Posted by pspcrazy on

This guide describes the process to transfer MP3 files from your PC to your PSP with album art. Note that the first 5 steps of this guide are optional; if you don’t care about having album art associated with your MP3 files while playing them on the PSP, feel free to skip them. Also, this tutorial has a series of sub-steps; the letters A, B, C, and so on depict certain operations users are asked to accomplish within the screenshots themselves. It’s not that I think you’re stupid, it’s just that I wanted to be as clear as possible.

Materials needed:

• PSP
  
• Memory Stick Duo (any size)
  
• MP3 album(s)
  
• (Optional) Album Art
  
• (Optional) ID3v2 editor software with support for album art (this tutorial is based on The GodFather, a freeware editor)
  
• USB Mini cable
  
• PC running Windows 98SE or above with a free USB port

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Step 0: Follow the PSP to PC Basic Connection Guide

Before you start, you’ll need to connect your PSP to your computer.

Step 1 (Optional): Launch the GodFather, setup



For the album art section of this tutorial, we’ll be using a piece of freeware called The GodFather. As I mentioned in the overview, there are a number of tools that can accomplish this task -- I more or less chose the GodFather because it was the first thing that came up in my search. The first part of this tutorial deals with assigning album art to MP3 files through the use of ID3v2 tags, because this appears to be the only format the PSP can read them from. If you already know how to create album art using ID3v2 tags, skip ahead to step 6. If you don’t, go ahead and start The GodFather, and we can begin.

A: Select your MP3 album from your hard drive. You won’t be able to edit the ID3v2 tags of files stored on read-only media such as CD-R.
B: Choose "Manual Edit." I unfortunately can’t find an option to automatically add album art to albums.
C: Notice that the "Pic." column is empty. Double click on the Pic box for the first track in your album. You’ll see a dialog. But before you do anything in that...

Step 2 (Optional): Copy album art to clipboard



The GodFather has a function to tag album art directly from the clipboard, so there is no need to save image files to your hard drive. Album art for pretty much any popular album can be found at Amazon.com. If you’re looking for something more obscure, you’re probably better off with Google Image Search. Right clicking on an image will give you an option to "Copy Image." My screenshot is from Firefox, but Internet Explorer has a similar option in its right-click menu.

Step 3 (Optional): Apply album art to first track



A: Back in The GodFather, click on the "Pictures" button in the dialog that we spawned in step 1c.
B: Now that you have your album art in your clipboard, go ahead and paste it using the "Load from Clipboard" option that can be reached by click on the folder icon immediately below the "Standard" button.

Step 4 (Optional): Finalizing changes





Your image will show in the box if you’ve done things correctly thus far.

A: This step is extremely important! For one reason or another, the PSP will not read album art if it is named. By default, The GodFather names images pasted from the clipboard "Picture1." To remove this name, just highlight the text and push your delete key.
B: When you’re ready, click "Save & Close."

Notice that the "Pic." column now displays a check mark.

Step 5 (Optional): Finalizing changes part deux



The PSP will only read album art from the first track*, so you’re ready to close out.

A: Click the "Update" button to update your file’s ID3v2 tag. The GodFather’s status bar will display "ID3v2:updated." You are now through with The GodFather, so feel free to exit it.

Step 6: Copy MP3 folder to clipboard



Using Explorer, copy the entire MP3 album to the clipboard.

Step 7: Paste album in PSP’s "MUSIC" folder





Navigate your way to the PSP’s "MUSIC" folder under F:PSP (where F: is the drive letter of your PSP). Paste your MP3 folder into this directory.

Step 8: Exit USB Mode

Since your PSP has been in USB Mode throughout this entire process, just push X to exit.

Step 9: Verify transfer of MP3 files, directories




Under the Music menu, select Memory Stick. All albums you have loaded on your Memory Stick Duo will be displayed. Select an album, select a track, and it will begin playing.

*I’ve done some experimentation, and found that the PSP will only read different album art from multiple tracks within the same folder. Thus, a "mass album art apply" would be useless.

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That concludes the Music Transfer Guide. If you have any questions or comments, please post them below.