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[JimH]

This is the latest version of MC 12.0.  Any MC12.0 license will work with it.  Please post bugs here.  Please start a new thread for anything requiring discussion.  Non-bug posts will be deleted or moved.

This latest build (usually safe) of MC12.0 is here:
ftp://ftp.jriver.com/pub/downloads/MC12/MediaCenter120329.exe

12.0.329 (09/18/07)

1. Fixed: Adding external cover art to video files could be slower than necessary.
2. Fixed: With left-button lasso enabled, drawing a lasso wouldn't update the in-place-edit column.
3. NEW: Added album art and photo support for third generation iPod Nanos.
4. Fixed: When acquiring an image from the clipboard, a 32-bit DIB could be shifted a little.

12.0.328 (09/17/07)

1. Fixed: After multiple concurrent uploads, an iPod could use duplicate cover art for new files uploaded.

12.0.327 (09/17/07)

1. NEW: Added support for new "Classic" iPods.
2. Changed: Video codec uses MMX for bounds capping, resulting in a 6x speedup of this stage.
3. Fixed: Some trees with checkboxes were not properly loading the checkbox states. (handheld sync, action window playlists)
4. Changed: File > Open URL selects the most recently used URL by default. (all text is selected, so typing replaces it right away)
5. Changed: Some lists wouldn't auto-size their headers on header double-click. (i.e. Rename From Properties dialog)
6. Changed: Updated slideshow xxx gallery creator templates.

12.0.326 (09/14/07)

1. Changed: Improved efficiency of JRiver video codec bitstream and motion compensation by about 5%.
2. Changed: When seeking, JRiver video codec outputs black frames instead of green frames.
3. Changed: Video codec better manages YUV colorspace ranges, helping compression.
4. Changed: Video codec more intelligently handles dark frame areas, helping compression by around 12% with little quality difference.
5. Changed: Video codec incorporates in-loop deblocking filter for improved visual quality.

12.0.325 [internal build]

12.0.324 [internal build]

12.0.323 (09/11/07)

1. Optimized: Improved the seeking speed with YTV.
2. Changed: Each time-shifting sessions saves files to a unique subfolder under the configured record directory.
3. Changed: When stopping time-shifting when behind live or when longer than 20 minutes, a prompt for saving vs discarding the time-shifting files is presented.
4. Fixed: Message boxes with custom button text could truncate the button text.

12.0.322 [internal build]

12.0.321 (09/10/07)

1. Changed: Added support for keyboard ctrl arrow / spacebar list selection method.
2. Fixed: TV time-shifting would stop seeking nicely after 4 GB of data. (introduced recently)
3. Fixed: Some playlists would not show up in Action Window > Tag > Playlists.
4. Changed: Media Center uses "no change" as the size estimate for handheld transfers using external encoders instead of over-estimating the size.
5. Fixed: YTV could show audio and video data out of sync for a little while when seeking.
6. Changed: YTV uses a more efficient packet size when encoding with the JRiver video codec.
7. Changed: Revised how TV time-shifting starts to possibly fix problems where playback would fail to start because of lack of data.

12.0.320 (09/05/07)

1. NEW: Theater View font and weight can be configured independent of the rest of the program. (Options > Theater View)
2. Fixed: In some option dialog settings that allowed typing, pressing 'escape' would leave an empty options line.
3. Changed: Improved JRiver video codec motion compensation.
4. Fixed: JRiver video codec could introduce rainbow artifacts on the lower edge of a movie.
5. Changed: Revised video codec quantization scheme and encoding tables to improve efficiency.
6. Changed: Improved JRiver video codec bitstream efficiency by about 10%.

12.0.319 [internal build]

[Osho]

Possible bug report: I enabled caching for conversion for my iPod Classic 160GB (which works fine now - thanks ). I have setup the Directory name to

[Genre]\[Album Artist (auto)]\[Album]

This is working except that Album Artist (auto) is not being propagated with the right value but there is a directory named "Album Artist (auto)" instead.

Is this expected?

thanks,
Osho

[StFeder]

If you select "Direct Sound" for Output Mode some text at "Tools -> Options -> Playback -> Output Mode" Settings is cut of:

Channels (if in

BTW: I like this new feature

[...]12.0.321 (09/10/07)
1. Changed: Added support for keyboard ctrl arrow / spacebar list selection method. [...]

