After iOs 5.1 Update iTunes Resyncing 'Some' Songs

Question

Hello ... I will attempt to practice brevity here, especially because I've researched the issue, and have seen strings that date back to 2005, however, I have tried some of the suggested fixes, and nothing has resolved my issue. I am unsure if this is certainly an iOS 5.1 issue, but I have never encountered it until I updated to 5.1 from 4.2.8 this past weekend. I had reservations about updating for a while because my previous update resulted in serious battery loss, and I was simply given a new (refurbished) iPod Touch from Apple to address the battery issue. All very well, but I obviously lost all of my data/media.
So here it goes ... I started my update to 5.1 until I reached a point where it said that the device was being rebooted, and not to disconnect the device. I left the device plugged in, and it eventually came up with a screen asking me to choose language, etc., and started walking me through setting the device up. I then was given a choice to restore from backup, or set-up as a new device. I chose to set-up as a new device. I was then asked to connect the device to iTunes. I had never disconnected the device because I was never prompted to do so, so I just left it connected. I waited for a long while, and realized it was not going to finish the process, so I started researching that issue. In my case, I was stuck in a loop, and the prcocess would never complete, but it appeared that the new iOS was installed, so I had no other choice than to disconnect/reconnect and restore my device, which I did. This of course wiped out my media. Not terribly happy about this, but what can one do??
Ok, now I have 5.1 and need to go about putting my music back on. Note that I am very particular about my library and/or mp3 tags, and my entire collection is very neatly tagged using mp3Tag. I would also like to point out that I have never had any issues with copying music to/from my device before this update. I also manually manage my music/library, which have always done so, and do no sync podcasts, movies, etc. I use the device for music, a small amount of video's ... as well as apps. As I start adding music, I started noticing that after a loaded a number of discs, it appeared to be resyncing a number of items as I went along. This number increased as I moved along. If I selected an album of 10 songs to copy to the iPod, it would say: "updating ... 256 songs". It would first copy the songs I selected, and then I guess it would resync items already on the iPod. I say 'guess' because this sorta flashed by, and it was hard to tell what it was syncing. After a while, I decided something was amiss, and researched this issue. I saw different posts of 'resyncing' problems, and tried a few of the suggestions. Most of the suggestions seemed to point towards the tags, and I saw a number of suggestions to select all, choose 'get info' and make 1 change such as checking the box for album artwork, and then try syncing again. The issue persisted.
I then decided to start over. I wiped all of my music, and started slowly adding music and paying attention to any resyncing. Eventually, I found that it started with one song, so I investigated the tag, and nothing seemed amiss. It was tagged the same as the others. Nothing was off, such as album artist not being the same as artist, etc. All the tags are V2.3, and always have been. As I moved along, the same thing was happening. It seems like it just didn't like certain songs from certain albums, and they would be added to a list to resync. At least that's what it appears.
I'm really unsure where to go from here. I did do a full uninstall/re-install of iTunes, which did not resolve the issue. I was thinking of renaming my iTunes library file(s) to .old, and starting a new library, but decided I would post here to see if anyone else has experienced this?
I started over again this morning. I wiped all the songs, and started adding them again. What's interesting, is that now, when I select say, 12 songs to copy, it says it's updating 27 songs, and as I watch the update, when it gets to the 12th song, it just finishes ... even though it says it was updating 27 songs. This is so odd to me, and I never experienced this before this update, so it made me think it had to do with the way the new iOS is reading tags??????? I have no idea.
Thanks to any/all for reading, and providing any assistance they may have.
Cheers!
-peter

Answer 1

I have more info.  I am using a program to look at the files on my iPhone.  I did some testing and I came up with this.  When a photo is edited ( in my case cropping) an image is created in the Metadata folder.  The metadata folder is contained in a folder called PhotoData.  For some reason, the cropped JPG is put within this metadata folder.  The  DCIM folder contains the "actual image" you saved from the internet or wherever.  When a photo is edited in camer roll, a .XMP file is created for that image (Sometimes) and it's about 1kb.  Coincidentally, the image that is pixelated DOES NOT have an .XMP file associated with it in the DCIM folder.  
To conclude, it seems that the pictures that have a .XMP file associated with it in the DCIM folder does not come out as pixelated.
If there is a .XMP file then the photo in the Metadata folder become pixelated.