1. Unzip and launch Easy Album Manager
2. Menu : [File / New list]
3. New root directory dialog : Select the root directory of your albums (can be the full drive, but the scan will be longer) and click on Next step.
4. m3u files management : Manually visit each directory and create m3u lists, one per album, if it's not already done. Then click on Next step when it's completed. The application will perform a scan and list all found albums in the List window.
5. List window
   • For each album where information are missing, fill the blank fields and perform [Album / Tag mp3] files to be sure these informations are saved inside the mp3 files.
   • Add covers by drag'n'dropping image files in the cover area, or by CTRL + Right-click in this area if you have an image in the clipboard
   • Now save your list [File / Save list as]
6. Browse window : Access the browse window with CTRL + B or [List / List-Browse Mode], and double-click on the album you want to listen !

List window

1. Albums list : Displays all albums listed by the scan. Information are Artist name, Album name, Release year and Genre. You can edit all these information (and Genre directly or with the combo box 5). The last two colums indicate the album status in the list (when red, you should tag the mp3 files or save info to Ini file) and if a cover image exists or not.
2. Quick preference : to set a saved preference. Have a look at Filter & sort to learn about preferences.
3. Album cover : Displays the selected album cover image. To change an image, either drop a file on this zone, either CTRL + Right-click on it if you have an image in the clipboard.
4. Tracks : Displays the selected album tracks. The first tab shows the files, the second tab the "title" mp3 tag of each track. You can edit this title with the Edit button at the left of this window.

Browse window

1. Album : Each album panel displays the album cover, the artist, album name and release year. Double-click to launch it with your default mp3 player.
2. Layout options : You can change each album panel width, height, color and font (click on the Options button), and also the space between album panels.
3. Quick preference : to set a saved preference. Have a look at Filter & sort to learn about preferences.

m3u files management

1. Directories : root is the directory you defined as the root directory when you created your list.
2. mp3 files : in the selected directory.
3. m3u files : in the selected directory. With the buttons you can create a new m3u file (by default with the mp3 files of the selected directory, and artist, album, year read from these mp3 tags. You can also delete a m3u file.
4. Tracks : of the m3u file selected in the 3 list box. You can move tracks up and down, remove tracks and add tracks from the current directory.
5. m3u creation default file name : %artist = artist name, %album = album name, %year = release year.

Filter & sort

1. Filter by genre : Check the box to activate.
2. Filter by artist : Check the box to activate. Displays all artists if filter by genre is not activated, else displays only artists of the selected genres.
3. Filter by year : Check the box to activate.
4. Sort : Choose the sort priorities. Release year can be ascending or descending.
5. Preferences : Once you have a filter and sort configuration you would like to reuse, you can use the 6 buttons to manage a list of preferences presets. New creates a new preference (a name will be asked). Write will overwrite the selected preference. Read will get the selected preference and put the parameters in the left window part. Use the 7 buttons to manage your presets.

File

New list

Creates a new list. The application searches recursively for all m3u files in a directory called the root directory : this directory will be the first thing you'll be asked for. You can have a look at Update current list to have more detailed information.
You'll then enter a dialog called m3u files management (have a look at m3u files management).
When you're happy with the m3u files, the application will perform the full scan, and will extract the artist, album, genre and year information from the mp3 files tags.
If nothing is found, these fields will be blank. Anyway, you'll have to check these information in the list window because tags information may not be reliable.

Load list (Ctrl+O)

In order to avoid scanning directories each time you launch the application (it can take a while !), you can save and load list files.
A list file is a .eam file that contains all the scanned information. If you modify an album information (artist, album name, year, genre) you should always tag the mp3 files of the album (view Tag mp3 files) in order to keep these data at the lowest level. In the case you can't do it (mp3 files are on CDs for example or another read-only volume), the modified information will be lost if you perform another full update (that reads the mp3 tags again) so don't do it in this case !

Save list (Ctrl+S)

Save list as ...

Export list as text

If you want to export your list in a text file (that can be read by MS Excel for example). The file will contain an album per line, with fields artist, album, year, genre TAB separated.

Close list

Exit

Edit

Copy (Ctrl+C)

Paste (Ctrl+V)

List

Change root directory

To use only in the case you physically moved your music root directory (to another hard disk for example, or to somewhere else in your file system). If you mess here, mp3 and m3u files won't be found anymore ! For these reasons, a new scan is not performed after having changed the root directory.

Update current list (read mp3 tags too)

A first scan is performed when you create a new list, but you can perform another only after if you changed a lot of things on your file system and want to keep your list synchronized.
This update mode will read again all mp3 tags and modify the artist, album, genre and year information in the list, so don't do it in the case your mp3 and m3u files are on a read-only volume, else you will lose all the changes you formerly made.
This scan takes time, do prefer the Fast update option if you simply removed and added albums (it should be the case most of the time).

Fast update (don't read mp3 tags)

Launch this to keep your list synchronized with your file system, in the case you added new albums or removed ones.

Tag all modified albums

This operation launches 'Tag mp3 files' on each album for which information has been manually modified in the list (artist, album, genre or year) so these information are now saved at the lowest level.
Have a look at Tag mp3 files to understand what tagging an album means.

Filter & sort (Ctrl+F)

Have a look at the Filter & Sort dialog help.

List/Browse mode (Ctrl+B)

Switch between List and Browse modes. Have a look at the List window and Browse window windows help.

Album

Play (Ctrl+L)

Launch your mp3 default player with the selected album. You can also double-click on it in the Browse window.

Save info to INI file (Ctrl+I)

In the case your m3u files don't include mp3 files but something else (wma ...) you can't tag these audio files so artist, album, genre and year information can't be saved.
With this option, an INI file will be created in the same directory of the m3u file, with the same name but the .ini extension, and future scans will read information from this .ini file instead of searching for tags.

Tag mp3 files (Ctrl+T)

When you perform a scan, the application reads inside mp3 files to read the artist, album, genre and year information. Once you have modified these information in the list, because there were wrong or not found for example, you should tag these mp3 files to update them with the correct information.

Reread album information (Ctrl+R)

Update the list with the information read from the selected album mp3 files.
It's like launching a Full update on a single album. Modified information not formerly saved in mp3 files will be lost.

Paste image from clipboard (Ctrl+P)

To change the selected album cover picture. You can also drag'n'drop an image file on the cover panel, or CTRL + right-click on this panel when you have an image in the clipboard.
You can do it even if a cover image is already displayed, the new one will overwrite the former one.
Covers image files are always saved as a JPEG file in the album directory, with the same name as the m3u file but with the .jpg extension.

Delete image

Remove the selected album cover image.

Remove album from list

Tools

Rename JPG files

Covers image files are always saved as a JPEG file in the album directory, with the same name as the m3u file but with the .jpg extension.
If you already have .jpg files in your directories and don't want to manually rename them, launch this and for each .jpg file you will be proposed to rename it. After, a Fast update will be performed to include your new covers to the list.

m3u files management (Ctrl+M)

Have a look at the m3u files management dialog help.