[ThoBar]

Just a FYI...
During install, the "Installation Complete" dialog appeared while the plugins were still being installed.
I re-installed to try to reproduce the event, but it did not reoccur.
Vista Enterprise.

[bp1219]

TANK YOU!!!

[Qythyx]

I've found a weird bug when syncing Podcasts to my new gen iPod Nano, and I'm kind of thinking it isn't iPod related.

The problem is that if I choose any of my Podcast feeds in the Handheld Sync List options, then when the iPod is analyzed to determine what to sync everything in my entire library is analyzed (all songs, photos, videos, even junk files that somehow got added to my library like Thumbs.db files, etc). All those files are listed in the iPod Pane with their status as "Analyzing".

This problem is only if I select eh Podcasts list. If I select a playlist that contains my Podcasts, then it is fine (and that's the workaround I'm using at the moment).

[sbsp2]

Tree & View -> List -> Auto size columns feature appears to be broken or tweaked poorly in this build as most of my columns are getting truncated (like Album, Artist, Comment)...even if there are only 7 chars in those fields values.  This did not happen in the prior releases (same tracks even).

[mark_h]

If you hit STOP the playing now track Track Info visualisation clears.  If you then hit PLAY, the visualisation reappears but is not populated with its data or images. 

[olarte]

As reported in the Ipod forums... Album cover art is unreliable on coverflow. not all but many of the album covers are the wrong ones.

THis is after initializing the Ipod with both Itunes, and MC.

[JimH]

As reported in the Ipod forums... Album cover art is unreliable on coverflow. not all but many of the album covers are the wrong ones.

THis is after initializing the Ipod with both Itunes, and MC.

This is an iPod bug, and not an MC bug -- correct?

[bbrip]

I guess no one will be surprised, but i still have the problem that M12 does not "detect" the Directshow filters when trying to play back mp4 video files also in this latest release.

BBrip

[olarte]

This is an iPod bug, and not an MC bug -- correct?

Not not at all, it's how MC is handling the covers on the Ipod... even on the 5th gen ipods, if you went back and forth with itunes, covers would get scrambled...

This is even more so, I don't even have to bring up itunes, and covers will get messed up when I sync new stuff into Ipod classic with MC.

[Osho]

Not not at all, it's how MC is handling the covers on the Ipod... even on the 5th gen ipods, if you went back and forth with itunes, covers would get scrambled...

This is even more so, I don't even have to bring up itunes, and covers will get messed up when I sync new stuff into Ipod classic with MC.

olarte,

I also had issues with cover art on Ipod. But then, I removed all my music and then did a resync and all the issues went away.

I don't know why the issues were there but I thought that they were due to some albums/cover arts etc. that were left from a previous sync with iTunes or a previous version of MC12.

Osho

[olarte]

olarte,

I also had issues with cover art on Ipod. But then, I removed all my music and then did a resync and all the issues went away.

I don't know why the issues were there but I thought that they were due to some albums/cover arts etc. that were left from a previous sync with iTunes or a previous version of MC12.

Osho

Uhm, I believe I initialized the Ipod classic with MC, then tried to sync a few samples and still got some wrong covers. Not only that but later on ,some that were ok, seem to point to the wrong covers later on.

Also, until the compilation issue is fixed on the Ipod, I need to go back & forth between Itunes and MC. say to do most syncing in MC, but do compilations in Itunes since I can only use that to edit the "artist" field for compilations to change to a common artist (but only on the ipod).

So if ithe cover problem is related betwen the use of itunes and MC (at different time) then I have to stick with Itunes for Ipod use only MC to manage the library itself.

The funny part is that Itunes has no way of cleaning up dead links etc, bu that's another issue...

[Johnny B]

After I installed 12.0.329 over 12.0.318 the context menu for MC (seen for example in Windows Explorer via right-click) has disappeared and no matter what I do (selecting / unselecting "Enable shell integration", restarting MC or Explorer) I am not able to make it appear again 
If I re-install 12.0.318, select / unselect "Enable shell integration" then the context menu is back again. Re-install 12.0.329 -> the menu is gone again...

[mark_h]

I saw same issue re: shell integration, but a reboot solved it.  In fact, at reboot, an MC dialogue popped up "finalising installation" - shouldn't MC prompt for a reboot so that this stage can complete??

Mark

[AoXoMoXoA]

MC continues to crash frequently when applying cover art to flac files, regardless of what method I use to attach the art.

