can't seem to find a good MP3 player for Pocket PC [Archive]

View Full Version : can't seem to find a good MP3 player for Pocket PC

heov

01-06-2006, 05:32 AM

so basically i've tried a lot of diff mp3 players, but can't seem to find a good one.

the most important thing i need is .asx playlist support. I sync playlists using windows media player 10 on my desktop, and I dont' want to use anohter program nor do i want to convert my playlists on my ppc to another format (my playlist changes daily).

so with that being said, let me tell you what i've tried and my issues with them, and hopefully you guys can suggest a good mp3 player for me.

Annother issue i'd really like is a auto-screen off thing (either after 30s, 1min, etc).

WMP10.1 for Pocket PC.
- i can't map my buttons (only dpad)
-if i hit back on the first song, it won't go to the last song, it just does nothing (w/ rpt on).
-the screen likes to turn on when it hits the last song (it still rpts and plays the first, but the screen still turns back on)
-i hate how it doens't remember what i was playing

MortPlay 3.3
-seemed to be perfect, but it messes up my asx playlist. My asx playlist links to different songs several folders deep, and it just messes it up. It like splits each folder into a seperate play list or something :(

Pocket Player - wm5 is lacking and it messes up my mp3 songs (it's like slow or something)

I haven't tried Pocket Music yet, but I heard it's a "memory hog." I really want somethign that doesn't "skip" when i surf the net on my pocket pc. I'll try it soon enough. Does anyone recommend it, is it worth to pay for the bundled version? and does it have an auto-turn-off screen function?

Thanks!

GSmith

01-06-2006, 05:39 AM

heov

01-06-2006, 07:05 AM

You might consider TCPMP (used to be known as Betaplayer). If you need more choices, you can try all the players in this chart: http://www.feederreader.com/mediachart.html

Greg Smith
Author, FeederReader - Pocket PC *direct* RSS text, audio, video, podcasts
www.FeederReader.com - Download on the Road

oh right i was in a rush to finish this post i forgot to mention that I'm currenlty using TCPMP for my audio.

And I know the TCPMP team is working on improving the audio capabilities in the future revisions.

My problems w/ TCPMP is that it doens't have an "auto turn off screen" function and I really don't like hwo the playlist is setup (it's on a seperate screen). I'd liek to see what song is next, prev, what features i have turned on, easy access (w/o button mapping only) to the EQ, Playlist, Shuffle, Repeat, etc.

Thanks thoguh.

I remember there used to be an mp3 player that looked like winamp2 (but it was a permaninent skin i believe). It's native language wasn't english (but had an english version), and I believe it was the first of all "winamp look alikes" This was maybe liek 2 years ago though... It came out about the same time Winampaq came out... I can't think of the name for the life of me though. I think the name of hte company or player started w/ a W though. I'd like to look into it to see if it has ASX support or not.

Thanks

pocketpcadmirer

01-06-2006, 07:19 AM

yes pocket player is way too slow. I bought one without even trying the trial version. I would say stick with wmp and download "playlist editor" and u r done !!

Sunny

heov

01-06-2006, 07:44 AM

yes pocket player is way too slow. I bought one without even trying the trial version. I would say stick with wmp and download "playlist editor" and u r done !!

Sunny

ha! too bad wmp sucks. i mean seriouslyh, i can't use half my buttons. and why the heck does the screen turn on at the end of the list? and why the heck when it's at the first song, i can't hit prev and go to the last? so many stupid mistakes MS made w/ WMP10 for PPC.

If mortplayer would "fix" their .asx issue. It insists on seperating each folder into a seperate play list :( i think even if i did "open" folder, and i'd ahve include subfolders checked, it'd still seperate it into like a diff playlis per album (the way i have my music on my ppc is SD Card/music/album/artist/song.mp3)

pocketpcadmirer

01-06-2006, 10:01 AM

But you know what, all other mp3 players are not at all good on battery.
Yes i know that u get all those fancy visualisations but it hurts the battery.

