Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
thomsens;220410 Wrote: Without better integration, songscanner certainly isn't a fix - it's a workaround at best. If it could be tied to the FF button then maybe you are getting cloer. Check out this thread... KDF explains how to map Songscanner to the FFWD and RW remote buttons, as well as customizing the plugin's default exit behaviour. Great stuff. http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=39114page=5 -- Yannzola Yannzola's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=874 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
...and I believe Sean committed to reviewing both SongScanner and Fishbone and integrating if appropriate. I think we should let him and Dean do that. It seems like a pretty good route forwards. -- DynamicalSystem DynamicalSystem's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=4594 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
slimkid;218199 Wrote: Anyhow, would you care to share for which products/manufacturers you have worked so far - I mean, I could use some avoidance references. Many manuals have the legal disclaimer at the front that the specifications are subject to change at any time without notice. IANAL, but they are not subject to legal restrictions unlike advertising - this notice makes it extra clear. Lighten up. -- Mark Lanctot 'Sean Adams' Response-O-Matic checklist, patent pending!' (http://forums.slimdevices.com/showpost.php?p=200910postcount=2) Mark Lanctot's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=2071 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
seanadams;218214 Wrote: Wow - talk about taking a quote out of context! I think it was pretty clear that TireLegs was referring to the difference between a user's manual and an advertisement (the subject at hand), not saying that a manual shouldn't be accurate. The sentence was taken out of context for shortness and clarity. It is marked with '...' for the purpose of pointing that fact out. Taking it out of context didn't change the meaning and the point of the original text. If you disagree, please, quote the original post and show my malicious intentions. @ Mark: I didn't say it is illegal. I was asking for the list of manufactures who adhere to those practices, so that I can avoid them. And again. What is the purpose of the manual if it isn't accurate? -- slimkid The sound stage will open up, bass will tighten and the imaging will improve. DVD performance will also increase substantially. slimkid's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=8881 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
slimkid;218394 Wrote: The sentence was taken out of context for shortness and clarity. It is marked with '...' for the purpose of pointing that fact out. Taking it out of context didn't change the meaning and the point of the original text. If you disagree, please, quote the original post and show my malicious intentions. Clearly you just want to argue for the sake of arguing. What was the point of this discussion again? @ Mark: I didn't say it is illegal. I was asking for the list of manufactures who adhere to those practices, so that I can avoid them. And again. What is the purpose of the manual if it isn't accurate? Again, nobody is saying that manuals shouldn't be accurate. I'm tired of this thread. You win. Bye. -- seanadams seanadams's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=3 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
slimkid;218394 Wrote: And again. What is the purpose of the manual if it isn't accurate? Of course a manual should be accurate (and as far as I know, every one I have written was at the time it was issued). The critical point you are missing is that the purpose of a manual is to instruct users how to operate a product. It is not for the purpose of enticing purchase. That's what advertising is for. Manufacturers are legally required to deliver what they advertise, but the same legal standard does not apply to user manuals, and never has. Regarding the specific issue of the FF/REW description in the manual, presumably either: a) the manual's author mistakenly assumed that it would function a certain way (often the manual needs to be written before the finished product is ready for testing); or b) the product was originally intended to function the way it is described in the manual, but the engineers were unable to comply, because it turned out to be too difficult, or it would have delayed the release of the product, or other features and functions were deemed to be higher priority, or there's a bug in the firmware, etc. That's why specifications are subject to change without notice. In either case, the manual should be revised to reflect actual operations. Whether the product should be revised is a business decision of the product management team at the manufacturer, and has nothing to do with what happens to be stated in the user manual. Sean's post that started this thread explained in great detail why the company has not implemented FF/REW the way you and some others would like it to work. Frankly, I'm amazed that the CEO of the company would expend the time and effort to make such a post. I have no doubt that he has other important things he could be doing. But at least it's a sign that he cares enough about his users to explain the situation, even if he can't necessarily please everyone. -- TiredLegs TiredLegs's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=6201 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Like I said a few pages earlier, this problem has been fixed by the plugins SongScanner/Looper and the clickable progress bar in the Fishbone skin. Hooray for the plugin programmers, and hooray for Sean for having the wisdom and foresight to make this an open source platform! And Sean seems to be exceptionally in tune with the end users of his product. The system just keeps getting better and better, and I expect this will continue. Of course with such a dynamically developing system, any printed manual is destined to be out of date before it's even printed. I expect that the Wiki and online documentation will mature and take care of most of this, but the fact that the system is currently pretty geeky and the development decentralized, it's going to be hard to find all the information one might need in one place and clearly organized. I'm sure Logitech will be struggling with this as they go forward in trying to make this appeal more to the typical non-geeky consumer. It will be interesting to see what Slim v7 and Jive will bring us. -- bephillips More than 35611 songs on 2849 albums by 2050 artists. Mostly flac, some mp3. SlimServer Version: 6.5.3 - 12361 Mac OS X 10.4.10 (8R218) - EN - utf8 Perl Version: 5.8.6 darwin-thread-multi-2level MySQL Version: 5.0.22-standard On a 1.2GHz G4 Mac iBook with 768MB RAM http://db.etree.org/bephillips bephillips's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=2588 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
amey01;216917 Wrote: Sorry - no. Sure, the manual SHOULD reflect the way the product works, but it did not match the way the product worked when I purchased my Squeezebox. By all means fix the manual so this problem doesn't get raised by future purchasers, but that doesn't eliminate Slim Devices' need to provide me with a product whose performance matches the way it was advertised to me before my purchase! With the ubiquity of this feature, it would be ethical of the manual to explicitily state that this feature does not work. still, even no mention of FF/REW in the manual (although sneaky) would be within requirements. BUT the manual explicitly states this feature does work - and I quote from page nine: Press and hold REW to scan backward through the current song and Press and hold FWD to scan forward through the current song. It is on record that I think the Squeezebox is a fantastic product - ONE OF THE BEST I OWN - but it is essential that anything I purchase matches its advertsied description! A user's manual is not considered advertising (and I say that as someone who has written dozens of user's manuals for electronics products over the years). Manufacturers are not obligated to make products behave the way their manuals say. But they are obligated to make products behave the way their advertising says. -- TiredLegs TiredLegs's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=6201 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