Making it worse, MC leaves a thread running in the background as seen in Task Manager, which continues to run in the background even when you try to force it closed repeatedly.
This requires a reboot to allow MC to close fully so that it can be restarted, which when the PC is also used for other tasks can be a problem.

[richard.e.morton]

Hi All,

I know this is long stnading behaviour, but I thought I'd mention it.

When ripping a disc I set it to 1 ripping, and 1 encoding process, ripping on my PC takes a lot less time than encoding so it finishes ripping way before encoding but it doesn't eject the disc until its finished encoding... i'd like the cd to eject once it's finished ripping so I can put a new disc in and build a queue of tracks for encoding overnight.

A new option to see tracks queued for encoding would be nice as well (at the moment queued tracks can't be seen anywhere (even though they do continue to be encoded)

what do people think?

Rich

[benn600]

but it doesn't eject the disc until its finished encoding

I've had this trouble for quite a while.  I have discussed it before but never really complain because I don't care so much if the ripping process isn't seamless.  If you introduce auto-rip and different combinations of ripping/encoding processes, you will find very strange results as you described.

I find that it will eject the CD sometimes when it's supposed to.  It usually takes a track switch for it to re-check if it needs to eject the disc.

There are definitely some bugs in the ripping procedure.

[jolo]

A few comments

• In general, if I am ripping, burning or encoding, I always do it after a fresh boot. These actions use a lot of computer resources and sometimes, there is some leftover crud from a program that might not have closed all the way, or some bad stuff in RAM that lingers from a warning or error message. I find the success rate a lot higher after booting for those types of operations.
• Fortunately for me, I don't now or never will buy a Ipod. I have to say about the Ipod, it is one of the most amazingly marketed items I have ever scene. But is so dramatically limited and it allows Apple/Microsoft to control all parts of the audio market.
• First thing is that I would never, ever pay for any products that  has in its intention to kill off the open source software as well as focus on controlling the environment of what customers do with it. The Ipod customers (and Itunes customers) are forced to change what they would like to do, be creative by creating such a closed structure.
• Far superior to the Ipods are the portable multimedia players from Cowon (Iaudio).  For one thing, the audio output is like a generation ahead of the Ipods. Like the little 8gb (flash), Iaudio 7 that blows out 60w and allows for endless customization.
• All of the Cowen/Iaudio line support Ogg, Flac and Ape open source formats. Flac and Ape are lossless open source user created audio codecs and the open source Ogg is the finest lossy format that is available. All of these are allow for free licensing of their use. None of the DRM virus and make no mistake about it, DRM IS a virus.
• The will accept the audio that contains the DRM virus as well.
• While they include Jet software, I don't use it. I just take one of the two USB II connectors and read and write to it without going through ITunes, or Microshaft Media Player. So I just change files by using it like having a USB drive, which it can do as well. So Unix likes it as well.
• If interested, you can check here http://www.cowonglobal.com/. They're easy to get through Amazon and lots of other stores. The quality of the output and the choice of formats is second to none.

[benn600]

Great post!  I have trouble with choosing a portable player for a few reasons.

1. I'm not a big portable audio fan anyway!
2. The little bit of portable audio I do care about is music in my car.  Unfortunately, this means running a cable to the in-car stereo.  Yes, I could have run a simple audio in cable but I elected for the iPod cable.  It does make things simple when everything works with everything.  Too bad the iPod dock connector or some universal dock connector can't be created for all portable devices!  That is truly ridiculous.
3. I bet there is an iPod dock connector to analog audio port converter, though, so I could get around that.
4. Don't you use Media Center to sync it?
5. I admit that we should not support companies that lock users in!  With my iPhone, I love a lot of features.  However, it has a lot of severe limitations such as requiring iTunes, only allowing purchased ringtones, etc.  I want more flexibility, especially with my unprotected music (for ringtone use).  With my two iPaq's, I had tons of flexibility.  I could stream audio and video over wifi and install thousands of applications.  It was truly amazing how much time I could spend customizing it to absolutely every specification I wanted.  I could find just the right program for every need.
6. I feel like Apple does stuff right but they need a second tier Apple that focuses on more high-end audio output (among other things), more open standards, open-source support, standardized docks, etc.

Just imagine if the Apple dock or any other dock was freely available to every company to use!  Every car would have this connector and every audio player could interface!  And this same connector would allow any device to be controlable from the dash, etc.  Of course this is all obvious when you start thinking about it.

