Having both ID3v2 and v1 vs. having only ID3v2? Options

[d_headshot]

I noticed that when looking through my mp3 files, a lot of them have both ID3v2 and v1 tags. I know that v2 is superior in most cases but are there any advantages to having both? Or would it be useless space taken up? Personally I'd like to remove all the v1 tags since my portable media players read v2 tags by default but it's going to take a while going through everything and seeing which files have the tags that I don't need. Any reason to keep them the way they are?

[greynol]

ID3v1 consumes a whopping 128 bytes. If it's enough to store your metadata and can be read by your player, its usage is actually preferable to v2, since edits to the tag will never require a rewrite of the entire file which occurs when the space required by the v2 tag as edited exceeds that which is currently reserved.

Case in point: the default behavior when having Lame tag is not to write v2 unless a field cannot be fully written with v1.

[Ardax]

v1 tags are 128 bytes max. Actually, that might be 128 bytes fixed. The only reason to keep them around is if you have a device that can't read v2.

If you have foobar, it's got a very good way to take care of it with it's MP3 Tag Types dialog. I'd imagine most other tagging utilities could easily scrub v1 tags from your library as well.

At the same time, they're not taking up very much space at all. In fact, I'd bet that on most filesystems using 4k clusters, the real amount of space they waste is very close to zero since that extra 128 bytes would rarely cause the file to require an extra cluster that it wouldn't otherwise.

[d_headshot]

ID3v1 consumes a whopping 128 bytes. If it's enough to store your metadata and can be read by your player, its usage is actually preferable to v2, since edits to the tag will never require a rewrite of the entire file which occurs when the space required by the v2 tag as edited exceeds that which is currently reserved.

Case in point: the default behavior when having Lame tag is not to write v2 unless a field cannot be fully written with v1.

Okay so I guess I should keep the v1 tags and if I have fields such as disc number or ones that aren't supported in v1, they are written over to v2 tags?

[Ardax]

That would depend on the program, but any sane tagger should write a full set of v2 tags as a canonical reference or no v2 tag at all. The v1 tag would hold as much as it could represent with the limited fields (and their limited lengths) that it could express. If a v2 tag is present, it shouldn't be incomplete.

[Teknojnky]

I clean v1 tags, just so I don't have to worry about some program trying to keep them in sync, especially when its not even possible given the field length limits and genre restrictions.

[WonderSlug]

Some CD/MP3 portables (like the Sony Discman and its ilk) read ID3V1 tags and have issues with ID3V2.

Might as well keep both types for maximum compatibility.

[kornchild2002]

Well, instead of keep both or using just one, I would test certain devices for ID3 version compatibility first. I use only v2.3 tags as I have embedded album art and some specific tag entries that cannot be handled by v1. All of my devices are 100% compatible with v2.3 tags. There is absolutely no reason for me to have both 1 and 2.3 tags.

Personally, other than device compatibility, I don't a reason to keep both. I used to have both as my older Sony car CD deck would work with v1 tags only. My newer Kenwood deck, factory standard deck in my Civic, PS3, Xbox 360, iPods, cellphone, etc. are all fully compatible with v2.3 tags.

[greynol]

I don't see the maintenance worth the extra effort; perhaps if you have an obsessive-compulsive anal-retentive disorder, then sure.