TiredLegs;218190 Wrote: ...Manufacturers are not obligated to make products behave the way their manuals say... Really? So, what then, is the purpose of the manual? Anyhow, would you care to share for which products/manufacturers you have worked so far - I mean, I could use some avoidance references. -- slimkid The sound stage will open up, bass will tighten and the imaging will improve. DVD performance will also increase substantially. slimkid's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=8881 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
TiredLegs;215673 Wrote: It's actually the other way around, i.e., the manual should reflect the way the product operates. So if the manual is wrong, it needs correction. Sorry - no. Sure, the manual SHOULD reflect the way the product works, but it did not match the way the product worked when I purchased my Squeezebox. By all means fix the manual so this problem doesn't get raised by future purchasers, but that doesn't eliminate Slim Devices' need to provide me with a product whose performance matches the way it was advertised to me before my purchase! With the ubiquity of this feature, it would be ethical of the manual to explicitily state that this feature does not work. still, even no mention of FF/REW in the manual (although sneaky) would be within requirements. BUT the manual explicitly states this feature does work - and I quote from page nine: Press and hold REW to scan backward through the current song and Press and hold FWD to scan forward through the current song. It is on record that I think the Squeezebox is a fantastic product - ONE OF THE BEST I OWN - but it is essential that anything I purchase matches its advertsied description! -- amey01 amey01's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=11274 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Pat Farrell;216028 Wrote: thomsens wrote: Pat Farrell;216023 Wrote: A modern PC has a gigabyte of RAM, which can hold a complete CD, uncompressed, in memory. Serious PCs for either Vista or development have two or three gig. If it's really a matter of inadequate hw, then my original assertion that initial architectural decisions (i.e., hw specs) were the problem is true. Sean says that is not the case. Er, I wasn't talking about the SqueezeBox. The question was why can a Windoze Media Center handle it properly, and the reason is that it is a powerful generalized system. I don't quite get how you jump from Sean's initial post in this thread to your conclusion. The SqueezeBox and the Transporter are embedded systems. That is a totally different design space for software than generalized PCs/Mac, etc. What you seem to be asking for is that the price to everyone be increased to meet your needs for FF/RW. I never use it, never tried. Never tried it on the CD players I've had over the decades. I used to do all sorts of stuff when I was a radio station DJ when there were vinyl disks on turntables, but that was long ago and far away.[/url] To suggest based on a limited sample of this forum combined with your opinion that a feature is not required is silly. CD players have had the capability (note I said capability, not interested in the exact implementation) on just about every unit ever made. That's a better sample for me to believe it is a feature folks desire. Combine that with the fact that you now have other common media such as podcasts, etc. that you might want to jump to a certain section in, and in my opinion, the need is greater now than before. I rarely used it on my CD players, I've tried to use it many times on my SD products and have been left frustrated. Instant access to all my music and other media files increases the need for the feature for me. As you should have noted, I believe the memory should be adequate based on what I paid - I don't see how adequate memory should drive the price higher. In any case as Sean's next post indicates, memory is apparently not the issue. What Sean said was that it is not easy. He decided not to do it. What changes because you want it anyway? Great point. What changes is where I spend my $$ over time if the product does not continue to evolve (so far $2600 spent with SD). I'm sure given the choice, Sean would rather have me buy the T2 when my T1 dies. For that matter, I'm sure he's just hoping for the ability to build a T2 one day. Clearly without the base of users to support it, that will never happen. So, the average joe will need to start buying this thing and regardless of your or my opinion, the average joe will definitely expect this feature in a usable format. -- thomsens thomsens's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1352 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
seanadams;216027 Wrote: Not at all. You still have to _get_ all that data to the player. And you still have to be able to generate some audible rendition of it as you scan through the compressed stream. And you still have several of the other issues I originally mentioned, such as supporting the myriad of formats. So only if you had unlimited RAM, CPU, and bandwidth, and only one format to support would it be trivial. And as long as you're having all that, why not a pony too? :) Anyway if you could only change one of those things, I'd say the best one would be the bandwidth. If you're guaranteed the throughput, low latency, and zero packet loss of 100Mbps ethernet (as in the DVR example) then the problem becomes a LOT more manageable. More RAM is nice but certainly wouldn't solve the problem per se. Well, I suppose I cheat because I have GE to every port in the house, but obviously the TP drops that to 100Mbs. I'd be ok with a per client setting to enable a feature based on wired or not. It would be even better if a network health monitor set that capability automatically so the user just gets the best the unit can do at any time...but I'll settle for basic improvement first. -- thomsens thomsens's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1352 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
thomsens wrote: To suggest based on a limited sample of this forum combined with your opinion that a feature is not required is silly. This forum is where customers who have bought SqueezeBoxes and Transporters talk among themselves. The forums in total are for people interested in SD/Logitech audio products. There is no overwhelming demand for this feature in the forums. I have not said that you are silly, or your request is silly. I know you want it. But there is no groundswell of support for it. Instant access to all my music and other media files increases the need for the feature for me. CD players had 'index' support from the start. The idea was the movements or breaks to the chorus, or other musically significant parts could be indexed, so you could instantly go to them, forward or backwards. When CDs came out, reviewers noted with players did this properly. It was an expected feature. But hardly anyone used it, and few CDs carried index markers in their meta data, so over time the feature disappeared. Much like pre-emphasis in the audio tracks. What Sean said was that it is not easy. He decided not to do it. What changes because you want it anyway? Great point. What changes is where I spend my $$ over time if the product does not continue to evolve (so far $2600 spent with SD). I'm sure given the choice, Sean would rather have me buy the T2 when my T1 dies. For that matter, I'm sure he's just hoping for the ability to build a T2 one day. Clearly without the base of users to support it, that will never happen. So, the average joe will need to start buying this thing and regardless of your or my opinion, the average joe will definitely expect this feature in a usable format. I was with you up until the last sentence. It depends on your intended use of the word average. Given the sample of the folks posting to the forums, if you select a customer at random, they won't notice this missing feature. If you select a random sample of users, you would expect that the majority of folks selected don't care. If lots of Joe Customers bought SB's or Transporters, and returned them because this feature was missing, I am sure Sean and others would notice. If the average meaning more than half, so that most of the units were returned, I am sure Sean and others would find a way to fix it no matter how hard it is. Never say never, but when evaluating what features and functions to put in the next unit, a smart company has to listen to what the majority of its customers want. Or, if they can know, what features kept a large portion of the potential customers from purchasing the unit. Sony had better music players than the iPod in many dimensions many years before the iPod. Sony screwed up the interface with fascist DRM that made it unusable for mere mortals. Now, no one remember Sony was there in 1999 and 2000. I have no inside knowledge, but I bet if the SqueezeBox had exactly today's feature set, cost $200 and had a strong national marketing campaign, Logitech could sell four to ten times as many. There are people who want FF/RW, and would be happier, buy more, tell more friends, etc. but I don't think it would increase sales by more than 10%. IMHO, YMMV, etc. -- Pat http://www.pfarrell.com/music/slimserver/slimsoftware.html ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
