Proper MP3 / Media Player - General Topics

Is it me or do none of the available mp3 players really cut it?
I'm no iPod fan, but it does seem to work well, the PDA MP3 players just seem 'clunky'. Now storage is soooo cheap, PDAs are really becoming sensible for use as such devices.
I use my PDA for everything so I want a media player to fit in with everything else, for example when I'm using the sat nav in the car, I want to be able to use it also for playing MP3s over an FM link to the car stereo. When a new track starts I'd like a window to pop up for 2 or 3 seconds telling me what it is, and giving me the chance to skip.
Anyone have more experience than me, and can suggest something?
Thanks!

personally, I use pocket music, but i dont listen to music often. I find its a nice player, really.
maybe the new pocket tunes 4.1 with its iTunes support is to your taste? I havent tried any others (only windows media player).

I'd like this too. I liked using the voice command function of WMP in the car too.
Mortplayer is probably the best I've used. It's free, skinable and very customizable.

Related

Dynamic/Smart playlists in WMP on Mobile (or on an alternative player)

Hi everyone,
As you know WMP has an "Auto playlist" option that lets you create playlists on a set of rules. However, when it syncs it to the WMP mobile, they turn to regular playlists.
E.g if I have a playlist that is "Not played in last 5 days" and I play some songs from it on the WMP Mobile, all the songs will still be there. Is there a way for truly dynamic playlist on WMP Mobile? If not, what other player you know that supports this feature?
Thanks!
I'd love this feature as a way to create a playlist that stays filled with the latest podcasts downloaded from RSS Hub -- and ideally that deletes the ones I've listened to. Any suggestions?
Yeah I've been really disappointed with the media player features as well as the alternative media players in winmo. I hate having to carry my earbuds as well as a jabra bluetooth dongle, so I've switched back to carrying both an ipod and my phone. I'd pay $100 for a decent player with similar features to my ipod touch or my wife's zune.
Conduits Pocket Player. All you'll ever need, including dynamic playlists.
Robrecht said:
Conduits Pocket Player. All you'll ever need, including dynamic playlists.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll try that out; looks like it has a 30-day trial. I've been playing with Mortplayer, and it does at least some of what I'm looking for, for free.
Pocket Player's finger-friendly library is great: it has smooth flick scrolling, handles large libraries (2000+ tracks) effortlessly and is very customizable. Hope you like it too.
Try out Kinoma's Player. Not sure if this one does what you're trying to do, but there is a free version and so far in my use of it, is ridiculously cool. Also supports Orb.com and other streaming content providers, has RSS podcasts that will stream in (not sure if there's a way to download them to the device, again, haven't been using it very long).
http://kinoma.com/freeplay/download/
I've been playing with the Conduits Pocket Player trial and the Kimona FreePlay, which is a crippled version of the full Kimona Player. It's hard to compare them, because Pocket Player is a 30-day trial of the full version, whereas all of the relevant features are turned off in Kimona's free version.
Pocket Player does everything I need. It's great.
Kimona FreePlay's interface, though, is fantastic. If the full version does everything Pocket Player does -- dynamic smart playlists, especially -- it would probably be better than Pocket Player.
(I listen to podcasts on my 30-minute drive to work. Pocket Player has a smart playlist called "recently added", which stays full of various podcasts I subscribe to through RSS Hub -- which is great for one-tap skipping ahead and so forth while I'm driving).
A year has passed.
Has anyone come up with something less clunky for Windows Mobile smart playlists of podcasts (automatically or on demand download new episodes, add to playlist and delete old episodes) than using having to deal with using 2 different apps?
Seems like a really common request that's being ignored for Windows Mobile while good apps are made for Andorid, Blackberry and iPhone.
Even Stitcher.com has elected to make apps for every major smartphone OS except Windows Mobile.

Windows Mobile Media Players?

