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[gk666999]

Since we have "Status" column in the handheld pre-transfer window, i would like to see 'Queued to delete'  information. If not this, then some kind of warning display with a  list of files to be deleted before it has actually being deleted  from handheld device.

UPD: Implemented in 11.1.100 build - thank you very much!

[ranmasaotomes]

I know I am probebly going to get flamed for this.. But here is a suggestion none the less.

I have used the Microsoft Media Center on a friends computer and love it.. So why not make the theatre mode a similar or a copy of it.

I would love to be able to put that type of thing on my computer.. and with all the plug ins that there is on here. It is alot better.

Just would love the look and feel of the Windows Media Center.

[bopz]

MC should be better at remembering the configurable paths to folders on a portable device.

When the device isn't online, the entries are reset. They should be remembered and configurable whether the device is online or not.

On one of my devices, the Playlists path is always reset regardless of whether the device is online or not. Perhaps because playlists aren't supported on WMDM (can't find documentation for this). In this case the Playlists path should be grayed out and non-editable. 

[datdude]

I know I am probebly going to get flamed for this.. But here is a suggestion none the less.

I have used the Microsoft Media Center on a friends computer and love it.. So why not make the theatre mode a similar or a copy of it.

I would love to be able to put that type of thing on my computer.. and with all the plug ins that there is on here. It is alot better.

Just would love the look and feel of the Windows Media Center.

Obviously not gonna happen.  Is there anything you like about MC that you would like to see on Windows Media Player?

[ranmasaotomes]

Mainly the look, feel and animations that are present..

Something that circles the menu system instead of having all the options displayed. (IE like a rotating menu used in MCE or some mobile phones where the options are only displayed when you move to another part of the menu)

Start up sounds.

A bit sleeker with the Playing now page. (You don't really need that many options open.. Maybe Play delete and info)

The background to take up the whole screen.. (IE the cd cover to not be in a big black box)

Just to look a bit more streamlined.

[datdude]

You mean those are things you don't like about MC? ?

What drew you into trying out MC?  Is there anything you do like about MC? 

Im confused with the comparisons to Windows Media Player and MCE.

[lukecro]

This might be a bit of a wild idea... but what I'd like to be able to do is save all my settings online to JRiver.Com.

obviously for the security fanatics it would not be a default option..
however I'd so like my settings to follow me where ever I go so that MC is set up just how I like it where ever I go.

If I'd reinstalled my OS it would be no worry cuz i'd just log on and MC would be ready to go, the benefits of an Internet Application without
requiring a 100mbit connection 

Yeah, I concur. Either a way to store the settings online or an easy way to export/import the set-up, at least (we could always store the file on gmail, or a something of that nauture, for easy downloading to another PC later) ... The basic layout settings, options, playlists, etc.. .... but something that was simple enough that it would work well across MC builds, so that implementing this personal profile scheme would work after a fresh install of an upgrade as well as work when you install MC on, say, your work PC and you want to start with the same settings and look that you're using on your home PC....

2) For me it would be very useful if track information could span two (or three) rows in a view.  Perhaps Name Artist Genre ... on the first line and comments, bpm, duration... on the second.  Could also be collapseable but not necessary.  I love that I can store so much info in MC, I just wish I could see it all at once without scrolling on my 12.1 inch screen.

That would be awesome.

[lukecro]

You mean those are things you don't like about MC? ?

What drew you into trying out MC?  Is there anything you do like about MC? 

Im confused with the comparisons to Windows Media Player and MCE.

I believe Ranmasaotomes is simply saying that while he appreciates the power of MC, he feels that there are aspects that could be jazzed up visually. Personally, I'm far more concerned with functionality, stability, speed, and options than I am with the graphic interface ... but ya gotta admit that in many respects MC looks & feels more like a serious database program than a consumer music player in comparison to the newest versions of some of the big-name players out there (at least until you've figured out how customizable the program is and all the interface options that are actually possible). Of course, I use MC like a serious database program 60% of the time, so it's current look is fine by me -- 11.1 is better that 11 which was better than 10, etc... nothin' wrong with that  

When I'm not using MC to organize and tag and upload and such, I'm usually either (a) using it to play music in the background while I'm doing something else, or (b) using it to watch a movie or TV show -- in either case, I'm not looking at the basic MC interface, because I'm either (a) looking at something else, or (b) looking at the movie in full-screen mode, respectively.  So, to me, making MC look a lot slicker or consumer friendly is not a priority by any means. But offering a really slick, jazzy, deceptively simple "wow awesome" interface for the Playing Now and Start screens -- the screens that users are going to see first and might use the most at first -- might be a good way to crack a larger consumer market, in terms of offering a pretty face to front for the awesome mechanics.

