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[jack wallstreet]

Jim,

My top comment for competitive need is ability to work with IOS devices.  A simple way to accomplish that (in some way) would be to integrate the now open source MCIS.

[klweds]

Okay here are three competitive disadvantages:

1. In DLNA Server settings' audio mode... convert to 'Specified output format only when necessary' literally does not work properly. This is frustrating, and a definite disadvantage to me. Problems like this need to be addressed immediately instead of simply living on the forum indefinitely. This issue should not be considered a feature request, it's a feature failure.

DLNA audio streamer use is rising. Just check out Sonore.

2. Too many version upgrades with not enough new features. I understand the business model, it's fine, but at least associate each version with some sizable improvement. Right now upgrading basically assures the user he'll enjoy 6 months of bugs, then 3 to 6 months of peace before things start breaking again with the newest upgrade. And all this for not much benefit. I'm happy to keep supporting JRiver, just please think it out a little more.

Firefox does this rapid versioning too... constantly breaking everyone's add-ons. It's aggravating.

3. JRiver likes to insist that nothing else happening on the computer has any bearing on sound quality. Whether it's Audiophile Optimizer, *Play, Fidelizer, etc.. And JRiver likes to insist that other bitperfect applications cannot possibly sound better.

These persistent stances have grown to resemble the denial of climate change. It is a major competitive disadvantage in my eyes.

[JimH]

1.  You're correct.  It's a bug.  I've reported it a few times.

2.  Get over it.  Never update if that's what makes sense to you.

3.  These "solutions" are all smoking their sox.  They're selling air.  The emperor has no clothes.

[klweds]

1.  You're correct.  It's a bug.  I've reported it a few times.

2.  Get over it.  Never update if that's what makes sense to you.

3.  These "solutions" are all smoking their sox.  They're selling air.  The emperor has no clothes.

Okay I get the message, loud and clear.

MC is the best all-around library software I've ever used. I will happily continue using it for what it does best.

[jachin99]

Giving the user a broad range of choices in terms of appearance is what sets JRiver back from the rest, I think creating a few different options for theater view skins, and letting users tweak them a little from the pre-configured baselines would go a long way. 

Example:  Most skins in theater view appear to meant for a dark room, or they are bland, and they all have small buttons.  The only real difference is in the color scheme, and whether the menu items are situated horizontally, or vertically.   

Giving the user choices of fonts, font colors, background colors, and backgrounds through some kind of easy to use interface might help.  More choice over how the program appears overall would be a large improvement alone in my book. 

[DJLegba]

Okay I get the message, loud and clear.

MC is the best all-around library software I've ever used. I will happily continue using it for what it does best.

#3 should go in a Competitive Advantage thread. I very much appreciate that MC is 100% snake oil free.

[RoderickGI]

I didn't read all the above before writing this, but now I have, there seems to be some consistency, and good ideas. None of the comments below are requests for functionality. Just examples.

1. Generally Theatre View Skinning. Specifically, move, delete, add menus in Theatre View without breaking features, such as where to start MC. Ideally, the whole Theatre View skin would be user configurable with drag and drop fields, hidden fields if necessary with default values where required to make the rest of the skin functional. Sort of like a free-form, forms design tools, with element definition for groups of fields, reusable elements, all done in a GUI. Sort of like Microsoft Access forms, but not as clunky. I guess Standard View skinning may need some love, as per other comments, but I treat Standard View as the maintenance view, and don't care as much what it looks like, as long as it is fully functional.

2. Delivering "Play anything, anywhere, anytime". Plex was my second choice after MC, mainly due to the promise of this. I don't know if Plex actually delivers on the promise. JRemote may be great, but it sounds like it needs more work, based on other people's comments. I am thinking more of start watching on my TV, finish on an iPad or other (including Window 10) tablet sitting in bed. Or continuing to watch on my phone as I wait somewhere for something. Much of this can be done technically, using Webgizmo for example, but the functionality isn't a Competitive Edge. It is just a "oh, we can do that as well" followed by links to disparate bits of instructions. What is needed is Apps for all platforms that are standardised and fully functional.