What is this thread about? There's a perfectly good FF/RW function called songscanner, and a jump-to-a-point-in-the-track function in the fishbone skin. IMO both should be incorporated into the main SS builds as they are far superior to the standard FF/RW feature (which I think we all agree is broken). Meanwhile you can download songscanner as a plugin in 5 minutes. It doesn't act exactly like a CD player FF/RW - it's much nicer. -- opaqueice opaqueice's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=4234 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
opaqueice;216150 Wrote: What is this thread about? There's a perfectly good FF/RW function called songscanner, and a jump-to-a-point-in-the-track function in the fishbone skin. IMO both should be incorporated into the main SS builds as they are far superior to the standard FF/RW feature (which I think we all agree is broken). Meanwhile you can download songscanner as a plugin in 5 minutes. It doesn't act exactly like a CD player FF/RW - it's much nicer. I'm going to try that...problem is I use both standalone XP as well as Infrant NV version of SlimServer, so I don't like being out of sync between them (issue is that I have 2 libraries). But, I might add this simply to give the functionality to my TP (XP SS). -- thomsens thomsens's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1352 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Pat Farrell;216147 Wrote: thomsens wrote: To suggest based on a limited sample of this forum combined with your opinion that a feature is not required is silly. This forum is where customers who have bought SqueezeBoxes and Transporters talk among themselves. The forums in total are for people interested in SD/Logitech audio products. There is no overwhelming demand for this feature in the forums. I have not said that you are silly, or your request is silly. I know you want it. But there is no groundswell of support for it. Instant access to all my music and other media files increases the need for the feature for me. CD players had 'index' support from the start. The idea was the movements or breaks to the chorus, or other musically significant parts could be indexed, so you could instantly go to them, forward or backwards. When CDs came out, reviewers noted with players did this properly. It was an expected feature. But hardly anyone used it, and few CDs carried index markers in their meta data, so over time the feature disappeared. Much like pre-emphasis in the audio tracks. What Sean said was that it is not easy. He decided not to do it. What changes because you want it anyway? Great point. What changes is where I spend my $$ over time if the product does not continue to evolve (so far $2600 spent with SD). I'm sure given the choice, Sean would rather have me buy the T2 when my T1 dies. For that matter, I'm sure he's just hoping for the ability to build a T2 one day. Clearly without the base of users to support it, that will never happen. So, the average joe will need to start buying this thing and regardless of your or my opinion, the average joe will definitely expect this feature in a usable format. I was with you up until the last sentence. It depends on your intended use of the word average. Given the sample of the folks posting to the forums, if you select a customer at random, they won't notice this missing feature. If you select a random sample of users, you would expect that the majority of folks selected don't care. If lots of Joe Customers bought SB's or Transporters, and returned them because this feature was missing, I am sure Sean and others would notice. If the average meaning more than half, so that most of the units were returned, I am sure Sean and others would find a way to fix it no matter how hard it is. Never say never, but when evaluating what features and functions to put in the next unit, a smart company has to listen to what the majority of its customers want. Or, if they can know, what features kept a large portion of the potential customers from purchasing the unit. Sony had better music players than the iPod in many dimensions many years before the iPod. Sony screwed up the interface with fascist DRM that made it unusable for mere mortals. Now, no one remember Sony was there in 1999 and 2000. I have no inside knowledge, but I bet if the SqueezeBox had exactly today's feature set, cost $200 and had a strong national marketing campaign, Logitech could sell four to ten times as many. There are people who want FF/RW, and would be happier, buy more, tell more friends, etc. but I don't think it would increase sales by more than 10%. IMHO, YMMV, etc. -- Pat http://www.pfarrell.com/music/slimserver/slimsoftware.html We're just going to have to agree to disagree. My goal is simply to improve a feature that needs to be improved. I don't believe the need is lost on Sean - he's just in a tough spot because as he said, the path between here and there isn't easy. -- thomsens thomsens's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1352 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
seanadams;216027 Wrote: Not at all. You still have to _get_ all that data to the player. And you still have to be able to generate some audible rendition of it as you scan through the compressed stream. And you still have several of the other issues I originally mentioned, such as supporting the myriad of formats. So only if you had unlimited RAM, CPU, and bandwidth, and only one format to support would it be trivial. And as long as you're having all that, why not a pony too? :) Sure, as long as someone else pays for feeding and housing the thing... :P How I would solve it given infinite memory: decode the whole track and then the position of the sound at X seconds is derivable via multiplication. A faster CPU would help, too, so that more of the track could be decoded in background to anticipate forward movemeent. That would keep ff/rew in the client. I am not sure if bandwidth would help that much in cases of short ff's and wouldnt help at all in rewinds. But then were specing a reeasonably hefty CPU and memory... RAM is certainly cheap, but CPUs can be spendy, and the market for a $1000 device is a lot smaller (and of course faster CPUs almost always mean more heat...) That is most likely how MCE does it, with a sliding window instead of the whole file to save RAM, but still there is a lot more RAM. Anyway if you could only change one of those things, I'd say the best one would be the bandwidth. If you're guaranteed the throughput, low latency, and zero packet loss of 100Mbps ethernet (as in the DVR example) then the problem becomes a LOT more manageable. More RAM is nice but certainly wouldn't solve the problem per se. Well the DVR example also allows for a lot more intelligence in the client, and this is not even universal on Windows apps. (For some reason WMP will play AVI's stored on an SMB-mount, but Winaamp rarely works... some need in Winamp to seek or something is not implemented the same for SMB as it is in local access) Given infinite resources, the problem is easy, but then so are most problems. (It would be possible to design a chess-playing computer much like the always-winning checkers machine announced this week... assuming infinite CPU power to process the entire tree of potential moves and infinite memory store the results... the 50-move rule ensures that there is an end to any game. A decisiion tree could never be more than 30*50 nodes deep.) But, yes, given the real world constraints throwing 1G of memory and a 1Ghz CPU and 100W of heat into a music player to solve this is silly. In the real world, it is a hard problem. -- snarlydwarf snarlydwarf's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1179 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
thomsens;216015 Wrote: I'd still be interested as to why MCE seems to be able to handle what appears on the surface to be a much more challenging, but similar task. The typical PC has substantially more RAM to devote to buffering decoded frames than a Squeezebox. Throw enough RAM at the problem and it's trivial. -- snarlydwarf snarlydwarf's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1179 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
