I justed wiped my iPod this weekend and re-synced and all album art is correct now.
• MM hasn't hung since I initially reported it. Maybe the problem was fixed in later beta releases. I am running the offical release version of 3.1 now.
• Still some issues with file monitor. I updated some missing track numbers on a few albums and MM did not pick up the changes until I forced it to rescan those directories. My music is stored on a network share. I wonder if file monitor doesn't work with music on file servers.
• This goes back to having the ability to create playlists based on what is on the iPod and not in the MM main library. If you sync a playlist then all songs in the playlist are synced to the device. I though just the playlist itself would be synced and not the songs it contained.

[mjm]

I agree - this is one feature that I'd really like to see in MM