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sbowness

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#151596 30-Aug-2014 08:03
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I posted this on the Vodafone Community board as well. Please forgive me for multiposting, but I would be interested to hear from our community here as well.

I don't know whether he's still listening, but I missed the AMA with @joelholmes . There were some good questions and some helpful answers, although some ducking for cover in some cases as one would expect.   I've just jumped ship from iPhone to Lumia 925 ... but only for a trial month at this stage. We bought my mother a 625 and my partner then went and got one too, and I felt a little left out. So I decided to give it a go. By and large, I love it. The live tiles and active lock screen are great. I can live with the limited range of apps as I have found equivalents for almost everything I use the iPhone for, although I can't find a decent app to record my mileage for my tax return. However, there seem to be some glaringly aweful and obvious shortcomings that are inclining me to go back to iPhone at the end of the trial.  

 

  • Where is gapless playback? People have been asking about it for over a year but MS just don't seem to want to address the problem.
  • Where is sync over NTP for the clock? The official MS request forum says that it is apparently fixed but which no one can make work, unless of course you take your SIM out and why do that just to keep your clock synced. It's such a basic feature when not every provider uses NITZ (although why not, I can't fathom). I have to manually correct the clock 2-3 times a week just to keep it right. The iOS and Android just do it.
  • Going back to the inbuilt music player API that most applications seem to use (including Xbox Music and Nokia Music), why does it keep forgetting where I am in a track or even in an album? I listen to a lot of audio dramas on the bus (Big Finish's Doctor Who plays mainly) and it is so frustrating to come back to it on the way home to find that it has not just dropped the place in the track, but forgetten which track I was on as well. Oh, and why can it not handle multi-disk albums properly, mingling the tracks from each (although it looks like Xbox Music is now sorted)?
  • When using the almost-awesome Nokia Here Drive+, if you have you phone paired to a bluetooth car kit (like every good driver should), the turn-by-turn voice does not come down the correct channel and therefore you don't hear anything. If you do tell the OS to use the same channel used for phone calls, then there is a delay and the annoucement is over before it's kicked in. This renders the feature totally useless and I have to keep the phone unpaired in the car. MS's answer is a rather bland "this feature is not currently supported."
Microsoft have a potentially great OS that finds favour with a lot of people, particularly in Europe. Yet, they seem to shoot themselves in the foot with basic operability problems that should never get past user focus groups. I'd be interested to see if anyone can persuade me that I should stay with the Lumia. There are 3 weeks to go.  

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nathan
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  #1118468 30-Aug-2014 11:52
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some of the top of my head

no idea if gapless is coming.  I'm using Spotify, with a Premium subscription which seems fine, I've also tried this app http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/flac-player-sd/c812a2b0-ea8d-4819-9ed3-b35040c08b67 plays FLAC files from an SD card so close to gaplessly that I don’t hear a hiccup at all if I’m listening through speakers. Through headphones, it’s easier to hear it, but it’s still just barely there. It also does a pretty good job on MP3 files (which have to be renamed with an “MPEG3” extension before being copied to the SD card – in their Help, they claim that this is an OS limitation). I haven’t tried out a lot of stuff on it yet, but my early findings are very encouraging.

time sync with out requiring Sync is in Windows Phone 8.1 Update 1  which is in Developer Preview at the moment.  Its odd that your phone is time drifting 2-3 times a week in the first place, none of mine are

Bluetooth in the car, I think this is also fixed in Windows Phone 8.1 Update 1.  BrentR or nzregs maybe have had a chance to test this out.



GregV
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  #1118482 30-Aug-2014 12:20
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I'll add one frustration here.  In the People App, a FB post with a link will launch the FB app whether I press the FB story or the link within it.  I'd love it if pressing the link in the People App would take me straight to the url.  Instead the FB app is launched, and I then have to click the story link from there as well.

I do love the swipe keyboard though

Technofreak
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  #1118591 30-Aug-2014 14:42
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A couple more frustrations from me.