snarlydwarf wrote: The typical PC has substantially more RAM to devote to buffering decoded frames than a Squeezebox. Right A modern PC has a gigabyte of RAM, which can hold a complete CD, uncompressed, in memory. Serious PCs for either Vista or development have two or three gig. Any modern PC also has a vastly more powerful CPU than a SqueezeBox. -- Pat http://www.pfarrell.com/music/slimserver/slimsoftware.html ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
snarlydwarf;216019 Wrote: The typical PC has substantially more RAM to devote to buffering decoded frames than a Squeezebox. Throw enough RAM at the problem and it's trivial. My understanding was that the problem was technical implementation, not architectural decisions made on the hw. And, for $2K, the transporter should come with adequate RAM for the task. Even FLAC files are 50Mb typically. -- thomsens thomsens's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1352 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
thomsens wrote: Pat Farrell;216023 Wrote: A modern PC has a gigabyte of RAM, which can hold a complete CD, uncompressed, in memory. Serious PCs for either Vista or development have two or three gig. If it's really a matter of inadequate hw, then my original assertion that initial architectural decisions (i.e., hw specs) were the problem is true. Sean says that is not the case. Er, I wasn't talking about the SqueezeBox. The question was why can a Windoze Media Center handle it properly, and the reason is that it is a powerful generalized system. I don't quite get how you jump from Sean's initial post in this thread to your conclusion. The SqueezeBox and the Transporter are embedded systems. That is a totally different design space for software than generalized PCs/Mac, etc. What you seem to be asking for is that the price to everyone be increased to meet your needs for FF/RW. I never use it, never tried. Never tried it on the CD players I've had over the decades. I used to do all sorts of stuff when I was a radio station DJ when there were vinyl disks on turntables, but that was long ago and far away. What Sean said was that it is not easy. He decided not to do it. What changes because you want it anyway? I am sure that if a strong majority or even a significant minority wanted it, a future version might. But so far, I don't see more than a few people wanting it. Not to say that the few don't want it a lot, but there is no groundswell of support. -- Pat http://www.pfarrell.com/music/slimserver/slimsoftware.html ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
snarlydwarf;216019 Wrote: Throw enough RAM at the problem and it's trivial. Not at all. You still have to _get_ all that data to the player. And you still have to be able to generate some audible rendition of it as you scan through the compressed stream. And you still have several of the other issues I originally mentioned, such as supporting the myriad of formats. So only if you had unlimited RAM, CPU, and bandwidth, and only one format to support would it be trivial. And as long as you're having all that, why not a pony too? :) Anyway if you could only change one of those things, I'd say the best one would be the bandwidth. If you're guaranteed the throughput, low latency, and zero packet loss of 100Mbps ethernet (as in the DVR example) then the problem becomes a LOT more manageable. More RAM is nice but certainly wouldn't solve the problem per se. -- seanadams seanadams's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=3 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
amey01;213645 Wrote: I'm not insisting that FF/REW (or anything else) can be done - BUT I am insisting that the Squeezebox will do what the manual says it will do. It's actually the other way around, i.e., the manual should reflect the way the product operates. So if the manual is wrong, it needs correction. Regarding the FF/REW feature in question, I have owned CD players since 1984, and I can count on one hand the number of times I've ever used FF/REW. While I agree that a feature to skip ahead or back ~X seconds at a chunk would be useful to some users some of the time, it would be about number 47 on my list of top 10 things Slim Devices engineers should be working on. P.S. Thanks Sean for a great explanation of the technical issues involved. -- TiredLegs TiredLegs's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=6201 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
For me the main reason for the functionality is to be able to move through a podcast or radio programme to get the part I want to listen to and using the current implementation on the SB makes it very hit or miss. Fortunately it is more possible to do so via the web UI implementation of AlienBBC although you unfortunately can't see how far through the programme you are. I agree though that the manual in no way correctly reflects the actual ff/rw functionality. That at least must be changed... -- dehavillandrfc SB3 - Beresford DAC - Netgear Wireless Router - QNAP TS-101 LP12 / Genki - Kollektor / LK140 - ALR Jordan Entry M dehavillandrfc's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=12322 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Ok, have had a shiny new Transporter up and running for all of 8 hours and am very happy with sound quality and most aspects of the interface (server could be better, but hey...) However, have to say that behaviour of FF/RWD is at best useless, and IS a very annoying issue in my opinion. I have to agree with other people here that there is no need to implement a CD player style scan function. For me the ideal functionality would be, 1) The ability to skip forwards/backwards in 10, 20 or 30 second jumps 2) The ability to drop a marker which can be jumped back to repeatedly This should be accessable from the player and not just the server side of things. Cheers, John. -- JohnWH JohnWH's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=12401 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
seanadams;214132 Wrote: Which DVR is it by the way? Are the files plain old mpegs or transport streams, or are they in some kind of special container format? If the latter, it is possible that they have some additional data generated during the encoding process to facilitate scanning. Would be interesting to do a packet dump... MCE2005. So if I understand correctly, DVR-MS is just MPEG2 with a metadata wrapper. So, I assume it's an MPEG-2 file. Just to be sure, I just went and tested an SD and an HD recorded file accessed from my Infrant NV across the network to the MCE. Both work fine in both jump ahead/jump back mode. I have it setup to skip 7 sec back (missed what just happened) and skip 30 sec forward (skip commercial) - both work somewhat instantaneously and for multiple clicks. It also works fine for both formats for fast forward or rewind in multiple levels of speed. It can get into trouble if you leave it too long in those modes, but it falls very squarely into the acceptable implementation range for all practical uses. Obviously the audio is silent during the video jumps, but it does come back instantly when playback resumes. There's no reason to think this is anything more than user experience issue since it's really the video you are searching anyway and the chipmunk sound would just be annoying anyway. It may be technically challenging too, but it strikes me that the buffering challenges would be much greater in the HD video scenario than the audio only scenario. For grins, I also checked the music portion of the MCE. For reference, MCE's music capabilities are laughable and in my opinion, the PM for that portion of the product should find alternative employment. However, the FF function works well for MP3. There apparently isn't an option for RW since it does nothing when you press that button. So for MP3, the MCE has proven that a workable and CD-like verion of FF is possible. I can't say the lack RW function is technical since the overall implementation for music in MCE is so bad, I'd assume poor product management first. -- thomsens thomsens's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1352 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Just curious...why do DVRs have no problem with a workable version of this feature? I would think that would be more challenging than audio only. Mine does it fine while streaming from my NAS over the network. -- thomsens thomsens's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1352 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