[ranmasaotomes]

For everyone that is asking.. I am actually talking about the new Windows XP Media Center Edition.

Its basically a copy of Windows XP with a media center application in order to take control of playing Music/TV/DVD's

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/mediacenter/default.mspx

This is what I was kinda expecting with MC.. And what I kind of got.

So far I am impressed with what I have seen. I like the way that the menu system Is.. and I like it that I don't have to install Windows XP Media Center Edition on my other computers to get a similar interface.

The computer I am MC on is mainly going to be used as an entertainment PC.. basically so that I can run TV, Movies, Music and other things through it.

The copy that I am talking about is not Windows Media Player.. But a Microsoft Application similar to MC. I kind of only stumbled on this page when I was looking for Plug ins for Windows XP Media Center Edition.

[KStor]

I would like to have a cue option ie, listening for other tracks in my headphone while my main soundcard output is playing music.

Manu

[datdude]

But offering a really slick, jazzy, deceptively simple "wow awesome" interface for the Playing Now and Start screens -- the screens that users are going to see first and might use the most at first -- might be a good way to crack a larger consumer market, in terms of offering a pretty face to front for the awesome mechanics.

Yes,  I think these 2 things the playing now and start screen could be much improved in terms of cool features.  The playing now should hopefully eventually have an itunes party shuffle like auto DJ functionality.

I think others have asked for a more customizable start screen as well.

I think that overall MC is the best player for cataloguing, smart listing, and browsing, with a great underlying audio playback engine.  However the overall fun of 'look what this can do', kinda thing seems to be slightly behind the above categories.

 

[water1]

4) A multi-computer network "distribution" system similar to ATI's EasyShare/EasyConnect product.  This would solve many of the Multi-Zone sync issues that Mastiff and others have dealt with.  If you could simply "stream" what is playing on the "server" system to multiple "client" machines (including Video and Audio) then syncing multiple zones and multiple machines wouldn't be a problem anymore!

Having three HTPC's each attached to a separate audio system, I am very interested in this feature. When we have a party my wife wants to know why there is different music playing in each room.

[Laffer]

I would dearly like more movie support in MC.  At the moment I use MC for all things Music.  But I have to use another product to do the same for my movies.

J River would do well to take a look at Extreme Movie Manager (http://www.binaryworks.it/extrememoviemanager/index.asp)

It is a bit ropey round the edges but provides a great way to manage your movies.  I took the decesion about 18 months ago to rip all my movies into MPEG4 (Xvid) fromat place them on a 'Media Server' (also where all my music is too) and access them via network.  So I could do with all the flexibility and tagging that MC provides for music but for specifically for Movies as well (Maybe two databases - one for music, one for films).

I currently think movie support in MC is extremely weak, a look at extreme movie manager will put that into perspective.

Laffer.

[datdude]

I really do not like how when searching in MC, the search applies to both the library & playing now.  IF the search is still on, I can't add any songs to MC.  I think a great feautre would asearch box like those found on some forums where a search button is pressed and up pops a slighlty bigger search box.  That would be perfrect for the playing now.

Also I am still sort of suprised that a shuffle based on last played, ratings, ... has not been invented for the playing now.

[JONCAT]

What about settings for playlists e.g. Fades, no-gap, etc so you don't have to switch shuffle on/off.

Shuffle should implement differently in Playing Now. Tracks should load into playing now in track order or how they were selected not scrambled if shuffle is on. Shuffle should work "behind the scenes".

Try add to playing now with an album w/ shuffle on, the tracks are shuffled into Playing Now. It's counter-intuitive to me.

Dr. C

[Topazworm]

You know those light blue music notes to the left of songs in the media library?

I would love them to be like the tick boxes of itunes. Clicking turns then from blue to grey. Making sure only certain songs are uploaded. And also making an option that states:

"UnNoted/UnTicked Songs will: Played/Uploaded
                                                 Not uploaded to iPod
                                                 Not Played
                                                 Not played or uploaded to ipod

 

[cdrmaker]

It Would Be a Nice Idea To Have An Option For Directing Audio From Video, (either A DVD or File), To The S/PDIF Output as a pass through to an outboard processor/Reciever. (Like Cyberlink Power DVD Does)

[datdude]

Since JRiver has MC 12 in the works, I thought I would update my list of changes that I am hoping for:

* Save ALL settings in a library backup if possible.  Backups should happen every time MC is started AND delete older backups.