3. The limitations of the current Client/Server implementation, which is actually a copy and synchronisation process mostly, means people have to learn a lot about what they can do on a Client, versus what must be done on a Server. I'm sure people who run the 30 day trial hit up against issues here, and decide it isn't the application for them. Competitors may fair no better, but your competition may well be "no decision" rather than selecting a competitive product. Certainly that was my decision for a number of years; I lived with no Media Center and just used discrete hardware.

4. Improve the Discovery process both within MC and using external links. More metadata stored and displayed for media, with links or inclusion of data about related entities. i.e. Actor/Director/Artist BIOS, click a link to see all movies you have associated with that entity, click a link to go to an external page on he entity, based on entity type. i.e. IMDB details for an Actor or Director. Also, built in Lyrics for audio, or simple plug in installation that works.

5. Out of the box whole house synchronised audio. Others seem to compete almost solely on this feature.

[Aircub]

@Aircub

Have a look under "Drives & Devices" --> Explorer

Here you have a Folder View.

Thanks for your reply, I have edited my original as I would like folder view on the ipad remote, like I have with other players.

It would be nice if the remote could be made more comprehensive as part of the new release. It is often easier than going back to the Imac.

If the folder view was made available on the remote it would be nice to have some kind of forced import function also.

I download new content, update my server and play music all via my ipad. I then have to go to the Imac to import the music before I can play it.

My main ask therefore is to alow me to do more from the ipad remote. Other providers eg Synology constantly update their remote apps (even the one man band Audirvana have had updates) but JRiver have not, this is a competitive disadvantage in my view.... Thanks.

[Krunchy]

Hello,

Thanks for considering this
"eye candy" (already mentionned but important to me)
roon fonctions (mixing streaming services with the personnal audio base - please don't tell me about performer store). If this is not possible (for the reason you explained and that i understand), provide a real player for smartphone is for me necessary.
I still have the impression that jriver is designed for peaple behind their PC, their TV or in their car. But what do you do with people walking? using public transport?
Actually this is still very hard or impossible to connect/synchronise what we have in the pc to a mobile phone. What about a "cloud player" with the favorite playlists synchronising between devices? This is what every service does nowadays..
Thanks for your consideration

[AndyU]

Voice input.

"Hey JRiver, play Kind of Blue."

[aproc]

Playback of external audio files in JRiver.

Directshow players like MPC-HC, PotPlayer etc. allow loading an external audio track (for e.g. an mka track for different language) to be played with the video file. I think this is a very basic feature of a media player, not available in JRiver yet.

[doubrown]

I've been using MC since version 10. I discovered it after recommendation from the Rio forum (miss my 2003 era Rio Karma). Despite "cheating" with the competition, Media Center remains my main media player. Wish list:

1) Revised UI - the existing MC UI is familiar and efficient, but showing its age. This goes beyond style items like whether icons are flat. Modern UI's are almost invisible. They rely less on navigating lists, grids and trees. The content becomes the UI. Plex does this well and Kodi is moving this way with 17.0.

2) Merge views - while theater and normal views serve markedly different purposes, constantly switching between the 2 is cumbersome. I'm thinking an evolution of theater view would be great for navigating and selecting content, while drilling down further would resemble normal view. This will take some design genius. No competitor offers the depth of media management features so they have not had to tackle this challenge.

3) Discoverability features - competitors like Plex place discoverability at the root of the UI rather than burying it as a "recently imported", "recently released", "most played" etc playlists. Some go too far in promoting discoverability ahead of browsing, but MC can strike the right balance.

4) Metadata lookup - MC does a good job looking up metadata for TV Shows, Movies and ripped Music. I'm thinking something that corrects incomplete metadata. For example, my music files have inconsistent and often incorrect tagging of the genre field. I would appreciate a MC feature to lookup and over-write genre fields.

5) PC independence - This would be a big effort but given declining PC sales, but may be the path to survival. Plex does this very well. It has clients across all platforms (PC, Mac, iOS, Android, XBox, Playstation, Roku) that can access PC or NAS based servers. MC already provides a decent PC to PC client-server solution. JRemote is an OK PC server to Android client solution. Ideally, MC would evolve into a light weight PC or NAS based server and full featured PC, Mac, iOS and Android based clients. JRiver has taken a step towards this future with its QNAP NAS solution.

