iTunes Match accuracy

[WebHead]

Can any beta testers comment on the accuracy of iTunes Match, i.e. does it use a balance of probability to match songs, or does all metadata have to be identical?

For instance, I have some albums that have "remastered" in the title on the iTunes Store but not in my collection. And some music where the genre is different to what's on the store.

Also, does it match songs individually or match entire albums (where applicable)?

 

[superstrikertwo]

The accuracy varies at the moment.

The Match service just got reset and it is matching a lot better.

At the moment about half of my library gets matched before it was a quarter. By the time it goes public everything in the iTunes Store should match perfectly.

 

[WebHead]

Cool, thanks, something to look forward to!

 

[Senseotech]

Before the reset, it uploaded about 1200 of my 2300 song library, after the reset, it only had to upload about 600 tracks. A lot of the tracks I eyeballed last time as being uploaded are now marched, but there's still the weird problem where most of an album gets matched, then a few tracks are uploaded.

Two other little hiccups have also presented themselves post-reset. The first is that tracks that are "technically" higher quality, aka 320k mp3's, are getting matched instead of uploaded. Personally I like this, as to my untrained ears, 256k iTunes store tracks sound better than my random 320k mp3 rips. Also, there's a very small number of albums (1 so far through ~1/3 of my library) that are available in the store, and we supposedly uploaded, but once match is done, they can't be downloaded at all, either in the original format or a matched file. It's not a massive issue and thankfully it's only so farvan album I dont particularly listen to often, but it is frustrating to have a whole album unavailable.

 

[WebHead]

Thanks for sharing your experience. I found a reference on another forum that found album titles had to match exactly, so I might be adding "remastered" to a few of the ones in my library!

And yes, 256k AAC is superior in quality to 320k MP3 (plus the iTunes tracks are usually encoded direct from the masters).

 

[madmod20061]

It's gotten a lot better as the beta progressed. Even before the wipe it was actually doing a pretty good job of matching my library. After the wipe it's great. It looks to me that song title and length matter more than super accurate tag data. I have some compilation albums from cheap 80 music cds that do not have an artist listed (it's listed as various artist) and the cd is not available on itunes, but it still matched every song. I also tend to change soundtracks to various artists to keep my library a bit neater and it matched most of them too. It's not perfect though. Like a previous poster said, sometimes just 1 or 2 songs on an album won't match. I have 2 cds that it won't match or upload for some reason. Also, if the bitrate is too low it won't match or upload. I have one David Bowie CD that I converted to VBR mp3s and for some reason itunes reads it as 32kbs (it's most definitely not that low), so itunes match just skips it. I had one lone song in my library that was 64kbs, and Match also skipped it.

 

[WebHead]

Thanks madmod. I read somewhere that Gracenote had some involvement with the service, which gives credence to your theory.

 

[davosach]

About the compilation albums, I have a few cds that I've ripped like a ministry of sound, will those songs now exist only as individual songs, or will they be grouped into an album?

 

[mactmaster]

I've had some varying success with the latest beta. There are some albums that will match most of the tracks but a few tracks will not be matched. Upon looking further the copies that have not matched were a few seconds shorter or longer than their iTunes Store versions. I think Match is using the audio data as a digital fingerprint to match the songs, this part of the match must be weighed heavily.

I have been able to work with this and am purchasing the songs that are not matched. I know it uploads my local copy if it's not matched but a lot of my stuff is 128kbps and I am wanting to convert my entire library to 256kbps.

I am slowly converting my library over to the iTunes Match service and so far most of my stuff is 256kbps matched or purchased audio. I only have one album uploaded which is not on the iTunes store but that is ripped from CD at 256kbps.

 

[AbGilley89]

Can anybody comment on the accuracy now that it has been released?

 

[PNutts]

Can anybody comment on the accuracy now that it has been released?

There is a thread already dedicated to search results and I'm not the search police . I just don't have the link handy. From what I remember, it was generally between 8% and 20% match. However, the matching continues even after the initial upload and I haven't seen folks come back and post the new numbers.

 

[flynz4]

There is a thread already dedicated to search results and I'm not the search police . I just don't have the link handy. From what I remember, it was generally between 8% and 20% match. However, the matching continues even after the initial upload and I haven't seen folks come back and post the new numbers.

I find it hard to believe that the average is that low, unless you meant to say "mis-match". Mine match rate is about 83%.

/Jim

 

[philipk]

I find it hard to believe that the average is that low, unless you meant to say "mis-match". Mine match rate is about 83%.

/Jim

My match rate was almost that bad initially (33%). I have 3661 songs. After matching it stated that it was uploading over 2400 songs.

However, I like most people misunderstood what was happening. I am still unsure why it stated it was uploading that many songs. My guess it was uploading unique Metadata and artwork?

When everything was finished only 515 songs were not matched. Thus I had a 86% match rate.

Of that 515 songs only 130 should have matched but didn't. About 10 were single tracks from a matched CD. About 120 were from the wild west days of Napster. The rest were either classical, jazz, or gospel/religious.

PS
I replaced most of my wild west days Napster songs with purchases. I have about 140 songs I almost never play from that time period in my library. (Most of those songs have no last play date or 2004 or earlier). 20 of those matched and 120 did not.