INTERACT FORUM
More => Old Versions => Media Center 11 (Development Ended) => Topic started by: nila on January 25, 2003, 06:14:00 pm
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Ok,
WMP9 has a few great features that MJ doesn't have that really should be added.
You guys have an advantage for MC9 in that WMP9 is already out so you can see what big features they've added and make sure MC has all of them, but then more ontop to make it the greatest.
They obviously spent a FORTUNE on research to find out what was important so make the most of their research findings :)
Here's a few of the things they have that MC really should have:
- Auto Rating (all imported songs are given 3 rating and then this adjusts according to the number of plays etc) - VERY USEFUL tool to save having to individually rate each song.
- The database of when songs are played - being able to create smartlists of 'Songs played in the evenings' is a great way of doing smart lists for moods. People's listening habbits tend to follow a patter and I'd LOVE a playlist in MJ like the one in WMP of 'songs played in the evening', or 'songs played on the weekend' etc etc. - GREAT feature in my opinion.
- It's interface for creating smartlists is I feel VERY good. The way it's laid out is v. easy to understand and edit and use.
- Folder monitoring to find songs added to the folder.
- Now Playing's quick link to play any drive, playlist, etc - VERY nice feature!!
- The ALWAYS visible drop down menu filled with playlists for quick easy playing of any playlist or auto playlist - VERY quick and easy and permenantly accessible.
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>> Auto Rating
Mine are always rated where i want them "?" i would prefer to do the rating or My Program Chart and Lyrics Finder.
But it would be nice to set the rating level, and also a graphic rating level like 5 stars
I don't see any of the others you listed as important to me.
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MJ\MC Radio
where the program will go out and find other media servers, and play at random music from other users servers.
maybe also where a user can limit the selection thru rules like "Rating"
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I agree with all of them except when creating smarlists. MC9 was way more options. I think the way it is now works great.
The auto-rating and played times (night, day) are really cool features for WMP9. When you rate it manually, it changes the stars to bold and it's set.
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Folder monitoring to find songs added to the folder
I gave a try to it with MM.
You really need to have small folders.
If you have folders with few thousands tracks ,the player just need hours to open
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Folder monitoring to find songs added to the folder
I gave a try to it with MM.
You really need to have small folders.
If you have folders with few thousands tracks ,the player just need hours to open
Realone Player has this feature too, and I loved it. It allowed you to set scan intervals, "at startup" "every 30 minutes" etc. etc.
When I used it, it was set to go @ program startup, and I did not experience any loss performance.
Nice feature to have.
ps. I have ~5000 files in ~400 folders in my "watched" directory.
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i have been pressuring for the graphical ratings for a while, it seems to be gaining ground here on the board, lets hope someone is listening! go 5 star ratings!! :D
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I stated in another topic that I found the import function in MC to be a bit clumsy. A folder monitor would go a long way in aleviating much of that clumsiness. I LOVE that idea.
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I did it with one folder having 10000+ files.
And MM needed ages to scan it.
I do not now ,but maybe any player would do the same with such a number of songs.
I do not know that much MM-i use only super tag- but look like that this jukebox is fine with only
small' collections.
If fast on very big folders ,in this case it can be a cool thing for MC to have.
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Auto Rating (all imported songs are given 3 rating and then this adjusts according to the number of plays etc) - VERY USEFUL tool to save having to individually rate each song.
I clearly disagree. I was relieved when this was changed. Previously in MJ all was autorated a 3.
I wouldnt know how to distinguish the "real" 3's from the fake ones. And after, the "real" 4's, etc from the ones I actually rated.
I could listen to a song a couple of times, just to hear a certain riff or something, and this wouldnt qualify for a higher rating, unless I want it to in that specific case.
Agreed, manually rating all the songs is a huge job, but I'd rather do that.
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Xstatic - have you tried WMP9?
If you have you'll know that it's CLEARLY obvious which songs have been manually set rating wise and which are automatic.
The ones you've set appear as bright stars, the automatic ones are dull. It's really easy to easily distinguish.
And a simple search modifier could be used to distinguish between automatic rated songs and manually rated ones.
Fair enough you want to manually rate 7000 songs or so as I'd have to do but a LOT of us are lazy and not quite THAT keen music buff's.
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Automatic anything is fine, as long as you have the option to turn it off. :)
And, after thinking about it, if the auto-rating in WMP is based on the number of times the track is played, can't you just use MCs "Number Of Plays" field to achieve the same result?
Rob
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One more tidbit about the auto ratings... when making smartlists with WMP9, it gives you two "ratings" fields that you can use: "Auto Rating" and "My Rating". That way, if you want to make a smartlist containing your 4- and 5-star songs, you can make it so that "My Rating = 4, 5". That way, the automatically rated songs won't get mixed in.
I don't have an opinion either way... the auto rating seems to just be a substitute for play counts, in as much as: Auto Rating 3 = unrated, Auto Rating 4 = playcount > 0. Something that I can learn to live with or ignore, no worries.
As for other aspects of WMP9, I like the interface that they use for making smartlists... it's more user friendly. However, the smartlist interface for iTunes3 is even better. If JR is taking ideas for a new interface for smartlists, I'd suggest cruising to a CompUSA and taking a look at iTunes3's smartlist interface... it's very nice and extremely user-friendly.
Graphical, clickable ratings would be great, but you guys know what I think about that. I'm patient. :D
Also, for what it's worth, I think that it is important to look at WMP9 and iTunes3's strengths and try to match (or top) them. Why? Those programs are free. Now granted, MC can do more than they can, and better... but sometimes, feature usability or the whole UI can make the difference in a user between a free download and an online purchase.
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The ones you've set appear as bright stars, the automatic ones are dull. It's really easy to easily distinguish.
Good point. I haven't tried wmp9 because it isnt mpc compatible.
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The only thing I like about WMP9 is the ability to easily change the color of the interface.
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Yeah,
I LOVED that feature, it was soooo sweet. Unfortunately I cant see it being migrated to MJ just because it'd be too hard.
I also love it's ability to go full screen and hide the task bar and LOVE it's mini task bar player which automatically pop's up a little info window each time it changes tracks to tell you what it's about to play.
It's 'Album Info' is a great tool to as it works really well and can be done while still looking through your library without having to leave it.