Audible Player for your Smartphone

[Mike Temporale]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://audible.com' target='_blank'>http://audible.com</a><br /><br /></div>A number of our readers have been chatting about the new AudiblePlayer for Windows Mobile Smartphone, but nobody was able to get it working. Well, the problem is solved thanks to Ed Heyl! The fix is rather simple too. AudiblePlayer for Smartphone is in beta. You just need to get on the beta program. Simply email Audible (BetaProgram [at] Audible.com) and they should be able to help you out. Thanks Ed for bringing this to our attention! 8)

[squirrelist]

I sent an email and received a response within about twenty minutes.


Dear Audible Customer,

You have either expressed interest in becoming a beta tester for audible.com or sent us a correspondence related to the AudiblePlayer for the Smartphone.
We'd like to invite you to give your feedback to the latest enhancement of our AudiblePlayer software. We have a recent Beta candidate of AudiblePlayer for Smartphone ready for review. This beta version only currently works with these Microsoft Smartphones:

Verizon Samsung i600

Spring Samsung i600

AudioVox SMT5600

Orange SPV 200



We have not been able to test on the Motorola Mpx 220 so we encourage the customers that have these phones to immediately report any issues, findings they encounter. Or even if the software simply works for them.

We appreciate your help in evaluating this build.

This player is actually built from AudiblePlayer for Pocket PC. It shares the many improvements made with the latest release. These are:

- No skipping during playback

- Audio ends 3 seconds early at the end of playback



Please remember this is a beta. Any problems you encounter with AudiblePlayer, you should report immediately betaprogram [at] audible.com



How to participate:

Participating in this beta test is simple. Simply follow the remaining instructions and send us your feedback no later than Friday, February 18th 2005 .

You need to have a Smartphone and be an Audible customer to be part of this program. If you know a friend who may interested in being a tester, feel free to forward this email and send him or her to www.audible.com to become a customer.



How to test:

To test the software follow the instructions below:

1. Uninstall any version of AudibleManager present on your computer.

2. Make sure the device is in the cradle and Microsoft ActiveSync has finished synching with your device.

3. Install AudibleManager with Smartphone support by downloading and installing from: http://download.audible.com/AM36/ActiveSetupSmartphone.exe

4. Follow the Setup Wizard on your Desktop.

5. To install AudiblePlayer on your phone, use Microsoft ActiveSync to place the attached *.can file on your phone. After copying the file to your phone, run the cab file to install AudiblePlayer onto your device.

Send your feedback:

Attached to this email you will find a form that should be used for sending your feedback. Copies to Hwolfish [at] audible.com , cvictori [at] audible.com , and dust [at] audible.com

How to get help:

Since this is a beta program you will not be able to contact Audible's customer support for help. However, please feel free to reply to this email for any further questions or help that you may need.



We thank you for participating in this program.

Howard Wolfish

IT Director - Audible, Inc.


Edit: Upated the email addresses to protect the innocent. ;) Spam sucks. - MT

[MS Mobiles]

Very cool, squirrelist! Thanks for the additional information!

Care to attach some screenshots here?

[Gator5000e]

Can't find the cab file. What's it called?

[Gator5000e]

Little slow today. You need to e-mail audible and they will send you the cab file. Still having problems though. Once the player is installed the program needs to activate the player on the phone. It does so but when you click finish, the program hangs. So hopefully they can work this out. The welcome program played well on the 5600 so I bet this will work well if they can get the kinks out of the main manager program.

[Citezein]

I'm the person who originally posted about this in the Smartphone newsgroup. I got the beta client installed today on my Audiovox SMT5600 and walked my dog while listening to an audiobook. Finally.

I'm a bit unsure why Audible didn't develop this software a couple years ago. Audiobooks are a great application for smartphones. Being able to listen to content anywhere at any time is wonderful.

So thank-you Audible, if a bit late. Of course things aren't perfect. The client software on the PC still looks like it was designed for Windows 3.1 and the Smartphone software isn't any better. In fact, it looks rather ugly.

I'm not entirely sure why Audible continues to use their own format/drm/player any longer. They should just release the books in WMA with the standard Windows Media DRM for Windows and AAC / Fairplay on the Mac. They are integrating the store into WMP 10, which is nice, and I know you can buy books via iTunes as well, but at some point they should just make the switch. Their software is clumsy and buggy and they are forced to spend a lot of development time reinventing the wheel with the DRM and codec support. This is not a productive use of their time.

Complaints aside, it's a good time to be a Smartphone owner. Right now Audible is having a buy one, get one free sale so stock up.

[Gator5000e]

You did not have any problems with the Audible Manager when installing the software? I must have something on my machine that is preventing the completion of the installation. I can not get the Audible manager to operate. It continually wants to activate the player when it has already done so and then after it does it again, the entire program freezes when I click finish. I am stumped.

[Citezein]

You did not have any problems with the Audible Manager when installing the software? I must have something on my machine that is preventing the completion of the installation. I can not get the Audible manager to operate. It continually wants to activate the player when it has already done so and then after it does it again, the entire program freezes when I click finish. I am stumped.

I first uninstalled my existing Audible Manager software. Then I installed the new Audible Manager software with Smartphone suppot. I then installed the client on my phone and then rebooted the phone. Finally I hooked the phone up to the computer and ran Audible Manager. From then I was able to activate the phone successfully. Sorry if I can't be of more help than that.