iTunes Match and duplicates

[PFox78]

Hi again,

Yesterday, I came on here and asked a question about iTunes Match and storage space on iOS devices that was answered promptly and to my satisfaction.

As I said yesterday, I'm looking to get iTunes Match, but another issue came up that concerns me. I have bout 17,000 tracks in my library's. Quite a few of the same titles are in different albums such as compilations, live albums, "best ofs" (in addition to the album in which the song appears).

I've heard that iTunes Match finds duplicates and removes these songs from your library or doesn't include them in the various albums.

Can someone please explain how this works? I'm a bit confused and although I'd really like to get iTM, I'm not willing to lose songs in my library to do so.

Thanks a bunch!

 

[Julien]

...I've heard that iTunes Match finds duplicates and removes these songs from your library or doesn't include them in the various albums.

Can someone please explain how this works? I'm a bit confused and although I'd really like to get iTM, I'm not willing to lose songs in my library to do so.

Thanks a bunch!

Not sure where you head this but Match doesn't modify your library in any way. Only you can delete songs from your library. iTunes can find and mark duplicates for you (unrelated to Match) to delete but you must do the deleting.

 

[bucksaddle]

There are "good" duplicates and "bad" duplicates as far as I'm concerned. A bad duplicate is the same track twice within the same album and obviously should be remedied. A good duplicate is the same track that may appear on several albums by the same artist and in my case I want to keep these (main reason being that the mastering of these albums may be different and therefore I want to keep a consistent sound between all the tracks on the same album).

To answer the OP: When you run iTunes Match on your PC it will no doubt find many "good" duplicates (i.e. label them as duplicate even though the track exists only once in that album but may exist in another album from that artist). I have found this to be very hit and miss because I have plenty of "Greatest Hits" albums that obviously reproduce the same track(s) as previous studio albums but then only 2 or 3 of the tracks will be labeled as duplicate. Why not the whole album? Anyway if a song is labelled as duplicate within the iTunes Match process it will not appear in your library on your device (which is probably what you have read and what you are referencing in your original question). However once the match process has finished on your PC you can force duplicates to be included by right clicking on the duplicate tracks within iTunes and select "Add to iCloud". They will then be forced to either match or be uploaded but either way they will then appear on your device in the correct place.

Some might say that duplicates take up space and that if a single track is found to span multiple albums then a link should be created but I don't like that due to my reasoning above.

Edit: Just to add a bit more about why Match only probably labels 2 or 3 tracks duplicates in my Greatest Hits scenario. I believe (but could be wrong) that the match process not only takes the song / artist / album information but also utilises an algorithm of the actual sound wave of the track to provide a match. As mentioned in other threads some think that this process is far from perfect and I also subscribe to that. I've had a couple of albums that appear twice in the iTunes store (one original and one remastered) and after the match process (which was done on my copy of the original sound recording) I've ended up with a mismash of tracks from both albums. When I play that album back on my device the sound difference moving between the songs can be quite pronounced (one low in volume, the next one high, etc) - really annoying. These albums are ones I sync manually (as I mentioned in your other thread) before switching on Match on my device

 

[From A Buick 8]

Edit: Just to add a bit more about why Match only probably labels 2 or 3 tracks duplicates in my Greatest Hits scenario. I believe (but could be wrong) that the match process not only takes the song / artist / album information but also utilises an algorithm of the actual sound wave of the track to provide a match. As mentioned in other threads some think that this process is far from perfect and I also subscribe to that. I've had a couple of albums that appear twice in the iTunes store (one original and one remastered) and after the match process (which was done on my copy of the original sound recording) I've ended up with a mismash of tracks from both albums. When I play that album back on my device the sound difference moving between the songs can be quite pronounced (one low in volume, the next one high, etc) - really annoying. These albums are ones I sync manually (as I mentioned in your other thread) before switching on Match on my device

It works like that but reverse, it will use an algorithm to scan the song (think Shazam) and will match based on that. I do not think it usees your meta data at all (maybe a little im fuzzy on this part).

 

[Gav2k]

Purchased iTunes content do not count towards your total. Is you whole library ripped??

Also not that I'm 100% sure but looking at my library duplicates don't seem to count against your total.

 

[bucksaddle]

It works like that but reverse, it will use an algorithm to scan the song (think Shazam) and will match based on that. I do not think it usees your meta data at all (maybe a little im fuzzy on this part).

Thanks for that - I'm totally unsure how Match actually "Matches" (or doesn't in some cases).

Cheers

 

[From A Buick 8]

Purchased iTunes content do not count towards your total. Is you whole library ripped??

Also not that I'm 100% sure but looking at my library duplicates don't seem to count against your total.

I wonder if a matched vs uploaded duplicate would be handled differently. I tend to think it might, but i do not keep any duplicates to test it out.

