i have a large music collection (8500 or so songs) and the majority of the are mp3s. most are currently tagged with ID3v1 & ID3v2 tags for player compatibility while overcoming the size limits of v1.
the only problem is that retagging the files takes a significant amount of time, compared to similar mpc or flac files. i'm looking for suggestions as to what format to use. plain ID3v1 is unacceptable due to the length restrictions on fields and the lack of any extra metadata fields.
would APEv2 & ID3v1 be best?

also how would i go about update/switching tag formats for all my files?

There are two ways to solve this:
- increase padding-size in the id3v2 tags.
- use apev2

Notice that fb2k 0.8 has a limitation which generally slows down id3v2 tag-writing. This has been fixed in 0.9 - however, most plugins haven't yet been ported to 0.9, so you may want to wait before upgrading.

- Lyx

Because ID3v2 writes a tag at the start of the file, If there is no tag padding, or insufficient padding, the whole file has to be rewritten. Usually a 1kb padded tag is plenty unless you are adding things like album art right inside the mp3.

Updating or adding fields to tag with available padding should be super-fast.

As a side note, nothing stops you from having both 0.8 and 0.9 installed at the same time, in different places.

man you guys are too much...

question: "how come XXX does XXXX?"

answer: "FOOOOBAR!!!"

(his question didn't even mention foobar, but every single response except mine has)

He didn't mention that he is using foobar, but it seems very probable to me that he IS using foobar, because slow id3v2 tag-writing is most visible with fb2k, because only this player has the drawback, that it always writes id3v2 painfully slow(as mentioned before, this is fixed in 0.9).

- Lyx

how very astute
i am using foobar, i'll have to try v0.9, i think there is sufficent padding, and if slow tag writing is fixed, then i don't need to worry about switch formats.

thank you everyone for your help

Open the file up with a hex editor and take a look - frames will be fairly easy to see (you can read the text, it is plain ascii after all). There should be about a screen's worth of empty fields afterwards if you have a 1kb tag. I actually use a hex editor sometimes to make simple tag changes... but i'm a sucker for punishment

I use ID3v1 in combination with APEs,
just notice that plenty of software does not like see APE tags inside mp3s and will report a corrupted mp3 (ie mp3check or so) or just simply destroy APE tags. But combination of EAC, LAME, mp3tag and foobar works just fine..

btw, switching formats is popular OVERNIGHT activity.. so if you don't mention time while you're sleepin, start mp3tag and go ahead..

ID3v1+AP2v2 is the key