I love my iPhone because it can be my media player and my phone. But, I need more functionality offered in Windows Mobile.
So, do you guys use your Windows Mobile device as a Media Player? Or do you have separate Zunes/iPods/etc. to do the work of the media player?
If you do use Window Mobile, let me know what program you use for your media!
TCPMP is an excellent media player. I have not found an unlocked audio or video file it could not play. If you search for TCPMP in this forum or in the XDA-Developers Wiki you'll find most anything you'd want to know.
That said, while TCPMP is a nice player, it is not an organizer nor does it have a fancy "choosing" function for selecting files. Perhaps someone could recommend an application that makes launching TCPMP more intuitive.
Both have their place
I've got a Zune 30 that I bring along when I know I'll want plenty of music to choose from. My main reason is that battery life on my Tilt is not what I'd like it to be because my 8 gig sd card has plenty of room for tunes, and S2P is one of the slickest programs I've ever seen. You would be comfortable with it immediately. I do listen to Audible content (newspaper) on my phone every morning with the Kinoma player. It's actually easier to get the content onto my phone than to get it on my Zune. Audible's manager program blows hard. The Kinoma player can handle pictures, video, and streams as well. I use it for Youtube all the time.
As an added bonus for us Zune owners, I recently discoverd that ZunePass subscription content can be synched to our phones with Windows Media Player and plays just fine in either WMP or S2P, so I have been putting more music on the SD card lately.
on those occasions when i only want to carry one device then I use S2P to play audio files on my Trinity.
S2P on the Tilt for music, TCPMP for movies. Done.
Is s2p free? What media formats does it support? Is it A2DP compatible? And does it have any way of controlling music in standby mode (Can you click the D-Pad while the screen is off to skip a song??? Can you control volume using the toggle switches?
Thanks for the tips guys!
I use the HTC Audio Manager, which has a very similar interface to the classic iPod. You can use the D-Pad to control it and the volume switch to change the volume (but I think the device has to be on)
It supports A2DP.
You can also control it from the home screen (http://www.unwiredview.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/htc-touch-diamond-official.jpg)
Kinoma Player
I've used this free program called Kinoma Player which is brilliant.
It has full touch friendly interface, it can stream youtube files, supports many other files, it's great overall, even has podcasts.
I'd recommend that program, you can get it off of Windows Mobile Total Access or from Kinoma's sight directly.
Hey, about the ZunePass stuff, my subscription music doesn't work on my T-Mobile Wing. Any clue why? probably cuz of the DRM's but you guys said urs worked, so it leaves me wondering.
Do you sync ur Zune music to your phone using Windows Media Player sync? Or do you just drag & drop the music to ur card?
Sync the ZunePass content through WMP
and it should work. At least that is what works for me.

Best Music player for HD2?