[imugli]

Voice input.

"Hey JRiver, play Kind of Blue."

Have you seen the Amazon Echo integration that's going on over at

http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=102709.0

[The RomDoodle!]

MC:

Firstly, and fore mostly (I think that's a word), MC is unbelievable.  The team at JR have an unmatched passion for achieving perfection.  Although I believe the pursuit of perfection is more satisfying.

I see users mention their vast libraries of media, photos, music, videos and the like.  I have an ever growing black hole of 60+ TB of media and I add roughly 1 -2 TB monthly.

So, competitive disadvantages – none.  JR’s Reaction to users wants is impressive.  The ability to be agile, flexible and just ‘darn’ great is what keeps JR’s competitors at a ‘disadvantage’.

‘nuff said!...

-Rommie

[Aircub]

As a Synology NAS and IOS user I Completely agree with PC Independance as mentioned above.
Plex is a good example and JRiver is definately at a competitive disadvantage being tied to PC/MAC

[AndyU]

Have you seen the Amazon Echo integration that's going on over at

http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=102709.0

No I hadn't seen that, thanks for pointing it out. Seems as though it has a way to go! And I'd probably prefer to talk to my iThing, since I'm already accustomed to doing so for phone dialling and the odd bit of iTunes music.

JRiver is wonderful and has been an important part of my musical experience, but if it doesn't embrace streaming then I will use it less and less. As I like classical music, I have been a Qobuz subscriber for some months and it's just outstanding, and use it for well over half my listening. But how I wish for JRiver and JRemote searching and organising! I wonder/worry whether it is the case that the guys at JRiver don't think there's much future for them with the audio side of their product - plenty of other players have developed Tidal, Roon and Qobuz interfaces. And then there's MQA appearing, which may be hocus-pocus, but since Warner have just signed up for it, may not be.

[JimH]

Split Tidal

[imeric]

I've been looking for a high end audio player that can be used with my Android Phone connected to either my iFi Nano or the Dragonfly.  I purchased both Neutron and Poweramp but I wasn't satisfied and ended up buying USB Audio Player Pro which is excellent and is getting me closer to listening from a PC with MC. Haven't done a full A/B and don't really see the point as I'm not expecting it to beat MC and we all know this is where MC beats everyone else hands down...(And I'm using a higher end DAC for this...But I do love my Dragonfly...)

All of this to say that I would have seriously considered and most likely purchased or used MC for Android high-end listening had it been available...I currently use Gizmo and it's working great both for streaming and remoting of MC on the HTPC but I was looking for something to play files locally from the S7 and the micro SD (using MC to synchronise files with of course ...

[dhensley]

MC has a steep learning curve and limited/partially obsolete documentation. Examples: I'm fighting an Android sync problem now. Specifically, playlists aren't transferring. No idea what's going on--paths correct, directories exist, music files transfer with no issues. Online documentation doesn't get into playlist sync details, has portions marked as needing work, and searches of the forum haven't produced anything relevant. If I sync to a hard drive directory I get an option for type of playlist and relative/absolute. That option isn't shown for an android sync. Why?

Another example: sharing a library between multiple PCs. I know it gets into firewall issues, etc., but once those are solved it's still complex and fragile. I had it working at one time but it's broken and I don't have the time and patience to constantly tinker with it. A related issue is playing network share ISOs. Got it working, but I had to spend a lot of time searching the forum and trial and error to get it there, and in this case there was a pretty good writeup present. But, because of the shared library fragility issue I've just set up a network share and my family browses filenames and plays the movies directly--because I know that'll work even when I'm not there to troubleshoot things. I can and have figured this stuff out, but I've been doing embedded firmware development for 40+ years and I really don't want to spend my spare time tinkering with this stuff--I want to turn on the music or video and have it actually play without another project to troubleshoot. I desperately want to get my family on to theater view, which is one of the sexiest things I've ever seen--but I get the network, shared database and ISO issues fixed, wait a few months, and something's broken again.

I've deliberately not recommended MC to folks that have asked me because they're not software developers and I don't want to become their IT department. I'd go so far as to say that MC simply isn't accessible to a lot of folks because of the learning curve and amount of research and troubleshooting required to get what I consider basic functionality working. Some much less powerful competitive products are.

