INTERACT FORUM
Windows => Third Party Plug-ins, Programs, and Skins => Topic started by: PaulSinnema on February 16, 2012, 02:57:33 pm
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Hi All,
I've made the new version of MC Remote v2.0 available on the marketplace. As before there are 2 version the free LITE and payed PRO version. The PRO version has become cheaper then ever.
http://sinnema.ch/?cat=10
New in this version:- New layout with Panorama view.
- Nice looking 'Playing' page.
- Realtime update of what's playing right now on your phone.
- A tap on the image in the 'Playing' page gives the volume and position sliders.
- Scrubbing music, movies, etc works directly from the phone.
- Queue is now available (same as 'Playing Now' in MC).
- All media can be browsed through the Media page (Audio, Images, Video, Playlists).
- Images can be displayed on the PC where MC is running and are displayed on the phone.
- JPEG Images can be rotated from the Phone.
- The Viewmode is part of the Panoramaview and has context sensitive panels in accordance with the Viewmode MC is in.
- Playlists can be selected from a treeview.
- Several bugs fixed for MC Remote in MC17 latest build (thanks JRiver).
If you have any problems with the App please send me a mail to MCRemote@Sinnema.ch or leave a comment here. Remember, I can't fix problems I don't know about :)
Please write a review on the Marketplace.
Regards
Paul
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Hi Paul trying on my Nokia Lumia with Mango and it doesn't work -
I enter in IP Address, my port is correct. I've enabled wifi on the phone, and using JRMC16. Have gone to tools>options> Media Network> and enabled Use Media network to share this library and enable dLNA and just get an error "remote server returned an error: Not found". please help
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Nice update, very slick! A point of interest might be I only discovered the volume control by accident... Maybe put it in the app description?
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Hi Paul trying on my Nokia Lumia with Mango and it doesn't work -
I enter in IP Address, my port is correct. I've enabled wifi on the phone, and using JRMC16. Have gone to tools>options> Media Network> and enabled Use Media network to share this library and enable dLNA and just get an error "remote server returned an error: Not found". please help
Hi trionfare,
Most of the time Firewalls are blocking communication. Have you got one active? If so, try and disable it for a moment.
Regards
Paul
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Nice update, very slick! A point of interest might be I only discovered the volume control by accident... Maybe put it in the app description?
Hi Phytio,
Yep, I like it too. With MC17 (with last fixes) scrubbing of movies is a thrill. MC is still the best I know.
You're right. It's not obvious that tapping the image of in the 'Playing' page is going to bring up the volume and scrub sliders along with details of what's playing. The description would be a good place althought this is not easily found either. I'll think of something nice with a balloon that shows once or something like that.
If you like the update please leave a review on the Marketplace. There's one on there now (US) that's killing the App with a negative review and there's no way for me to reply to that so any positive feedback would really be welcome.
Regards
Paul
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Nice work (since it's the only one ;D)
In terms of the Pro version speed of operation, or the lack thereof, where's the bottleneck in the app or the way it communicates with MC? Tracks take ages to show up for example, and the app is generally stuttery going from mode to mode.
The response, especially of the tracks display, is the only real - and unfortunately the main - thing that makes it unusable in practice for me, but bravo for bringing it to the market! I look forward to refinements.
Are you planning anything for Metro/Win8 slates? JRiver have never been what you could call masters of the slick interface, so I'd really welcome a better (and better looking) front end for MC playback on slates too.
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Nice work (since it's the only one ;D)
In terms of the Pro version speed of operation, or the lack thereof, where's the bottleneck in the app or the way it communicates with MC? Tracks take ages to show up for example, and the app is generally stuttery going from mode to mode.
The response, especially of the tracks display, is the only real - and unfortunately the main - thing that makes it unusable in practice for me, but bravo for bringing it to the market! I look forward to refinements.
Are you planning anything for Metro/Win8 slates? JRiver have never been what you could call masters of the slick interface, so I'd really welcome a better (and better looking) front end for MC playback on slates too.
Hi,
I've had 1 more report of slow performance before and there's of cource the review on the marketplace. I can think of several problems all related to the local network situation.
If for instance the PC where MC is running is connected via WLAN then both connections (Phone and PC) will be communicating on possibly slow connections. There are several speed enhancements in MC Remote to get the best possible performance.
