I used to Export my projects as mp3 files, and did not have this problem. For the past year I have been exporting as wav files, and find I cannot alter the metadata written by Audacity.
When you export a project, the Edit Metadata Tags box pops up, and you can enter Album Title, Genre etc. So far so good. However, if later on you decide you want to alter the Album Title using the tag edit feature in Windows File Explorer [Properties>Details], you find you can’t do it.
I dont get it - this works on Exported mp3 files, why the grief with wav? Has anyone found a software app that will alter these tags? foobar? Media Monkey??
Try [u]MP3Tag[/u]. (It works on most formats, not just MP3s.)
WAV is about the worst format for metadata. It’s not well standardized or well supported. If you want lossless, FLAC is usually better option if your player supports it. Plus, your files will be smaller.
Sorry to pick your brains again, but do you know of a Windows music player that does not insist on building a library from your tracks?
All I want to do is play single tracks (MP3, FLAC, WAV) that I have Exported from Audacity to check they are all right. I want these to be kept separate from any Library stuff - they are just tracks in folders on the disc. If you go on TechRadar or somewhere, they list loads of players with wonderful functions which I don’t need - I just want Play - that’s it!
It has an “option” to build a library, but only if you tell it to. It’s very lightweight and can play virtually any audio file type. It can also be used to convert file types (if you tell it to), and it’s free.
Actually, not quite! I did try MP3Tag, and like I said, it’s great, but on reflection, I think a word of warning is appropriate.
If you click on Doug’s link, you will find it is no longer current: what you get is a page that appears to be MP3Tag, you click Download, and it takes you to NCH Software, which doesn’t offer you MP3Tag, it offers you the Strike ID3 Tag Editor instead. I tried this, but it didn’t work for me, so I went looking for MP3Tag and it wasn’t easy. Finally I Googled MP3Tag Old Versions, and after several false starts, i got to a site that had the genuine article, filehorse
So I downloaded a slightly older version (v3.04), and like Doug says, it does what it says on the tin. I have completed a large number of tag edits to my WAV files, incuding multi-line edits, and am very happy.
DVDdoug’s link IS the official website, but you have to be careful of misleading adverts. This is a constant problem for free software makers that rely on advertising revenue to pay the bills because unscrupulous advertisers disguise their adverts to look like official download links. It can be very difficult even for the most conscientious software vendor to keep out the bad ads.
Here’s an example:
I would highly recommend using a advert blocker to screen out these kinds of bad adverts.
Here’s the MP3Tag download page (ad blocker enabled) showing the genuine download link:
(MP3Tag download page: https://www.mp3tag.de/en/download.html)
what you get is a page that appears to be MP3Tag, you click Download, and it takes you to NCH Software,
Hmmm… I just downloaded mp3tagv306asetup.exe from www.mp3tag.de/en/download.html and it’s working fine. (This computer previously had version 3.02.) [EDIT] Thanks, Steve.
And I agree with you about flac, but sometimes my objective is to write a CD, so WAV isn’t crazy.
Right… Most CD burning software can convert from other formats but I’ve always used WAV when making CDs too… And you don’t want to start with (lossy) MP3 if you can help it.
As you may know, metadata is “different” on CDs. Audio CDs can use [u]CD Text[/u] but not all CDs have it and not every player supports it. (I don’t have a CD player that supports it so I don’t know how many of my CDs have it.) Typically, when you play a CD on a computer it gets a “fingerprint” of the CD and then goes online to find title/artist/album info and the artwork. But of course your “homemade” CD won’t be in the online database.
In some cases you may see the occasional false positive. No anti-virus checkers are 100% accurate. A strength of this site is that it checks with many virus checkers, including many of the best known and most reputable virus checkers.
Thanks, Steve, as you say, i was fooled by the ads - what a nightmare! (And apologies to Doug, of course.)
I’m impressed by your two displays, first with adverts, then without - it’s stunning what these rogues can achieve . . . I stopped using an ad blocker a couple of years ago, because I value free software, and realise they have to get revenue from somewhere - but this is a gross abuse of the system.
In the meantime, I will study that first diagram of yours again - highly educational!
VLC media player should do exactly what you want. I do not use it much for audio, but when I open a file with the player, or just select the “Play with VLC” option, VLC simply plays the file without doing anything else.
