WM5 and SD/Ext Storage Card: Autosyncing Music and TV w/Media Player 10

Contributed by seamonkey420 April 8, 2006  
Tagged: Pocket PC

This is a quickie recipe i thought i should share that tells you how to sync your ext storage card (via a memory stick reader preferably) with Meida Player 10. This is great if your like me and have MCE 2005 and watch tv on your pc.

Requirements:
-Windows Media Player 10
-WM5 based device w/Ext Storage
-Memory Card reader, Memory Card

Overview:
This receipe will tell you how to sync your tv/music/videos to a storage card (i use miniSD w/my Tmobile MDA) connected via a memory card reader.

Main reason i use a memory card reader is because with Activesync and reading a storage card through activesync, it will cause your autoplaylists to sync whenever activesync does. And with version 4.1, activesync tries to trickle sync (every few minutes check status and if changes are seen, syncs) and thus in turn your pc is continously resyncing your playlists to your wm5 device. phew! lots there!

first things first, open up Windows Media Player 10, got to your library and setup an autoplaylist to sync. I’d recommend setting up one with a limit so that way you can have one playlist for videos, one for music, and one for tv.. also, i use “Randomize Playback Order” as an option, so it will pick my songs/media randomly.. Also, i’ve rated almost all of my media in media player 10, so i setup my music playlist to be my fave 4/5 star songs; takes a long time to do but worth it in the end.. :)

once you get your autoplaylists; pop your memory card into your reader… then in media player 10, go to the Sync tab.

Once here, if your memory card isn’t recognized, hit F5 to refresh. Once it does, you will want to setup the device and the syncing..

If you click on the Storage Card Properties box, you will be able to setup the conversion quality for music and video/tv and also the device name and more.

Once done, click on OK.

Then click on the “Setup Sync” button. This lets us add the autoplaylists to sync with. Be sure to setup to Sync Automatically.

Again click OK. once you do that you should see the sync starting. once done, remove your card and enjoy the fruits of your labor on the train w/your family guy on your phone.. ;)

TIPS/TRICKS:-if you do not have video conversion options (greyed out), you might have to connect via activesync and the memory card in your device and then stop the sync and change to manual sync and then put memory card in reader and options should show.. i had this prob..

-sync automatically might continously sync.. i’m still working on checking this more often then not.. but i wish activesync had options to sync manually instead of stupid trick.. most devices that run WM5 have live connections to the net for email.. arg!!!

peace
seamonkey420