Album Art Bug In iOS 6 - Any fix?

[Roc P.]

I have a meticulously organized iTunes library with album art, tags, etc. After upgrading to iOS 6, I noticed a handful of albums missing art. I am wondering if anyone knows of a fix? Deleting the music and re-syncing brought no change. Here's the strange thing... (with some pictures to help visualize it):

1) Missing Art
2) Art in thumbnail if I tap album
3) Art shows up if I play a song
4) When I return to cover flow it's there too
5) Art disappears when I move

😕

 

[KeanosMagicHat]

Perhaps my (slightly) similar experience will help you, hope so. Read the last post on this thread;

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1439746/

 

[Roc P.]

Perhaps my (slightly) similar experience will help you, hope so. Read the last post on this thread;

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1439746/

Thank you for the suggestion, but removing the music and syncing it back doesnt resolve the issue 🙁

 

[KeanosMagicHat]

Thank you for the suggestion, but removing the music and syncing it back doesnt resolve the issue 🙁

It seemed it hadn't for me if I jumped in immediately to look. I'd remembered the library update warning on the 3G and 3GS, which doesn't seem to have appeared on later phones even though I now believe that's what's happening.

I'm not sure where you live in the world, but it's worth trying another removal & sync just before you go to bed and then resist temptation to open the music app until the next morning.

With my 4500+ track music library it appeared to take a couple of hours for all of the artwork to be processed.

Good luck either way.

 

[Roc P.]

It seemed it hadn't for me if I jumped in immediately to look. I'd remembered the library update warning on the 3G and 3GS, which doesn't seem to have appeared on later phones even though I now believe that's what's happening.

I'm not sure where you live in the world, but it's worth trying another removal & sync just before you go to bed and then resist temptation to open the music app until the next morning.

With my 4500+ track music library it appeared to take a couple of hours for all of the artwork to be processed.

Good luck either way.

Thanks. I just deleted my entire library from my iPod Touch and am re-syncing it again now. I have already done this before though. My cousin is having the same issue on his iPhone 5 and he also deleted and re-synced his music library. I'll wait a while after it syncs like you suggested. Worth a try anyway. In the meantime if anyone reads this thread and knows of any other solutions PLEASE share the info, thanks!

 

[Roc P.]

Deleting and re-syncing music library does not work.

So after deleting and re-syncing my music library AGAIN, the problem of missing art (in coverflow mode) is STILL there!

I DID manage to find a solution though 🙂 BUT it is very TEDIOUS, TIME CONSUMING, and doesnt resolve it 100%. 😡 Here is what I did:

1) Find an album in my iPod Touch missing art in coverflow as stated in my original post
2) Download the missing art from the internet, unless I already have it
3) Open iTunes and find the album in my music library
4) Highlight every track in the album
5) Right click>get info
6) Double click the box named "Artwork" on bottom right
7) Finder will open. Locate the art I downloaded and select "open". Click ok.
8) Sync iPod.

The album art now appears in coverflow mode again and stays there.
**Here is the problem: For songs missing artwork that are individual and not part of an album, when I click "get info", the "artwork" box doesnt show up, and I cant use the method described above 😕

I included photos to explain what I mean regarding the "artwork" box showing up for albums and not for individual songs.

**UPDATE**

I was able to fix my individual tracks also. Except for 2, using this method:

1) Download the art for the track with art that doesnt show up in coverflow
2) Locate the track with missing art in iTunes library
3) Right Click>get info
4) Click the "artwork" tab
5) Delete the art thats there
6) Add the art I just downloaded
7) Sync

After that they were all there in my coverflow except for 2 songs that are individual. I can't seem to fix them no matter what. All my art has been restored and viewable in coverflow now except for 2 songs. I can live with that for now.

I have 495 albums and a total of 2,835 songs so it wasnt too bad for me since my library isnt that massive. Only about 19GB

 

[parish]

Well, if you've only seen this problem after u/g to iOS 6 then you were very lucky because I - and a great many others - have had this problem since day one of Match.

The fact that several upgrades to iOS and iTunes have not resolved it suggests to me that the problem is either in iTunes and requires a complete re-write so won't arrive until iTunes 11, or it's a problem with the Match s/w running at the data centres.

