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Hi,
I used to listen to a lot of audiobooks during a day on my iPod. Since I have a decent sized memory card in my HTC Topaz, I'd rather use it instead so I only need one device with me. The problem is that all of my audiobooks are in .m4b format, so I need something that runs on WinMo that can:
1. Play this .m4b format (I think it's just AAC)
2. Bookmark where I am in each book so if I close and re-open the player, the book continues from where I left off
3. Allows fine tuned rewind/fast forward as I often rewind 5-30 seconds to hear some part of a book a second time
4. Show me the chapters of M4B (Unicode support).
5. In iPod there is an option to listen at faster speed, which is very nice when you can short the time for a book by 25%.
6. Support the Bluetooth Play(Main)/Next Chapter(VolUp) etc buttons.
I've found tcpmp/core player can play .m4b's, but it's not great at bookmarking. That is, if I'm listening to a book, close the player and re-open it, the bookmark works fine and it continues to play where I left off. However, if I open any other file in between, the bookmark is lost. This is made worse by the inability to do any fine tuned rewind/fast forward. The only option is to use the progress slider, which tends to jump in VERY large increments.
Any suggestions?
You hit the nail on the head with this one. Any luck finding an app for us??
m4b on windows mobile
still an unsolved question... The first post here still brings it right to the point!
There are two indispensable functions regarding a m4b player for me:
- remember last position for each audiobook when stop playing / restart player / change audiobook
- possibility to list and scroll through chapter marks (!) - which seems not to be possible with any player I know...
I'd be glad to hear somebody has found a solution???
PocketMusic 5.3.5 does remember playing position in m4b, however chapters navigation is still an open issue.
wjenya said:
Hi,
I used to listen to a lot of audiobooks during a day on my iPod. Since I have a decent sized memory card in my HTC Topaz, I'd rather use it instead so I only need one device with me. The problem is that all of my audiobooks are in .m4b format, so I need something that runs on WinMo that can:
1. Play this .m4b format (I think it's just AAC)
2. Bookmark where I am in each book so if I close and re-open the player, the book continues from where I left off
3. Allows fine tuned rewind/fast forward as I often rewind 5-30 seconds to hear some part of a book a second time
4. Show me the chapters of M4B (Unicode support).
5. In iPod there is an option to listen at faster speed, which is very nice when you can short the time for a book by 25%.
6. Support the Bluetooth Play(Main)/Next Chapter(VolUp) etc buttons.
I've found tcpmp/core player can play .m4b's, but it's not great at bookmarking. That is, if I'm listening to a book, close the player and re-open it, the bookmark works fine and it continues to play where I left off. However, if I open any other file in between, the bookmark is lost. This is made worse by the inability to do any fine tuned rewind/fast forward. The only option is to use the progress slider, which tends to jump in VERY large increments.
Any suggestions?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try elaudiobooks
http://forum.xda-developers.com/win...oks2-audio-t2922308/post56362244#post56362244
Hi guys,
I tried to find out if something was already posted... but nothing came.
So I am looking for a good podcast reader which would enable me to download and manage my audio Podcast directly on my HTC HD2.
For the moment I am using YomoMedia, but it only alow to download/keep the last 20 Feed and sometimes I need to be able to have more. Plus it is not possible to listen to them directly in the application and because of that it is not possible to listen to them, one after the other without doing anything.
Thanks for your suggesiton.
Ulysses
I second that.
Since I've bought my Kaiser i've been looking for a good podcast app.
For me, it should have:
Podcast Playlist - I want do press "play" and it would play my new podcasts one after another, without stopping and without the need to go in the phone to play the next (a must to listen to podcasts while runnig, for example).
Automatic download - I should be able to scheduled download, for exemplo, every day at 08:00. It would also be nice if it has a funcion like "refresh whenever there is an available connection".
Also, I want one that will not only refresh but download the audio itself, so, if I want to listen to it later, I can, even without internet.