Another thing is that having DLNA on in your network will cause extra traffic on your LAN. If you have many DLNA devices connected there will be a lot of traffic that MC will detect and react to.
I'm using the remote myself and I don't see any drop in performance. I use a Netgear WNDR3700 WLAN router and the Mac mini with Windows XP I have MC running on is connected via a powerplug. This setup has more than enough bandwidth to get instant reaction and quick loading of lists on the phone. Scrubbing movies is a thrill and works so fast that I do not see a lag between my slider touch and the reaction of MC.
The amount of data going accross the network from MC to the phone is limited to the bare minimum using techniques like virtual lists, lazy loading and retrieving only keys from MC where large lists are fetched.
Of cource I can not limit the data needed for an image the phone displays since MC does present me with a possibility to do that. Having said that. In the settings you can limit the size of photos retrieved from MC, but that does not help the display of covers etc.
Could you test the network speed for both the phone and PC in your network. My guess is that this is the brake on the performance somehow. MC Remote does not really need a lot of bandwidth but slow networks can have an impact. Please let me know what the maximum throughput is for your phone and PC.
If this is breaking MC Remote I'm dedicated to get the remote working to your satisfaction so let me know how it goes and we will get to the bottom of this.
Regards
Paul
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Hi,
I've had 1 more report of slow performance before and there's of cource the review on the marketplace. I can think of several problems all related to the local network situation.
If for instance the PC where MC is running is connected via WLAN then both connections (Phone and PC) will be communicating on possibly slow connections. There are several speed enhancements in MC Remote to get the best possible performance.
Another thing is that having DLNA on in your network will cause extra traffic on your LAN. If you have many DLNA devices connected there will be a lot of traffic that MC will detect and react to.
I'm using the remote myself and I don't see any drop in performance. I use a Netgear WNDR3700 WLAN router and the Mac mini with Windows XP I have MC running on is connected via a powerplug. This setup has more than enough bandwidth to get instant reaction and quick loading of lists on the phone. Scrubbing movies is a thrill and works so fast that I do not see a lag between my slider touch and the reaction of MC.
The amount of data going accross the network from MC to the phone is limited to the bare minimum using techniques like virtual lists, lazy loading and retrieving only keys from MC where large lists are fetched.
Of cource I can not limit the data needed for an image the phone displays since MC does present me with a possibility to do that. Having said that. In the settings you can limit the size of photos retrieved from MC, but that does not help the display of covers etc.
Could you test the network speed for both the phone and PC in your network. My guess is that this is the brake on the performance somehow. MC Remote does not really need a lot of bandwidth but slow networks can have an impact. Please let me know what the maximum throughput is for your phone and PC.
If this is breaking MC Remote I'm dedicated to get the remote working to your satisfaction so let me know how it goes and we will get to the bottom of this.
Regards
Paul
There might be another point of concern. How many songs do you have in your library? I've tested MC Remote with about 6000 items in the library and that results in acceptable speeds. When MC Remote fetches the contents of the library it uses a stream of keys that MC sends. Each key results in an object in memory. That might just be too much for the phone when you have a large amount of items in your library.
Try and limit the amount of items you have in your 'Playing Now' list (the queue on the remote) and see if that solves something.
Each time a new playlist is started MC Remote fetches all keys in the list and creates (empty) objects of information (song info, image, etc) which are fetched from MC as late as possible (at least at the moment they become visible on the screen) and are removed again when they leave the screen.
If you are prepared to help me out here I could make you a beta tester. Would you be prepared to go through the administrative proces at MS for that?
Regards
Paul
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Hi,
I've just submitted a new update to the Marketplace (v.2.4). Certification should take about 3 - 5 working days.
I've changed the way it loads it's virtual items. Only items visible on the screen have virtual objects. All other items now only store their key. This should give a performance boost for loading lists. Let me know if it helps.
Regards
Paul
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Thanks. I'll check it out when it hits the store. Didn't want to leave a premature review since I'm anxious to have a truly viable remote. Any chance of local playback somewhere along the line?
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Did You follow the advice I gave you and did it have any result?
Did you measure the speed of your network connections?
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Did you measure the speed of your network connections?
It's full-duplex gigabit with way more switch fabric capability than most small businesses, let alone homes... until it hits the TZ 210's radios.
What's the best way to measure throughput from the WP7?