* Add random sorting option for tile view, from option menu at top right.

* Album tile or thumbnails should playback in track order by default settings(there used to be an option for this).

* 'View’ menu for each tile should have a 'files' option for full screen list viewing at all times, and not just the files at bottom option as it currently is. It would be really nice if this view option went directly to panes.

* Files at bottom sorting should be seperate from the view scheme sorting.

* 'View' menu for each tile should auto open saving tons of unnecessary clicking.

* Double clicking on the final tile after drilling into a view should automatically play, right now it does nothing!

* Add a tile view tooltip that shows all of the stats for that tile rather than the current rotisserie style for stats.

* Searches should persist across current views in a view scheme but not across different view schemes.

* Search box should have a ‘saved searches’ feature much like the navigation toolbar system!

* Search should not apply for both playing now and library views when in split views, this currently makes it confusing and difficult to use playing now.

* There needs to be a better way for applying certain settings within a customize current view and applying those changes across all views but leaving other settings within that view, unique.

* Add tabbed/modulated browsing options on the left hand side of MC for total control of what the user would prefer to see, rather than just the tree and action window OR simply add vertical split views.

* A locked down viewable tagging mode so that no tags can be changed unless they are happening behind the scenes.  MC is just too easy to accidentally change tags while browsing without realizing it.

* Add a dynamic ‘switch track’ playback option.  When playing albums I prefer gapless and when playing a mix I prefer a cross fade of 5 seconds.  MC is smart enough to know the difference between an album and a mix so this should be possible (make it customizable).

* Design a second ‘playing now queue’ (party shuffle) with smartlist capabilities that is always started after the normal “playing now’ is done and is NOT on repeat.   A really cool feature could be the last played song in the first playing now causes random songs by that artist or year to be played.   Maybe integrate with a service like musicip.

* Bring back the early MC 11.1 slideshow picture option from the internet!

* Improve Start page to allow for customized dynamic HTML style content pulled from my Library database, i.e. stats, suggested songs/albums , and artist profiles based on metadata, etc.  Turn this into a full-fledged encyclopedia like interface to browse my library rather than, list and tiles view would be sweet!

* Add a relational database, and all of the cool possibilities that come along with it.

[park]

I agree with most of datdudes suggestions. I hope that the MC team stay focussed on improving the interface.

Personally i dont like the idea of auto entering tiles. What if you want to multiply select tiles?

I would like to see something on the interface showing what the next level would be if you were to double click. ie. "Double click to see Artists of current selection"

Verticle split views would be great, but only if the whole split view system gets an overhaul. I found myself getting very frustrated when clicking on tools, searching, and well just about doing anything, and realising that those actions were applying to the wrong split view. One view should always take focus and be the main view, even after you have clicked in another view. Perhaps more limited options about what can appear in each view would be better. I dont know why anyone would need to see the library in two views at once, but playing now being visible at the same time as the library is really useful.

Before split views happen, I'd be more than content just to be able to see the files list split so that it appears to the right of the tiles, rather than underneath them. Would be great for my dual screen setup.

Would also love it if album thumbnails in the file list were replaced by "album tiles" with these drop down options:
"See album in panes view" (shows the album in panes view with all relevant entries for each pane selected rather than the current behaviour of "Locate album" which just   does a simple blanket search)
"play in track order"
"find in list above" (if in "artists" in top view, selected album in bottom view would find and select the artist for that album so that you can see all albums for that artist in one click)

Would also be nice if said "album tiles" could have a drop down/pop out list of songs contained in that album so that we could just play one song without having to keep switching between thumbnails and details.

Loving the tiles, but they are still a bit clumsy at the moment. Cant wait to see what MC12 will look like when it's done.

Finally, how about putting a "Create new field" at the bottom of each of the categories in the tag info window. Something like "New Genre" does in the panes when in tagging mode. This would almost negate the need for the "library options" in the main options, and have everything to do with tagging in one nice neat place. Would be pretty intuitive for new users.

Sorry. Seems I've written another essay. Hope some of you stayed with me till the end.