All the options I've tried have some or none of this, wich is kind of frustrating...
BeyondPod seems to be very good.
Automatically checks and downloads new podcasts (on program launch or in the background on a schedule).
Can configure to only download over WiFi, or 3G as well.
Can choose media player to play back podcasts (incl itegrated one)
Free
romperstomper said:
BeyondPod seems to be very good.
Automatically checks and downloads new podcasts (on program launch or in the background on a schedule).
Can configure to only download over WiFi, or 3G as well.
Can choose media player to play back podcasts (incl itegrated one)
Free
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I saw this in OpnMarket, but it misses the "playlist" function.
You can't play podcasts sequencially and without intervention...
zefiltrin said:
I second that.
Since I've bought my Kaiser i've been looking for a good podcast app.
For me, it should have:
Podcast Playlist - I want do press "play" and it would play my new podcasts one after another, without stopping and without the need to go in the phone to play the next (a must to listen to podcasts while runnig, for example).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That is exactly what I mean, thanks for the better formulation
I found a kind of work around...
You kann manage and download your podcast with YomoMedia. Then you will find them in the Normal HTC Sense Music player (in Library, Artist under the name of the podcast or Radio who produce the podacst, etc...)
Then you can play them one after the other using the Repeat function.
But of course it only work if you have several podcast produce by the same source... or maybe with the Genres (by me they are under Radio), etc...
It is not ideal... but better than nothing !
umaccaud said:
I found a kind of work around...
You kann manage and download your podcast with YomoMedia. Then you will find them in the Normal HTC Sense Music player (in Library, Artist under the name of the podcast or Radio who produce the podacst, etc...)
Then you can play them one after the other using the Repeat function.
But of course it only work if you have several podcast produce by the same source... or maybe with the Genres (by me they are under Radio), etc...
It is not ideal... but better than nothing !
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It is a good idea indeed, but the problem is that, when you listen to you podcasts regularly, most of the times you'll have only one episode of each.
What I'd really like is this.
I have podcasts feeds 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.
Today, I have new episodes in 2, 4 and 5.
I want to just push "play" and listen to 2, 4 and 5, marking then automatically as "read".
Tomorrow I have new ones in 1, 2 (different from the day before) and 4. So I want to press play and, again, only listen to the new ones, without having to manually go to podcast 1, then 2, then 4...
I really like now the "SmartRSS Touch GR Edition" - great name eh?
It works online with a direct link to google reader where I have my RSS catalogue.
The Podcast section of this app is great - I can select if I want to download a podcast and then it keeps it in a separate folder. I don't know the limit, however, on how many. Give it a try.
As of Jan 3,2011...
If anyone can give information / review about how different apps save downloaded art, it would be very helpful. It seems that art can be embedded in ID3 tags, or it can have put in a folder. But different programs save in different folders or into an "album art" file...which may not be compatible with different programs. Also, how does iTunes, Winamp, and Windows Media handle this? (Ive used each for my music collection, and so may have different types of cover art formats in my collection)
12/28/2010 I didn't mean to start making this into a bigger post. But let me first say what I'm looking at/for:
Features I'm paying attention to:
headset control
Lock Screen and homepage widget
General UI ( and in particular, ease of getting from a "playlist" back to the "Now playing" quickly
Features which are sort of cool to me:
lyric display
Folder / File Organization
Album art (it would help me if someone could tell me about the different types and options here. ID3 mode? Files?
(and a distant fourth in importance) Video player
Equalizer (I don
't care about this but everyone else seems to be)
Features are just can't get myself to care about:
Scrobbing (whatever the hell that is)
Social stuff
Any damn fraking thing that statistically analyzes my preference in order to help me decide what I like. I don't want to robotize my music.