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Speed tester free App
Bandwidth Tester free App
Help me out here become a beta tester. All you nee is a MS Live Account.
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Forgot to mention - way more than 6000 tracks. The videos do come up reasonably quickly, so it does seem to be a numbers issue. I need to do some library pruning and I'm still not fully familiar with an app so I'll play about with stuff for a while.
Also, it's worth mentioning that my tracks reside on a WHS, i.e. track storage is not local - though that's hardly slow either.
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Thanks for the reply.
Yep, I think that the change I submitted yesterday will help you. I'm also adding a Diagnostic tool in the About screen (not in submitted version yet) that will tell you numbers like 'average/min/max response time', 'average/min/max response size', 'queue count', etc. This will help you (and me) diagnose problems with the App.
That your tracks are on an external source should have no impact on the response time of the App. Try and make a playlist in MC with no more than 5000 items in it and see if that helps you.
Regards
Paul
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Hi All,
I've made a description of possible connection problems to MC from MCRemote here: http://sinnema.ch/?p=304
Regards
Paul
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Thanks, Paul. Nice work! I've added it at the bottom of our [url=http://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Network_Access]Network Access (http://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Network_Access#More_Information)[/url] wiki topic.
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OK, perhaps I'm doing something wrong so maybe you could help me in describing the sequence in which to use the remote.
Say I wanted to scroll down through a list of artists and select someone from there. What would be the steps I would need to take to do this?
Still really slow by the way.
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Hi all,
Today found a bug that defenitely will cause more traffic on the local network and thus slowness. I'm stil in the beta fase but I'll be releasing this soon.
Regards
Paul
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OK, perhaps I'm doing something wrong so maybe you could help me in describing the sequence in which to use the remote.
Say I wanted to scroll down through a list of artists and select someone from there. What would be the steps I would need to take to do this?
Still really slow by the way.
The only way (for now) to find artist is by using the Search. I'm planning to add Artist and Albums in the future.
What the slowness concerns. I've found a few bugs in the routines that fetch the data from MC. I'm still in the beta fase with those but I'll release as soon as that fase of finished.
Regards
Paul
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The only way (for now) to find artist is by using the Search. I'm planning to add Artist and Albums in the future.
What the slowness concerns. I've found a few bugs in the routines that fetch the data from MC. I'm still in the beta fase with those but I'll release as soon as that fase of finished.
Regards
Paul
Cool, will be keeping an eye on changes. Ideally I'd like to end up with functionality (and the actually usable response of) somewhere along the lines of My River for iOS...?
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Cool, will be keeping an eye on changes. Ideally I'd like to end up with functionality (and the actually usable response of) somewhere along the lines of My River for iOS...?
Well it may not look like it but programming this App has allready taken about 4 months of my free time and the earnings have not made up for the costs at all. You might say I'm doing it for the fun of it. If I wanted to make an MC for iOS that would take probably the rest of my life ;-)
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Well it may not look like it but programming this App has allready taken about 4 months of my free time and the earnings have not made up for the costs at all. You might say I'm doing it for the fun of it. If I wanted to make an MC for iOS that would take probably the rest of my life ;-)
Oh absolutely - I realise it's a major undertaking. But I think that if you build a usable product, people will come. I'd really like you to succeed but right now, speaking as a user with no attachment to the app, the remote is unfortunately (IMO) not what I'd call that usable yet. I think you're nearly there but key functionality is missing at this point, and yes, something has to be done about the speed - because e.g. other iOS based remotes I've used have no issues over my WLAN.
What I meant about My River is that what I'm really after is a My River (it's a relatively mature MC remote, and also will play to the device) equivalent for Windows Phone.
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What I meant about My River is that what I'm really after is a My River (it's a relatively mature MC remote, and also will play to the device) equivalent for Windows Phone.
Ah.... not being an iPhone man myself I did not that one.
Regards
Paul
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BTW am I right in saying that switching on authentication in MC causes this not to work?
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Yes, that is right. Authentication switched on kills MC Remote
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hi paul, i've just bought your app for my wife's phone a lumia 800
so she can use jriver as well
I'm using gizmo with my android phone
there is a function I can't find with your app,
how can I play an entire album with one action?
right now the only way I've found is to enter in the album an select each song then add them to play
regards
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Hi Salora,
Tap and hold the album a while to get the Play popup.
Regards
Paul
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Hi Salora,
Tap and hold the album a while to get the Play popup.
