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Author Topic: wma radio stations ("Radio Free..." sites) problems.  (Read 1212 times)

lalittle

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wma radio stations ("Radio Free..." sites) problems.
« on: April 09, 2004, 12:18:59 am »

I'm having problems with wma radio stations (namely the "Radio Free Virgin..." sites), and I've seen several reports of others having similar issues with the same sites.  JRiver has commented on this a few times, but I've never really seen an "it works fine on our systems" post.  Is this something that has been tested very much at JRiver?  With the recent release of 10, I was wondering if there have just been too many other things to test lately.

I should mention that in my particular case, two systems can play these stations and two can't.  I feel like the fact that two systems are working is giving some people the impression that this isn't a MC issue, but I don't think this is the case given the other reports of people having the same problem with MC.  It seems like my two systems that DO play these stations are the exceptions, and I cannot figure out what it is that is preventing my other two systems from playing the same stations.  With the recent "working/not working" condition with MC and wma stations in general (the 2 systems that play these station now did not play them recently) I honestly believe that this is an MC issue in some way -- some setting or condition that we need to uncover.

Could other people possibly try to play some of these stations and tell us your results?  It would help to know just how widespread this issue is.  When I test this, I do a search with "Blues" in the genre box and try to play some of the topmost "Radio Free Virgin..." stations in the resulting list.  If others could try this, maybe we could figure out the pattern to what is causing the issue for some people.

Thanks,

Larry
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mkutsen

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Re:wma radio stations ("Radio Free..." sites) problems.
« Reply #1 on: April 09, 2004, 01:13:02 am »

Interresting, "Radio Free Virgin" links point to the JRiver website.
I can play some of them while others won't play.  Perhaps the playlists have been removed from the site.  Maybe you have to subscribe for higher bitrates?  They are also MP3 playlists as far as I can tell.
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lalittle

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Re:wma radio stations ("Radio Free..." sites) problems.
« Reply #2 on: April 09, 2004, 03:24:14 am »

I can play some of them while others won't play.  Perhaps the playlists have been removed from the site.  Maybe you have to subscribe for higher bitrates?  They are also MP3 playlists as far as I can tell.

The station I use to test is the second station down from the top of the list when selecting "blues" in the "genre" dropdown box and hitting search.  This station plays on two of my systems, but not on the other two -- it's a wma station.

On a side note, this station says "96k," but is actually only 32k according to MC's progress display bar (which lists bitrate).  I notice this with a LOT of stations -- the info isn't very accurate.  Does anyone know if MC will put more emphasis toward web based radio in the near future?  MC's current implementation of internet radio is one of the few weak points of MC  -- it feels like an kind of an afterthought compared to the obvious slickness of the rest of the program.  This is odd when you consider how popular web radio is getting these days.

Thanks,

Larry
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Omni

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Re:wma radio stations ("Radio Free..." sites) problems.
« Reply #3 on: April 09, 2004, 01:39:51 pm »

No, I can't play them either, and worse yet, when I clicked on one of the other stations (one of the non-Radio Free stations), MC started stuttering (left channel only--right channel was silent) and then up and crashed.  To add insult to injury ::), even after MC crashed, the stuttering remained--I had to reboot my machine to clear the sound driver.  :o

But didn't Matt mention in one of your previous threads that the problem is that these stations don't identify the type of stream being played?  <shrug>

Well, I subscribe to two radio streaming services, so not being able to play these cheesy freebie ones is no big deal to me personally, but it is obviously causing you a lot of grief, so let me know if there are any other tests you would like me to perform to help you in your quest.  ;D
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mkutsen

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Re:wma radio stations ("Radio Free..." sites) problems.
« Reply #4 on: April 09, 2004, 01:57:19 pm »

This is the second link from the top when I follow your directions

Radio Free Virgin Absolutely Live-[Jazz & Blues] [96k] Format: Windows Media Audio
http://www.musicex.com/mediajukebox/MPL/111.mpl

That's a Media Jukebox Playlist located on a JRiver server.  You would think they should be able to help you.  I am still not sure its a WMA file despite what the link and the MC10 say while playing it.

It does not play for me either, while the "28 K" link does play.  

I agree with you regarding poor WMA support.  I am having issues while playing many other WMA stations as well.  They range from random crashes to stuttering.

Also RM support is not so good either.
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