[shortie]

Since I'm playing with streaming Internet radio stations right now, here's my (admittedly short) list:

• Ability to add URLs to Playing Now instead of replacing (maybe this is available but File -> OpenURL doesn't have an "Add to Playing Now" option)
• Don't replace a playlist with its individual components. This is a problem with streaming Internet radion -- they give you a playlist for a reason -- they might wanna change the servers!
• Make "Playing Now" in Theater View respond to meta-data changes from the Internet streamers like Track Info now does (as of 11.1.184).  Maybe there's a way to make this happen in 11.1 but I don't know what it is.

That didn't hurt, did it?

[park]

I like that when you click on a root level element like "Services and plugins" you get webpage explaining in laymans terms what you can do there. It would be nice to see this extended to the "playlists" root with some instructions on creating smartlists and organising through smartlist groups etc. I'm sure that nobody uses the list of of files as it stands, and an easy to follow web page here would be great for new users who dont want to trawl through the help file.

[hottuna]

- a dockable playlist that supports drag/drop or a filmstrip playlist (like movie maker) that you can drop files into and will crossfade when songs/video's are overlapped
- more tools for musicians like a/b repeat, 1/4 and 1/2 speed while preserving pitch (like Transcribe!)
- fixed fonts for lyrics to allow cut and paste of lyrics and guitar chords and keep the guitar chords over the correct words in the song
- the ability to include links to the web within lyrics & comment fields
- while adding a song to playing now - have the option to play it next or add it to the end
- allow songs to be added to multiple genres

[Motorcycle-Tuneup]

Hows About On On Off Switch For"ON SCREEN Display".......
I Hate When I Run A Playlist With Video & Stills And I See The PLAY or PAUSE On Screen.....
PLEASE Put On On Screen Display OFF Checkbox OR Menu

[Listener]

I'm ripping classical music CDs in bulk right now so I'm focused on slreamlining that process.  MC 11 is the best tool I've found for ripping classical music CDs but some things could be streamlined. I realize that my way of using MC 11 to rip CDs may not be everyone's method but I'd like to do things my way without extra keystrokes and mouse clicks that distract me.

Some context: I start by clicking on my CD drive in the tree on the left side of the screen. I do not have "auto rip mode" enabled.  I insert a CD and then fill out tags manually (no YADB) and click on the "rip tracks" button to start.
 
1. Click once to start ripping - After I click on the "rip tracks button" above the list of tracks on the CD, I have to click on the "Rip" button in the rip progress window.

2. Don't force me to read and dismiss a pop-up dialog to see a summary of ripping results.  - For most CDs, a single line saying "All tracks ripped with 100 % confidence" would tell me what I need to know.  If some tracks required extra-reads, you can add a line saying how many files required re-reads and what the range of confidence was.  You could put the summary about the CD track list or in the Ripping progress window. I might choose to read a detailed report and click on a button if the one or two line summary suggests that I need to.  In most cases, I should be able to read a one line summary and insert the next CD without distraction.

3. Leave the track listing on the CD drive contents. - At present, MC 11 jumps to the recently ripped list after I rip a CD.   I have to click on the CD drive in the tree  list to get back to the list of CD tracks.

In addition to these streamlining requests, I have a request for additional functionality in ripping CDs.

Joining tracks when ripping CDs - I'd like to be able to select a list of tracks that make up a work (i.e. Symphony No. 1, movements 1-4) and have them ripped to a single file with an embedded Cue sheet.  I use the  Flac format so I'd like to have this cabability for Flac files but it should be supported  for those file formats that support cue sheets.  (Maybe an external cue sheet would work. )
 
More context: I tried using YADB.  Like FreeDB and CDDB, it doesn't provide a separate Composer tag and usage of Album-Artist-Name tags was erratic.  I also hadd trouble with MC 11 crashing during the YADB lookup.  I searched the forum for information on such crashes.  There were some threads on crashes when more than one CD drive was in use.  Nothing about problems a single CD drive situation like mine for 11.163.  I did not want to spend time to verify the crashes  with the current latest version and perhaps encounter other problems.  And YADB didn't really provide what I needed for classical music tagging so I stopped using YADB.  However, I did have one comment:

Reduce the number of nesting of dialogs and message boxes during YADB lookup. - I counted at least 3 levels of nested dialogs or message boxes.  I think using YADB would be less distracting with fewer pop-ups.

Bill

 




 Bill

[Mr ChriZ]

Hierarchical Tagging.
 