My suggestion is that some very basic use cases be identified and thoroughly documented for non-technical users. Some auto discovery and auto configuration of things like common networking scenarios are needed. I'm not the only person trying to sync to an android device. I'm not the only person trying to set up a whole house media infrastructure with a shared library. I'm not the only person that rips DVDs to ISO and wants to play them over a network. This is basic stuff and should be a by the numbers, step by step procedure with a high probability of success without troubleshooting and research. Discovery of database masters and firewall configuration should be automatic and, over time, robust. So, I'll submit that maybe the product functionality is already pretty good, but it's difficult, frustrating and time consuming to use. I hate documentation. You hate documentation. It needs documentation and that documentation needs to always be up to date. User-generated documentation for basic functionality is a non-starter.

IMHO, the biggest impediment to MC's market growing is the lack of accessibility for an average computer/handheld user. I've seen this stated on other forums when someone asks about a media player and they're steered elsewhere. Fix the accessibility issue and grow the customer base. The sophisticated users are here and have been for a while and the product functionality is pretty darn good--I believe that making MC more accessible is the best allocation of resources.

Cheers.

[Castius]

So i think most people have said what's important already.

It's great you're adding new features like IOT automation (Internet of Things)
Plus TV support has been making big strides lately. Some new features some usability.

JRiver needs a good pass on usability, to match its technical qualities.
Standard view, theater view, media network are too disconnected.
And now we also going to have one remote.

Before i choose JRiver i tried almost every alternative.
What brought me here was the large feature set.
And a UI that didn't dumb down itself to the point you can't do anything.
By combining using a mouse and keyboard and a remote control.

So if you can consolidate your UI and maintain that feature set. That would go along way.

Now on to the competition examples.
I have been playing with launchBox and in light of this tread and reading reddit HTPC thread.
I have taken a look at https://emby.media/index.html.

These two apps have good webpages. Emby wiki/manual is very good.
LaunchBox has Tons of video tutorials
Both are free with paid premium.
And Both have better Visual metaData use.
launchBox. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZetWn98LUg
Emby https://emby.media/emby-theater.html
Emby has done a good job in many areas. That have been requested in these forums.  

Thanks for for all your hard work and passion.

[imeric]

MC has a steep learning curve and  ...

Making MC work the way you want it when you go a little out of the box can be extremely frustrating and time consuming...Especially when you start from scratch whether your PC illiterate or a developer/techie person...

MC is great and sky is the limit in what you can do with it but...
+1 on better handheld sync and (second one for me besides TV improvements) and on better doc.

[JimH]

Standard view, theater view, media network are too disconnected.

How do you think they could be better integrated?  I'm interested.

[Castius]

First i would start with a shared views editor.
Then tag views that are visible in certain UIs.

Create a new standard view that works in all Environments. Windows/Linux,Mac.Android
This would be a more like a TheaterView/JRemote view. That is remote friendly and shows more meta Data.
Make is possible to load webpages in this view. That also responds to remote commands
Rename standard view to Detailed View.

Then improve editing views.
It's should be easier to edit view and see it updating. Like edit view would be a split. 
So you can see it update while you testing. This will help learning the expressions engine.
Fix the need to restart JRiver to see media Network updates

These would start to build a better learning curving curve.

[syndromeofadown]

How do you think they could be better integrated?  I'm interested.

Forget about backwards compatibility with current default views.

Have a few simple default views that are in both theatre view and standard view. Have JRemote and Gizmo setup to use these views by default too.

Video views:
Movies-->Name
Movies-->Year-->Name
Movies-->Genre-->Name
TV Shows-->Series-->Season-->Episode

For music:
Artist-->Album-->Track
One view with panes and album thumbnails, and another with categories.

Have auto import look in Window’s Video and Music folders (I'm sure it already does).

Give users semi strict naming convention to use in order to get their videos from the windows folder into the few simple views all tagged up with cover art. Maybe do naming conventions similar to Plex, or Kodi, or whatever the kids are using these days to help make moving to MC easier.

If users don’t like the views you give them they can tweak and add as needed using the defaults as a starting point.

