Album artwork not syncing on iPhone iOS 5.1 update

Walking through this step by step:

• On my Mac, well over 95% of my library consists of music ripped from my CD collection, all as ALAC files.
• The balance consists of songs purchased from iTunes, plus a small number of MP3s downloaded from other sources (musician sites, etc.).
• Nearly all of the associated artwork comes from iTunes. The balance was taken from Amazon listings of the album, or the artist's own site. On all of the MP3 tracks, I updated the ID3 tags, as applicable, to version 2.4.
• On my iMac, there is no problem - art correlates to track without fail.
• When music is exported (using the 'downsample to 128K' option) to my iPhone (running iOS4, iOS5, and now iOS 6), cover art is linked to every track, but it is no longer reliably the RIGHT art. Right now I am listening to Tom Petty, but the album art displayed is John Coltrane - Giant Steps. Other tracks from the same album display the proper album cover. The entire Abbey Road Album display's Ben Sidran's The Cat in the Hat cover. But so does Ben's album.
• Every track on my iPhone has an associated album cover. It is the right cover only about half the time.
• There is, in short, no discernable pattern between CD-ripped ALAC, iTunes AAC, or third source MP3s. Nor is there a pattern of where the art comes from.

But the art is right on my iMac, and on my 1st Gen appleTV. So why not on my iPhone? I've tried everything on this chain at opne point or another. At best, cover art and tracks synced for afew days, but then began relinking at random again.

I tried disabling the downsampling and it worked but i didnt want to have huge files on my iphone and wanted all my music to be there. What i tried was weirdly simple but it worked, not sure why...

I just de-selected all tracks and enabled 'sync all checked tracks' in order to erase all my music.

Then i just simply tried to drag & drop tracks (individually or in groups) and the artwork started to appear again... no effin' idea why but it works this way. I didnt even have to uncheck downsampling or convert ID3 to 2.4....

Go figure...

My experience with this issue indicates that downsampling (not using it) and other "settings oriented" ideas purporting to fix the problem are all only temporary and do not really solve the problem. I have never used downsampling, yet experienced the lost artwork issue.

I think the reason people are posting here claiming they have found a fix is due to the fact that the "fixes" all include an unsync/resync process that rebuilds the library on the phone. Unfortunately, this procedure only results in a temporary fix. Subsequent syncs "break" the artwork on the phone.

I can get my artwork back on my phone anytime. All I need to do is uncheck music sync in itunes, disconnect my phone and restart it, reconnect the phone, and recheck music sync in itunes. Then wait a few hours for my tracks to copy back to my phone and, voila! Artwork restored!

Until the next sync, that is. The same is true when monkeying with the tags and other twiddling: It all concludes with a temporarily-fresh rebuild of the song library on the phone, which is what results in the artwork being magically restored. But then hopes are dashed when subsequent syncing takes place and suddenly random tracks are once again missing their artwork.

This should really be the responsibility of the mega corporation whom we have paid for this platform, but since they are unresponsive, I challenge anyone here to come up with a fix that lasts. I'd really like to see it. But all appearances point to an inherent problem in the syncing process which breaks the artwork on the phone. Has nothing to do with the tracks themselves or other settings. Prove me wrong?

Never mind - now all artwork is gone on the phone and even using the 'trick' I can't get it back. I don't even think there's been an itunes update recently, so apparently this can just be chalked up to very poor quality software to begin with. That's the only thing I can come up with, is that we're basically paying for software that wouldn't even pass for freeware. Even freeware gets bug fixes. iTunes, not so much...

Yes - my trick I used to get all the art work stopped working too. Doing a complete restore however did work - it just takes hours and hours (I have thousands of songs). And every time I sync I lose a few album covers!! Maddening!!!

This thread now has over 50K views, which is probably a small minority of those who have noticed the problem. It's fair to say most people never even find their way to the forums, which means there are probably hundreds of thousands of users who are noticing this problem and want it fixed. Sad.