You what I hear you ask?
Well I'm filling in more LOST tags.
Now lost in my library goes under TV Series genre....
Therefore when I receive a new episode of LOST it's very unlikely
to suddenly turn into a film....
Magically using Extreme Turbo logic, MC should work out
that it's a new episode of lost and set the Genre to TV Series.

[ThoBar]

Big vote for Listener's suggestions! 

[JONCAT]

1. Fix the tree; yes, it needs fixin’. Been discussed before and again 2. now>>>>>>We need a hotkey to make it open and close or some kind of windows taskbar-like auto hide function (if the tree is stayin') . On a big screen with a dark skin it is ridiculous trying to min/max the tree every 5 minutes; double clicking on the divider is extremely tedious. MC + Pop-up action window/tree = crazy delicious!

3. The Display Window should have customizable options like Find CD & Find Artist so you can then have the toolbar buttons Find CD/Artist search for what is highlighted in a field. This would allow music to run uninterrupted and users could then link to Amazon or All Music.com instantly via what is playing now or from fields they may be editing in the library. This would be incredibly useful as you currently have to search the web with what’s playing now, and then tag, as advised, when not playing the file back.

4. Select Drives & Devices: button for Rip should be there next to play tracks. You can see this button when selecting individual drives but not multiple drives i.e. Drives & Devices. You can right click on Drives & Device and rip all tracks from all drives so a button should appear above the tracks instead of the user having to open the tree and manually select rip (from all drives).

5. Fonts, fonts, fonts. Make the the Tile font adjustable! Large monitors or simply using large fonts for editing provides one with cut off values
at many various Tile sizes.

I have to agree with Listener, less nesting of menus and pop-ups. Ripping is not a destructive activity like burning and the post-rip info could be consolidated; for users who rip from 4 or 5 drives at a time it would help a lot.


Dr. C

[JimH]

The tree closes with ctrl-g.

[JONCAT]

The tree collapses or closes...I see collapse within the tree not close of the tree itself. Minimize and maximize of the tree's side-bar window needs a hotkey.

Dr. C

[JimH]

Maybe you know, but double click on the divider bar to close the tree window.

[park]

Any hint on when we might get to play with MC12?
I can't wait to see how the auto import works.

[Marty3d]

Why not introduce a new view in MC12?
One hyped feature on web2.0 sites is actually really good, and that's Clouds. The more popular a topic is, the larger font (or more visible color) it has.
Here's an example from Del.icio.us. There are better examples out there but I think you get the idea.

It could be used for popular albums, artists, and more.

[negopus]

Before I post my suggestions, let me briefly outline my profile as an MC user.
•   I can't care less about skins and visual effect. In Media Jukebox 8 I used no skin at all (it was possible then), the program was looking more like a spreadsheet.
•   I like an active style of listening to audio, with quick browsing and attention to real-time control.
•   I consider Images and Podcasts a welcome addition, but I never used them and I wouldn't die if they were missing from MC.
•   I never used video features in MC. I think that dedicated video player software has much better features.
•   I use the keyboard a lot, while I use the mouse as little as possible. I prefer controlling MC with a remote control, when applicable.

My suggestions are:

- Spreadsheet mode
This is mainly for keyboard-only users like me. In spreadsheet mode only a cell at a time is highlighted, and you move between them with the standard arrow keys. When you press F2 to edit, you know in advance what is the field that is going to be edited. There should be a quick keyboard shortcut to display/hide the left pane (like F4 in Opera), in order to have full screen available in spreadsheet mode.

- Cue points
Cue points are meta-data that give added value to the audio track. They are markers to specific points into the track. The transport controls should include shortcuts to quickly jump to cue points. The user could set up A-B loops on the fly. Cue points, if standardized, could be used by DJ software too.

- Meta-data
I know there is a MPEG 7 standard being developed, dealing with meta-data in general. JRiver should follow its evolution and implement meta-data handling in future versions of MC.

- Hot-key and Single-click command activation
Everything is MC is two or three clicks away. All operations are not immediate. I regularly use just half a dozen commands, and I would like them to be quickly available, at the touch of one hot-key (or a single mouse click on a small icon). Hot-keys should be customizable. For example, transport (with cue points) could be controlled using the numeric keypad, like in the Cubase/Nuendo sequencer programs.

- Advanced navigation
I would like to find similar or related tracks in an advanced 2-dimensional display,  like in the Glass Engine. This display is based on a complete classification of tracks. Music lovers sure would not mind spending some time building their own classification, even if it requires some manual work to update the library with extra tags. Most users, however, do not want to bother and prefer to have track tagged in an automatic way.