Addition: I was just looking at their D2 and was very impressed.  But what's up with 2GB / 4GB?  LOL!  I looked on Amazon and that was the largest solid state Cowon player they had!  I wouldn't consider anything less than 16GB at this point because it would be a downgrade (or samegrade)!  I want the D2 with 16GB!  Or better yet, a 160 or 200GB hard drive!  Where are the amazing Cowon players with tons of storage?  Cowon should join J River and be the official portable player company for J River.  And they could bundle MC with their players!

The Cowon A2 is a hdd PMP and it doesn't even state it's capacity on the specifications page without digging!

Wow, we're off topic.

GO Media Center 12.0.329!!  Great version!

[Qythyx]

I've run into 1 small problem that I believe started with 329. For all of my Podcasts the art image that is associated with them has become corrupted. Basically the top 1/2 of the image looks fine, but then there's jagged line with the bottom half being a solid color. This corrupted image not only shows up in MC, but is also synced to my iPod.

My question is, where are these images stored so I can delete them to re-download a good one? Alternatively, is there a better way to refresh them?

[Johnny B]

I saw same issue re: shell integration, but a reboot solved it...

Indeed once I restarted Windows the shell integration works...

[richard.e.morton]

A few comments

• All of the Cowen/Iaudio line support Ogg, Flac and Ape open source formats. Flac and Ape are lossless open source user created audio codecs and the open source Ogg is the finest lossy format that is available. All of these are allow for free licensing of their use. None of the DRM virus and make no mistake about it, DRM IS a virus.

don't overlook iRiver either, they support open formats like Ogg Vorbis.

the Clix2 is a fabulously intuitive product.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/index=blended&field-keywords=clix2&results-process=default&dispatch=search/ref=pd_sl_aw_tops-2_blended_207336365_2&results-process=default

Rich

[Cedric D]

Lately, I bought MC but there still standing "Media Library 12...." in the Mp3tag when I'm editing a comment.
Thats so much work to clean all my files from that, because in any other application "Media L..." pops up on my screen, which is very anoying. Can you put that information to another unimportant field?

Furthermore I cant manage to play an album in the right order. I sort it after Track# and it still plays track_15 after track_1...
Is it possible to mark a track and it will be played after the current?

[Bill S]

Tree & View -> List -> Auto size columns isn't working for me either.

Also, when I put the mouse over the vertical line inbetween two columns and double click, the column does not expand (it should expand to the width of the widest 'cell' in the column).  After I manually 'drag' the column to be wider, go to a different playlist and then return to the one I was in the width of the column has reverted back to the small default value.

FWIW, I'm on WinXP

[dynamic]

ALL 12.0.3XX versions crash when I right click to edit tags.

1. Left click to edit then right click to cut or paste (no problem there)
2. repeat the same steps and MC closed with an illegal action.

Media Center 12.0.329 -- C:\Program Files (x86)\J River\Media Center 12\

Microsoft Windows Vista 6.0  (Build 6000)
Intel Core 2 2399 MHz MMX / Memory: Total - 4192 MB, Free - 2641 MB

Internet Explorer: 7.0.6000.16512 / ComCtl32.dll: 5.82.6000 / Shlwapi.dll: 6.0.6000 / Shell32.dll: 6.0.6000 / wnaspi32.dll: N/A
Ripping /   Drive H:   Mode:Normal  Type:Auto  Speed:Max
  Digital playback: Yes /  Use YADB: Yes /  Get cover art: Yes /  Calc replay gain: Yes /  Copy volume: 32767
  Eject after ripping: Yes /  Play sound after ripping: No 

Burning /  Drive H: TSSTcorp CD/DVDW SH-S183L   Addr: 1:1:0  Speed:48  MaxSpeed:48  BurnProof:Yes
  Test mode: No /  Eject after writing: Yes /  Direct decoding: Yes /  Write CD-Text: Yes
  Use playback settings: No /

Interface Plugins:
  last.fm (Active)
  Library Server (Active)
  TiVo Server (Active)
  UPnP Server (Active)

[skylarplane]

For two days in a rows since I've upgraded I've had to reinstall this release
because it keeps abending.  Has anyone else had this problem.

Skylar  ?

After several failure to come up, even after reinstalling, I've had to revert
back to a previous release.

Skylar  ?

[benn600]

abending

Abending is a term IT folks use when a computer or program does an unexpected shutdown. So the data itself was not abending, but either the computer that holds the data or the program that makes the data available to you on that computer had abended.

