iTunes play counts


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So let's say I have one copy of a song and then encode it again at a higher bitrate or something, essentially a different file. If I just want to use it to replace the original, it isn't going to have the same play count in iTunes, which I'd like to retain if possible.

Anyone know how to do this, other than just playing the track over and over? Basically I just want to manually set the play count to what it is with the 'original' copy that I want to replace.

Thanks :)

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You could edit the "iTunes Music Library.xml" file directly, then reload iTunes. This should work. Just make sure you make a backup before you take any advice of mine! :)

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Well, if the XML thing doesn't work (it should though), you don't need to play through the entire track. Just put iTunes in repeat one mode (click the repeat button in the lower left twice), then keep clicking on the end of the time slider to move the track to the end of the track. iTunes counts a play count by the number of times it got to the end of the track, so you can speed it up by getting to the end of it really quickly :)

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Another way around this is to just 'copy over the originals' with the new copies, just make sure you name them exactly the same (file extentions don't count) so you could for example replace.

01 Songname.mp3

with

01 Songname.m4a (thats AAC)

And iTunes will just play as normal but with the new track.

Note: Be sure to empty the trash with your old(er) MP3's.

If you don't understand what I mean, just let me know and i'll try to explain it better.

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Another way around this is to just 'copy over the originals' with the new copies, just make sure you name them exactly the same (file extentions don't count) so you could for example replace.

01 Songname.mp3

with

01 Songname.m4a (thats AAC)

And iTunes will just play as normal but with the new track.

Note: Be sure to empty the trash with your old(er) MP3's.

If you don't understand what I mean, just let me know and i'll try to explain it better.

iTunes will play the song as normal, but it won't retain the playcount status of the old song, which is what he is looking for.

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iTunes will play the song as normal, but it won't retain the playcount status of the old song, which is what he is looking for.

Ermmm it will, I've done it many a time.

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So let's say I have one copy of a song and then encode it again at a higher bitrate or something, essentially a different file. If I just want to use it to replace the original, it isn't going to have the same play count in iTunes, which I'd like to retain if possible.

Anyone know how to do this, other than just playing the track over and over? Basically I just want to manually set the play count to what it is with the 'original' copy that I want to replace.

Thanks :)

Are you going to keep the file the same extension? Ie. Is it going to remain an mp3 file or mp4 etc.?

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Ermmm it will, I've done it many a time.

IF I'm understanding you correctly...I may not be...but since you can have an instance of song1.mp3 and song1.m4a in the same folder, you can't actually copy over the m4a file. iTunes knows the difference between the two. By the way I understand it, I've tried doing that but it doesn't work. iTunes differentiates between the two files by the file extension.

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Wow thanks for the replies. If any of you are curious, editing the XML file did nothing, it simply ignored my changes.

I wanted to test it before adding the new file, so I just tried editing the XML file to change the play count of the copy that was already there.. the song was at 33* and I tried a few other values, 99 / 11 / etc*.. but iTunes ignored my edits, still showing 33* no matter what I put in there.

So I just put added the new file and did what was suggested here, searched it out so it was on its own and then set it to repeat and just skipped it up 33 times, it didn't take too long. Wouldn't wanna do it for my more played tunes though (100+).

FYI the new copy is the same format (mp3) as the old one.

Still, the question of how to do it efficiently remains as I imagine the idea of being able to swap one copy of a song for another (either higher or lower bitrate, depending on your current needs), without screwing up your iTunes DB, would be quite a useful facility to have :)

I guess next time I'll just try replacing the file in the directory itself next time like danbalsh said.

* like you gotta be a multiple of 11 to get my attention or something ;)

Edited by am_fek
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You can just name the file the exact same and overwrite the older version. iTunes will update the bitrate and ID3 tag information as soon as you play the song, but retain the "played" information. I've only tried this using the same file format though.

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