While there are third-party tools out there that let you fix things, TagScanner comes to mind, it turns out that if you’re using Windows 7, you can fix your music files directly using features built into the operating system.

Let’s look at an example, shall we?

Looking at music files

Do you notice how the track number on ’08 – Go With the Flow.mp3′ is missing? Look at the column between Album and Title. The one labeled “#”. For this song, it should have an 8, but it’s not there. Let’s fix that!

Right click that entry to bring up the context menu.

context menu

Select the ‘Properties’ item from the context menu and you’ll see the Properties dialog:

Properties dialog

Select the Details tab and put the right value, in this case 8, into the # field:

the Details tab

You’re almost there! Now, just press the OK button.

When you look at the file in your file viewer, you’ll now see that it has the correct track number. Even better, when you copy this file to your iPod, the track will play in the correct order.

correct File Viewer

You did it! Note that this example focused on fixing the track number, but you can change just about any property of a song file including artist, album, genre, etc.