Hi,
I would like to know which music player is best for playing music on HD?
I looking for someone good player as Ipod or as build on sence, good-looking and have good management also..
Please give me some tips..
THX
I prefer Kinoma Play.
Others you can try are Nitrogen, S2P, Pocketplayer, Mortplayer, Pocketmusic.
I use Kinoma Free Play. It's really good.
Nitrogen
Nitrogen is the best player!
maati said:
I prefer Kinoma Play.
Others you can try are Nitrogen, S2P, Pocketplayer, Mortplayer, Pocketmusic.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Looking good but there you can play lot off thing's i wont only for music for rest i have coreplayer but picasa upload ets not bad too..
Big fan op pocketplayer here...
Kinoma Play by far....
I more and more like the built in HTC music player.
To my mind, mort player ist the best. wvga is supported by many skins it's got mp3 alarm (that works), mp3 and ogg support and it is freeware.
here is the dl:
http://mortplayer.softonic.de/pocketpc
I found S2P and this is not so bad..
I used to use Nitrogen but started to get pauses in the playback for a couple of seconds at a time. With Nitrogen installed these occurred in both the built in Music Player and Nitrogen itself. As soon as I removed it though these pauses also disappeared. Now I use the built in Music Player until I find something better that is also finger friendly.
I would like to ask, which player can support AVRCP on HD2?
Nowadays i get back to buld-in music player.. I didn't found any player to be better..
Probably a stupid question but can I still access the built in htc music player if I have SPB shell installed?
Also, why is Kinoma player described as Free? I thought it was a program you have to pay for?
If you want the best equalizer (you have to pump up the low frequencies in order to get a good bass), best bass level (the best for Rock and Metal music) and a very good UI, you should go for Pocket Player. It has tons of functions (playlists and a lot more organizing functions) and it's the most function oriented music player. It works perfectly with the headset (its buttons) when you install the WMP plugin (something you don't get with the other players) . If you use it combined with the AudioBooster of the phone, the sound will be perfect.
But if you want something simple to use, use PocketMusic (the equalizer is horrible, but the bass booster is very good) or Nitrogen. MortPlayer isn't bad. But it can be difficult to use and it's a heavy program.
So there you have it.
Cret said:
Probably a stupid question but can I still access the built in htc music player if I have SPB shell installed?
Also, why is Kinoma player described as Free? I thought it was a program you have to pay for?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There's a free version called "Kinoma Free Play". It works great for music with no real limitations (except for upgrade ads at startup).
nitrogen is very basic, but does the job. PocketPlayer is without a doubt the best player out there though.
Thanks Nsider
I've tried it now and kinoma keeps hanging when it's scanning through my media on the storage card so I've not actually been able to test it. It's the same video it gets stuck on so I could remove it I guess but not much use if that happens whenever there is a file it doesn't like.
Tried Pocket Player and while it looks like it'd do the job ok it seems REALLY slow to run & respond. Any reason why this would be?
Pocket Player is slow at the first time you run it. Because it searches for your MP3 files and it makes an index of them. Therfor it is slow only for 3-5 minutes. After that, it's very fast and smooth. If you have a class 2 memory card, install Pocet Player on your device memory.
Cret said:
Thanks Nsider
I've tried it now and kinoma keeps hanging when it's scanning through my media on the storage card so I've not actually been able to test it. It's the same video it gets stuck on so I could remove it I guess but not much use if that happens whenever there is a file it doesn't like.
Tried Pocket Player and while it looks like it'd do the job ok it seems REALLY slow to run & respond. Any reason why this would be?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Builtin HTC media player in my books, could do with a few tweaks tho, like search/letters down the side. On Coverflo the albums should be ordered alphabetically. Other than that its perfect! I have about 14gb worth of music and it handles it perfectly.
Other than that, I would also go with PocketPlayer, its really good, loved using that on my Diamond.

[POLL] Which music player are you using?

As a follow up to this thread, let's determine the most popular music player.
Lithium the best
MediaScape not included in the list.
Thread moved to D&H Android General.
Sadly, I think the stock player is the best one yet. The volume rocker and trackball controls are a nice feature. Plus, it just looks nice having the album art as a black and white background while selecting a song.
I have tried several of the more popular players and found them to be fairly ugly and plain.
I remember reading somewhere that most media players dont even have their own audio support, they just use the default/built in audio engine of the regular player anyway...
Stock is working best and with the device controls for me right now.
Subsonic ..... It allows me to have all my music without trying to fit it on my phone
Sent from my ADR6300 using XDA App
Streamfurious, as I don't really use local mp3s.
Stock music player is so primitive it cannot be the best. Maybe most popular if it's good enough for many people, but I think some other players in this poll are better.
chaostic_2k1 said:
Streamfurious, as I don't really use local mp3s.
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Click to collapse
There are many competing streaming music apps (btw Rdio opened to public today). Should make a separate poll for them.
MortPlayer
I've used MixZing, MusicMod, doubleTwist and Meridian
So the conclusion is ... inconclusive. The stock music player seems to be bad enough so that people are trying out other players, but there are no clear winner among non-stock players yet.
Default stock Sense music player is best to me.
I personally prefer RealPlayer. Currently it's in the Market in Beta stage. But it's incredibly clean looking, and easy to use. Plus, I don't have to put my music, video, or pictures in set locations on the SDCard. I can put everything where I want without loss of speed.
I like the stock player on my Captivate.. but for me it lacks lockscreen control and scrobbling. I have been trying other free ones that fit my needs, and may settle on 3 (cubed) for awhile.
(From my Captivate via XDA app)
Id personaly love to see winamp, been using it for years and think its great.
HTC Stock because I don't really listen to mp3s on the phone (ipod), Retro Radio for streams