Thats why, try to stick with WMP. :(

Sunny

martin_ayton

01-06-2006, 10:54 AM

I have a beta of Conduits PocketPlayer 2.7 and it has fixed a bunch of issues. They claim full WM5 compatibility but I can't speak to that since I using WM2003SE ('phone edition). IMO the PP sound just walks all over WMP10 and I can't imagine ever wanting to use WMP again (despite whinging for ages that O2 wouldn't replace WMP9 with WMP10, now (I've got it I don't use it).

It does still have an issue in that if you have it set to switch the screen off after, say, 30 seconds, and then you let it play to the end of the playlist and then the PPC goes to sleep, then the only way to wake it up is with a soft reset. Still, that's what betas are for: to spot these problems and fix them, no?

What I'm saying is: hang on for Pocket Player 2.7 - it may well be just what you need.

heov

01-06-2006, 06:00 PM

martin_ayton

01-06-2006, 08:13 PM

First off, it's not a full install: you have to have v2.61 installed, and then you just add some files to the relevant folder and replace some others and away you go. It's not really my place to be handing out files, so I'll PM you with an email address at Conduits that you could try.

sto-helit.de

01-06-2006, 08:53 PM

-seemed to be perfect, but it messes up my asx playlist. My asx playlist links to different songs several folders deep, and it just messes it up. It like splits each folder into a seperate play list or something :(
Can you send me an example of such an ASX file? ([email protected])
Maybe I can find what's going wrong. At least MortPlayer doesn't split playlists in any way...

sto-helit.de

01-06-2006, 09:20 PM

If mortplayer would "fix" their .asx issue. It insists on seperating each folder into a seperate play list :( i think even if i did "open" folder, and i'd ahve include subfolders checked, it'd still seperate it into like a diff playlis per album (the way i have my music on my ppc is SD Card/music/album/artist/song.mp3)
Er, now I'm a bit confused...
There is no "include subfolders" when a single playlist or directory is opened. This option only exists in favorites, and there only for directories.
Playlists and directories are handled almost identically in MortPlayer. If you want to use playlists you've either have to open them with "Other path/playlist" in the open dialog (eject button, playlists are displayed like subfolders) or add them to you favorites.
If you want to use the folders, you can add the entire contents of a folder and all subfolders by selecting "<All favorites>" - "<Complete tree to list>". You can also set "Favorites into playlist" as startup in "Program start" settings.
Or try the changer mode. It switches to the next folder (or playlist - depending on you favorites) once a playlist is finished and offers some nice options like "repeat list" if you want to repeat a single album or "shuffle all" to shuffle between all tracks in all folders (well up to a number given in the settings, to avoid memory troubles on huge storages...).

heov

01-07-2006, 05:58 AM

Sorry I can't seem to figure this out.

I have synced playlists files (asx). They refer to songs in directories like SD Card/Music/Artist/Album/Song.mp3

The playlist is located in
SD Card/Playlists/playlist.asx

the playlists.asx correctly refered to the right song in the write directory structure, etc. This playlist file works fine in WMP10.1 for PPC and TCPMP and Pocket Player (in case the playlist was at fault).

In MortPlayer, when I load the playlist, it does basically nothing. On the playlist, it shows the file name of my playlist i just loaded, but nothing happens at all. no songs are loaded into the list. Even if i switch to "changer mode". This is the issue I have. It basically can't properly read my .asx playlist.

My second issue is importing my entire Music folder into one big playlist. If i go to "Open Path/Playlist" and choose my Music Direcotyr (which has liek 3 levels down to get to the song), it won't load the songs :( Same issue w/ the playlist. I've tried all the options int eh prefs for how to deal w/ subdirectories too.