Only able to input one .ics entry into the calendar at one time - unless you buy an app to do this. Calendar entries are an integral function of a smartphone, there should be no need to buy an app. Multiple entries such as a roster need to be done one by one.

Lack of a browser that will reflow the text when you pinch and zoom the text to a larger size. I'm not sure if this is a broswer problem or a WP OS problem.  There's certainly a lack of good browsers.




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Technofreak
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  #1118643 30-Aug-2014 17:17
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sbowness:
If you do tell the OS to use the same channel used for phone calls
How do you do this?




Sony Xperia XA2 running Sailfish OS. https://sailfishos.org The true independent open source mobile OS 
Samsung Galaxy Tab S6
Dell Inspiron 14z i5


Technofreak
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  #1119115 31-Aug-2014 19:54
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nathan:
Bluetooth in the car, I think this is also fixed in Windows Phone 8.1 Update 1.  BrentR or nzregs maybe have had a chance to test this out.


Yep is fixed.




Sony Xperia XA2 running Sailfish OS. https://sailfishos.org The true independent open source mobile OS 
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sbowness

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  #1119550 1-Sep-2014 12:58
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Technofreak: sbowness:
If you do tell the OS to use the same channel used for phone calls
How do you do this?


In the Bluetooth Advanced Settings there's a tickbox called "Use an alternative Bluetooth audio connection for Speech." But don't because it doesn't really work.

sbowness

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  #1119554 1-Sep-2014 13:02
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nathan: some of the top of my head

no idea if gapless is coming.  I'm using Spotify, with a Premium subscription which seems fine, I've also tried this app http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/flac-player-sd/c812a2b0-ea8d-4819-9ed3-b35040c08b67 plays FLAC files from an SD card so close to gaplessly that I don’t hear a hiccup at all if I’m listening through speakers. Through headphones, it’s easier to hear it, but it’s still just barely there. It also does a pretty good job on MP3 files (which have to be renamed with an “MPEG3” extension before being copied to the SD card – in their Help, they claim that this is an OS limitation). I haven’t tried out a lot of stuff on it yet, but my early findings are very encouraging.

time sync with out requiring Sync is in Windows Phone 8.1 Update 1  which is in Developer Preview at the moment.  Its odd that your phone is time drifting 2-3 times a week in the first place, none of mine are

Bluetooth in the car, I think this is also fixed in Windows Phone 8.1 Update 1.  BrentR or nzregs maybe have had a chance to test this out.


Thanks for the tip. I play mp3s rather than use streaming of FLAC files. And the 925 has no SD slot. Does the player work with internal memory?

For the time sync, I've seen comments on other forums that you have to have the SIM out for the NTP sync to work in Update 1. Have you found that? Other people have also reported the 925 going slow. I'm a bit precious with keeping the clock accurate and I'm probably a little more sensitive to it that many people would be.

 
 
 

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Regs
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  #1119589 1-Sep-2014 13:54
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Question: what version of the OS are you running?  Are you on the 8.1 release with Cyan firmware?

I've not tried the Here Drive via the Bluetooth, because the car I've been testing the bluetooth in (mazda) has Here Maps as part of the built-in Nav system (Mazda Connect).  I don't have an off the shelf BT car kit to try it out with either.  Wrt the Bluetooth voice channel in general, there are a few issues - some cars/devices do weird things when setting up voice channels - like expecting the phone to 'ring' at least once and hanging up the channel if it doesn't happen - I know the responsible teams are working on testing compatibility, especially with vehicles.  WP is not the only platform that has problems with various Bluetooth implementations...  a number of improvements were made in the 8.1 update which you may or may not be running (part of Dev Preview).  Using cortana via Bluetooth is kinda cool, very functional.  Have to switch phone regions to make it work still though.

Something I have been testing extensively is the ability to browse artists/albums/playlists etc in the xbox music app from the car's headunit.  It all appears to work well under the 8.1 update.  Xbox music app itself is constantly getting updates too - its obviously under pretty heavy development.