So this is what I have looked at so far:
Samsung Default:
Great Status bar and lock screen controls. headset controls. Has equalizer. NO Folder Select (it scans all music on the phone and so will get unintended stuff into the library). Nothing special other than this, but it a good app. HOWEVER, I'm now using Darky's ROM which does not have the Samsung Lock Screen. The Samsung player's lockscreen widget is tied to the Samsung lockscreen. Also does not have homescreen widget, but this is more than made up for by the very good notification bar integration.
Meridian:
Plays video and music. Headset controls but no lock screen. Good gesture control. Edit ID Tags
Cubed:
Video and Music. NIce Lockscreen widget. Headset controls. Art download in ID3 mode. However I still don't terribly like the interface, but it works. Has a directory filter , so can play just a folder and keep out unwanted songs (like game songs). Downloads art in ID3...method. Don't know if that's good or bad. There really is no "Now Playing" screen. It just shows it super-imposed on the song library. Which is not pretty but its actually functional. For me, Cubed is a good free app.
MixZing:
Plays music and video. Options up the yingyang, including lots of social crap. I'm not going to detail here because lockscreen version is a paid app, and I'm focusing on not paying (it does have trial period though). Good UI. Can do folder view, and has good folder management options. Can switch between folder list and now playing very quickly. Has headset controls. Has Equalizer. Auto-download album art. The free version is staying on my phone because it plays video. Lots of damn social crap.
Winamp:
Just plays Music. Interface easy, but maybe a little dull (maybe there are skinning options?). Has headset controls and lockscreen. Ability to look up info and search on the artist. Ability to syn with Winamp desktop, so a good choice if you use that. Some social crap. No Equalizer
DoubleTwist:
Looks a little like Winamp, but also plays video. Has Lockscreen wideget and headset controls. With $5 purchase can sync with Itunes. No equalizer.
UI is mostly good, if not exciting. Does not do folder view(!). Not that many options. If I wanted to use one player for both music and video, and have the lockscreen widget and handset controls, this definitly works. It also has art download, but that's not so important to me. I also use iTunes Agent to file-sync anyway.
Miui:
Bare basic player. No equalizer. No lockscreen widget. No headset controls. What this does have is a) art download , and most exciting b) lyric read-along. I intend to use this app just for my KTV practice, so it will stay on my phone
(but I recently discovered Lyrics App, which allows me to see Lyrics of everything).
PowerAmp:
This has everything. But the free version is 15 day trialware, and I don't want to go through it all here. One thing I remember about this is that it allows fine customization of its widget appearence.
TinyPlayer:
As the name implies, a small player with minimum bells and wistles. My device is an SGS which generally has an OK time with demanding applications, so this is not for me. But for those who want a simple bare-minimum player, this works.
......
Others have mentioned apps which I need to pay for to try, such as Lithium Player... apps which have a social network focus (Tunewiki), and apps that I need to flash (CW Mod). I'm sorry I cannot add these to this list now.
12/27/2010
I'm in China and sometimes the market is problematic (although I could just fix that with a VPN). When I can download again, I intend to note the features of :
btunes
Astro Player
TuneWiki
Also, I will re-download all the above (I just wiped-flash Darky's awesome ROM for my SGS) and go back over the others and note down features I missed.
Here is a pic of the homescreen widgets.
Widgets (from top to bottom):
Meridian
Cubed
MixZing
Winamp
Doubletwist
I'll never understand why people say they don't understand "cubed" interface. What's confusing about it? It's the same thing as scrolling through albums with a little animation. The new update gives you control over the directory files, so it's not like it's different then any other player. Do people really get that shocked when they see something that looks different but operates the exact same?
Just scroll up or down, man. You'll see the albums or artist (depending on how you choose) in ABC order. You want to skip to a different letter, scroll side to side. That's literally the entire learning curve. Don't like the cube? Change the view mode to Morph Flow. Don't like looking at albums? Change the view mode to boring, it just gives you a list.
The only thing I can possibly imagine people being slow to realize is that to change the place of a song, you click on the dotted light thing at the bottom. To change from artist to album to song you drag the dotted bar in the bottom-middle to the right or left.