So yeah... I really like mortplay too, so if i can get this to work it'd be awesome. I think if I can figure out how to add all my songs to a playlist within mortplay, it'd be great :) Like what option to choose in the prefs, and then I assume I just go to <Other path/playlists> and pick the Music directory (let's forget about favorites later... once i can do this i'm sure i can get the favorites thing working.

Thanks

EDIT/UPDATE:

Ok so I added my entire "music" folder into the favorites, checked the "Include Subdirectories" in the mangement options, and it'll read them all in, and it'll basically make a seperate playlist for each song. So i see one song per list, and i can cycle through the lists by hitting hte right/left arrow keys by the Play list onscreen.

How can I make this one big list? Thanks!

EDIT2:
so yeah same issue, but basically everythings working, except for the fact that I have seperate lists. I can still "shuffle" and hit prev, next, etc, and go through my songs, but i'd rather see one big list of all my songs then having to go through each folder's songs.

And I made a dummy playlist file w/ only 1 directory deep, and itr works. So i'm just gonna assume that ASX support in MortPlay is limited by the directory structure.

sto-helit.de

01-07-2006, 10:29 AM

In MortPlayer, when I load the playlist, it does basically nothing.
Please send me the ASX file, so I can check what's going wrong there.

How can I make this one big list? Thanks!
Like I explained before: Choose "Favorites into playlist" in "program start" settings (so it's done every program start) or select "<All favorites>" - "<Complete tree to list>" in the open dialog.

And I made a dummy playlist file w/ only 1 directory deep, and itr works. So i'm just gonna assume that ASX support in MortPlay is limited by the directory structure.
Not as such. I think the paths to the files are saved in another way if there are multiple directories.

sto-helit.de

01-07-2006, 11:49 AM

Please check whether loading the ASX playlist works better with this (http://www.sto-helit.de/downloads/pocketpc/MortPlayer-3.31b2.zip) version.
The ZIP contains only the updated PPC exe. You have to copy the contained file to the MortPlayer installation directory on your device ("Browse" in ActiveSync or "Mobile device" in Explorer tree).

Dyvim

01-07-2006, 04:39 PM

But you know what, all other mp3 players are not at all good on battery.
Yes i know that u get all those fancy visualisations but it hurts the battery.

Thats why, try to stick with WMP. :(

There are a number of super small freeware "screen toggle" apps that will allow you to toggle the ppc screen on and off. Or you can even write your own from sample code available from MSDN if you're a programmer (this is what I did).

Anyway, you can just map this app to a hardware button and voila! you can shut off your screen while you listen to tunes with TCPMP or whatever. The only problem is that you have to sacrifice one of your hardware button mappings - and of course it's not automatic. And with this thing, your screen won't accidentally turn itself on when you don't want it to - you need to either press the button to run the app again or press the power button (which when screen is off will turn screen back on instead of turning the device off).

heov

01-07-2006, 07:04 PM

REGARDING ADDING A FOLDER:
I did exactly what you just said inolving the settings.

So now when i load up mortplayer, all my songs are there, but i'm in the same situation. Each album has it's own "Playlist," and I can sort through them using hte horizontal arrows on each side of the playlist.

I thnk the best way to test what I'm experiencing is simply mimic my directory struction.

SD Card/Music/Arist1/Albumb1/song1.mp3
SD Card/Music/Artist2/Album2/song2.mp3

Then in mortplayer, add the "Music" directory to your favorites. And it'll give you 2 seperate lists instead of one list w/ both songs.

NOW REGARDING THE ASX ISSUE:
I don't have any play to host the asx file at the moment, but I can assure you it's a proper file. WMP10 on my desktop makes this playlist since it's synced over. It works in Pocket Player 2.61 (pocket player is no good on wm5 though), it works in TCPMP, and it works in WMP10.1 for PPC.

