Too many choices - are you guys having this problem?

breaker021 · 05-30-2006, 10:48 AM

Ever since I've had a PC in my car, with 1,600+ songs on it, I've noticed that:

1) I can't listen to a single song entirely - i always skip almost one song a minute.
2) i get confused as to what the F i wanna listen to. techno now? maybe rap? etc.

I have an h2 with a 6-disc in-dash changer and i noticed that i never really skipped songs as frequently as on my carpc...

most likely im obsessive compulsive (lol - some people have told me that but i dont think so...) or i have far too many options than i know what to do with...

just wondering if anyone else has come across something similar.... are you feeling the same way? that you have too many choices and can't stick to a single song for 3 minutes?
- sh00k

Jahntassa · 05-30-2006, 10:51 AM

Yeah, that's the same problem I ran into with my MP3 collection. You keep hearing stuff you don't feel like listening to at the time.

I currently use XM 90% of the time, and flip to MP3s when I feel the need for something specific.

e39dream · 05-30-2006, 07:44 PM

I'm a big fan of random myself.

Sidewalksalvage · 05-30-2006, 07:56 PM

I have over 25gigs of music...the majority of which i had no idea what was there. (I stole it from ipods i have fixed in the past)

I basically made a list of my favorite songs/cds then threw it on random and only hit next if i really wasnt in the mood, other wise it just runs...and runs...and runs

breaker021 · 05-30-2006, 09:00 PM

ALL I DO is use the random feature on winamp. The playlist I most commonly use is comprised of ALL the songs I have on my hard drive (indian, rap, techno, reggaeton, r&b, etc)... I'll go through the first 2 seconds of like 60 songs then pick one only because im tired of trying to pick something... my drives consist of me picking songs or playing half of a verse and then switching to another song.....

i may just be tired of my collecton.... =/ i dunno....

- sh00k

Kalt · 05-30-2006, 09:08 PM

I have the same problem too, i found myself skiping songs till i found one i felt like listening too. I now use XM bout 80% of the time like Jahntassa.

RedGTiVR6 · 05-31-2006, 11:24 AM

hehe - with 100 gigs, or 25,000 songs, it's even worse

I can't stand the SQ out of XM so I dumped it, as did my husband, it's gotten worse over the years...unfortunately..

speaking of which, I need to start looking for some new music..lol

breaker021 · 05-31-2006, 11:27 AM

l0l - wow, that's a lot of music!!!

I constantly find myself doing the following:
- Typing in a keyword into a music search engine like "rap" or "techno" or "indian"
- out of the 1,000 songs that come up, i highlight and download all of them

The cool thing is - i dont know what the F i downloaded. the even better part is - finding a song, by accident, that you really really like!

This has happened to me a couple of times! heh.... this SORT OF makes things better but still.... i am at the point where i download hundreds of songs KNOWING that im going to delete them within the next week or two...
- sh00k

RedGTiVR6 · 05-31-2006, 11:29 AM

sounds more like somoene who just discovered the internet than anything else...lol

Rafster · 05-31-2006, 05:52 PM

Quote: Originally Posted by Red GTi VR6

sounds more like somoene who just discovered the internet than anything else...lol

breaker021 · 05-31-2006, 05:58 PM

The Internet, ayeeeeeee? I hear they have that on computers now!

- sh00k

Puffanug · 05-31-2006, 06:05 PM

Quote:

The Internet, ayeeeeeee? I hear they have that on computers now!
- sh00k

Breaker, you may be able to start an internet company like Homer with that bit of insight!

tj!2k4 · 05-31-2006, 06:09 PM

i thought i was the only person who suffered from teh "skip skip skip skip skip" dissorder.. lol

DJiK · 05-31-2006, 07:13 PM

To Breaker:
I too use Winamp 98% of the time, (the other 2% is WMP for Videos).
If I'm by myself, there's a keyboard on the passenger seat, and if I'm with someone, it's usually on their lap.
If the mood comes on, or a song hits me in the face, I just press 'j' and quickly type the name (or keyword if stored those in comments) of the song I want to hear. Et voilá!

Oh yeah, I also have 5 playlists on the desktop at all times... Mainly sorted by genre and language.

I usually skip 3 songs out of the 5 that are randomly selected.

GizmoQ · 06-01-2006, 02:25 AM

I am a little more structured in my acquisitions. I too have well over 5000 songs in my library, but 99% of them are for mood enhancement. I have fallen in love with the CFX sort option that allows me to sort by decending date, i.e., last acquired first played. With this cool tool, my playlists usually consist of genre based lists for reggae, reggaeton, Hip Hop, Jazz, Fusion, and Funk and like most when I'm alone I skip through till I find one I remember liking a lot and then switch to random.

Then there's that 1% though, that is new music. My new music folders are arranged cascaded:
New Music
New Music/2006
New Music/2006/Last Quarter
New Music/2006/Last Quarter/Last Month
New Music/2006/Last Quarter/Last Month/This Month

This allows me to just select a folder, such as Last quarter, and Winamp will include that folder, Last month, and this month since their subfolders.

Twice a month on my home network, I initiate the download of the chart toppers and new to the charts songs from about a dozen charts worldwide. Primarily the big three, then there are a few from radio stations on all three coasts and lastly two european and one eastern block radio station. I also have this process mostly scripted/automated and am refining the automation I have for populating the ID3 tags and album art. EZSync then automatically transfers completed songs to the CarPC without any intervention on my part. After you've done this a while - that delete (Delete from Harddrive) key is indispensible.

I also have a record key

on my audio player (Internet Radio - I'm so hooked

), FM radio (for when I'm out of town and want to see what the locals like), as well as my XM screens for those times when I'm listening to something that really catches my fancy. These recordings are automatically saved as 128k MP3s in the "This Month" directory, and hopefully before I migrate them to "this quarter" I've found an original to replace them.

Bottom line I listen to my MP3 50% mood, 50% checking out/deleting the new stuff. I've probably got over 100 albums but after the first listen while ripping to MP3, I rarely listen to one whole. As you can see I like new music because I so quicky tire of listening to the same thing too much. And with my home network doing most of the work for me, almost every day I get in my car there are a few new songs added to "this month" every day.