[syndromeofadown]

I'd like to hear your opinion on big areas where you find that MC is weak when compared to competitors.

- Fully functional and visually identical versions on Mac, Linux, Raspberry, android, etc.
- Metadata lookup for digital music: Freedb, Amazon, TrackType.org, etc.
- Complete and total touchscreen integration.
- Eye candy

We're thinking about where we need to go next with MC.

Don't go anywhere. I would be happy with just more fixes from the Too Easy thread, as there are a lot of requests that have been skipped over. Maybe start a Moderately Easy thread.

You could focus marketing on playing media you own and being DRM free. People will likely get fed up with streaming when there are 40 different services they need to be able to watch the things they want. Or when there is only one music streaming service left with unreasonably high fees trying not to go bankrupt. Geo-blocking and DRM is only tolerated when a service is super cheap and convenient.

I'd like to hear your opinion on big areas where you find that MC is weak when compared to competitors.

One thing no-one has brought up is the fact that that competitors have plugins that allow for streaming of illegal content.
If it comes to the point where these plugins are disabled I'm sure they will loose three quarters of their users.

[Ferdi]

To answer the question, I really think it matters to define what the competition is, which requires to know which audience you target, what user profile(s) you consider your customers.
I have been using JRiver for ages (jukebox late in the 90's) and till today use only a marginal subset of it's features. I organize (tag) my music, sometimes seek help when trying to get advanced playlists or groupings, and play music. I have zero interest in TV, barely any in movies (hence the last versions did not give much new, but that's ok). Standard sound quality is totally sufficient, I don't care about HiRes, DSP etc., though i have flac where i can.

I failed using Id (find it unstable, unreliable and way too complicated to set up). It took me years to realize how easy it was to set up an external stream. It took me even longer to set up a media server! I was playing music only at home and sync to iPod, it was literally by accident that I set up the server.

User Interface (screens) is just ok and should be modernized, as many say.
User Experience is the biggest area of improvements: give me wizards to set things up, not options I don't understand. Guide me through the wealth of features by first telling me in plain language what i can actually do, and don't scare me away with technical descriptions of individual options. The whole approach to configuring MC reminds of enterprise software like SAP back in the 90's. Option rich, but hard to use. I have once seen someone on this forum offering to pay for help with MC - that says much!  
Create intuitive, goal or task oriented navigation patterns to set up features and 'flavors'. Think TurboTax. And fix some of the unique terminology ('zone' doesn't make any sense to me). If this all was in place, you'd not get the requests for documentation or better wiki pages, i am sure!
I remember one post where you asked something along the line of how you could compete with Sonos: Sonos doesn't give me an overwhelming options menu, they just ask me what i want, and then set it up for me. Their user experience incredible! (their mobile app sucks, though, and i usually play on Sonos via JRemote, an outstanding app).

[mata7]

i think the future is Server and Clients Apps like plex and Emby are doing, IOS, Android TV, AppleTV And of course Phone apps, i belive today most people use this device to stream and play videos and music from the Server or from stream service and no PCs any more, my 2 cents

[JohnnyFire]

another - minus point is the crashes. I know its not easy to create and programming an app, but i really hate it when my music app goes off makes me really sad! stability for me is the begining of all!

[Trumpetguy]

User experience when playing video on remote device. Short summary of what I (and others) have complained about earlier, and are the reason why JRiver is not a technically feasible solution in our living room (it is in the home theater!):

• Yes, it is possible to play video using gizmo or other remotes, and even use the remote(s) to play it to my tv. But I never do, because it always ends in a battle against technical problems, e.g. it requires all kind of trouble getting the transcoding right, and more often than not it just stops. It invariably forces me down to the server room to fiddle with JRiver from there.
• Competitors even let you change bitrate manually during playback.
• Seek in remote video is in practice not working. Tapping on the progress bar usually makes video start from the beginning. No problems with that with competitors.
• Subtitles not working. Works for your competitors.
• Change audio track not possible from remote. Competitors let you do that even during playback.

