namja

When you rip your CD into MP3s, how do you name your MP3s?

I've been doing:
{artist} - {title}.mp3

Now, I feel the need to include {tracknum} to the filename.

QUESTION 1:
Should I put that before the {artist} or after? And is there an easy way to rename all my MP3s to include the {tracknum}?

QUESTION 2:
I'm having problems because I want to use two digits for {tracknum} (like 08 for the 8th track) but I'm having two issues with this because: (1) the softwares that I use to mass rename the files only give one digits for single-digit track numbers (like 8 for the 8th track), and (2) I've tagged the MP3s to indicate that the song is track 12 out of 19 total tracks, so when I insert {tracknum}, I get 1219 instead of 12. Any way I can show just two digits in the filename?

Tarantino

I just use iTunes.

= J

Walker Boh

I use MediaMonkey to keep my stuff organized. Most of it is in this format:

My Music\Radiohead\[1997] OK Computer\[06] Karma Police.mp3

I have different naming conventions for soundtracks, tribute albums, audiobooks, etc.
I like MediaMonkey because I can manually select how it organizes each album ... it took a while to set everything up the first time around, but now my collection is really nicely organized and easy to keep that way.

The Cow

I used to use a program called "Tag & Rename" that was good for mass editing of MP3 tags and names.

But now it's iTunes for me as well.

CKMorpheus

I got my file format pretty OCDish. I use MP3Tag to tag multiple MP3s.

My Music\Radiohead\1997 - OK Computer\06 - Radiohead - Karma Police

My Music\Beatles, The\1969 - Abbey Road\04 - Beatles, The - Oh! Darling

My Music\Soundtracks\Children of Men\05 - King Crimson - The Court of the Crimson (King Edit)

My Music\Nine Inch Nails\Halo 27 - The Slip\07 - Nine Inch Nails - Lights in the Sky

Sean O'Hara

There's no need for the filename to be anything other than the song title -- everything else should be stored in the ID3 tag. If you want to find a particular MP3 and your library isn't organized, do a search in explorer and it'll look through the ID3 data. If you want to go through the trouble of putting lyrics in the tag, you can even look up a song with a specific line.

DaveWadding

I used track number - song title

Dan

Oddly (or not) I used to use ALL of the different methods above. And more. My favourite for a long time was

F:\Music\Nine_Inch_Nails\The_Fragile\Nine_Inch_Nails_-_The_Fragile_-_01_-_Somewhat_Damaged.mp3

ugh.

Nowadays, the ONLY naming method that is acceptable to me is the iTunes method (with track numbers)

ie:

F:\iTunes\Nine Inch Nails\The Fragile\01 Somewhat Damaged.mp3

ID3 tags FTW.

namja

I'm a little OCD. I like the filenames to be as descriptive (and uniform) as possible in addition to having all the ID3 tags correct.

Drexl

I always put the track number first so they line up in Explorer or another file system (such as if I was playing them on the PS3 or something from a flash drive).

If the song is in an album folder, only the track number and song title is needed, but if it's a general folder with many different artists, I put the artist name in the title first.

DRG

I'm the same way. Plus it helps because I prefer to listen to my mp3s in a lean player like Winamp instead of a bulky interface like iTunes, Musicmatch, etc. I do use Media Monkey for tagging and organizing purposes, though.

wendersfan

The Beatles - Please Please Me - 01 - I Saw Her Standing There.mp3

Everything is kept nice and uniform thanks to MP3Tag.

FatTony

I absolutely hate the way iTunes does things (part of the reason I don't buy from them), so I take a very hands-on approach with my tagging/naming/organizing. I've used a couple of different programs and I've found MP3Tag to be the best (it'll help with the OP's tracknum issues). All of my files follow this pattern:

My Music\R\Reel Big Fish\Turn The Radio Off\Reel Big Fish - 01 - Sell Out.mp3

I also put "tags" in the comment field for making smart playlists (for example, I tag all Seattle-area bands with a "Local" in the comments for my Local Band playlist). I've thought about adding the year to the album folder, but that would likely mess up my library and all my track ratings in Winamp, so I've decided against it.

I'm definitely a bit OCD when it comes to my mp3 collection.

namja

Thanks all for the MP3Tag suggestion. Awesome.

I think I'm gonna go with CKMorpheus' suggestion:
01 - Artist - Title.mp3

shizawn

Artist - Tracknumber - Title.mp3 for single artist albums.
Tracknumber - Artist - Title.mp3 for various artist albums.
Artist - Title.mp3 for single tracks.

The Bus

Artist_Name\Artist_Name-Album_Title-YYYY\00-Artist_Name-Song_Title.mp3