- Track structure
The transport slider should display the structure of the track, highlighting different track elements (verse, chorus, bridge, …) with rectangles of different colors. The structure of the track can be delimited by cue points. In DVD videos, for example, the structure is made up of chapters.

Here is an example of what I mean. Dr. Masataka Goto has developed an hardware player device, called the SmartMusicKIOSK. It allows the listener to “see” the structure of the track, and quickly jump to relevant parts of it. The reason for its development is clearly commercial. It allows the customer in music stores to quickly browse CD tracks before buying them. The SmartMusicKIOSK has algorithms that detect the track structure using hidden Markov chains. I think that automatic structure detection would be too hard to implement in MC. Music lovers, again, wouldn’t mind spending some time devising the structure of a track. So, if some automatic help can be added, I think that beat detection would be enough.

[negopus]

Spectrum Analyzer

The Spectrum Analyzer in MC is clearly designed for aesthetic pleasure only, not to have any technical meaning. The deviations from the ideal behavior can be visualized by playing test signals by Fred Nachbaur.

•   The frequency axis is linear, and not logarithmic as it should be when dealing with audio and music (it makes the high-frequency spectrum more interesting to watch) [linear sweep 20 Hz-20 kHz].
•   The frequency axis is limited to 16 kHz (you won't notice when you are listening to band-limited encoded files) [linear sweep 20 Hz-20 kHz].
•   The amplitude is not flat, a +3 dB/oct equalization is applied before the meter (it enhances the visual movement in the high-frequency portion of the audio spectrum) [white noise] [pink noise].
•   Only instant value is displayed, there is no peak hold neither an average value.
•   There are no scale indicators, and no colors are used.

The user should be able to configure many of the spectrum visualization parameters, and some enhancements should be made:
•   The user should choose the frequency axis to use, linear or logarithmic. Since 32 bars are displayed, the logarithmic mode could show a 1/3 octave scale.
•   The user should be able to remove the +3 dB/oct boost.
•   Ballistics (decay time) should be adjustable.
•   Peak hold and average value should be optionally displayed, in addition to the instant value.
•   A vertical bar indicating the overall level (with both optional peak hold and average value) should be added.
•   Small ticks can be added to show a scale reference, even without numbers (for example 100 Hz, 1 kHz and 10 kHz on the frequency axis, and ticks every 10 dB on the amplitude scale).
•   There should be an indicator that lights up when the peak level (0 dBFS) is reached. It can be reset by clicking on it.

It is useful to know that peaks in the overall signal amplitude should be analyzed by oversampling, as you might not notice 0dBFS+ artifacts otherwise. This suggestion can be applied to Audio Analysis too. It could find a Peak Level of more than 100% when there are 0 dBFS+ artifacts in the audio file.

The user could choose whether to display two spectrum analyzers with the left frequency scale reversed (the default eye candy setting according to JRiver) or a single spectrum analyzer (on the sum of the two stereo channels) with a waveform display on the other side. Of course, when the sum of the two channels is displayed, the vertical bars should be two, one for each of the audio channels.

And finally there should be an option to "Reset to Defaults" that brings all the settings to the aesthetically pleasing values devised by JRiver.

[negopus]

Better support for visualization plug-ins

Using DirectX (DirectX host plug-in) for visualization is not feasible because:
•   initialization is slow (it scans all DirectX plug-ins, not only instruments, and tries to initialize all of them somehow)
•   the video refresh rate is too slow for real-time visualization
•   the plug-in "tap" is at the beginning of the audio chain, before the buffer, and visualization is in advance of sound by one buffer size
There should be a plug-in "tap" at the end of the audio chain (after the buffer) for visualization only (that is, the output of the plug-in is discarded), with a decent video refresh rate, so that the visualization in sync with audio.

[negopus]

Better MIDI support

MC needs VST instruments and/or plug-in support for high quality MIDI playback.

MIDI support isn't very strong in MC. By default MIDI files are played back through the system device, that by default is the standard Microsoft GS Synthesizer, one of the worst synthesizers ever on the face of this world.

Also, KAR files should be handled exactly like MIDI files.

[negopus]

Quit confirmation

The user might accidentally press ALT+F4 and quit MC by mistake while playing to an audience. In order to prevent that, when the user presses ALT+F4, a pop-up should appear that asks for confirmation. After 15-20 seconds, if the user took no action, the pop-up disappears.

