Missing album covers on new Sony A15 Walkman

[seranil]

I am using a mac so can't use MediaGo. Any ideas for a easy solution to this problem. Thanks

[feline1]

erdie, it will definately NOT be a "random" issue - computers and electronics don't do random things unless you program them that way!  

There are a great variety of image formats and encodings out there. Obviously some are supported by the Walkman firmware, and some are not - and obviously Media Go converts the unsupported types so that they will display. 

This is fine... until someone doesn't want to use Media Go.

I would urge anyone who has the same problems to spend 2 minutes of their time emailing Sony Support and asking them for more info about what image formats are supported.  

We're not even asking for any firmware upgrade, just information! (Although firmware upgrade to support these images would obviously make life simpler too...)

[-erdie-]

Whatever.

Of course you get random issues and problems wirh both conputers and electronics, or don't yours ever go wrong!

Everyday all over the world computer systems have random issues

[feline1]

eh?  Just because you do not know what is causing it does not mean it is "random".

Do you think there are little tiny people inside your walkman, playing the songs on specially shrunken instruments or something? And sometimes they get it wrong?  Good grief, man!

[NPLorand]

The problem with the Walkman's firmware is that it works ok just with version 2.3 of ID3-tags. So if some mp3 files won't display correct info (album art, artist, track no., etc.), you'll need to adjust these files in the following way: 1 - convert ID3v2.4 tags to ID3v2.3, and 2 - remove ID3v1 tags (if any). The easiest way to do this is with a software called "kid3". The good news is that it has binaries for all platforms, including MacOS.

[feline1]

Where did you get that info? Or did you just decide this for yourself?

[NPLorand]

The info can be found here: https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2035559

And the kid3 really works! I just retagged all faulty mp3 files on the Walkman to ID3v2.3 and now every album shows up with the cover, the tracks are in order and there are no more "Untitled albums" on my list.

[NPLorand]

There's only one problem left: even with ID3v2.3, if an album cosists of multiple disks, the playing order is 1-1, 2-1, ... instead of 1-1, 1-2, ... 2-1, 2-2, ...

[chbundh]

Yes, this is quite annoying, since it could surely be resolved in a firmware update. I wrote to Sony about it soon after the A15 was released...they never replied.

[SONYNWZA17]

Old post / new(?) Solution:

Often a lurker, but wanted to take the time to share a solution I sorted out last night...might save someone an hour or two digging.  The NWZ-A17 certainly won't display progressive jpg, which seems to be the prevalent/default format for Discogs.  Being a bit OCD, it was maddening to have my favorite album playing yet missing that lovely album art.  So...here's the fix with a twist to other solutions I've seen out there:

1. Programs needed

a. Irfanview w-Thumbnails, installed Plugins

b. MP3Tag

2. File prep

a. If all files have an embedded cover picture, you're set.

b. Better yet, if that picture already exists as "cover.jpg" or "folder.jpg" you can save an extraction step.

3. If your status is 2a, then open MP3Tag and invoke a batch "extract cover art" as an Action (see MP3Tag for guide.)  This will create an image "cover.jpg" in every album folder.

4. If your status is 2b, then skip to step 5

5. Here's the fun part.  You can LOSSLESSLY convert all jpgs from progressive to baseline (readable by Walkman) with Irfanview Thumbnails.  Open the program and mouse over the music library folder in the left tree, then select the "load...subfolders" option from the context menu and populate every album jpg file in your library.  You will see a nice wall of art.  Select ALL then context menu JPG Lossless Rotation with defaults.  Optimize option is good, Progressive is bad!  In a matter of minutes, the jpg headers are updated without re-encoding the image.

6. Final step is use MP3Tag to import the "cover.jpg" or "folder.jpg" back into the music files with an Action (see MP3Tag forums for instructions.)

Done!

Hopefully this helps...

[gruniversal]

Had the same problem (using linux) and wrote myself a bash script to transfer my complete music library to the player. Maybe you find this useful: https://gitlab.com/gruniversal/export-sony