Zune HD - "This item is missing or can't be played."

jstern2 · 05-25-2010, 05:54 PM

I have a 16 gb Zune HD. Sometime when I try to play music, the Zune will say "This item is missing or can't be played." and skip over the song, or it will play the wrong song (sometimes it'll even play a podcast even though I'm trying to listen to a song), or it will play the song but then half way through the song will change to another seemingly random song on my Zune, even though the Zune says the original song is still playing. Usually just re-syncing the song works, but then this problem will affect other songs after that re-syncing, and sometimes I'm not near my computer to re-sync and it becomes very frustrating. I hope I explained this well, but please help. Thanks.

kcoppock · 05-25-2010, 06:41 PM

Have you deployed any OpenZDK apps? I usually have this problem if I forget to restart after running one of them. Any DRMd tracks will be unplayable until you restart. Is that the case?

jstern2 · 05-25-2010, 06:44 PM

No, I haven't. At least I don't think I have because I'm not sure what openZDK apps are. I'm assuming they're not the standard Zune apps, because those are the only ones I used.

kcoppock · 05-25-2010, 06:47 PM

Does it seem to be only the tracks that have been purchased with DRM through the marketplace (or Zune Pass content) or is it doing it with regular ripped tracks too?

jstern2 · 05-25-2010, 06:54 PM

It does it with all songs (I get most of my music from ripping or legal indie torrents).

kcoppock · 05-25-2010, 06:58 PM

Gotcha. Hmm, that is bizarre.

Assuming you have all the contents of your Zune on your desktop computer still, I would probably do a complete hard wipe, reinstall the firmware, and resync. It'll take you all frickin day (it took mine about 14-15 hours to resync), but it should clear up those problems.

I've not had those exact problems before, but I used to have some glitches to where it wouldn't change tracks, it would just stay at 0:00; some podcasts registered as days worth of playtime remaining; some tracks would say it was playing one song but be playing another. Whatever the case, usually just doing a fresh install and sync clears them up pretty quick.

jstern2 · 05-25-2010, 07:29 PM

That's what I'm trying now. Thanks for the help though. And also, I meant all varieties of songs in my above post, not literally every song on my Zune.

kcoppock · 05-25-2010, 07:32 PM

No problem

Not sure what you mean by the last sentence...? I just meant to make sure all your content would be on your desktop to resync, since reinstalling the firmware will erase everything.

Grimm312 · 05-25-2010, 10:44 PM

Are you letting your Zune sync completely? When it says it's done, it's not actually done. I can't remember what the messages are, but it stays on "sync complete" (or something to that effect) for ages, then it' not completely done until it says "connected" again.

During this time, it's getting the artist pictures, bios, marketplace content etc. MS must consider "syncing" just the actual content, not all the extra stuff that's tacked on.

What i'd advise is to try resyncing, but wait until it says "Connected" again to disconnect.

gjosuem · 05-30-2010, 05:31 PM

Make sure your new zune is linked to your zune account, mine wasn't, that was my issue