----------

Thanks for that - I'm totally unsure how Match actually "Matches" (or doesn't in some cases).

Cheers

It can be kind of like witchcraft, but songs recorded at different times might be processed slightly different.

So if you have a cd from 2001 that you rip, and that same CD was re-issued in 2010 the songs may be slightly different (from the algorithm point of view). I had about 95% success with my initial match, I have had some luck with re-ripping that 5% (when I still had the CD).

Others I have just broke down and bought from iTunes (when what I had was a low bit rate) the others that are higher than 256 I and just living with those being uploaded.

 

[PFox78]

There are "good" duplicates and "bad" duplicates as far as I'm concerned. A bad duplicate is the same track twice within the same album and obviously should be remedied. A good duplicate is the same track that may appear on several albums by the same artist and in my case I want to keep these (main reason being that the mastering of these albums may be different and therefore I want to keep a consistent sound between all the tracks on the same album).

To answer the OP: When you run iTunes Match on your PC it will no doubt find many "good" duplicates (i.e. label them as duplicate even though the track exists only once in that album but may exist in another album from that artist). I have found this to be very hit and miss because I have plenty of "Greatest Hits" albums that obviously reproduce the same track(s) as previous studio albums but then only 2 or 3 of the tracks will be labeled as duplicate. Why not the whole album? Anyway if a song is labelled as duplicate within the iTunes Match process it will not appear in your library on your device (which is probably what you have read and what you are referencing in your original question). However once the match process has finished on your PC you can force duplicates to be included by right clicking on the duplicate tracks within iTunes and select "Add to iCloud". They will then be forced to either match or be uploaded but either way they will then appear on your device in the correct place.

Some might say that duplicates take up space and that if a single track is found to span multiple albums then a link should be created but I don't like that due to my reasoning above.

Edit: Just to add a bit more about why Match only probably labels 2 or 3 tracks duplicates in my Greatest Hits scenario. I believe (but could be wrong) that the match process not only takes the song / artist / album information but also utilises an algorithm of the actual sound wave of the track to provide a match. As mentioned in other threads some think that this process is far from perfect and I also subscribe to that. I've had a couple of albums that appear twice in the iTunes store (one original and one remastered) and after the match process (which was done on my copy of the original sound recording) I've ended up with a mismash of tracks from both albums. When I play that album back on my device the sound difference moving between the songs can be quite pronounced (one low in volume, the next one high, etc) - really annoying. These albums are ones I sync manually (as I mentioned in your other thread) before switching on Match on my device

Bucksaddle,

Thanks again for this very thorough explanation. Between this and your last one, you've answered my two biggest concerns with iTunes Match.

I think the issue here, as you noted, is the difference between a "good" and "bad" duplicate. As far as I'm aware — and I'm quite anal with my library — I don't have any "bad" duplicates. But, I do have various artists with all their records and best ofs; furthermore, in the case of a band like Pearl Jam, I have umpteen live albums that I'd like to have available online. It would suck if they weren't simply because the songs also appear on their studio albums.

It's great to hear that if they're not matched, you can force an upload. Given the answer to this and yesterday (ability to sync content to your phone first, then turn on iTM), I think I'm going to give it a go.

I'm hopeful that the service will not present many issues and force me to spend umpteen hours fixing things. That — and the issues above — are what's kept me from signing up since Day 1.

 

[bucksaddle]

But, I do have various artists with all their records and best ofs; furthermore, in the case of a band like Pearl Jam, I have umpteen live albums that I'd like to have available online. It would suck if they weren't simply because the songs also appear on their studio albums.

I wouldnt worry to much about this - the duplicates that Match reports tend to be when a studio track is reproduced twice - I've never seen it report (at least in my library) a duplicate between a studio and live version of a track.

It's great to hear that if they're not matched, you can force an upload.

The right click "Add to iCloud" is not really a force upload - iTunes Match will still try and match the tracks again when you initiate this method but it does seem to tell the service that "I want these duplicate tracks within iTunes in the Cloud whether they are matched or uploaded"

I'm hopeful that the service will not present many issues and force me to spend umpteen hours fixing things. That — and the issues above — are what's kept me from signing up since Day 1.

From my experience there will be some troubleshooting - it's not perfect. The duplicate issue has been mentioned but you will have no doubt seen some threads on here about 9 out of 10 tracks on a single album matching and the remaining one uploading. There are things you can do but sometimes you just have to live with it.

Good luck

 

[From A Buick 8]

IFrom my experience there will be some troubleshooting - it's not perfect. The duplicate issue has been mentioned but you will have no doubt seen some threads on here about 9 out of 10 tracks on a single album matching and the remaining one uploading. There are things you can do but sometimes you just have to live with it.
Good luck

For the ones that really bothered me i just ended up down loading the song from iTunes.