It could also be that it is a software issue with iTunes, regardless of iOS version, Apple is aware of it, has addressed it with iTunes 11, and in the meantime the suits have told support to say nothing that acknowledges there IS a problem. Dumb from a customer satisfaction perspective, but not out of character.

I think everyone is making this a little bit too complicated. There is a very simple solution...

Step 1: Plug in iPhone.

Step 2: Open Up ITunes

Step 3: Click iPhone icon on the left of the iTunes window

Step 4: Click the "Summary" tab at the top of the iTunes window

Step 5: Scroll down to the bottom of the summary window and check "Manually manage music and videos"

Step 6: Hit sync.

Then your done. Manually sync any music you want. Make sure the artwork exsists in iTunes. If it doesnt, click "Advanced" at the top of your computer screen in the iTunes application and click "Get Album Artwork" at the bottom of the drop down menu. That will download all missing artwork.

Also, please do not use the conversion option. This degrades audio quality and is not recommended.

Hi i also have a solution that worked for me 🙂 1. Go into itunes and with mine music their mostly albums so i search the album name so that only those songs appear.

2. Click edit then select all

3. Click get info, then drag the artwork u want

4. Then click the songs one by one and add the same artwork a 2nd time & your album artwork shoud be on your phone

FKWAJP & Dricka44 - I don't think you're reading the full chain.

• The problem occurs whether you manually or automatically manage music. You can do all the extra work of getting the covers to sync, but it doesn't stick.
• The covers are never a problem within the computer's iTunes.
• All the art work is there (at least for me). Covers transfer, but don't successfully link to the correct tracks. As in, I get a cover for every song on my iPhone, but it's the correct one only about half the time. That means, for example, when I glance at my screen to see what song I'm listening to I see Bela Fleck when Anette Peacock is playing.

Downsampling when transferring is offered not as an option, but as a feature, of iTunes. It is reasonable to expect that it work correctly. I know downsampling degrades audio quality, that's why my entire collection is stored as ALAC files on my home system. But I knowingly make the trade off between a little extra hi-hat sizzle, and 8-10 times as many songs on my iPhone. Why? I also know I am never going to hear that extra fidelity through ear buds on the PATH train.

FatKidWitAJetPak

RE: Making it too complicated

It's really not that we're making it complicated. The issue is pretty simple: Album artwork is fine within iTunes on the computer, but either nonexistent or randomly-existent on the iPhone, despite all manner of twiddling in an attempt to make the phone display the artwork that iTunes displays. The steps you listed don't work either.

Well, of course we know that downsampleing will degrade the music quality - but it is a choice we are willing to make in order to fit our music libraries on our iDevices. That is why Apple offers this as an option - and personally, I can't really tell the difference in sound quality. As far as making it too complicated... nope, the fact seems to be that no matter what "trick" you do, eventually the art and the tunes begin to mis-match and finally the art disappears all together (if you are using the conversion to 128k rate anyway - otherwise the art syncing works fine). Now, I've not tried the manully manage music option - and I do not care too. I have thousands upon thousnads of songs, and numerous complex play-lists... I just want to plug it in and sync. Add new music, change playlists... whatever, just sync.

> (if you are using the conversion to 128k rate anyway - otherwise the art syncing works fine)

Sorry, not true. Like others in this thread, I have never used downsampling, and art syncing is definitely NOT 'fine'.

Also, choosing to manually manage music does not work either.

Wow. Really? I always worked fine for me - for years and years all my art mathced my tunes... then about 6 or 8 months I chose the "covert to 128k" option... from then on I've had the problem. Hmm. Perhaps there was an iTunes or iOS update that happened at or near the same time I chose the convert option and I wrongly assumed it was the conversion when in reality it was the update? I have no idea. I only know it worked fine for a very long time, and for the past 6 or 8 months - around the time I started using the convert to 128k option - it has not worked (for me). I do apply all updates the day they are realsed too, so that may be a factor as well.

Side note: Does it bother anyone else that we have to keep signing in to this forum, and after sign in we must go to our history to come back to the page we were on??!! There must be a more elegant way. Come on Apple, your better than this.