Current State of Music Players

[garak0410]

I was curious about what music lovers do in this day and age of cloud music, limited data plans and the slow death of the MP3 player.

From the point of view of someone who would have no unlimited data, not a lot of daily access to WiFi and a large music collection, what do they do? While a 32GB phone is decent, music lovers who want local music need more storage. Many of the good Windows Phones max at 32 and do not have expandable storage. Sure, they could pick up an Lumia 520 and add a 64GB card and be in good shape but what if you only want one device.

Why the push to cloud music, subscriptions, if most carriers limit data and you don't have a comfortable amount of storage? Do we just need to live without all or most of our music collection with us at all times?

I do use my XBOX Music cloud music all day at work. I just wish it would let me add music from my collection that they haven't cataloged.

Just thinking out loud!

 

[jmshub]

I am in the same boat. I have a large music collection, and I like a lot of less popular music. I stream what I can off of XBox Music. Luckily, I have a shared 10GB plan and wifi at home and work so I am not hammering my data too hard.

I have about 10-15 GB of music on my phone, and it is some of my favorite songs and tracks that I like that I know aren't in the XBox music streaming library. It isn't perfect and I find myself occasionally wanting to hear a song that I don't have access to, but I find it's often "good enough". I still have a Zune 120 GB and a Zune HD 64 GB that has even more MP3s, but I really don't like to carry another thing with me.

 

[garak0410]

I am in the same boat. I have a large music collection, and I like a lot of less popular music. I stream what I can off of XBox Music. Luckily, I have a shared 10GB plan and wifi at home and work so I am not hammering my data too hard.

I have about 10-15 GB of music on my phone, and it is some of my favorite songs and tracks that I like that I know aren't in the XBox music streaming library. It isn't perfect and I find myself occasionally wanting to hear a song that I don't have access to, but I find it's often "good enough". I still have a Zune 120 GB and a Zune HD 64 GB that has even more MP3s, but I really don't like to carry another thing with me.

I am still on an unlimited but one day I may be facing going back to a carrier with limited data. Even so, sometimes I try to do my cloud music and it just says "connecting" forever, and then just stop and sometimes won't let me play again until I reboot. So, even when I try cloud on my phone, it isn't a good experience.

 

[Jack Janik]

I am in the same boat. I have a large music collection, and I like a lot of less popular music.

Me too. Happen to like black metal?

 

[jmshub]

I am still on an unlimited but one day I may be facing going back to a carrier with limited data. Even so, sometimes I try to do my cloud music and it just says "connecting" forever, and then just stop and sometimes won't let me play again until I reboot. So, even when I try cloud on my phone, it isn't a good experience.

I have no issue connecting to the XBox music service. About half of the songs I play on my phone are streamed and it works flawlessly for me.

Me too. Happen to like black metal?

I listen to a little of everything. Most of the music I'm talking about that isn't in the online collections is obscure indie/alternative songs. (My avatar is the CD cover of Beulah's The Coast is Never Clear.) I do like some metal too, but don't dive too deeply into the obscure metal.