In Tools > Options I find only startup options, not shutdown ones.

[Mr ChriZ]

Better support for visualization plug-ins

Using DirectX (DirectX host plug-in) for visualization is not feasible because:
•   initialization is slow (it scans all DirectX plug-ins, not only instruments, and tries to initialize all of them somehow)
•   the video refresh rate is too slow for real-time visualization
•   the plug-in "tap" is at the beginning of the audio chain, before the buffer, and visualization is in advance of sound by one buffer size
There should be a plug-in "tap" at the end of the audio chain (after the buffer) for visualization only (that is, the output of the plug-in is discarded), with a decent video refresh rate, so that the visualization in sync with audio.

Erm.... there is 
http://www.jrmediacenter.com/devzone.html
Look for Display Plugin SDK

[negopus]

Erm.... there is 
http://www.jrmediacenter.com/devzone.html
Look for Display Plugin SDK

I know it, but this is not exactly what I was asking for. This SDK allows a programmer to develop new plug-ins. I was looking for a structural change in MC that allows using existing DirectX or VST plug-ins (very good ones already exist) for technically-oriented visualizations.

[negopus]

Differentiate the line of products

I think that JRiver could differentiate its line of products, each product having a different price tag and being targeted towards different types of audience. The customer base is so large that cannot be satisfied by a single product. I would suggest a line of products like this:

MC BASIC (all media, no enhanced audio features)
MC PRO (all media, plus enhanced audio features)
MC audio only BASIC (only audio media, no enhanced audio features)
MC audio only PRO (only audio media, plus enhanced audio features)

Of course, I would be interested in MC audio only PRO. By "enhanced audio features" I mean more technically-oriented visualizations, plug-in support, MIDI support and so on.

[ferent]

Differentiate the line of products

I think that JRiver could differentiate its line of products, each product having a different price tag and being targeted towards different types of audience. The customer base is so large that cannot be satisfied by a single product. I would suggest a line of products like this:

MC BASIC (all media, no enhanced audio features)
MC PRO (all media, plus enhanced audio features)
MC audio only BASIC (only audio media, no enhanced audio features)
MC audio only PRO (only audio media, plus enhanced audio features)

Of course, I would be interested in MC audio only PRO. By "enhanced audio features" I mean more technically-oriented visualizations, plug-in support, MIDI support and so on.

I think MC is cheap and it don't need to make different products

[JimH]

I think MC is cheap and it don't need to make different products

Me too.

[jkrzok]

I think MC is cheap and it don't need to make different products

I for one am glad to discover and use those aspects of MC I didn't buy it for.

[ferent]

I for one am glad to discover and use those aspects of MC I didn't buy it for.

Sorry, I´m from Spain and I don´t understand your coment. Could you explain me, please?

[jkrzok]

When I bought MC I did it because it was a decent audio player with a robust library. At the time I didn't care about things like CD burning, or images, or TV playback for example. And I suppose I would have bought a 'lite' version of MC to save a few dollars. But I'm glad I couldn't because I now use these features regularly.

I discoverd after I bought it that MC is easier and quicker to use than Nero for audio CDs. I prefer MC's cover creator to Nero's. The TV software that came with my tuner crashes hard and frequently. MC doesn't, at all. These are all things I didn't think I needed or wanted when I decided to buy but I now find I'm glad MC does them all.

To me it's like I bought an audio player and discovered I got TV tuner and burner software and more for free.

[negopus]

I think MC is cheap and it don't need to make different products

I just wanted to say that I would pay something more in order to have pro audio features implemented. On the other side, there are other functions in MC that I never used, and I think I'll never do, even if I already paid for them.

[negopus]

Better MIDI support (updated from previous post)

In order to support high quality MIDI playback MC just needs to make the MIDI output port selectable. You can then use MIDI Yoke or Hubi’s Loopback Driver in order to feed the MIDI stream back into a decent synthesizer (hardware or software).

[Mr ChriZ]

Thing is Negopus, there's only so many developers to this project.
If they are making several different versions their high quality work
is going to be spread a tad thinnly.  While life is never going to be perfect for
everyone, I think they're doing a pretty good job as it is!

[ferent]

I think isn't necessary to speak more about that. We want MC with all the features!!! )

[Mr ChriZ]

Erase DVD/CD in Action Window when an Eraseable disk is present