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Yes

1 (4.5%)

No

19 (86.4%)

Don't know or don't care

2 (9.1%)

Total Members Voted: 22

[JimH]

Matt and I were talking yesterday about what the mute button should do.  I said that I couldn't think of a case where you would ever want to mute playback without also pausing it.

He said, then we should remove the mute and just use pause.  I said I thought someone would object.

I'm not sure we'll make any changes, but I wonder if you can think of a reason not to pause playback when muted.

Thanks for your thoughts.

[zirum]

Ony place I can think of mute actually usefull is when someone watch a video, and need a sudden silence...

I audio, mute is just a waste.

[AoXoMoXoA]

If I wish to pause playback, I will click the "Pause" button, if I click "Mute" I expect only that: the audio will mute while playback continues. This is how my car stereo works.

However my car stereo mutes the audio without silencing it, it reduces the volume to barely audible. This is really not a "Mute" but rather an "Attenuate" function, and the button should call it such.

Perhaps this might be considered as an alternative, but with an adjustable level for when it is attenuated. Handy for telephone calls or trollbooths.

[Fex]

If I wish to pause playback, I will click the "Pause" button...

All said.

[HTPC4ME]

i like the mute button as well. i do alot of video chats\conferences, and also running 2 versions of jriver at same one to play videos with no sound and one to play music etc.. and when I use those its nice to be able to hear system sounds but still be able to watch movies being played back, and hear voice chats or music being played\streamed to chat rooms
for me be nice to keep it.. but no big deal either way.  can just slide volume down on video side

[gappie]

When the phone rings and you press the mute button, should playback also be paused?

when the phone rings i turn down the volume or hit pause. the only time i used the mute button was when i checked if i programmed that button on my remote right. so for me the mute button is not necessary, but it also does not bother me. on the other hand, a mute button that would pause playback is a superfluous button, there is already a big pause button.

 
gab

edit: i would expect that when a file is muted/paused at the same time, that play would also unmute. and ofcource that pause would also mute otherwise it would get really confusing... 

[rpalmer68]

Sometimes I'll have the audio muted but live TV video playing, especially if I have the radio commentary playing for a live sports event.

Richard

[mabes]

Absolutely you need both IMO. Yes, most of the time when you mute you would pause. But the pause functions as a mute in those cases. I don't see the advantage of removing mute.

[MrHaugen]

Me neither. It would be the exact same thing as pause.
Some times I want to check out things on a video and use mute to not get distracted, or to simply turn off really awfull sound.

[leezer3]

I use mute extensively when previewing videos.
It was bad enough when you tried clearing the mute state on stopping playback, please don't even think of going here 

-Leezer-

[JimH]

OK, so it looks like the general consensus is that we should remove both the mute and the pause buttons.  Do I have that right?

[Mr ChriZ]

OK, so it looks like the general consensus is that we should remove both the mute and the pause buttons.  Do I have that right?

That would definitley solve the problem.  I find the next button gets in the way too.

[gappie]

and how about the play button..

[eba]

One thing it shouldn't do is unmute when you press stop, which it does to do a fadeout.

[rpalmer68]

and how about the play button..

THAT"S IT!

Get rid of PLAY but keep PAUSE.... that will confuse them 

R

[ninedosus]

For reasons relating to work, I need to have the Last.fm audioscrobbler always scrobbling my tracks. However, this doesn't mean I always want to listen to those tracks. So I need to be able to mute at will without stopping the scrobbling.

Making mute pause playback would really screw up my day, and I'd need to have another media player running instead.

[KingDoughnut]

You might think that if you mute, you might want to pause too [because you dont want to miss anything] but mute always just muted and pause always just paused [always separate functions].  Changing it would only confuse people, no matter how logical it might seem.