Regards
Paul
thanks paul it's working like that
another issue,I've got nothing in artist list, only in the album list
sometimes one artist appear but the connection after it's gone.
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That is a funny problem. I've tested it on 2 windows phones and in the emulator and all show all my artists. I have had at least 1 other user reporting this but it is impossible for me to reproduce. It must be something in the information retrieved from your MC or in other words: my artist list has a structure the App expects and maybe yours doesn't.
Could you send me the result of the following query from a PC browser (replace the 'x.x' with the right IP Address of your MC PC. If you don't know how to find your IP Address, there are some tips on my blog here: http://sinnema.ch/?p=304):
http://192.168.x.x:52199/MCWS/v1/Files/Search?Query=[Media%20Type]=[audio]%20~nodup=[Artist]%20~sort=[Artist]&Fields=Artist&Zone=0&ZoneType=ID
Regards
Paul
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hi paul here it is
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes" ?>
<MPL Version="2.0" Title="MCWS - Files - 3196">
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">53</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Depeche Mode</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">620</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Dire Straits</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">647</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">EAGLES</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">1125</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Genesis</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">2746</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Hugh Laurie</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">2716</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Lana Del Rey</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">2803</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Marillion</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">3787</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Michael Jackson</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">3759</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Michael Jackson; Janet Jackson</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">711</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Mike Oldfield</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">4115</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Muse</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">754</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Norah Jones</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">1467</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Peter Gabriel</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">5275</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Pink Floyd</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">4508</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Placebo</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">1846</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Queen</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">4622</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Queen; David Bowie</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">4770</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Roger Waters</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">4837</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Sting</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">4886</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">The H Band</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">1561</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">The Police</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">2879</Field>
</Item>
</MPL>
it'sstrange got the problem only with your app on a lumia 800, don't have the issue with nmedian or gizmo on my android phone
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any answer??
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Hi Salora,
I'm sorry but I have not been able to do anything at the time. My PC is not up and running yet (I'm answering this from my iPad). We are still recovering from the move to our newly build house 2 weeks ago. Building inside is still continuing at the moment so my guess is it is going to take some time before I can do anything. I promise I will take a look but please be a bit patient with me.
Regards
Paul
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hi paul here it is
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes" ?>
<MPL Version="2.0" Title="MCWS - Files - 3196">
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">53</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Depeche Mode</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">620</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Dire Straits</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">647</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">EAGLES</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">1125</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Genesis</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">2746</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Hugh Laurie</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">2716</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Lana Del Rey</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">2803</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Marillion</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">3787</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Michael Jackson</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">3759</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Michael Jackson; Janet Jackson</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">711</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Mike Oldfield</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">4115</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Muse</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">754</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Norah Jones</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">1467</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Peter Gabriel</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">5275</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Pink Floyd</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">4508</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Placebo</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">1846</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Queen</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">4622</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Queen; David Bowie</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">4770</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Roger Waters</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">4837</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">Sting</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">4886</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">The H Band</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">1561</Field>
<Field Name="Artist">The Police</Field>
</Item>
<Item>
<Field Name="Key">2879</Field>
</Item>
</MPL>
it'sstrange got the problem only with your app on a lumia 800, don't have the issue with nmedian or gizmo on my android phone
Hi Salora,
Well I'm up and running again. The house is still a mess but I am able to spend some time again.
Did you create this result from your phone? The result is pretty normal and looks ok to me. No problems there. Could you confirm it comes from your phone.
Regards
Paul
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Hi All,
I've just discovered a minor but significant bug in the base classes of MC Remote. During the communication with the server I sometimes skipped a request when a refresh was in progress. This could cause the Artists list from not being populated in some cases.
Now I still can not reproduce this problem locally so my hopes are that this fix will solve the problem. I've just released an update to the Marketplace. I will take up to 5 days before you will receive it. Let me know how it goes.
Regards
Paul
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Microsoft really took it's time on this one. The submission process was completed succesfully.
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Best $.99 I have ever spent.. using it on my Nokia Lumia 920 Windows 8 phone and MC Version 18. Great effort - thanks
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Is it working with a user ID and password now?
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Does this also work on Windows 8 RT tablets ?
It's not available in the Windows 8 store (Windows 8 Pro, Belgium)
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Does this also work on Windows 8 RT tablets ?