This all took me less then 2 minutes to figure out.
poweramp = iTunes . I'm off it. same **** different skin. Cubed can scan all the bands in your library and tell you A) when their upcoming release is and B) the next time their playing a show within 50 miles of you (you can adjust the distance). Now THAT'S practical application.
I appreciate you putting this list together. It is exactly what I was looking for. Thanks.
Hands down the best player is TINY PLAYER. It actually does REAL folder play like you're using windows explorer on your home computer.
Another great feature is the live font size option which lets me read long file names. Even Poweramp doesn't have that crucial feature. What good is it if I can't read what song it is. Especially true for Classical music with long file names.
PS - It is the ugliest ui ever tho lol. But I really don't care.
PS2 - Poweramp doesn't have everything. It lacks sleep timer and font size changing to read long file names. And no true folder play. Both of which are available in tiny player. and it is tiny at 64kb
I figured I would throw a few notes in the discussion about music players since music is a big part of my Android experience. I use two apps, one for playing music located on my phone, and another app for streaming from my home PC.
1) Mixing:
the main reason I bought this app was because of the lock screen abilities. Not only does it give you gesture commands from the lock screen, but it also has a setting that will make the lock screen come active for a few seconds each time a new song starts, showing the album art and song information. I like this a lot since it allows me to see what has just started playing, and mainly because it gives me a few seconds to skip the song if I do not like it ... instead of having to hit the power button first to activate the screen, like all the other music apps do ... it's one less step to distract you when driving. It is a small, nitch feature, but it is worth the money of the full version app for me. I have yet to find another music app that does this.
2) Audiogalaxy:
Hands down, this is the best app to use if you want to stream music from your home computer. This is great for people like me that have huge music libraries that will not fit on an SD card. All you have to do is download the app for your phone, install a small program on your PC, and sign up on their website. It is free, and it simply works with no hastles. I have tried many other apps that I could not get to work ... they all required me to **** around with ports and IP addresses, and I could not get any of them to work. Audiogalaxy was so easy my mom could do it. No screwing around with ports or IP's, just install, setup which folders you want to scan, and then wait for it to build your library. Great app!!
Hopefully Mixzing adds streaming ability into its code so I can just use one music app. Until then I will continue to use these two apps together. Together they make for an awesome music experience on the Android phone.
hi, nice list for reference.
just a quick note from me, i'm using miui and the lockscreen and heatset controls works on cm6 which has those tweaks modded on.
irish22022 said:
I'll never understand why people say they don't understand "cubed" interface. What's confusing about it? ...
Just scroll up or down, man. You'll see the albums or artist (depending on how you choose) in ABC order. ...
...Cubed can scan all the bands in your library and tell you A) when their upcoming release is and B) the next time their playing a show within 50 miles of you (you can adjust the distance). Now THAT'S practical application.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I guess I should say I like "folder view". Or just Song List. I have a lot of songs from independents, songs un-attributed in the tags, songs from Chinese artists, etc. So I don't want to go to an Album or Artist, but rather to a folder. I'm sorry...I did not know the correct terminology.
As for internet-related content, you may have seen I call that stuff "social crap". I have no idea what scrobbing is. The artists don't come to China. And even if I was in the US, I really could not care to share my music tastes with others... let everyone find their own muse.
nghj said:
hi, nice list for reference.
just a quick note from me, i'm using miui and the lockscreen and heatset controls works on cm6 which has those tweaks modded on.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Oh. Sounds cool. I don't want to have to flash something just to get that function though. But having lyrics is fun.
AlexNC75 said:
I figured I would throw a few notes in the discussion about music players since music is a big part of my Android experience. I use two apps, one for playing music located on my phone, and another app for streaming from my home PC.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm just focusing on Apps that I can use outside. But thanks for those comments. Does AudioGalaxy allow non-streaming, regular functionality? FYI some of the other players above (I think Meridian) also have streaming, but I didn't review this because its not something I look for. I need to update for this feature I guess.