[JohnnyFire]

User experience when playing video on remote device. Short summary of what I (and others) have complained about earlier, and are the reason why JRiver is not a technically feasible solution in our living room (it is in the home theater!):

• Yes, it is possible to play video using gizmo or other remotes, and even use the remote(s) to play it to my tv. But I never do, because it always ends in a battle against technical problems, e.g. it requires all kind of trouble getting the transcoding right, and more often than not it just stops. It invariably forces me down to the server room to fiddle with JRiver from there.
• Competitors even let you change bitrate manually during playback.
• Seek in remote video is in practice not working. Tapping on the progress bar usually makes video start from the beginning. No problems with that with competitors.
• Subtitles not working. Works for your competitors.
• Change audio track not possible from remote. Competitors let you do that even during playback.

that will like to see it too! i use jremote a lot and will be usefull to use the app to the full pontentional

[JohnnyFire]

customization is everyting! i believe the team can push it further.

for example the bottom bar track info text for is no needed there is no choice to disable it. the only way is to change the text colour to match with the colour of the skin.
people loves the custom settings to make an app to closest to their needs!

just my opinion!

[JimH]

No +1 voting please.

[jachin99]

Most of you might think I'm nuts but cloud storage could be useful in JRiver for some aspects of media organizing.  I'm thinking more for storing photos or personal videos, and maybe even music.  I know it isn't something that most of your competitors have but as you build up your photo collection, having an off-site backup is a really good idea, and it could save users some storage space.  Maybe even an iPhone, an Android app that that will allow users to give pictures taken from their cameras custom name, and build tagging capabilities that jriver is kind of famous for into the program. 

[imugli]

Most of you might think I'm nuts but cloud storage could be useful in JRiver for some aspects of media organizing.  I'm thinking more for storing photos or personal videos, and maybe even music.  I know it isn't something that most of your competitors have but as you build up your photo collection, having an off-site backup is a really good idea, and it could save users some storage space.  Maybe even an iPhone, an Android app that that will allow users to give pictures taken from their cameras custom name, and build tagging capabilities that jriver is kind of famous for into the program. 

There are apps that let you map google drive, dropbox etc as local drives. It's not "integration" as you suggest, but perhaps it's a stop gap in the meantime :-)

[JimH]

Split Sage TV

[CadErik]

2.  Get over it.  Never update if that's what makes sense to you.

I use MC to play music and watch movies on my computer and TV and for both interfaces, there have been very little changes. The default skin is the same old one... At least a new L&F for every new release would not hurt and a new theme for the Theather view. The Van Gogh picture has been there forever as background, I was certainly disappointed that there was not a single UI improvement in release 21. I am happy to update and hope for the best, but the last release has not brought a single new feature for me.

[Seisteve]

I only use River for audio as setting up video in Europe is always tricky I have been using it for a number of years.

However Connection to SkyGo.com and BBC iplayer with a proxy server wold be great.

• Personally I would like to see JRiver on Windows 10 mobile so I can take the awesome sound quality with me every place I go and focus the sound for headphones so I get the ultimate mobile sound.
• I think the interface could do with a little lift especially for Laptop users and touch screens sometimes the buttons for drooping the volume are small for tablet use

I found River and have never felt the need to try anything else... but if you can get me away from Groove on my phone I would buy a second licence easily.

Please Note that I have the Windows Mobile for work along with a large number of people in Europe.

Steve

[Seisteve]

Guys

here is another one.... when I put in my registration number for the upgrade.... how about pore-filling in the form ;-)

that would be a great improvement

[Etsijä]

I have only one very simple but essential feature, which has been lacking from MC from the start: the ability to Play/Pause by pressing the SPACEBAR.  This is a very clear competitive disadvantage since all other main players out there have supported it for years.

You see, I am a professional dance teacher and I am using the MC in my classes every day. I do not need more eye candy, remote libraries (I have mine set up in OneDrive - works perfectly), even a fancy manual. What I need is a robust music player which is versatile, supports all sorts of ways of sorting my music library (BPM, Genre and Number Plays, for the most), where I can build different views into my library, Smartlists etc.  Plus it needs to be as robust as possible in the class situation ie. I need to be able to Play/Pause with keyboard, not with mouse.

In all other aspects MC is perfect for me - but this SIMPLE feature. So let it at least be configurable to Play/Pause with the SPACEBAR.  Thank you.