 

[Roc P.]

Well, if you've only seen this problem after u/g to iOS 6 then you were very lucky because I - and a great many others - have had this problem since day one of Match.

The fact that several upgrades to iOS and iTunes have not resolved it suggests to me that the problem is either in iTunes and requires a complete re-write so won't arrive until iTunes 11, or it's a problem with the Match s/w running at the data centres.

Wow, I didnt know that. I dont use iTunes Match but I was wondering if maybe this was an issue with iTunes and not iOS 6.

 

[parish]

Wow, I didnt know that. I dont use iTunes Match but I was wondering if maybe this was an issue with iTunes and not iOS 6.

Ah, so maybe it is an iCloud issue, not Match? If I disabled syncing music over iCloud and sync it the old way from my Mac then all the artwork shows up (it is all present in iTunes anyway).

 

[Roc P.]

Ah, so maybe it is an iCloud issue, not Match? If I disabled syncing music over iCloud and sync it the old way from my Mac then all the artwork shows up (it is all present in iTunes anyway).

Hmm not sure if it's an iCloud issue either though only because I have never synced my music over iCloud, so I'm not sure how could iCloud could have affected it for me. Anything is possible though. I didnt even know iCloud could be used to sync music without having an iTunes Match account.

 

[parish]

Hmm not sure if it's an iCloud issue either though only because I have never synced my music over iCloud, so I'm not sure how could iCloud could have affected it for me. Anything is possible though.

Am I misunderstanding your problem here? Are you syncing your music to your iDevice from your Mac and not through iCloud? If so, then that's a new one on me. As I said, it's always worked fine for me syncing from my Mac, it's only through iCloud I see the problem.

TBH, it's a bit confusing as the boundaries between iTunes, iTunes Match, and iCloud are somewhat blurred which, I suppose, is an indication that Apple are doing it right (bugs excepted), i.e. it's seamless.

 

[Roc P.]

Am I misunderstanding your problem here? Are you syncing your music to your iDevice from your Mac and not through iCloud? If so, then that's a new one on me. As I said, it's always worked fine for me syncing from my Mac, it's only through iCloud I see the problem.

TBH, it's a bit confusing as the boundaries between iTunes, iTunes Match, and iCloud are somewhat blurred which, I suppose, is an indication that Apple are doing it right (bugs excepted), i.e. it's seamless.

Yeah I sync my music to my iPod Touch (4th Gen) from my Mac. My cousin also has this issue. He noticed it today when he synced his library to his iPhone 5 from his computer running Windows. I was able to resolve it at least (except for 2 songs) using the methods above but hopefully whatever is causing this is resolved by Apple at some point.

 

[parish]

Yeah I sync my music to my iPod Touch (4th Gen) from my Mac. My cousin also has this issue. He noticed it today when he synced his library to his iPhone 5 from his computer running Windows. I was able to resolve it at least (except for 2 songs) using the methods above but hopefully whatever is causing this is resolved by Apple at some point.

Ah, my bad. In which case this is a new feature 🙂p) in iOS 6. Sorry for the noise 😱

 

[Roc P.]

Ah, my bad. In which case this is a new feature 🙂p) in iOS 6. Sorry for the noise 😱

No worries 🙂

 

[elfary]

I have a meticulously organized iTunes library with album art, tags, etc. After upgrading to iOS 6, I noticed a handful of albums missing art. I am wondering if anyone knows of a fix? Deleting the music and re-syncing brought no change. Here's the strange thing... (with some pictures to help visualize it):

1) Missing Art
2) Art in thumbnail if I tap album
3) Art shows up if I play a song
4) When I return to cover flow it's there too
5) Art disappears when I move

😕

Since i upgraded my iPhone 4S to iOS 6 i had that exact bug. I could not fix it by deleting and resynching. I even could not fixing removing albums from my library and importing them again. Note: i sync from computer since i don't have iTunes Match.

I have 15000 tracks perfectly tagged so that bug was nasty. Since (in addition) under iOS 6 i had a few seconds of hiss everytime i unlocked my iPhone with earphones (Westone UM3x) plugged i ended up at an Apple Store having my 4S exchanged for a new one runnin' iOS 5.1.

