Here's a fix for uploaded files that won't play.

Is this you? You've found a lot of files were uploaded, instead of matched. Some of those files might even be on albums where other tracks matched. Sure you want them ALL to match, but meantime, it would be nice if uploaded files would actually play! Sure, you can see their names, track durations, etc. but if you try to play them directly, nothing happens and if you try to play an album through, when it gets to an uploaded track, it stalls or skips past it. You've checked the file type and it's an AAC so you figure it can't be a file encoding incompatibility problem and besides, whatever the file type, Apple is red-flagging anything incompatible, tells you it's ineligible, right?

Guess Again - not all AAC files are produced with the same encoder and some of them, while they'll get past Apple's eligibile/ineligible screening process, probably shouldn't.

I routinely record vinyl using Audacity and at various times I've used different encoders (not that I knew it until now). As a result of checking which uploaded files play and which do not, I'm pretty confident of the following. While some AAC files created outside of iTunes might work, those encoded using Lavf52.36.0 will not. Neither will files encoded using Lavf52.64.2. There may be others.

So what's the fix? The same one recommended for getting files flagged by Apple as ineligible to pass muster. You need to make an AAC copy in iTunes and swap that for the uploaded files that won't play.

Here are the steps I use to get it done. You may be able to streamline the process though.

(1) Turn off wi-fi to prevent iTunes Match from attempting to match any new files until you're good and ready. If you don't to this, you may end up with files you've just created being flagged as duplicates.

(2) Select all files in an album that has some bad uploaded files. Select Advanced > Create AAC Version. (NOTE: I don't bother trying to separate uploaded from matched, just too much hassle.)

(3) Select one of the files, so you can File > Reveal In Finder. Generally this will get you to the album folder that includes both sets of tracks. The ones you just created will have a "1" in the file name.

(4) Create a folder on the desktop and move all the newly created files to it. Delete the "1" from the file names. Name the folder based on album title.

(5) In iTunes, delete the listings for the newly created files.

(6) Turn on wi-fi and wait for iCloud to reconnect. Watch the cloud icon - it'll tell you.

(7) Delete the album from iTunes (You're now getting rid of the copy that was originally uploaded, so be sure you've really got the new AAC files handy to replace them with). Note you will see an option to delete from iCloud too. Check it. You want these files GONE!

(8) Select Store > Update iTunes Match. If you do a search for the album from an iCloud enabled iOS device (I use Apple TV) after the update is completed, you shouldn't be able to find the album.

(9) Select File > Add To Library and go get the folder of tunes you created.

(10) Run Update iTunes Match again.

(11) Watch the iTunes progress bar. Once the matching process has checked to see if you've added anything to your library, you'll see fresh copies of your songs uploading.

(12) As another means of confirmation, once several of the songs have uploaded, do an iOS device search for the album. You should be able to get the album to appear before the upload is complete. You may have to back out of the search and back in to get it to work, but chances are when you first see the album, the song titles will all be grayed out. Once the update is complete, give it a minute and everything should become available to you.

(13) Pick a track that wouldn't play before and watch to see if the timer starts to move, followed by music! It is now time to do a little happy dance.

I know this is a far cry from figuring out what it takes to get songs that should match to actually do so, but that's a whole different ball of wax.