Hello, I hope that this is in the correct place, if it is not, could a mod please move it?. I did a search before posting to see if I could find anything, but was unable to find something the same as my problem.

The problem is I am trying to burn some MP3 CD's to play in my car stereo, which is able to play MP3 CD's. If I burn the CD through iTunes, it works no problem, but with iTunes you cannot organize the songs by artist, or anything else. I want to organize the MP3 CD with folders by artist, but everytime I try, it will not work in my player, it just says CD error. I find this very odd because I know that I have done this before, so I know that my player will support folders. I have tried just dragging and dropping the folders full of music into the drive and burning it using XP's built in burning software (which is what I used before) and it worked (before being about a year ago). Now when I try, it will not, so I tried using another burning software, no luck. I then used Nero, still no luck. This is bugging the crap out of me, since I can't handle not having my songs organized on the disc lol, not to mention that it takes forever to scroll through songs without the folders. I burned 5 different discs, some of them the same, some with different music, and using a different CD drive as well. Does anyone have any clue as to what could be going on? It would be greatly appreciated. Thank you all for your time.

*EDIT*
I just read somewhere that you can only have 8 folders including root dir, is this true? If so, I think that may explain it. I will need to test that as soon as I get back to my computer at home.

*EDIT AGAIN*
Nope, that wasn't it, just tried using only 4 folders. It isn't my player, as the CDs won't work in my friend's player either, and tried my girlfriend's player as well, still no luck. Any ideas that anyone has would be really appreciated. =)

Well, you can try the basics first, just ISO, no Joliet, no extensions. Then add Joliet if that works.
Also, try Disk-At-Once and Track-At-Once modes. Maybe it's DAO your player reads, but not TAO.

TAO and DAO? I never heard of a device not being able to read discs written in TAO mode.

To re-enable CD writing, first make sure the IMAPI burning engine is enabled. Go to Start --> Settings --> Control Panel --> Administration Tools --> Services, enable the IMAPI... entry and also start it.
After that, fire up Windows Explorer, right click your burner, go to the properties and make sure writhing to that device is activated (there should be a special tab about that).

And you say that if you don't organize the files it works? Funny - I thought it might be an Unicode problem.

I've had several...

What model player is it?

My iRiver can play TAO discs...

You could try to burn it with othjer programs like MediaMonkey or Winamp... And have you chose MP3-CD in Nero?

Big_Berny

Hlloyge, I'm sorry but I'm not sure exactly what you mean, sorry to be a newb, I'm just not understanding all the abbreviations or know what Joliet is heheh. I usually don't burn all too many CDs.

Thank you Sebastian Mares, I will try that, hopefully it will work. Also, yes, if I do not organize them and just place the MP3 files without folders, it will work just fine.

A_Man_Eating_Duck, it is a Sony XPlod CDX-F5700.

Big_Berny, I will try those programs, and yes I did select MP3-CD in Nero.

Thanks for the replies all, hopefully I can get it to work =/.

My car's MP3 CD player also acts up sometimes.
It won't play an MP3 CD if I burned with the 'MP3 CD' settings using Nero Express, but it will play those burned with plain 'Data CD'.

Weird, but it works.

And it also displays ID3 tags improperly when there's an RG tag from mp3gain.

Just tried doing a data CD, no luck. Nothing seems to be working, followed all other suggestions as well. This is ridiculous =(. My pile of CDs that don't work is getting bigger and bigger. *Sigh*. I wish I could just afford an iPod, this would be so much easier.

Well, try using RWs

I don't know which program you are using, I'll assume you are using Nero Burning Rom. I hope you still use some 6.x version, as v7x crashes on my system.
Anyways, when you start Nero (not express, mind you), select
New/CDRom (ISO). Click on new, and you'll get into browser.
Next, right click on CD icon on left side of browser (the one where files that are going to be burned on CD), select properties.
In this new window, Compilation Properties, check these tabs:

Multisession:
NO Multisession (maybe you used the option to be able to write more on CD, and player doesn't support multisession?)

ISO:
Data mode 1: Mode 1
File system: ISO 9660 + Joliet (or just iso, but this is just testing, but when using just ISO, you'll get vers short file names)
File name ISO: Max of 11...
Charset ISO: ISO9660
Relax restrictions: Allow more than 64 characters...