[flac.rules]

I agree with many of the other points here:

- Better UI, especially in theatre view.
- More robust client-server functionality.
- Better stability, while the program is more advanced, there is also more troubles, more tweaks that has to be done for stable operation and so on.

[pgruebele]

1. Having to enter settings and dig around to change the font size is complicated and arcane.  You should be able to "zoom" the views (fonts/icons) like in a web browser.  I have multiple people using MC on my TV and it's a constant struggle to change font size for different eyes.

2. Android based set top boxes are becoming popular, cheap, and well integrated with remote etc.  In my opinion Linux is hardly worth supporting because it is a very niche market, but with Android there will be a much bigger market.  You could even re-sell Android set top boxes with JR preinstalled.  Of course things like media players, UPnP/DLNA etc are all available under Android but JRiver combines all these and a nice library manager all into one package - much simpler.

[blgentry]

I have only one very simple but essential feature, which has been lacking from MC from the start: the ability to Play/Pause by pressing the SPACEBAR.  This is a very clear competitive disadvantage since all other main players out there have supported it for years.

I agree.  The way MC handles the spacebar differently, in different parts of the interface is frustrating.  Frankly, I see no good reason to use spacebar for anything other than "a literal space" or "play/pause".  I wish they would change this.

Of course, spacebar *does* do play/pause, depending on where you are clicked in the interface.  If you are in Playing Now, it should work correctly.

If you're willing to do some work, you can modify this yourself so that spacebar does play/pause almost everywhere.  It takes a bit of effort, but it was worth it for me.  Here's an outline of the process:

https://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=98858.msg684066#msg684066

Brian.

[MikeO]

A couple of comments ...

I am an EX user of MC  - sounds strange but I had so many stability issues either with MC or external USB drives I was getting seriously fed up as was the other half...

The main reason for change , (I moved to Cambridge Audio CXN as a dedicated Network streamer and a Mede8er for video) was usability . As some one above pointed out we are a group of "collectors and hoarders" I am 66 and have been collecting audio since my early teens so I think I qualify. So navigation of my hoard is quite important and often demanding. Using Theatre View is good but means a picture on when you are listening which I find distracting , I suppose I am used to staring at the brick wall ahead after all these years.

For non techies (i.e. wives and kids ?) to actually select a Movie or Album and get it running via a PC can be quite demanding . JRemote helps a lot but it still boils down to being MY system not the family one for complexity reasons.

What the rest have is probably no better , but I suspect some slicker method of configuration wouldn't go amiss , and as mentioned above  a "sexier" UI. Without being rude DataGrids are functional but rather old hat, using even windows forms you can achieve a more "Mobile Look" UI. How about JRemote lookalike for the UI would that be so difficult to achieve , is WPF really dead ?

Enough gripes .. I am still a staunch supporter and will continue to be so , MC is far and away the best Library Manager around and the ability to have custom tags is simply magic, I have seen no other implementation of this. Tagging and organisation in general is a major and important part of "Collecting" and being able to navigate the collection.

Streaming stuff from a NAS or PC using DNLA is probably the way to go , I use MC as the DLNA server and hence get the custom tag usage I love. I tend to agree with the comments about streaming services , I live in South Africa and we suffer from limited bandwidth, expensive data and very limited streaming services eg we JUST got Netflix a couple of months back . What is this Spotify thing ?

So my vote would go for UI beef up ,modernize and simplification. I appreciate to maintain the flexibility and configurability of MC requires a complex config system but its a bit daunting to a new user however tech savvy they may be (I have been a developer amateur and pro for the last 30 years or so and I struggle initially).

My 2 penneth

Mike

[DemeraraDrinker]

I used to use MediaMonkey.  In MM, you can do a "Google" search in the search bar.  Just type a word or word fragment and it searches all the metadata for all the tracks in the database.  Tidal does the same thing.

Search results are albums, artists, tracks, etc.  Whatever matches.  I have looked for a plugin to do this to no avail.

Would be great if MC22 could do this.  I just want to type something in the search box no matter where I am in MC and just see matches against all of the metadata. 

[mwillems]

I used to use MediaMonkey.  In MM, you can do a "Google" search in the search bar.  Just type a word or word fragment and it searches all the metadata for all the tracks in the database.  Tidal does the same thing.

