How to add cover art to tracks on the Sony Ericsson W890i

How to use the new Media Manager software to add cover art to your music tracks and transfer them to your Sony Ericsson W890i

The Sony Ericsson W890i uses the latest Walkman 3.0 music player software and one of the key benefits of this is its ability to show album art when you are playing back tracks.

Previously the supplied software didn't allow you to extract cover art onto your tracks but the new Sony Media Manager software at last incorporates this useful feature.

Using Media Manager to place cover art onto your W890i's music:

Install Media Manager onto your PC. Make sure your register for both Media Manager and the Gracenote (formerly CDDB) music recognition software when prompted
Quit and restart Media Manager. Insert an audio CD. Media Manager should automatically look up the album, artist, track names and cover art on the Gracenote database. Note: if this doesn't happen click on the Settings tab, then click on the CD Extract button on the left panel. Make sure that the Enable CD Lookup checkbox is checked. Then click on the CD tab and click the Look Up MusicID button - or simply reinsert the CD
Click on the Extract Music Tracks button to import the CD audio tracks to your PC
Now use the supplied USB cable to connect your W890i to the PC. The phone will prompt you for various options when you connect - select Mass Storage
If this is the first time you have used the phone with Media Manager you will be asked to give it a unique name
When the W890i appears in the phone pane select the music you want to transfer across and drag it down into the Music folder
Disconnect your phone and select the Walkman icon or button. The artwork should now appear when you play back your new tracks. If it doesn't appear, click on Options and Settings then Visualizations. Make sure the Album Art option is selected. The album art should now appear.

Using third-party software or a Mac

If you don't want to use Media Manager you can use other tools to embed the cover art into the MP3 or AAC files. On a Windows PC, one free program that does this is Album Cover Art Downloader. You can also use Music Match, Windows Media Player or iTunes. On a Mac, iTunes is the best option.

One thing you have to remember - because of a bug, the Walkman 3.0 software cannot display high resolution cover art images.

Ideally the cover art you use should match the following criteria:

Completely square image (ie the width and height are identical in size)
No larger than 200 x 200 pixels
In the JPEG format

Adding cover art on iTunes

Don't use the built-in cover art download feature (found under Advanced > Get Album Artwork). The cover art that Apple uses is too high resolution for your W890i and while it will look great in iTunes it won't display on your handset.

In iTunes, find the song you want to add album art (you can select multiple songs - such as an album - by shift-clicking them).

Click on CTRL and I (ignore the alert). You will see a set of menus if you are editing a single track's info - if you are editing multiple tracks you will see a single window showing the shared information you can edit.

Find the artwork you want to add to the track(s) making sure it matches the criteria set out above. Copy and paste it into the Artwork box then click on OK

Transfer music to your W890i

When you have added the artwork to your music simply transfer it to your W890i by using the USB cable or via the M2 card.

The artwork should now appear when you play back your edited tracks. If it doesn't appear click on More then Settings and then Visualizations.

Make sure the Album Art option is selected. The album art should now appear.