Daydream and Fastkayak, thanks for well written replays. I support you 100%.
whatever. you are still clinging to the "i spent $50 and want everything i want".
This is not only about things he, I or we want. I my self use Theater View ALL the time. It's almost the only interface I use except for my workstation. I've tried XBMC several times. The last time for 36 hours just for video, but had to uninstall it because I got sick of the navigation and sluggishness. I'm never leaving MC, but that does not mean that me or everyone else is happy, and that MC gets as much attention as it should.
This discussion springs largely from the idea of bringing MC to a wider audience. Helping out the new users more easily sticking with MC after testing it out. Not only focusing on media feature nutcases like me, geeks like me, IT guys like me, audiophiles and videophiles. The other segment which I call "casual media users" are actually a MUCH larger segment, and it's here that MC struggles getting new users the most. Of this I am 99.9% sure. In the Eye Candy thread there's been a lot of suggestions how to improve the first time usage for new users, to improve ease of customization AND at the same time to bring more features and to raise the perceived "bling/eye candy" in Theater View. I've tried to make a small summary of what I noticed as the most commonly agreed points:
http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=72095.msg489544#msg489544Yes, MC is far superior in most fields. It's hands down the best player for audio, probably also for Video. It got NO competitors when it comes to flexibility and customization. It's standard view and features are almost limitless in usability. The problem is that the majority of users will not do a listening test and compare players (I don't), they will not see much of a difference in video playback over VLC player (I don't), they will not use expression or customize even the smallest detail because they do not want or have the time devoted to this. They just want it to work, be functional as well as presenting and playing their media in a nice way.
Yes, MC can do this, but try to think of all the media users you've seen out there. All the persons with iTunes and portable players or phones with music and other media. All the persons that have a Cable, PvR or DVD players. All the people at work or home using Spotify or other streaming services. ALL those are potential MC purchasers and users. If you take the average technical skill of those, I think most of you understand that customization to get things like they want is of no priority. They do not want to spend 1 hour on a forum to get the help needed to get what they want. Would they be willing to spend hours a week to figure out new functionality of a media player or media center? No, probably not. They stick with familiar alternatives instead. This is based on the usage and behavior of perhaps 50 persons I've seen using media over the last years. I might live in a strange country. But I doubt the difference is that huge from Norway to the US. Or any other place in the world.
So, what DO this big group of users want? They want things to work out of the box. They want things to be functional and look good out of the box. They want common and easily accessible features available when they want. They want hazel free media experience. As we've seen in the poll of the usage of the Theater View, a good 70% of the users used Theater View some or all the time (and that is just people on this forum). When you look at Media Center, which is actually the name of this product, I think most of those "normal users" sees this as a HTPC and couch experience. Most people I know of that uses music and video either have a dedicated PC for their TV, or they hook up their laptop to a TV. When they do, they would rather use a 10 foot interface instead of mouse and keyboard. I think it's pretty safe to say that Theater View is VERY important.
The problem is that people hear about XBMC and similar clones years before they hear anything about MC. It's much more wide spread and it's a well known product. That makes them a strong competitor just because of that. People coming from such systems have their catalog structure in place and things works as they expect. They have gotten used to nice skins that does pretty much everything they need (at least this is what they think).
The following is a list of what I believe many new MC users sees and thinks when they try out MC for the first time. At least those that come from other media center alternatives. These are not things that HAVE to be in MC, but I do think it's very often things people will miss. Please do not take this list as demands of what
I want to be fixed or added. It's just what I personally believe have some of the biggest impacts on new users coming from competitors. It's partially based on feedback from friends and family and new and old posts on this forum.
- They need to adapt to the "library thinking" and they probably need to fix some some media types to have nice and consistent views in Theater View
- Theater View looks plain compared to what they have seen other places (more use of art work, backdrops, graphics for media properties and so on)
- They do not see ratings for their media, except when they highlight the item
- They do not see Number Plays in caption or possibly in the Info Panels
- The caption is just a string of text. No graphics to ease the reading. No alignment to get logical placement of the text/graphics
- They do not see a summary for series and seasons like they are used to
- They have no chance of selecting positions for the info panels
- They have wrong sorting in season view and perhaps others
- They can not sort or filter from within The the UI. They have to exit and edit options (less dynamic content than they are used to)
- They do not get the logical "Season " text in front of the season numbers in the views
- The backgrounds are sometimes wrong, and they are slow to change when selecting new items (especially if you need to download them). They are often used to ultra fast switching with local downloaded images.
- They DO have some nice cover flow and video wall options, but many users does not even know they are there because it's hidden in a sub menu
- Those cover flow and video list styles does attract some users, but those users who need to quickly glance at for instance ratings and description, this is a bad list choice. Yes, you can use enter and left left to go in and out again, but it's to much work when you want to look at several alternatives. Many are not used to it either.
All of those things mentioned, and the fact that so many uses XBMC and clones already (it's easier to be convinced of a large crowd going the right way), makes it very very hard for MC users to convince others of the fact that MC is a better product. Most people will not spend the time needed to actually figure out what all the upsides are. And that is incredibly sad imo. Because I know that if some more resources was spent here, it would be such an easy job for us to help you sell this superb piece of software to a lot more people. If some of the "major" overlaying causes was to be fixed, we would have a lot better basis for getting our friends and family to use this wonderful application.