Music Setup

I don't think there is a lot of discussion about this, so I thought i would start one. Good evening, my name is Gregg and I am a recovering Ioser. It started out with just an ipod...you know it was convenient, it was shiny. It worked well. Buying music was a simple process. You clicked and could listen immediatly. At first it was just occasionally, but I got into the podcast scene and itseemed to fit me perfectly. Podcasts would let me listen to things while I was doing chores around the house. Eventually though podcasts on my ipod weren't enough for me. I also had to carry around a phone on the side, so I decided that maybe it would be OK to try a little iphone. The first click was awesome...phone and tunes...podcasts done well. I was hooked.
For two years I was doing a lot of Ios, but eventually the shiny IOS had me hooked. There were bills for apps that did nothing but make funny noises, their was music that I paid for but never listened to. I was hooked. I probably hit rock-bottom last year. My iosing was out of control and I thought I would go cold turkey. So I got my G2x.
Sorry for the goofy intro, but I though this would set me up a bit. Here's what I have itunes on the windows side. So getting music and podcasts from itunes to the g2X involves multiple layers.
1. Moving music to the machine.
2. Moving and managing podcasts
3. Playing and managing music (which includes playing, rating music and searchng through my music)
So I will start with the first question. From what I understand there are really two ways that I know of to move music and podcasts from itunes to your phone. One is doubletwist, the other is isyncr. There might be others, but these are the two that I worked with. of the two I went with iSyncr and here's why. Doubletwist has a lot going for it. Really a nice interface, and a nice music player on the android side. Its trying very hard to give me, an ex-ioser a bit of what I am missing. The sync app looks like itunes and allows me to sync my playlists. The app looks a lot like itunes. It plays music fine. The player struggled with my phone, though. Somehow it didn't cooperate with the cm7 ROM I am using. It wouldn't play well on the lock screen and seemed buggy. The syncing was buggy too. Genius podcasts wouldn't refresh when they changed on my itunes. There were workaround(relaunch itunes and doubletwist).
Isyncr is a 2.99 purchase. Its simple. You install the app on the android(you pretty much install and forget it) and it syncs when you launch the windows EXE on the memory card when the phone is docked to the computer. It works well. It syncs podcasts, and ratings. To me, that was important because I have this theory that I will rate my music into organization in itunes.Its flawless. I haven't tried the wifi setup, but I might in the future. It doesn't play your music, so its just a solution for syncing.
As for podcasts, I tried very hardto find a solution on the android side that will satisfy my needs right on the android. I bought the full version of pocketcasts. There are a lot of good things going for it, but there are bugs. One that was kind of a deal breaker was that if you try to advance the podcast in the player while its playing you lock up the app. Restart is the only solution. So, it was a good, pretty solution, but it had to go. I tried a couple other apps, but I wasn't sold.
So, ultimately, isyncr is my solution for podcasts too. It woks well, but it will require a daily sync. The advantage ultimatley of syncing from the desktop is also that I am able to make Mp3 CDs of podcasts as well as sync my podcasts from the same source. Simple, efficient and workable.
Which brings me to playing. I love google music(I have two more invites if anyone wants one), and it allows me to access my music when I am around wifi seamlessly. It allows me to make instant mixes based on a song. That's a killer feature. Combined with wireless access to all my music via the cloud its excellent. Advancing and moving within tracks and podcasts works well. Its not a full-feature app, but it works.
Almost there, there is one last aspect. I would like to rate music from my library while its playing. Isyncr has a nice widget that allows you to rate and see your playing apps and see the album art. Its part of the package. The ratings and playcounts go right back to itunes.
My preferences represent my unique quirks in terms of music and listening: I am a podcaster and a music listener and I prefer to rate my music. Because of this I am happy with: Isyncr and google music.
Long set-up, but ultimately I am asking you what your music listening setup is. Thoughts?
I use the standard music app since it has DTS for the g2x. Google music as well for some streaming music. Google Listen app for podcasts. I also like BeyondPod.
I drag and drop music. It's not fancy but I don't mind.
Power Amp with some EQ modifications and Voodoo Sound is how I enjoy my music. I used to use Doubletwist for syncing my music to my phone, but each update made more and more bloated, along with random freezes, so I just uninstalled it. Sony's Media Go software good is good for adding music, but I prefer to drag and drop into organized folders.
Sent from my T-Mobile G2x using XDA Premium App
If you're using a stock ROM, I'd recommend sticking to the stock player because of it's DTS feature. It greatly improves sound quality if you have it selected.

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