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Archiving music well involves knowing how you would like to be able to access your MP3 files and creating a system conducive to this arrangement. If you are just beginning to archive music on your PC or MP3 player, the biggest task ahead is to get a system going from the beginning and to stick with it.

When downloading or ripping music, it is a good idea to consciously store all of your music files in one location. Direct music downloads from a web browser in a Windows environment typically go to the "My Received" folder in "My Documents"; to avoid too much confusion, I would suggest directing such downloads to the "My Music" folder in "My Documents" every time you save a music file. While it may be momentarily more convenient to simply let the download go wherever the web browser is set to send it, in the long term this will tend to result in a fairly cluttered arrangement.

While automatic archiving utilities such as the one found in the latest editions of WMP (Windows Media Player) can be both handy and attractive, they can also be somewhat confusing; the utility is merely a program, and will miss steps or mislabel music, especially for those with less mainstream tastes. I would not advise against using WMP for archiving, but would instead suggest that you review the decisions it makes to see if they're in keeping with your desires; I personally often find WMP arranging files in ways I would rather not have it do, and thus typically have it's auto-arranging functions turned off when I use the player.

If you are already fully inundated in MP3 music, the biggest task ahead is to reconcile all of your material to one central location and to work from there. While a Windows search will help you to find all of your music, it will also locate every other sound file on your computer; if you happen to have games on your computer, you will likely find yourself buried under literally thousands of music files before even touching your MP3 music. The best strategy to employ in centralizing all of your music is to perform specific searches in specific folders; if you use P2P or Torrent software, the client programs used to download files typically place files in their own specific folders. By entering the program and checking settings, you can determine where this is and proceed to cut and paste your music to your central file. You can also set your P2P or Torrent client to automatically download all music to your central file.

At this point, if you know that you still have music files out there that you cannot find, a Windows search can come in handy. Simply type in the name of the song, wait for the result to come up, right click the file and scroll down to "Open containing folder". This will take you directly to the folder hosting your MP3, and likely several other stragglers as well.

Music can be organized in many different ways. Most people seem to like to organize their music by Artist and Album, though organizing music by genre in folders is another good idea. Additionally, within most every media player, the user can create playlist files; these are files that can work as sub-archives, titled to taste and containing all appropriate files. Playlists are convenient, as they can be opened up as a single file from which all your other files will be queued to play, and they work without any sort of file-moving process.

Learn more about this author, Daniel Booy.
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