I will now download tinyplayer and add this to the review. I also hope to download (from somewhere) the stock Android player.
Right now probably Doubletwist will be my main player, only because its a music and video player that has lockscreen widget and headset controls. OR I will try to reinstall the Galaxy SGS player (which is uninstalled after flashing Darky's ROM). Funny thing is Doubletwist's main sell-point is iPhone integration, and I don't care enough about that to purchase it.
If I was going to spend money (which I may just do), then Mixing is the best of what I have reviewed so far. I don't know if its worth $5 for now.
I personally use 2 music players
1 standard CyanogenMod player
2 Lithium player
I normally do this because I will have music on lithium, and podcast download through methods other than my podcast player in t he CM music player.
since nobody mentioned lithium and it's a pay app I would mention a few things..
Pro: Looks great, UI is great and has nice things like volume built in, multi-colors/customizations and the #1 reason I bought it is it grabs album art for with a few clicks!
Cons: The ui for FF/RW skips to big of a segment in a 2 hour, or 2 hour podcast (not a big deal, it's a music player not a podcast player) and one semi-major issue for me is the program NEVER shows up in tasks (holding home), or previously used programs (etc). For some reason android doesn't recognize it as a program and the CM lockscreen music controls don't work for it.
To me the pro's outweigh the cons so I purchased it even if just for the album grabber.
I still really like bTunes.
I know it's abandonware, but it's only $1.49.
Looks like the iPod player (may be a good thing or a bad thing), it's very simple to use, it has a nice widget and even though it hasn't been updated in some time, it works great on froyo and never crashes on my phone. I don't think it has an equalizer.
TuneWiki is my fave, actually one of my fave Android apps.
Music Player Pro is still the best for me, I wish PowerAmp gets some of MPP features to use only one.
Thanks for the comments about the apps you tested
Tinyplayer for me on the Inc. Half the players can't find the built in memory. Most of the others can't restrict themselves to a folder so a bunch of sound files that aren't music and belong to games.
dvdivx said:
Tinyplayer for me on the Inc. Half the players can't find the built in memory. Most of the others can't restrict themselves to a folder so a bunch of sound files that aren't music and belong to games.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm looking at Mort Player now and it also does folder selection but has a lot more options, (headset control for one)
I'm still using the basic player ...
I've tried some of the more robust apps, but damn if they don't chew up a bunch of runtime memory, causing lag. I'd like an equalizer, but I don't want all the extra garbage that comes with an app, when I don't need it.
Have gone through various music players but Power Amp is the best it's worth paying for in the market.
Rockbox is absolutely the best choice. Equalizer, actual playlist support, themes, lockscreen controls, and plays every codec at the highest quality you throw at it. Just missing widgets, but it's a little buggy at the moment and it's still early in development.
i think u forgot TTPOD
A nice feature is if it is compatible with Last.FM scrobble apps
Nice summary atm i use Winamp becausr it has a esay ui and i love the shoutcast Radio Feature but maybe i switch to Double Twist because of the wifi sync i dont know yet...
Lollipop_Lawlipop said:
Rockbox is absolutely the best choice. Equalizer, actual playlist support, themes, lockscreen controls, and plays every codec at the highest quality you throw at it. Just missing widgets, but it's a little buggy at the moment and it's still early in development.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I will check it out. Widgets is a must-have for me, unless it also has a status bar control option (which is even better than widgets.
jonny68 said:
Have gone through various music players but Power Amp is the best it's worth paying for in the market.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I tend to agree, but I'm not sure how much money I want to spend on my phone. Part of me wants to get an iPhone and never have to fudge around with settings and roms again. Part of me hates the iPhone because I can't do with it what I want. So I'm trying not to invest more money in my phone unless I get something really really must-have. As the default player with the SGS is good (and now can use it with Darky's ROM), I'm good.
phoezies said:
i think u forgot TTPOD
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Will check it out and update.