thomsens;214126 Wrote: Just curious...why do DVRs have no problem with a workable version of this feature? I would think that would be more challenging than audio only. Mine does it fine while streaming from my NAS over the network. Hmmm well one thing video has going for it is that there are key frames at fixed intervals - from a local disk it shouldn't be too hard. But depending on the format I'm not sure how you could efficiently get just those key frames streamed to you from a NAS. -- seanadams seanadams's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=3 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Which DVR is it by the way? Are the files plain old mpegs or transport streams, or are they in some kind of special container format? If the latter, it is possible that they have some additional data generated during the encoding process to facilitate scanning. Would be interesting to do a packet dump... -- seanadams seanadams's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=3 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Thanks and I will be trying the SongSkipper plugin - I have downloaded it - all I need is some time to install it on my SlimServer. -- amey01 amey01's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=11274 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
seanadams;211343 Wrote: (spinning a new thread from http://forums.slimdevices.com/showpost.php?p=211286postcount=45) This is about the same as complaining that you can't scratch on a CD player the same way you could on last century's phonograph... except that in this case it is a bit less obvious why you can't. It's clear from the tone of your comment that you don't care why, you just want it to work. That's fine, you can stop reading here, but in case anyone else wants to know, I will explain. Featuritis and stability and simply incompatible goals, and to make the assertion that ff/rw is an essential or trivial feature that must be implemented, while at the same time calling for software that just works, is not really constructive. Most of us have little or no need for scanning, and just because a CD player does it does not automatically mean it is a good idea to make Squeezebox do it. Thank you for this great explanation! It's great to have some understanding of how things are working in the background. My only gripe is that *it says in the manual that it should work* - there is no mention of it requiring special formats or anything else. -- amey01 amey01's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=11274 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
thomsens;212715 Wrote: People who think that it should work like a CD player should just get over it. We just need a solution to move around songs easily. Any reasonable solution is probably ok. I'm not going to respond to this snide stuff. Point is that you are arguing from where the product is. If you wanted to, you could have designed it day one to support it. Perhaps that would involved more complex buffering and memory required to do it...and maybe GE instead of 10/100. But, you chose not to and now the product has a deficiency. If I knew how to code it myself, I would have built the product myself and wouldn't be on this forum now would I? I mean no offense Sean - you've built an awesome product. But, it has an unfortunate flaw that does drive me crazy...apparently there are others too. Sorry - the last thing I was trying to be was snide. This is absolutely correct - all we need is a reasonable and effective way to move around songs. A method like on iPod where there is no audiable feedback is just as good (for my needs anyway)! The only reason I locked on to the CD player part is because it is perfectly clear to me that that is the way Slim Devices envisaged this operating with their product in the first place. I make this assumption because the manual states it - words to the effect of Hold the FF button to skip forward within a song - is it not reasonable of me to expect that I could follow this direction out of the manual and have an expected outcome? -- amey01 amey01's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=11274 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
seanadams;212721 Wrote: I articulated as best I could why it is not feasible. If you have a better idea I am all ears, but I don't think it is reasonable to insist that it can be done without having any idea how. I just want to state what a fantastic product the Squeezebox is. Let that be on record. Now, I'm not insisting that FF/REW (or anything else) can be done - BUT I am insisting that the Squeezebox will do what the manual says it will do. I don't think that is unreasonable. Constructively, all I need is a way to move around songs - the iPod scenario (choose a point in the song without audiable feedback) is fine. -- amey01 amey01's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=11274 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
amey01;213645 Wrote: all I need is a way to move around songs So until slimdevices improves this, you should try the SongScanner plugin, seems to be working great for me, provides just this functionality. I'm having some trouble remapping it to the ff/rw button hold, but this should be possible. You can also get to it pretty quickly by moving it to the top level of menus in the player settings. -- bephillips More than 33159 songs on 3246 albums by 2029 artists. Mostly flac, some mp3. SlimServer Version: 6.5.3 - 12361 Mac OS X 10.4.10 (8R218) - EN - utf8 Perl Version: 5.8.6 darwin-thread-multi-2level MySQL Version: 5.0.22-standard On a 1.2GHz G4 Mac iBook with 768MB RAM http://db.etree.org/bephillips bephillips's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=2588 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
bephillips;213113 Wrote: I'd like: A clickable progress bar in the browser UI, that skips to the position in the track clicked on. This basic functionality already exists in Fishbone (though the resolution is a bit coarse). -- azinck3 azinck3's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=3967 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
I'm still in 6.5, no clicking in the progress bar yet for me. I'm glad to hear that it's coming. -- bephillips More than 33159 songs on 3246 albums by 2029 artists. SlimServer Version: 6.5.3 - 12361 Mac OS X 10.4.10 (8R218) - EN - utf8 Perl Version: 5.8.6 darwin-thread-multi-2level MySQL Version: 5.0.22-standard On a 1.2GHz G4 Mac iBook with 768MB RAM http://db.etree.org/bephillips bephillips's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=2588 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
bephillips;213230 Wrote: I'm still in 6.5, no clicking in the progress bar yet for me. I'm glad to hear that it's coming. Are you using the Fishbone skin in 6.5.2 or 6.5.0? The click on the progress bar is certainly working for me with 6.5.2, and I'm sure it's worked like that in the past for 6.5.1 at least. You do need to use Fishbone however. As azinck3 says, it's not precisely accurate, but you can easily move within the song (end first quarter, halfway through, a few mins from the end type of thing) -- Siduhe Siduhe's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=723 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Siduhe;213235 Wrote: Are you using the Fishbone skin in 6.5.2 or 6.5.0? The click on the progress bar is certainly working for me with 6.5.2, and I'm sure it's worked like that in the past for 6.5.1 at least. You do need to use Fishbone however. As azinck3 says, it's not precisely accurate, but you can easily move within the song (end first quarter, halfway through, a few mins from the end type of thing) It doesn't seem to work on transcoded tracks, though. Steve. -- SteveEast SteveEast's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=4193 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Sweet, there it is. All the info in my signature is up to date. Upgraded from 6.5.1 fairly recently. I thought I had clicked up there a few times and had no response, but I now think that was just because of the coarseness of the control. KDF himself told me it was a 7.0 feature. Very cool. This with Song/LoopScanner goes a long way towards what I'd like to ultimately see. Now I think the progress bar needs to be just a little thicker for easier clicking, maybe I can mod that myself. I've been meaning to play with colors in Fishbone anyway. I bet a lot of the people complaining about ff/rw might not know about this. Why isn't Fishbone the default skin anyway? -- bephillips More than 33159 songs on 3246 albums by 2029 artists. Mostly flac, some mp3. SlimServer Version: 6.5.3 - 12361 Mac OS X 10.4.10 (8R218) - EN - utf8 Perl Version: 5.8.6 darwin-thread-multi-2level MySQL Version: 5.0.22-standard On a 1.2GHz G4 Mac iBook with 768MB RAM http://db.etree.org/bephillips