[SOLVED] How can I make Windows auto play music on USB drive in order?

[Skillet06]

So I am helping a client put his audiobook tracks on a USB drive but the general audience that will be listening to this audiobook are older and know nothing about computers which means they don't know how to click on file explorer, navagate to the USB drive, highlight all the tracks, right click play, and start playing the audio tracks in order. I remember back in the day when I had Windows XP I would insert a CD and it would automatically open Windows Media Player and start playing the tracks in order. How can I program a USB drive to do that or essentially turn a USB drive into a CD?

 

[BFG-9000]

For security reasons, Autorun hasn't been enabled by default since Windows Vista, where you could even set a USB drive to automatically open a WMP playlist file. You should still be able to make an Autorun.inf play a CD or DVD automatically.

But when you insert a USB, it should prompt an Autoplay popup asking if you want to play the files. Have you tried numbering the file names in the order that they should be played?

 

[Math Geek]

autorun.inf file is what i would also do. it can point to a playlist file which should already be associated with some media player in windows. pretty sure it defaults to media player anyway.

the other option i would consider is combining the audiobook tracks into one single long file. that way it can't be out of order

just a thought anyway. but the autorun.inf file is def where i'd start looking for the autoplay answer.

if this will be played on only a couple pc's you can set it the first time you get the "what do you want to do with this?" pop-up. you tell it to open it with the preferred media player and it won't ask again.

but if they are gonna pass it around then they'll have to click the media player option when it pops up. hopefully they can handle that part.

 

[Skillet06]

Order isn't an issue as I use FAT Sorter so they should play in order but the tricky part would be making sure that when one track ends the next starts or when they press the next track button (I>I>)
Also I can't merge all the tracks into one because there are references on some tracks referring to others and this has to be able to play on Windows, Mac, and Bluetooth speakers via USB input.

I guess it doesn't have to automatically play when inserted, they should be able to figure out the autorun pop-up but as long as it is more simple than performing the usual steps that we would usually do that I referred to earlier.

OMG I can't believe I didn't think of creating an autorun.inf file that is in like every freaking CD or USB program... Thanks for the tip! . Thanks again guys, I knew y'all would steer me in the right direction! 😀 Big preesh!