Actually, i'll paste it here:

<ASX VERSION="3.0">
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\Lil Rob\Twelve Eighteen, Pt. 1\Lil Rob-Summer Nights.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\Green Day\American Idiot\Green Day-American Idiot.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\Bow Wow\Wanted\Bow Wow-Let Me Hold You.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\Pretty Ricky\Bluestars\Pretty Ricky-Your Body.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\Young Jeezy\Let's Get It Thug Motivation 101\Akon-Soul Survivor.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\Gwen Stefani\Love Angel Music Baby\Gwen Stefani-Luxurious.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\Trick Trick\The People Vs_\Eminem-Welcome 2 Detroit.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\T-Pain\Rappa Ternt Sanga\T-Pain-I'm Sprung.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\Fall Out Boy\From Under the Cork Tree\Fall Out Boy-Sugar, We're Goin Down.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\Eminem\Curtain Call The Hits\Eminem-When I'm Gone.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\Three 6 Mafia\Most Known Unknown\Eightball-Stay Fly.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\Puff Daddy\No Way Out [RERLS]\Busta Rhymes-Puff Daddy-The Notorious B.I.G-Victory (Feat. The Notorious B.I.G. & Bust.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\The Notorious B.I.G_\Duets\Avery Storm-Nasty Girl.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\The Notorious B.I.G_\Duets\Faith Evans-1970 Somthin'.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\The Notorious B.I.G_\Duets\The Notorious B.I.G-The Most Shady.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\The Notorious B.I.G_\Duets\Jay-Z-Whatchu Want.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\The Notorious B.I.G_\Duets\2Pac-Living in Pain.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\The Notorious B.I.G_\Duets\Akon-Hustler's Story.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\The Notorious B.I.G_\Duets\Bob Marley-Hold Ya Head.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\Ludacris\Unknown Album\Ludacris-Georgia.mp3" /></ENTRY>
<ENTRY><REF HREF="..\Music\Ben Folds\Songs for Silverman [Vinyl]\Ben Folds-Bitches Ain't S--t.mp3" /></ENTRY>
</ASX>

So maybe the issue is w/ the ".." (updir cmd)

Remember, the playlist is in "SD Card/Playlists/playlist.asx" and the songs are in "SD Card/Music/Artist/Album/song.mp3.

I would try editing the playlist file to maybe the exact path, but I really see no point in doing so since i'd have to do that eveytime a new playlist is synced, and I really just want to be able to sync and play.

Thanks for your help.

PS. I tried w/ the new beta, still have the same issues.

EDIT: btw, this is the way WMP10 on desktop will sync files (in terms of dir structure). There is an option to forego the dir structure and just put all the fiels in one dir, and i'm sure mortplayer would handle it, but I really want to keep this dir structure.

sto-helit.de

01-08-2006, 06:21 PM

REGARDING ADDING A FOLDER:
I did exactly what you just said inolving the settings.
If you'd set the startup mode correctly, you should have all files (incl. subfolders) in the playlist after a restart...

So maybe the issue is w/ the ".." (updir cmd)
No, I think it's the uppercase REF HREF. The old test files I got were lowercase, XML is usually lowercase, so I didn't think there could be an uppercase variant...

Please try this version (http://www.sto-helit.de/downloads/pocketpc/MortPlayer-3.31b3.zip).

heov

01-08-2006, 08:55 PM

Cool :)

The playlist works (or it's loaded rather) now, and they all appear in one big list :)

Thanks a lot for your help and quick responses. MortPlayer truly is the must-have mp3 player for PPC today.

But I do have one more question/request:

I know you can set it so that the Volume simply changes the pre-amp of the song instead of changing the system volume, and you clearly state that setting it too high will cause distortion (whcih it does), but is there anyway to make it behave like WMP10.1 for PPC or TCPMP?

For example, if I set the max system volume 50%, and then i load up WMP, it simply scales the 50% of total volume. So max in WMP is 50% of the total volume and low is still 0% (and the slider doens't affect system volume).

It's also similar to hwo WMP on desktop and I believe WinAmp works. They might be simply adjusting the pre-amp too, but maybe I guess they impose some sort of limit, or maybe they're doing something else?