bephillips's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=2588 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Thanks for the very clear explanation, Sean. And as this is the first I've replied to one of your posts, thanks so much for the Slimserver SB3. Best tech purchase since I don't know when. After a year, my extensive collection is almost all organized and tagged up. It's been a huge project, but so rewarding, I'm rediscovering my collection, music listening is way up and TV viewing is way down. I feel smarter already. WRT ff/rw, I have also been unsatisfied with the current implementation. I just installed SongScanner and SongLoop (I'm a musician, so the ability to loop a passage of music for study is very useful). Integration of these plugins might be the way to go, they do what I want, I don't usually need to hear what I'm ff or rw. The main problem with songscanner is the number of button presses required to get where you want, even though I've placed it in the top level of the player menus. I'd like: A clickable progress bar in the browser UI, that skips to the position in the track clicked on. In the remote control interface, if not separating the buttons for ff/rw from track skip, when ff/rw is held down, a progress bar appears on the SB# screen indicating the position, and then plays at that position when released. There could be a setting to choose whether the progress bar would appear, or as SongScanner does now, a time indicator, or an option for the way it works now for those who prefer or have grown used to this. Being able to play loops out of the box would be good too. Something like SongLoop now does, perhaps with a loop button in the browser UI that pops up a dialog to enter the start and end times with a cancel button. (Changes along these lines, and a default skin something like the tan Fishbone skin with the addition of drag and drop in playlists like in SlimFX, and I'll be a perfectly satisfied customer, instead of only 99.99% now) Thanks again for the fantastic and ever improving product (how many companies can say that?) Keep up the great work! Brad http://db.etree.org/bephillips -- bephillips More than 33159 songs on 3246 albums by 2029 artists. SlimServer Version: 6.5.3 - 12361 - Mac OS X 10.4.10 (8R218) - EN - utf8 Server IP address: 10.0.1.6 Perl Version: 5.8.6 darwin-thread-multi-2level MySQL Version: 5.0.22-standard On a 1.2GHz G4 Mac iBook with 768MB RAM bephillips's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=2588 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
seanadams;212683 Wrote: I agree, but the fact that is does not work the same as a CD player has been the overwhelming complaint WRT scanning. That is the point I was trying to answer, and in particular, why it is silly to assert that it should be a trivial feature on the basis that a 20-yr old product can do it. Please read the original comment I quoted. If you want to have a discussion about a different mechanism that does not have audible feedback like a CD player, then I think that would be an excellent new direction to explore. People who think that it should work like a CD player should just get over it. We just need a solution to move around songs easily. Any reasonable solution is probably ok. seanadams;212683 Wrote: Interesting - can you explain? Are you saying a) network streaming is a useless technology, because it makes scanning difficult. Instead of making a network streamer, Slim Devices should have used an internal hard drive or something, and perhaps only supported WAV files. b) scanning is not really difficult to implement in a network streamer (if that is what you're saying, please tell me how you would do it). c) something else? I'm not going to respond to this snide stuff. Point is that you are arguing from where the product is. If you wanted to, you could have designed it day one to support it. Perhaps that would involved more complex buffering and memory required to do it...and maybe GE instead of 10/100. But, you chose not to and now the product has a deficiency. If I knew how to code it myself, I would have built the product myself and wouldn't be on this forum now would I? I mean no offense Sean - you've built an awesome product. But, it has an unfortunate flaw that does drive me crazy...apparently there are others too. -- thomsens thomsens's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1352 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
thomsens;212715 Wrote: If you wanted to, you could have designed it day one to support it. Perhaps that would involved more complex buffering and memory required to do it...and maybe GE instead of 10/100. But, you chose not to and now the product has a deficiency. If I knew how to code it myself, I would have built the product myself and wouldn't be on this forum now would I articulated as best I could why it is not feasible. If you have a better idea I am all ears, but I don't think it is reasonable to insist that it can be done without having any idea how. -- seanadams seanadams's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=3 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
thomsens;212715 Wrote: People who think that it should work like a CD player should just get over it. We just need a solution to move around songs easily. Any reasonable solution is probably ok. Funny thing is, the way that most CD players work doesn't do the trick for me. I typically want to skip to a known time within the track. I once owned a CD player that allowed for that, but it's not a common feature. On the other hand, the Song Scanner plugin goes a long way to doing what I want. So for me, skipping around on a Squeezebox is *better* than most CD players. If you've not yet tried it out, give it a go. Note: as far as I am aware, it only works with native formats, not transcoded ones. (One more reason to use FLAC). -- cliveb Transporter - ATC SCM100A cliveb's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=348 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
cliveb;212722 Wrote: On the other hand, the Song Scanner plugin goes a long way to doing what I want. So for me, skipping around on a Squeezebox is *better* than most CD players. If you've not yet tried it out, give it a go. I have not tried it but I will give it a go. I would support a solution that does not attempt to provide audible feedback, and if Song Scanner does the trick then we should see if we can incorporate it. Note: as far as I am aware, it only works with native formats, not transcoded ones. (One more reason to use FLAC). If we only need to seek to some offset in the track, that is a manageable problem even if it has to be addressed individually for each format. -- seanadams seanadams's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=3 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Sorry folks...I'm not clear on why anyone accepts this answer. The implementation is broken. There are times when I want to skip back or skip forward in a song. Sometimes to hear a part over again. Sometimes to get to my favorite part of the song (especially long classical pieces). Right now, I have no idea where I'm going to end up in the song when I start the skip forward process. I've often ended up behind where I started or at the end of the song! It's just plain broken. It's counter-intuitive to use as well, but at least I'd learn it through repetition once it becomes more useful. I actually don't care if I hear any music at all when I'm skipping. I just want the ability to quickly move to a different portion of the song in both directions...and preferably in a way that's easy to do on the remote. I can learn the way it's implemented - I'm not so simple that it has to be exactly like some other device. Maybe if it had a clear readout of the change in the elapsed time as it's scanning that would be fine. Some kind of indication. No sound is needed as long as getting in and out of scan is easy enough to check progress. I think the key is addressing the capability and not past implementations. I'm surprised so much effort was spent discussing the way CD players did it. Who cares? Don't get me wrong - I really like Slim Devices products, but I really don't agree with the defensive tone of this thread. It's a feature that can and absolutely should be improved - there shouldn't be an argument about that. Saying it's not often used is just plain crap. It's not used because it's broken. If it's a very tough engineering challenge, then I'd say a mistake was made during the architectural design of the product. It certainly shouldn't have been a surprise that people would want this capability. -- thomsens thomsens's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1352 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
