How To Recover Broken MP3 Files That Aren’t Recognized

` , Apr 22, 2011



There are a lot of audio applications that are essentially flawed. They seem to work great, and may continue to do so, but under the surface they transfer little quirks and errors to the files they’re handling in your music collection.You’d be surprised how many of your files are already affected. Luckily, many of these errors stay below the radar, and these files will continue to play as if nothing were wrong. Most applications don’t rely too heavily on a particular MP3 tag.
But if a file suddenly has choppy sound or doesn’t play at all, and if a collection of songs can’t be added to iTunes, then you know what’s happening.


Depending on how grave the particular distortion is, it might be easy to solve, or not at all. Below are a bunch of applications, for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux, that will help you detect the fault and recover corrupt MP3 files in your music collection.Validating & Repairing MP3 TagsMost of these errors have to do with so-called MP3 tags. These aren’t limited to the name of the artist and the album release year, but also contain critical technical information, like MPEG stream and Xing header data. When these don’t match up or there’s garbage at the beginning or end of the file, some MP3 players will get confused. The applications below analyze your files, try to realize what’s wrong, and fix it.a) MP3 Diags – Download (Windows, Linux)This application is available for both Windows and Linux. If you’re experiencing trouble, try option (c).
MP3 Diags is a wonderfully extensive application that not only takes care of the aforementioned errors, but also helps you maintain the consumer-relevant tags and album artwork. For the purpose for this article, we will focus only on its repairing capabilities.




In this collection, MP3 Diags is the heaviest and most extended application. It works its magic fast, precise and with vast detail. If you’re technologically gifted, MP3 Diags will duly and thoroughly inform you of the nature of those errors. It’s obviously one of the better applications in this category.The main development platform is Linux (OpenSUSE), so it’ll function best on Linux OS’s. Contrary to MP3val, MP3 Diags offers a decent GUI. Windows compilations should work fine though, although program crashes are slightly more likely. The Windows build is currently being developed and tested using Windows 7.b) MP3 Scan+Repair (Mac OS X)
The Mac OS X handyman is called MP3 Scan+Repair. Barely 1MB, MP3 Scan+Repair is a small, but resourceful application, that’s just as easy (if not easier) to use as MP3val.




Files can be added from within the application, or by dragging it onto the application window or dock item. The application will immediately start scanning your files. To repair all (repairable) errors, select the corrupt files (click the warning icon at the top and select all) and press the hammer icon. Files will be moved to the trash and reconstructed in their stead.c) MP3val (Windows, Linux)This application is available for both Windows and Linux. If you’re experiencing trouble, try option (a).
MP3val is a lightweight application that can fix most of the aforementioned problems, lightning fast. It’s been the salvation of many an audiophile. You can include files manually, or add whole folders to scan. Once the MP3 problems have been determined, they can be fixed with the click of a button.
Although MP3val is technically a command-line tool, the MP3val frontend offers a graphical user interface for Windows users, as can be seen in the screenshot above. On the download page, make sure to select the MP3val-frontend 0.1.1 binaries. The MP3val core (command-line) is up to version 0.1.8 and can be used on both Windows and on Linux after compilation.
The majority of, but not all, files can are repairable. It’s possible that some files have been distorted beyond repair. It’s also possible that you’re not looking at a ‘real’ MP3 file. If you downloaded this from a shady source, I suggest doing a full system spyware sweep.