No plans to upgrade to iOS 6 for the moment. Got an iPhone for a flawless music experience i guess.

 

[SAD*FACED*CLOWN]

After upgrading to 6.0 my album art disappeared from the iTunes list view in the music app...today it reappeared...I didn't do anything to make it happen

 

[Roc P.]

After upgrading to 6.0 my album art disappeared from the iTunes list view in the music app...today it reappeared...I didn't do anything to make it happen

I actually noticed today that while I fixed the coverflow situation some art now doesnt show up in list view. If I play the song it's there though. Really strange.

**EDIT: It's actually only 1 album that the art wont show up in list view. Strange

 

[elfary]

@Roc P. Did you upgrade over the air to iOS 6?

I did and other fella that reports to have the same Coverflow issue also updated OTA. Tryin' to find a pattern.

Since i got my iPhone exchanged for a new one now i'm on 5.1 and i won't upgrade if Coverflow corruption happens to every iOS 6 device. It's the way is wade thru my music collection.

 

[KeanosMagicHat]

After upgrading to 6.0 my album art disappeared from the iTunes list view in the music app...today it reappeared...I didn't do anything to make it happen

Could be wrong, but I suspect it was building the database in the background, like mine.

Pleased it resolved itself for you anyway.

 

[KRB24]

I am having the same issue here. The songs that convert to 256 kbps before importing to my iPhone 5 are the ones without the artwork. The songs I have that are 256 kbps or less do not convert (they are directly imported to my iPhone 5) and have artwork. So the problem is with itunes compressing the music and not remembering the artwork of the original song. I was so happy about Apple finally increasing the pre-import compression from just 128 kbps to 192 and 256. Great! Now the artwork is missing. This must be a simple fix. Hope someone finds an answer.

EDIT: I meant exporting not importing.

 

[Roc P.]

@Roc P. Did you upgrade over the air to iOS 6?

I did and other fella that reports to have the same Coverflow issue also updated OTA. Tryin' to find a pattern.

Since i got my iPhone exchanged for a new one now i'm on 5.1 and i won't upgrade if Coverflow corruption happens to every iOS 6 device. It's the way is wade thru my music collection.

I upgraded via WiFi and plugged into a charger. Sorry it took me so long to reply!

One thing I want to specify is my cousin who also had this issue, has an iPhone 5 that came preinstalled with iOS 6. He fixed everything manually and it's ok now though.

 

[KRB24]

I am having the same issue here. The songs that convert to 256 kbps before importing to my iPhone 5 are the ones without the artwork. The songs I have that are 256 kbps or less do not convert (they are directly imported to my iPhone 5) and have artwork. So the problem is with itunes compressing the music and not remembering the artwork of the original song. I was so happy about Apple finally increasing the pre-import compression from just 128 kbps to 192 and 256. Great! Now the artwork is missing. This must be a simple fix. Hope someone finds an answer.

EDIT: I meant exporting not importing.

Also, I should mention that my artwork is high quality. I manually add artwork to my library. The dimensions of my artwork range from 1000 x 1000 to 1500 x 1500. I wonder if this has anything to do with the artwork not showing up on my iOS 6 iPhone 5. Ugghh, I like my high res artwork. Make it work Apple!

 

[KRB24]

I seem to have found a fix which works for me.

You can still manually drag music onto your iPhone once you have unchecked "manually manage music".
Simply uncheck it, go to the iPhone's Music tab in iTunes, Check Sync Music, make sure to sync "only selected"
And then drag and drop as usual.

All my artwork synced just fine using this method.


Source: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3801919?start=90&tstart=0

 

[Phil1inamillion]

This quick fix worked for me:

1. connect iPhone to mac via USB
2. In iTunes tick the sync iBooks option, this will warn you that all music must be removed, click ok
3. drag your music onto the iPhone from iTunes

All cover art then displayed correctly, regardless of music quality or cover art image size.....(my iTunes library is to big to fit on my iPhone, so I don't sync all music, no reason why it shouldn't work though) .... Hope it works for you!

Phil

 

[elfary]

Did iOS 6.0.1 fix this annoying Cover Flow Album Art bug?