Search results are albums, artists, tracks, etc.  Whatever matches.  I have looked for a plugin to do this to no avail.

Would be great if MC22 could do this.  I just want to type something in the search box no matter where I am in MC and just see matches against all of the metadata. 

Doesn't the search bar in the upper right hand corner of MC do exactly this?  When I type a search term in, I see all my files with any matching metadata in the view (albums, artists, tracks, whatever).  Could you elaborate a bit about what the current MC search functionality doesn't do that you're looking for?

[RD James]

1. Having to enter settings and dig around to change the font size is complicated and arcane.  You should be able to "zoom" the views (fonts/icons) like in a web browser.  I have multiple people using MC on my TV and it's a constant struggle to change font size for different eyes.

View > Size

I agree.  The way MC handles the spacebar differently, in different parts of the interface is frustrating.  Frankly, I see no good reason to use spacebar for anything other than "a literal space" or "play/pause".  I wish they would change this.

Unless you're entering text in a field, I can't think of what else the spacebar would be used for.
I agree that having it play/pause would be a good change.

For non techies (i.e. wives and kids ?) to actually select a Movie or Album and get it running via a PC can be quite demanding . JRemote helps a lot but it still boils down to being MY system not the family one for complexity reasons.

This is why I want to be able to assign a user to each device.
I want to have different views presented to different users devices.
 
With my remote, I want to see everything. All items in the library, all the complex views that I have for sorting things in a specific way. E.g. handling classical music completely differently from other music.
For the wife's remote, set it up to display three basic music, movies, and tv views.
For the kids' tablet, only list basic views for pre-approved content. No listing of R-rated content if I forgot to change the user on the server.
Guest mode (or guest device) only lists certain content, behavior is set to add instead of play by default. Can only access certain zones.

Doesn't the search bar in the upper right hand corner of MC do exactly this?  When I type a search term in, I see all my files with any matching metadata in the view (albums, artists, tracks, whatever).  Could you elaborate a bit about what the current MC search functionality doesn't do that you're looking for?

He probably wants it to search the entire database, not just the current view.

[rexibaby]

The Most important features that would carry MC over to the future is touch screen capability for video. Almost all manufacturer are pushing out window 10 tablet and video is the next thing forward.. Here is the problem with MC21

There are no swipe control to move video forward, pause or backward.
The UI is not touch friendly even in theater mode.
Need a light weight mode as most tablets CPU are low voltage which means low power. MC always get the tablet fan to spin really loud for just playing videos. This does not happen in other players.

I have been waiting for this feature for the last 7 years...

[DemeraraDrinker]

Doesn't the search bar in the upper right hand corner of MC do exactly this?  When I type a search term in, I see all my files with any matching metadata in the view (albums, artists, tracks, whatever).  Could you elaborate a bit about what the current MC search functionality doesn't do that you're looking for?

For me, when I type text into the search bar, it searches against whatever you have open in the left side tree menu (a podcast, an album, etc).  It does not search against the metadata for the entire library. 

I usually have to go out to the Files view to get what I'm after, but this takes me out of the context of whatever I am doing.  Instead I would like to be able to "Google" the entire library at any time by using the search box.

If I am wrong and there is a way to search the entire library, I'm all ears.

[blgentry]

Unless you're entering text in a field, I can't think of what else the spacebar would be used for.
I agree that having it play/pause would be a good change.

Spacebar is used for some navigation tasks including expanding trees when you are tree navigation areas.  In all other places, MC already uses spacebar for Play/Pause.  It's just in these other areas that it doesn't function.  My key mapping overrides most of those so spacebar acts as Play/Pause in almost all contexts.

Brian.

[Etsijä]

@RD James and Brian: thank you for your understanding & support for my SPACEBAR request. And Brian, I'll certainly look into your process of mapping spacebar for my purposes.

For others: I am aware that if the mouse context is in the "playing now" area, spacebar does work as the default Play/Pause button. For my profession (dance teacher), the mouse context just never IS in that area.  It is 100% of the time on my library view, where I select the next song to be played by double-clicking. So the mouse context stays in my library view, and spacebar by default doesn't work.