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[johnp]

I am wondering if it is just me or if anyone else can see the value in being able to browse the music library and generate now playing lists for multiple output zones independently.

Allow me to elaborate:

If you have the good  fortune of using an interactive remote control mechanism for controlling Media Center remotely, using a product like Music Lobby, Net Remote, or Glissando etc. etc.  and you are further blessed by having multiple output zones going to separate areas of your home, then you are likely to run into this problem.

If you are browsing the music library with one of the tools mentioned above, the first thing you will notice is the need to pick the output zone based on where you want the music to output.  There is no way to automate this since MC only allows 1 library browser at a time that is in the "active" zone.

Then if you happen to have a spouse, room mate, or some other form of co-dweller, and that person desires to pick and play music at the same time in a separate area of the house, you will begin to have what I have affectionately dubbed "zone wars".  The person who wants control will inevitably be either adding music to the wrong zone, or be fighting for control of it.  Either scenario is very very undesirable in my humble opinion.

What I would like to know is; Does anyone else have a similar opinion and see value in a feature that would allow up to 10 users to independatly browse the library simultaneously and pick tracks discretely?

Or does anyone have a work around solution for this problem?

Before you reply, I already know that MC supports discrete transport controls, and saved playlist loading.  That is not the issue here.  I want to focus strickly on the interactive (two way) browsing of the music library.

Regards,

[PabloR]

Johnp,

I have the exact same desire. I am now using MC9 for my main zone (theater) and multiple copies of winamp controlled by Iremote (www.mcmajeres.com) that allows me to do just that. This is redundant as I would like to get rid of winamp and use solely MC9 defining all of the zones. The downstairs PC should know nothing about what I am listening to in the theater. Right now it is a zone war with MC9 so I stopped using zones in MC9 as they dont work the way most people with multiple zones would use it. The other thing that I wouild like is that when MC9 starts, it starts automatically in the toolbar area and not in the task bar. As MC9 manages all of the zones, it should be able to be started in toolbar mode. Right now one must maximize and minimize before it goes into the toolbar.

The other feature is automatically starting zones with predefined playlists. This creates background music throughout the house without anybody picking it.

Thanks

[dreicher]

John,

Here-here! The thought of the ability to control multiple zones independently from an external remote ala MusicLobby sends shivers down my spine. JRiver, you wanna rule the world - that's your ticket.

Seriously, coupling independent zone control from anywhere in the house to Media Center's already fantastic list of features and you've got a whole house control system that is untouchable in quality.

In keeping with the zone theme - I would personally like to see the ability to toggle zone mirroring of zone 1 in all zones to give me the ability to play background music throughout the entire house and still be able to control volume and dsp independently per zone. All I ask is the ability to "mirror" a single zone and have that feature either on or off. If it's off - everything works as planned, if it's on same source in synch to multiple zones.

Dan

[johnp]

Yeah I'm with both of you on the toolbar issue as well as the zone mirroring.

Regards,


John

[mcascio]

Here's my vote!

[Mads_H]

Ofcourse, this is how multizoning must work.
My vote aswell

[ccclapp]

I agree!!  I am a big believer in multi-zone whole house AV.  

Zone sync is a basic necessity for this...without it the idea of mult-zone is not very practical.

With regard to the first post, I don't fully understand (but that's nothing new).  For example in NetRemote, I believe each PPC and/or win32 connection (client) can specify which zone to control and can very easily switch between zones.  Isn't this what you want?  Maybe I am wrong about the capability, but that is what I remember.

--Caleb

[Mastiff]

The tzar agrees.  

[WickedEwok]

Absolutely. This is the most important feature needed in Media Center (IMHO), and the last needed piece to make MC the "crown jewel" of whole house audio applications.

The API should handle this by allowing you to request the Mixer and Current Playlist for a specific zone. If no zone is specified, it should grab the "current zone". This way everything is still backwards compatible.

I agree with Dan about "mirroring".

[blafarm]

I wholeheartedly agree! Multiple independent zones and "mirroring" would make MC the definitive "category killer".

[Dave T]

Agree very much with all said.  Aaaand, I'd like to add one thing.  "Mirroring" would be even more powerful if you had the option to have several concurrent output streams, and could pick which output stream each zone was playing.  That way, instead of having one stream go to all zones a la "mirroring", or each zone getting its own stream, you could have one stream going to more than one zone, and other streams going to other zones.  The scenario I imagine is that all zones are playing one thing, but one contrary feeling zone is playing something else.

[Mads_H]

Ok - I know I wrote earlier, that mirroring was what we needed for "the whole house system" - But I have done some extra thinking and come to the conclusion that that is probably not going to be enough...
Right now Im trying to implement MC in a couple of rooms in my house, and just realised that Webmedia and tv are more than difficult to use in the rest of the house. That tv is difficult, is what I expected, but webmedia should be as easy as the normal medialibrary, in my opinion.
Or am I wrong, does any of you know how to omplement webmedia in my "whole house system"?

[marketability]

I'll vote for running multiple zones against a single instance of MC!

[davidne0uk]

Agree with all.

Davie

[pclausen]

Please make it so!

I'm using MusicLobby and have an airpanel and a PPC.  Fighting the zone wars on a daily basis.

On the mirroring, I'd be happy with just being able to mirror zone1 into the other zones.

[BBadenov]

With this, my first post here, I would just like to second the request to be able sync the output of a two (or more) different zones so that each is playing the same thing at the same time.  This is absolutely necessary for sane, multi room listening.