 

@Technofreak question about the text re-flow - have you tried the 'reading mode' in IE (book icon in address bar)?  It doesn't reflow the text on pinch/zoom, but it makes it much more readable in many cases - works on Geekzone site too :-)

NTP Time Sync :- my 925 has kept in perfect sync, have "set date and time automatically" set to on and have not been taking SIM out... no problems that i'm aware of, but i'll keep my eyes out..




BlueShift
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  #1119609 1-Sep-2014 14:13
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Regs:
NTP Time Sync :- my 925 has kept in perfect sync, have "set date and time automatically" set to on and have not been taking SIM out... no problems that i'm aware of, but i'll keep my eyes out..


Is your phone on Spark or Vodafone? "set date and time automatically" will work fine on Spark, but not on VF, as they don't have it turned on on their network. It uses the cell network, not the internet to pick up the time.

matisyahu
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  #1120137 2-Sep-2014 00:50
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All I can say is: gapless playback, gapless playback, gapless playback. It is a crime in this day and age for an operating system not to include such a basic feature. Implement that feature and my life will be complete - nirvana will be reached.




"When the people are being beaten with a stick, they are not much happier if it is called 'the People's Stick'"


Regs
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  #1120223 2-Sep-2014 09:04
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kawaii: All I can say is: gapless playback, gapless playback, gapless playback. It is a crime in this day and age for an operating system not to include such a basic feature. Implement that feature and my life will be complete - nirvana will be reached.


The team definitely are aware of the request, there is a uservoice suggestion here: http://xboxmusic.uservoice.com/forums/209733-xbox-music-suggestion-box/suggestions/5791730-gapless-playback

the official answer there is "Great suggestion! We realize many of you are passionate about gapless playback and we are working on it. There is currently no ETA but keep checking back for status"

comments there also suggest that Spotify (recent update), flac player sd, and subsonic music streamer, all seem to do gapless playback




matisyahu
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  #1122254 5-Sep-2014 04:38
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Regs:
kawaii: All I can say is: gapless playback, gapless playback, gapless playback. It is a crime in this day and age for an operating system not to include such a basic feature. Implement that feature and my life will be complete - nirvana will be reached.


The team definitely are aware of the request, there is a uservoice suggestion here: http://xboxmusic.uservoice.com/forums/209733-xbox-music-suggestion-box/suggestions/5791730-gapless-playback

the official answer there is "Great suggestion! We realize many of you are passionate about gapless playback and we are working on it. There is currently no ETA but keep checking back for status"

comments there also suggest that Spotify (recent update), flac player sd, and subsonic music streamer, all seem to do gapless playback


I just hope that the HTC One M8 for Windows Phone will finally arrive in New Zealand either that or Microsoft finally update their Lumia with a CPU that isn't as old as god himself - Qualcomm S4 in that day and age for a flag ship product? *shudder*




"When the people are being beaten with a stick, they are not much happier if it is called 'the People's Stick'"


sbowness

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  #1122299 5-Sep-2014 08:27
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Just to provide an update, I had to return the Lumia 925 for a fault yesterday. As I couldn't get a similar replacement without paying out another $400 I've retreated back to my iPhone for now. 

amorpeth
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  #1122355 5-Sep-2014 10:13
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I haven't had too many issues with Bluetooth since 8.1. The navigation successfully interrupts the radio, which I must say is kinda annoying with all the warnings you get when approaching a turn. Its almost not worth having the radio on :) It would be nice to be able to choose if the audio is on the device or via Bluetooth. With 8.1 I got the ability to control Bluetooth volume when connected, however I seem to have now lost that with 8.1 update 1 preview. Also the Skype app doesn't seem to route audio via Bluetooth at all.

Music is an absolute joke, its been a nightmare that they just haven't got right since 8.1. It started off completely unusable, and now it works but just stops playing music every 3 or 4 tracks.

I personally love the OS, but some of the basic features you would expect to work flawlessly by now, just do not!

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