thomsens;212680 Wrote: I think the key is addressing the capability and not past implementations. I'm surprised so much effort was spent discussing the way CD players did it. Who cares? I agree, but the fact that is does not work the same as a CD player has been the overwhelming complaint WRT scanning. That is the point I was trying to answer, and in particular, why it is silly to assert that it should be a trivial feature because a 20-yr old product can do it. Please read the original comment I quoted. If you want to have a discussion about a different mechanism that does not have audible feedback like a CD player, then I think that would be an excellent new direction to explore. If it's a very tough engineering challenge, then I'd say a mistake was made during the architectural design of the product. Interesting - can you explain? Are you saying a) network streaming is a useless technology, because it makes scanning difficult. Instead of making a network streamer, Slim Devices should have used an internal hard drive or something. b) scanning is not really difficult to implement in a network streamer (if that is what you're saying, please tell me how you would do it). c) something else? -- seanadams seanadams's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=3 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Maybe a mechanism that allows you to ff/rr n seconds or n% _without_ audible feedback would make people happy (or _happier_, anyway ). It would at least be (somewhat) feasible. Now that people are somewhat used to dealing with video in this manner, it might just work. I could see how such a feature would make me happier, but I really wouldn't want to guess how widely popular it would be. -- totoro squeezebox 3 - mccormack dna .5 - audio physic tempo 4 totoro's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=5935 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Remember Sean used to not have a boss (not in the corporate sense, anyway). His boss was the customer. Now he probably reports to a Logitech VP, and was probably asked the same question in his boss's staff meeting last week! :o) -- Zten Zten's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=1810 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Zten;212695 Wrote: Remember Sean used to not have a boss (not in the corporate sense, anyway). His boss was the customer. Now he probably reports to a Logitech VP, and was probably asked the same question in his boss's staff meeting last week! :o) Rght my boss cares about the fast forward function. Uh huh. Grep the archives - this is a very old issue, and in fact I was the first to suggest some specific solutions for how to implement scanning back in the SLIMP3 days. I replied to that particular comment from amey01 because it was especially snide and ill-informed. I admit sometimes my comments are also snide but I hope they are at least informative. I hoped that by explaining all the details of why scanning is the way it is, it might spark some more constructive discussion, or at least convince people that it's not a matter of doing what CD players have always done. That is all. If you all don't want me to post this kind of information let me know. -- seanadams seanadams's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=3 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
OK, I dont mind how the current fast fwd is implemented, confused me at first but once I figured it out, no probs. But when players are synced, fast fwd doesnt seem to work at all. And when switching on another player, the currently playing track restarts from the beginning. This combined with the lack of fast forward means that when playing a long 1 hour+ track, if you switch on another synced player there is no way to go back to where you were in the track. I have quite a lot of cds which are continuous 1 hour+ tracks. I'm sure I'm not the only one. Cheers, Menno -- menno menno's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=11751 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Thanks to Sean for the detailed explanation as to why ff/rw can't be implemented as it is in a CD player. However, add me to the list of people that thinks ff/rw should be done differently than it is currently. The current implementation essentially doesn't work (at least not for me -- I use mostly FLAC). I would much prefer a solution that does the following: ff: jump forward about 30 seconds (it doesn't matter if it's not exactly 30 seconds), rwd: jump backward about 10 seconds. This would be very useful and I'm guessing it could be implemented easily. Right now I use songscanner plugin and I'm reasonably happy with that. -- lanierb lanierb's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=5566 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
flipflip;211357 Wrote: the need for jumping forward and backward in a stream is critical to me. I listen to lots of podcasts (downloaded separately [1]) and audio books (e.g. language courses). And in this case I need to skip backwards a few seconds all the time to listen to a sentence I did not understand again. And here the FW/RW which is available is not suitable. So I wrote a small plugin that offers a function to skip forward or backward a certain amount of time [2] and mapped that function to buttons I don't need otherwise. This works great, apart from the playtime display which gets out of sync and the inaccuracy of the skipping, but that doesn't bother me. [2] http://oinkzwurgl.org/skipper Have you looked at the Song Scanner plugin? Like lanierb, I've been using Song Scanner to move through longer recordings like podcasts and radio shows. One reason I mention this is that Song Scanner doesn't seem to cause problems with the playtime display. I think your skip forward/back sounds really good. That's something I've become accustomed to having for video recordings with my MythTV setup, and I think it'd be nice on the Squeezebox. While I've said before that I think the overloaded/modal button behavior is problematic, I wonder about an intelligent all-software (no map file edit) solution like a plugin that would provide two modes for Fwd/Rew: jumping seconds forward/back within a track; and skipping to the beginning/end of tracks (current behavior). Default behavior would be that jumping would require you to press some button on the remote like Now Playing and then within a second or so, press Fwd or Rew to jump. Subsequent Fwd/Rew presses (within the 1 second of the last Fwd/Rew/Now Playing press) would be interpreted as jump. The plugin should allow users 1) the ability to reverse the behavior (i.e, treat plain Fwd/Rew as Jump, and require a Now Playing button press to get the Skip behavior that the buttons have out-of-the-box now) 2) the ability to have the plugin always treat Fwd/Rew as Jump if there's only one item in the playlist, since Skip only makes sense with multiple items in the playlist (my typical podcast usage; probably not as helpful for language lessons where you probably queue up multiple tracks) 3) the ability to specify how many seconds to jump, and allow different Fwd and Rew timings (normally I'd expect Fwd to jump more seconds than Rew) -Peter P.S. I don't use the built-in podcast support, either. I've been much happier setting up a third-party app to download selected podcasts to my Slimserver music directory. -- peterw http://www.tux.org/~peterw/ free plugins: http://www.tux.org/~peterw/#slim BlankSaver BottleRocket FuzzyTime SaverSwitcher SleepFade StatusFirst VolumeLock peterw's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=2107 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Hi Sean thanks for your (as usual) helpful commentary. I'd just like to chip in with some thoughts: you've described well why a scanning feature is not likely to be forthcoming, and also the difficulty with transcoded formats. Having read many of the same threads as you obviously have, I think this leaves at least one problematic area still to discuss - the UI. If you start from the premise that the FF/RWD function that we have is all we are going to have, I think there is still a legitimate concern over the way we access it (the overloading of the FF/RWD buttons with the skip functions, short and long presses...). Quite a few people find this hard to use - this includes me, though personally I'm not that bothered as its not a feature I consider critical. Just separating Skip and FF/RWD buttons on your next remote (as was suggested in a recent thread, can't find it for now) would help. Ceejay -- ceejay ceejay's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=148 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