Zalastax said:
A nice feature is if it is compatible with Last.FM scrobble apps
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm in China and so have missed the social network craze. I think if I was in USA, I still would have missed it.
Poapfel said:
Nice summary atm i use Winamp becausr it has a esay ui and i love the shoutcast Radio Feature but maybe i switch to Double Twist because of the wifi sync i dont know yet...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Winamp's UI is easy, but Double Twist is very similar UI IMO.
I have gone through a bunch of players on Play store, but I haven't managed to find what I'm looking for. It's really very simple: I want a music player (I refuse to watch video on anything smaller than the 55" in my cabin or the 2,5 meter wide screen in my home theater, and I don't commute, so I have no need to kill time (which I don't have enough of anyway, working in a home office)) that doesn't read anything but file names, and that operates with folders. I don't need any grouping, I have my music/podcasts/audio books sorted in neat folders. But the problem is that I need to be able to tick boxes for choosing several files to play. That way I can line up 4-5 podcasts or whatever fits my schedule at the moment and won't have to take the phone up of my pocket before they are done. I have found several that works on folders (like Folder Play), but none of them allows me to tick boxes or easily multi select in any other way. I have been using my Windows Mobile 6.5 HTC HD2 until today and if there was something that worked like Pocket Player I'd be good. The problem is that even Pocket Player for Android doesn't work like Pocket Player... So please, give me suggestions for a good and easy app!
Mastiff said:
I have gone through a bunch of players on Play store, but I haven't managed to find what I'm looking for. It's really very simple: I want a music player (I refuse to watch video on anything smaller than the 55" in my cabin or the 2,5 meter wide screen in my home theater, and I don't commute, so I have no need to kill time (which I don't have enough of anyway, working in a home office)) that doesn't read anything but file names, and that operates with folders. I don't need any grouping, I have my music/podcasts/audio books sorted in neat folders. But the problem is that I need to be able to tick boxes for choosing several files to play. That way I can line up 4-5 podcasts or whatever fits my schedule at the moment and won't have to take the phone up of my pocket before they are done. I have found several that works on folders (like Folder Play), but none of them allows me to tick boxes or easily multi select in any other way. I have been using my Windows Mobile 6.5 HTC HD2 until today and if there was something that worked like Pocket Player I'd be good. The problem is that even Pocket Player for Android doesn't work like Pocket Player... So please, give me suggestions for a good and easy app!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try Music Folder Player, it lets you select the folder you wish to play. Here's the link: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=de.zorillasoft.musicfolderplayer&feature=search_result
What about Rockbox? You are the same as me, music are sorted in neat, organized folders. You can just browse through folder method and long pressing a few to add in queue.
Or, you can try XenoAmp, which is pretty the same, except that one press adds the selected music into the queue right away. It is available in the section you posted here (not in Play Store).
Rockbox: http://rasher.dk/rockbox/android
Thanks! I'll have a look at all the suggestions.
How about PlayerPro , which u can try its "Folder Browser" feature.
Sent from my GT-N7105 using Tapatalk 2
While I enjoy working out, I will admit that going without my favorite music makes it much more difficult — especially with cardio. For me, good music equals gains. Equally important, though, is keeping track of progress, but that can often require switching between two or three apps. That is, unless you go old-school and carry a notebook.
Starting today, users of Runtastic will be able to access curated playlists from Play Music directly within the fitness app. These span a wide variety of genres and styles for any mood or physical activity. Control of the music is integrated directly into the Runtastic app, in the obvious "Music" section.
Finally, Google is offering all users of Runtastic, on iOS and Android, free trials of Play Music for custom playlist creation and ad-free streaming. There is not any mention in the announcement of how long the trial is.
This sounds great for all of you who use both of these apps for your workouts. It's even tempting enough for me to re-download Runtastic (it's been a few years) to give this a go when I hit the gym today.