But no biggie :) Thanks for your help again in solving this issue.

heov

01-08-2006, 09:10 PM

1 more thing :)

So I set it to repeat track, or I set my shuffle options, etc (all w/ teh big buttons on the program).

Then I exit the program. Then I come back, and my repeat/shuffle settings are back to the default (Don't shuffle, Repeat All i think).

Is there a way/option to make it remember my settings for those things?

Thanks.

sto-helit.de

01-09-2006, 05:45 PM

Is there a way/option to make it remember my settings for those things?
Just set them in "Shuffle/repeat" settings.

sto-helit.de

01-09-2006, 05:58 PM

but is there anyway to make it behave like WMP10.1 for PPC or TCPMP?
Well, at least WMP simply uses something similar to the preamp, just limited to 50%...
I could imagine TCPMP does something more sophisticated, but that'd require me to do some major work in the playback routines, which I'd like to avoid...

I thought about something like a "limited preamp" (0-50%), but that would cause quite a big volume jump if the preamp in the current preset is >50%.
Another way I though about was a percentage of the current preamp. The trouble with this is that there are only 64 preamp steps. With the common preamp of 50%, this would be 32 available steps, which isn't perfect but OK. But if there's a lower preamp in the preset, there could be quite some gaps...
Besides, I'd have to find a better way to implement it than the current optional preamp <-> volume swap.

It's also similar to hwo WMP on desktop and I believe WinAmp works. They might be simply adjusting the pre-amp too, but maybe I guess they impose some sort of limit, or maybe they're doing something else?
They've got a big advantage - they simply use the channel volume. Sadly, there's no such thing in the sound drivers of PocketPCs .

heov

01-10-2006, 02:59 AM

Thanks for the help and replies.

Everything seems good now.

However, in Pocket PC 2k3 SE (friends PPC), if I map the screensaver button to say Button 4, and then turn teh screen off w/ that button, and I can't press that button to turn it back on. It turns on really fast then off again. I assume it turns it on, then activates that button, eh? thus turning it off.

This isn't a problem on my WM5 device, but it does occur on his hx2415, and isn't reall a big deal. The other buttons work fine.

Thanks again :)

sto-helit.de

01-10-2006, 09:40 AM

However, in Pocket PC 2k3 SE (friends PPC), if I map the screensaver button to say Button 4, and then turn teh screen off w/ that button, and I can't press that button to turn it back on. It turns on really fast then off again. I assume it turns it on, then activates that button, eh? thus turning it off.
Strange. I've got WM2003 SE myself, and it works fine for me.
Maybe "deactivate screensaver with every button" is active? In that case, the screensaver's been deactivated because there was any button press, and then activated because the screensaver button was pressed and the screensaver's already off. I think I fixed that bug in the beta, but I'm not sure yet. Or maybe his device is sending additional key codes that lead to a similar effect, i.e. some (usually unhandled) key code deactivates the screensaver, then comes the screensaver key code and reactivates it...

pocketpcadmirer

01-12-2006, 01:19 PM

There are a number of super small freeware "screen toggle" apps that will allow you to toggle the ppc screen on and off. Or you can even write your own from sample code available from MSDN if you're a programmer (this is what I did).

I think you have not tried the battery tests then. WMP is much more processor and battery life friendly than any other player. I've tried them all and WMP is the only player which can give 8+hours of music on my magician and 9-10+ hours on my ipaq 2215
(with screen off)

Sunny

Guest979

01-25-2006, 03:53 AM

I know that WMP requires hardware support to be able to play files with DRM - but am I correct to guess that all other PocketPC players are the same way?

It seems odd that Pocket Tunes can play protected WMAs (with proper authorization) on Palms that don't even have an MS operating system, let alone MS DRM hardware support, but PocketPCs can't. Whatever, viva iTMS! :)