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20060608184537AAO7sHh

[richard.e.morton]

send to external

Just setup the send to internet explorer to search for the album I have selected.
setup with:
Name: Amazon
c:\....\iexplore.exe
[artist] [album]

If I am in a album thumbnails view when I click send to external -> amazon
it opens the same number of internet explorer windows as there are tracks in the album.

Thanks

Richard

[brossmac]

For two days in a rows since I've upgraded I've had to reinstall this release
because it keeps abending.  Has anyone else had this problem.

Skylar  ?

I've been having the same trouble.  I thought there was a problem with one of my skins and when I change skins, none of the buttons work.  They will react to mouseovers and will visually react to a click, but they don't do anything.  Keyboard shortcuts, however, still work and are the only way I can stop play or shut the program down once the buttons freeze.

[richard.e.morton]

If you put a cd in, windows comes up with a dialog asking what you want to do. The JRiver entry is "Play a CD in MC" or words to that affect. Could that be changed to "Open MC" cause what happens is linked to your settings in MC and not nessacarily play the CD ...
small thing I know

R

[jantypas]

Subject says it all, if I try to take an OPML file from Itunes 7.4.2 and tell MC 12.329 to import it, I get error messages about Direct Show filters.  

I can send a copy of the OPML file if desired, but I'll need an e-mail or dropbox as it's larger than what this forum can handle.

[JimH]

The error means a DirectShow filter has not been found for the filetype.

[Vorgod]

Hi

A little incident report (perhaps)

could it be that 'Auto Size Columns' is not working properly in 12.0.329?

[richard.e.morton]

minor bug in search and replace.

if all fields are deselected except album and the first two characters in the album name are two spaces "  "

if you then complete a seach and replace on "  " with "" it takes the first character of the name with it.

I couldn't replicate this though

Rich

[AoXoMoXoA]

Flac issues, perhaps belonging in a seperate thread?

as previously reported MC continues to crash when applying cover art to flac files with option to save art in tags selected.
This is about the only time MC ever crashes on me anymore so it is especially disappointing.

possibly related:

-flac files with minor errors crash MC and require to be converted to wav and back into flac with a 3rd party program before MC can handle them. They do sometimes report the errors in the other software, but they are not fatal errors so the files convert sucessfully (offset error?).

-flac files created in MC10 with cover art contained in tags does not show art when viewed on MC12

-when converting Flac to mp3, cover art is lost on some of the files. (almost appears to be every other file but not necessarily exactly consistant)

[sbsp2]

Tree & View -> List -> Auto size columns feature appears to be broken or tweaked poorly in this build as most of my columns are getting truncated (like Album, Artist, Comment)...even if there are only 7 chars in those fields values.  This did not happen in the prior releases (same tracks even).

In the meantime, reverted back to build 318 and this option is working again (just fyi).

[benn600]

I wonder what all this J River codec tweaking is for...hmm?  Maybe this is gonna be the codec with which video will be transcoded for transferring over Library Server to clients!  Ooooooooooooooo!

[AoXoMoXoA]

Occasionally when MC crashes, it leaves "Media Center 12.exe" running in the task manager for what seems like forever.

Trying to close it from within Task Manager is fruitless, whether using "End Process" or "End Process Tree", forcing a reboot in order to get MC to run again.

Unless these type of faults can be corrected to avoid an interruption of music being played, I have an alternative idea:

Make it so I can run one copy of MC for precessing/tagging/importing, and another copy of MC running just for playback . . . . even if they must be run on seperate PC's, as long as you can place the library updated in the Tagging copy of MC into the playback version of MC without losing any views, thumbnails, etc.

-or perhaps-

force MC to run "split" wth playback in one instance (using one processor core) while Tagging and file handling are performed in a seperate thread in the second core of the processor. I expect that then eash "half" can then be made to crash seperately without affecting the other.


***Almost an hour later and MC is finally no longer showing showing in the Task Manager, unable to be forced closed or re-start. But not before it had tied up over 192mb ram
Memory consumption is up to


**OOOps - my bad -  either I did not se MC in the Task Manager, or it reapeared when I tried to start MC, but either way it is the same as before, stuck, cant force closed, cannot restart MC without a reboot. 

[Qythyx]

I just ran into a problem syncing my 3rd gen iPod Nano. It had been working fine since 329 first came out, and this was the first time I ran into the problem.