It's not available in the Windows 8 store (Windows 8 Pro, Belgium)
Hi Benny,
No, WP7 Apps are not compatible with W8RT, sorry.
Regards
Paul
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Best $.99 I have ever spent.. using it on my Nokia Lumia 920 Windows 8 phone and MC Version 18. Great effort - thanks
Hi,
Write me a review when you have the time.
Thanks
Paul
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Hi Paul
The only need I have for a third-party app is when I'm outside of the firewall and needing to stream to a device. Is there *any* chance you could work on this for WP7 or 8? (and RT would be nice, though I'm about to try and RemoteApp JRiver on that side)
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I'm looking for something to be able to control my zones and that runs on WP8.
I can't seem to find a way of switching Zones with MC Remote, does it support zone switching?
Also, is MC Remote it still in development or have development basically stopped?
Thanks
Richard
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Hi Richard,
I never noticed that the zones have vanished from MC Remote. There used to be a little green arrow on top of the 'Playing now' tab but it's gone. I does not show up if you have only 1 zone. I'll take a look.
Regards
Paul
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Hi Richard,
No, zones are still there. As I said, when only 1 zone is present the zone button dissapears and I don't use zones in MC. After adding 1 extra zone the button appears.
There is a known bug with Sonos devices. In some release of MC Zonos devices are returned with there guid's (Global Unique Identifiers). The id's are however not guids and MC Remote is not very happy with that. Can it be that you have several Sonos devices, which MC sees as zones, but no further zones added manually?
What do you see when you type the following in a browser (replace <MC Ip Address> by the Ip Address of the PC where MC is running. If you don't know how to find your IP address. Here are some tips & tricks: http://sinnema.ch/?p=304
http://<MC Ip Address>:52199/MCWS/v1/Playback/Zones
I see the following:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="true"?>
<Response Status="OK"><Item Name="NumberZones">4</Item>
<Item Name="CurrentZoneID">10002</Item>
<Item Name="CurrentZoneIndex">1</Item>
<Item Name="ZoneName0">Player</Item>
<Item Name="ZoneID0">0</Item>
<Item Name="ZoneGUID0">{6F9B7CF8-E8D0-40EB-B9C1-C6B88F7C1B70}</Item>
<Item Name="ZoneName1">Achterkamer - Sonos PLAY:3 Media Renderer</Item>
<Item Name="ZoneID1">10002</Item><Item Name="ZoneGUID1">{RINCON_000E5879641601400_MR}</Item>
<Item Name="ZoneName2">Woonkamer - Sonos CONNECT Media Renderer</Item><Item Name="ZoneID2">10000</Item>
<Item Name="ZoneGUID2">{RINCON_000E582AB15801400_MR}</Item><Item Name="ZoneName3">Badkamer - Sonos PLAY:3 Media Renderer</Item><Item Name="ZoneID3">10001</Item>
<Item Name="ZoneGUID3">{RINCON_000E5873572A01400_MR}</Item>
</Response>
Regards
Paul
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Hi All,
Just submitted MCRemote PRO for WP8 to the Marketplace. It will take some time to consume so stay tuned.
With this new version you can also control your Sonos devices via MC remotely. Have fun.
Regards
Paul
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Hi Paul,
Sorry I missed your reply.
I have just realised that MCRemote wasn't in fact connecting to my server.
I have authentication enabled, so MC Remote won't connect/work.
Are there any plans to have authentication supported? Oh and also a way of setting what server I want to connect to as at times I run more than one MC server here.
Thanks
Richard
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Hi Paul. This app is just the best. I bought it in windows store and it worked flawlessly out the box - no connection problems at all. I am running MCRemote 3 on Win 8 phone, Win 8.1 (Preview) desktop with Media Centre 18 running as DLNA server and playing sound through my netbook (Win 8.1 Preview) wireless from FLAC without converting to MP3.
I do have a question but first an observation from my own experience today and those written above - some sort of getting started guide would relieve you of much email support... Now for my question:
Out the box MCRemote controlled my JRiver Media Centre - I didn't even need the DLNA key. However that's the wrong box I want to control. How do I configure either MCRemote or my netbook (Digital Media Player ) - not my Digital Media Server - to be controlled by MCRemote? The Server must not play audio / be controlled by MCRemote - just stream to devices in the home.
Thanks in advance - such a cool remote!
Mitch