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Why is the music upload app in Garmin Express so bad?

tonyb15re
over 4 years ago

I have both a Macbook and a Windows PC, it appears the only way to upload music is via the Garmin Express app. 

For windows it takes almost 5 minutes for it to load the screen to allow me to crossload the music, when I choose Album it doesnt show albums it shows individual songs so I have to select them one by one.

When using the Macbook it only allows me to crossload music from ITunes, I have lots of music downloaded as MP3 from Amazon etc and therefore cannot crossload from my Macbook.

I managed to get 2 albums across to my watch with half the memory used, of course with the limited memory on the watch and high quality audio files theres no way you will get 500 songs on, why therefore doesnt the Garmin Express app offer the ability to reduce quality size to increase the number of songs that can be uploaded?

Is there a better and more user friendly way of crossloading music to my 645M? 

All of these items are basic, I've had iPod's and Sony Walkmans from about 15 years ago that had better content management capability why in 2019 is this such a difficult thing to do on this device? 

  • 0 over 4 years ago

    What I did was change the directory to a specific one, rather than let it scan my music folder. Then when I want to add any podcast or music to the watch I copy that to the folder I have created just for the watch. Much quicker as it doesn't have to create a "directory" of available pods/songs from my complete library.

    Another thing you can do is just to copy the files directly to the watch in windows explorer to the This PC\Forerunner 645 Music\Media folder.

  • 0 over 4 years ago in reply to MichaelW

    hi MichaelW, I have the same problem as tonyb15re that instead of the album I get individual songs when the album has got different singers. I tried the method you suggested: I opened the Forerunner 645 Music/Media folder. I created a new folder with the name Hitmix 2019 and filled it with songs from different singers. On the watch the folder doesn't appear, but only individual songs. When I download a folder with songs only by one singer, it works (I get the folder). Do you have any idea how to get a folder onto the watch with various singers? This would be a great help! For jogging, for example, I prefer to listen to various singers and I don't want to press "play all songs" because that would mean that also songs from other albums would be played. Thanks.

  • +1 over 4 years ago in reply to MichaelW

    Most bizarre, I tried the windows file manager before and it didnt work on my main PC, I ran up an old laptop and was able to transfer the music easily. Doing it enabled me to create the correct folders and put the music in them and they now display correctly as albums on the watch. 

  • 0 over 4 years ago in reply to 7766673

    It may be a problem with the music files, if they are from a different album then the metta data on the file will be different. I have 4 different albums on the watch all with various artists now. I connected to my laptop, locate the Garmin Device, deleted all music that was on there previously which had individual folders per song, created a folder called Music and then copied the album folders directly from my share onto the watch, all worked fine

  • +1 over 4 years ago

    On windows, I just user the Windows Media Player.  It sees the watch and you can just drag files to the Sync window, and then sync a bunch of stuff at once.

  • 0 over 4 years ago in reply to jim_m_58

    Using the Windows Media Player works beautifully with my Fenix 5 Plus. Thanks for the advice! 

  • 0 over 4 years ago in reply to MichaelW

    This works well with my Fenix 5 Plus