I hadn't really considered the complexity of it, but it is indeed obvious when you stop and think (or just read that post!). Count this as one vote for 'please ignore FF/RW forever'. I never use it. The only conceivable use for it I can see is where you have ripped an album as a whole. There are much more important things. Sean, why not start a thread where people can vote on the single feature they would most like to see in their SB3/SlimServer? Might be interesting. Adam -- adamslim Those are my principles, and if you don't like them... well, I have others http://www.last.fm/user/AdamSlim/ 'Last.fm group: people who don't listen to any of last.fm's top artists' (http://www.last.fm/group/People+who+don%27t+listen+to+any+of+last.fm%27s+top+artists) SB+, EAR 859, Living Voice Auditorium II plus some other stuff SB3, Shek d2, Ming-Da MC84-C, Harbeth HL-P3ES adamslim's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=7355 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Sean, thanks for the detailed explanation. I am aware of the technical reasons why scanning (like on a CD player) would not be practical to implement. And I am not expecting from SD to implement it. However, the need for jumping forward and backward in a stream is critical to me. I listen to lots of podcasts (downloaded separately [1]) and audio books (e.g. language courses). And in this case I need to skip backwards a few seconds all the time to listen to a sentence I did not understand again. And here the FW/RW which is available is not suitable. So I wrote a small plugin that offers a function to skip forward or backward a certain amount of time [2] and mapped that function to buttons I don't need otherwise. This works great, apart from the playtime display which gets out of sync and the inaccuracy of the skipping, but that doesn't bother me. Maybe this plugin is helpful for others, too. Regards, flip [1] http://oinkzwurgl.org/ffpodcast.sh [2] http://oinkzwurgl.org/skipper -- flipflip Check out flipflip's 'SlimServer On DiskStation (SSODS)' (http://oinkzwurgl.org/ssods/)! flipflip's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=5223 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
seanadams wrote: This is about the same as complaining that you can't scratch on a CD player the same way you could on last century's phonograph... Hi Sean, Thanks for your great summary of how ff/rw work differently between CD and tape deck. It is clear that the designers of both of those transports produced the best ff/rw feature possible within the technical constraints of the transport technology. it's helpful to understand some details of how FF/RW scanning works on a CD player, since that is the behavior we want to emulate. It seems that you are making the problem harder than it needs to be. ff/rw on a slim device doesnt have to work *the same way* as a CD player. It doesnt have to blurp. Nor does it need to sound like chipmunks. It was never the case that some user focus group decided it would be desirable a CD player to play blurps while fast forwarding - some engineer did it that way because it was EASY. Yes, this relates your final point on code complexity. I agree this should be the driving factor here. So, is there a *different* method of handling the ff/rw use case which is technically easier? I can make some guesses. Every format has different size frames, and many can even be variable in size. For some formats it is not possible to know how far to look ahead in order to advance by some amount of time. You either have to guesstimate and then resync Would it really be a showstopper to guesstimate, without the resync? It was never a problem that the advance speed of FF on a tape varied with how much tape was already spooled. or you have to process every frame in between. For the rewind case, every frame would already have been processed anyway. Currently our transcoding capability does not support seeking of any kind within a track Maybe slimserver could spool the output of the transcoding process to disk, and seek within that? Would it be OK for seeking to have a granularity of a few seconds (or a few frames)? In order to quickly move to a different point in the stream, you would need to implement a very sophisticated buffering scheme, So we need a user interface for choosing the ff/rw restart point which sidesteps this buffering problem. SongScanner suggests one solution. ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Not that this was ever a big issue for me, but using Moose one can skip ahead or go back in a song just by clicking on the timeline. -- ezkcdude There are 10 kind of people in the world - those who understand binary and those who don't. EZ DIY AUDIO DESIGNS: '*Site*' (http://www.ezdiyaudio.com)| '*RSS*' (http://www2.kumc.edu/students/ezamir/rss/ezdiyaudio.xml) |'*Forum*' (http://ezdiyaudio.informe.com) ezkcdude's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=2545 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
ezkcdude;211386 Wrote: Not that this was ever a big issue for me, but using Moose one can skip ahead or go back in a song just by clicking on the timeline. Can you explain please? Chris -- krzys krzys's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=2256 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
ceejay;211344 Wrote: Having read many of the same threads as you obviously have, I think this leaves at least one problematic area still to discuss - the UI. I agree. I think the button _should_ behave like a CD player and I'm not aware of any reason why we could not do that. Also, displaying a large progress bar or time line indicating the new seek position might be helpful. -- seanadams seanadams's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=3 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
krzys;211389 Wrote: Can you explain please? Chris http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=35468highlight=Moose -- ceejay ceejay's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=148 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
seanadams wrote: I agree. I think the button _should_ behave like a CD player and I'm not aware of any reason why we could not do that. Also, displaying a large progress bar or time line indicating the new seek position might be helpful. +1 on the separate buttons The glyph convention seems to be: | | I recall it took me a while to figure out what the expected behavior was intended to be, as well as how to invoke it. The button configuration was definitely a contributing factor. Also +1 to the position indicator during seek-ahead. Very useful, and likely to be self-explanatory once invoked. ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
Hi Sean: Let me premise this question by stating I love your product and I understand it is not technically posible, so the ff/rw issue is moot, but I found the Most of us have little or no need for scanning comment interesting. How do you know this to be true? Was there any market study done to see what features customers wanted? I for one would like to have the option. Would it be a deal breaker? Of course not, but all things being equal, I'd certainly choose the device that had it. My curiosity is really predicated on my interest in technology commercialization/marketing (of which I just earned a degree in). Hopefully you take the question in the spirit it was intended. Thanks, EAS -- stlblue stlblue's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=7688 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
Re: [SlimDevices: Audiophiles] Here is why no FF/RW
I agree that FF/RW isn't quite as smooth as a CD player and you have to have a native format going to squeezebox. But the overloaded buttons is at least half the issue that folks are complaining about. I actually expected the bumpy behavior of FF to be worse and thought it was quite good (getting to it was pretty sad though). FF/RW works fine for me once I seperated the functions from skip next prev which allowed meto remove the hold function which it really clumsy. Some folks can master the timing with the overloaded buttons other can't. But if when you can with the hold feature it's a very slow operation to loop through the speeds and it doesn't have to be that way. -- mswlogo Thinkpad XP SS Cat5 SB3 SPDIF-COAX Meridian 861V4 (Trifield, Room corrected, Upsampled) DSP5500 Mains, DSP5500HC Center, DSP33 Rears mswlogo's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=9090 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=36446 ___ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/audiophiles
