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View Full Version : Zune 101: Creating and Using Sync Groups (Auto-playlists)


Jason Dunn
05-14-2008, 11:00 AM
<embed width="425" height="355" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/M5NFPOiIXMg&amp;hl=en" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent"></embed><br /><br />One of the new features in the 2.5 spring update for the Zune is the ability to create sync groups, which are auto playlists - easy ways for you to get the music, photos, and videos you want onto your Zune, automatically. This video shows you how to do that.<br /><br />One important note though: because the Zune software uses the &quot;date added&quot; as the primary attribute for sync groups, if you've just installed the Zune software, or if you have to <a href="http://www.zunethoughts.com/news/show/89025/still-having-trouble-with-metadata-after-the-2-5-update-reset-your-collection.html" target="_blank">reset your Zune collection to fix metadata issues</a> (which is what I had to do), sync groups are a complete and total disaster. Let me explain: rather than using the EXIF date taken attribute of a photo to determine the date when the photo was taken, or the file creation date of an MP3 to determine when the MP3 was ripped, the Zune software uses &quot;date added&quot; which means when you create a sync group for &quot;all photos from the last 90 days&quot; you might get <em>every photo on your hard drive</em>. That's exactly what happened to me - right now I can't use any date-based sync groups, which completely sucks. I don't know what the Zune team was thinking when they did it this way, but the results are ugly. There has to be a better way!