The problem is that after syncing (which MC seemed to complete just fine), I ejected, but then the iPod showed nothing as existing on it (except for all the photos). I repeatedly tried reconnecting and resyncing, but could not resolve the problem. Interestingly, each time I reconnected MC showed all the expected content as being on the iPod, but after ejecting the iPod though it was empty. I eventually reinitialized my iPod and resynced and that seemed to fix it.

[JimH]

I just ran into a problem syncing my 3rd gen iPod Nano. It had been working fine since 329 first came out, and this was the first time I ran into the problem.

Vista?

[leezer3]

Slightly random little issue here, pretty sure its on MC's end-
When importing M4B files with embedded chapter art (Plays fine & syncs fine in iTunes), MC12 classifies them as video. No big deal, as the images are still present at this time. When syncing them to the iPod however, all the images are replaced with MC12's default no cover art image.

Cheers

-Leezer-

[Wolfman]

I am wondering about the mc crashing when saving tag informartion  Most of the time that it crashes is when I am working on flac files.  I am running vista business version on my pc.  Other than that small anoying problem  this is great media software.  I wish that I would have found it sooner.

[Qythyx]

Vista?

Yes, and I was wrong, the iPod reinit did not fix the problem. Will reboot into XP for now, I guess.

[Seviien]

Could we get a build that fixes the auto-column-sizing bug?  Or at least be able to download the last public build (which seems to have been deleted off the ftp)?

[jolo]

I have to bud in here.

Media Center is fantastic software.

I personally hope that JRiver doesn't waste a lot of time and resources trying to keep up with Apple and Microsoft's multimedia products.

For example, The IPuds/Windozs Media Player/ITunes are MEANT to be exclusive and proprietary and are oriented toward marketing and market control and busting of industry standards. The WANT to make it difficult for MC to work with their crap.

If you want to make things easy for yourself, look around, get away Microsoft/Apple (basically the same firm), and work with industry standard products and open source software.
Also make sure that the codecs you use are open source, license free products that are meant to make it easy and compatible.
Last thing is NEVER TO LOAD anything that has the DRM virus.

Just don't be market driven and think that there are no choices out there. For example, as far as codecs go, use OGG instead of MP3, use FLAC and APE as they are great lossless codecs.

DON'T purchase products that create are designed for proprietary exclusiveness rather than inclusiveness with other hardware and software.

Sometimes it amazes me when I see how people seem to powerlessly change what they would like to do, limit their options and do just about anything and inconvenience themselves by the Microshaft/Apple oligopoly. 

For example, My portable audio player has far better sound quality than any Ipud and plays, FLAC, APE and OOG. They are free to license.

Let us take the Apple/Microshaft options.
Remember when Jobs freaked out because Real Player had some software that would allow Real files to be played on the Ipud ??
Jobs now made a decision to create a "virus" that would destroy all of the PURCHASED IPhones that have been enhanced by people who have opened them up and did some reverse engineering to improve them for themselves.

Can your portable media player transfer files easily with Linux and anything that has a USB port on it ??

Products like LAME (which MC takes advantage of ), to encode to MP3 are great. Use MC to play music on your PC, look at other options like the enormously flexible, small and fast Media Player Classic http://sourceforge.net/projects/guliverkli/ that is a free download from Sourceforge.
There is some real creativity going on with projects that are community driven from places like Sourceforge.

Just for information purposes: Microsoft invested in 150 million in Apple several years ago. When the MAC was first announced, Steve Jobs was on stage with only one other person, Bill Gates, as Microshaft partnered with Apple on Microshaft Office.

Check out the portable audio players from Cowon/Iaudio.

Get stand alone DVD players that allow play anything that you can throw at them, PAL, NTSC, DIVX, MPG, VCD, SVCD, JPG, CDs, MP3, OOG, etc. The wind up being a lot less money because their names are NOT Sony, however, they might be the company that makes the Sony DVD products.

With you behaviors in the marketplace, you can force competition and a focus on customers back in the industry by voting with your dollars and usage.

IE7, still a a overblown, big open security hole, has improved for one reason, the use of FIREFOX !!

If you have an Ipus, COMPLAIN AND WRITE APPLE TO MAKE THEIR PRODUCTS EASIER TO WORK WITH, ALLOW FLEXIBILITY WITH CODECS.
Complain to Apple about the difficulties with working with MC, MC is attempting to use common industry standards. Let them know that you will move to other products if they don't stop making it difficult to work with the rest of the world.

Jon