Burn:
Action: Write
Write method: Disk-at-once, if fails, Track-at-once (these are DAO and TAO write modes).

I hope this helps.

H.

I normally wouldn't want to throw more software at you in order to solve a problem, but I'd definitely check out www.burnatonce.com and see if anything works with that.

Thanks for the info, I'll give both of the suggestions a try...As soon as I get home from work heheh.

I've seen MP3BR Imager recommended for the purpose, but the site is currently down (expired domain?). I understand that CDR Tools Front End also allows to burn files to CD-R in the order you specify. HTH.

Thanks a lot everyone, I finally got it to work heheh.

I got it to work using hlloyge's instructions, thanks man! I was using express before, and then once I used nero burning rom all I had to change was TAO to DAO, so I'm assuming it was defaulting to TAO before and that my player cannot read it. Anyway, glad I got it fixed, and thanks again.

Could someone please tell me what the difference between TAO and DAO is? I always had the impression that they only affect the way data is burn on the disc and has nothing to do with how the data is read.

TAO = Track at once
DAO = Disc at once

TAO means the burner burns one track, and then pauses until it gets the command to write the next track. Burning audio-cds in TAO mode might lead to bad gapsettings.
However, in DAO mode, everything (the whole disc, not just one track) is written continuosly without any pause. This should be safer for the gaps of audio-cds, because it can write them more precisely.

I do not know however why some odd devices can't read TAO burnt discs. And I don't know what the impact is on data-cds. I always thought it wouldn't really matter, but somehow it does.

Maybe it's because in TAO lead-in AND lead-out are written after having written all tracks, while in DAO lead-in is written, then all the tracks at once, and then the lead-out. (So you could say in DAO mode it burns continuosly from the beginning to the end of the disc, while in TAO mode it burns track one, track two, ..., lead-in, lead-out.)

I don't know if I could help you in any way, maybe someone can explain better

Glancing through the replies - I didn't see this so I thought I would mention it.

Some software that allegedly burns mp3 CDs neglect the fact that the mp3 CD specification has a limit on how long a filename can be (I think 32 characters). Others adjust for that when making the CD.

Some mp3 CD players will work with longer filenames, some won't.

Could that have been your problem?

Also - sometimes non ascii characters cause problems.

For this reason - when I rip, I limit the filename to 32 characters, remove any non ascii characters, etc.
Since doing that - I personally have not have not had an mp3 CD fail.

Another question for you helpful people, well for of asking for opinions rather. Does anyone have any suggestion on some good CDs? With this working, I would like to burn my music collection now, but I have some crappy CDs that stop working after a certain amount of time (around track 20 on a regular audio CD, around track 70 on a non organized mp3 cd, and around folder 9 on an organized mp3 CD). I had this problem before with memorex, so I got some Sony, which worked perfectly, but now I guess Sony has failed me heh, as I have the same Cds that now don't work.

Taiyo Yuden. I'd be violating the TOS by just outright saying they're the best without any proper explanation, so let me just tell you that they are very highly recommended.

Probably the easiest way to get them would be buy from an online store. Just be sure that you're buying genuine Taiyo Yuden discs.

You can burn a mp3 CD from iTunes with folder structure if you wish. Just select the CD "Data CD or DVD" instead of "mp3 CD" when burning your list. That will preserve the folder structure but will burn files that are other than mp3 as well (wav, wma, etc,) if they are included in the list. It also burns a *.xml list in the CD.

Taiyo Yuden is indeed Rolls Royce of CD-Rs, but may not be the best option in a hot, humid enviroment: cyanine dyes have been shown to be inferior in such conditions to phthalocyanine ones.

Memorex doesn't manufacturer their own CD-Rs. With them, it can be anything: RiTEK, CMC, Prodisc, anything. Usually, it's the bottom of the barrel stuff, so avoid Memorex. Sony CD-Rs can be hit or miss. I've had very good results with their 50pcs spindles - phthalos with Sony ATIP - on par with Taiyos; but no disc from a 100pcs spindle would burn at above 8X without numerous errors. So I would suggest getting a five-pack or ten-pack as a sample first.

If you live in a temperate climate area, Taiyo Yuden are the best, followed closely by Verbatim Super AZO (Datalife Plus).

Thanks again for the info guys!