Plan to fix Xbox Music

[segasaturn]

I think overall the XBM app for WP has improved somewhat since the initial release with WP 8.1. We all can agree that there are still significant areas for improvement. I was thinking and narrowed it down to 3 major aspects that I think if MS fixed and addressed would put the app on par relatively with iTunes, Android, ect. I've listed these below. Let me know what you think of this list and if you have any other points or sections to add please do. I think if we the community who actually use this app can get a coherent list together of issues we want changed MS will really have to look at being serious and integrating these into their dev cycle and update.

1.) Add live tile for now playing artist

2.) Increase speed when opening and navigating to artists/playlist ect (i.e no more black screens when you just select an artist to view)

3.) Have a way to recognize whether music/content is local (i.e coming from your files on PC) or cloud and if files are local, to use metadata (tracks, album art, ect) that is on those files, not pull something from the cloud

Just those 3 things would greatly improve the overall experience of using the app.

 

[anon(7900571)]

And while opening the music app remove the splash screen. It should be instant :smile: And where are my manners , welcome to WPCentral forums

 

[HyperKid]

And while opening the music app remove the splash screen. It should be instant :smile: And where are my manners , welcome to WPCentral forums

Unfortunately,splash screen will continue UNTIL the app is once again baked into the OS

 

[bsayegh]

I am still on WP7 and W7 so I haven't even seen XBM yet. I have only heard bad things about it. The Music and Video hub on W7 works fine, so maybe they should just roll back to that. There are some things I would like for them to improve there, but otherwise I don't have much of an issue with that.

 

[fiveaces01]

I would settle for just your 1st item on the list. And I would also like to extend a welcome.

 

[anon(7900571)]

I am still on WP7 and W7 so I haven't even seen XBM yet. I have only heard bad things about it. The Music and Video hub on W7 works fine, so maybe they should just roll back to that. There are some things I would like for them to improve there, but otherwise I don't have much of an issue with that.

Still enjoying zune ? :wink: why not upgrade to Lumia 520. In my opinion windows phone 7 is dead in terms of apps. I haven't used any windows phone 7 device so I can not say how well it was. Which device do you have ? :smile:

 

[ramandindewar]

only think i want is when i am in albums section though the songs are in one folder (with 10 songs), in albums it shows 10 different folders, such frustrating to use apps like this

 

[anon(7900571)]

Unfortunately,splash screen will continue UNTIL the app is once again baked into the OS

That sucks. Now I see why calendar,battery saver have splash screen. Thanks for this clarification bud :smile:

 

[fiveaces01]

WP8 still had a music and video hub. It took quite a while but they got it working pretty well and there was a Live tile showing the artist now playing that you could even edit with an app called MPATool. Then when the 8.1 preview for developers came out it was no longer in a "hub" but was a standalone app that is still a real mess. They wanted to be able to send out updates that weren't tied to OS updates and thus not under carrier release schedules. There is a good thread in the 8.1 preview for dev forum that goes into more depth.

 

[bsayegh]

Still enjoying zune ? :wink: why not upgrade to Lumia 520. In my opinion windows phone 7 is dead in terms of apps. I haven't used any windows phone 7 device so I can not say how well it was. Which device do you have ? :smile:

Yeah, Zune has done well by me. I have an HTC Titan II. I have had a free upgrade available for about 3 months now and have just been waiting for a new high end WP to come out on AT&T (REALLY hoping my phone doesn't break before then).

I don't really know how rapidly apps are released for WP8, but on 7 they are still being released. The major apps don't get updates anymore, but developers are still making games and tools for the OS.

 

[anon(7900571)]

Yeah, Zune has done well by me. I have an HTC Titan II. I have had a free upgrade available for about 3 months now and have just been waiting for a new high end WP to come out on AT&T (REALLY hoping my phone doesn't break before then).

I don't really know how rapidly apps are released for WP8, but on 7 they are still being released. The major apps don't get updates anymore, but developers are still making games and tools for the OS.

Ah HTC Titan II is a solid device. Lol keep this beauty safely until your device is ready for an upgrade :wink:


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[loofmodnar]

Speed and performance is all I care about now. I bought my 520 to replace my ZuneHD for long car trips. It's basically unusable while I'm driving since it takes so long to load everything.

Feature-wise, I'd like to see:

1. Larger buttons/touch points for play/pause, skip, etc
2. The recently added list
3. Return of the now playing stuff.

I'm hopeful that the big performance/feature update mentioned on twitter is actually something useful.

 

[bsayegh]

I want to be able to select a song using voice commands. I realize it wont be perfectly accurate, but I would rather they did it half-assed than no-assed.

 

[loofmodnar]

I want to be able to select a song using voice commands. I realize it wont be perfectly accurate, but I would rather they did it half-assed than no-assed.

That's already available via Cortana. "Play song XYZ"

 

[Simon Gregory]

To get even close to the WP7 experience they'd need to:
- Reinstate recently played screen.
- Reinstate the live tile
- Correctly adhere to multidisc order.
- Stop the app trying to connect through the internet all the time, if I'm playing local music, I shouldn't need to 'log in'.
- Fix app from streaming songs even when they are local
- Fix app from occasionally refusing to play songs with DRM related error messages
- Fix app to correctly read metadata and images
- Fix the noise between tracks
- provide a decent companion app to allow you to organise your collection properly and controls to seemlessly edit metadata
- add decent syncing experience
- add wireless sync and or add a music locker to allow you to sync (not just stream) own music collection through the cloud
- vastly improve the performance
- bring back music ratings and reinstate it as a syncing filter
- stop cloud matching overwriting metadata of your own collection
- stop cloud syncing creating duplicate tracks
- properly reinstate recommended music suggestions

Oh, and seeing as its the #1 suggestion on the uservoice page they might want to look at providing gapless playback too!

 

[Desynthesis]

To get even close to the WP7 experience they'd need to:
- Reinstate recently played screen.
- Reinstate the live tile
- Correctly adhere to multidisc order.
- Stop the app trying to connect through the internet all the time, if I'm playing local music, I shouldn't need to 'log in'.
- Fix app from streaming songs even when they are local
- Fix app from occasionally refusing to play songs with DRM related error messages
- Fix app to correctly read metadata and images
- Fix the noise between tracks
- provide a decent companion app to allow you to organise your collection properly and controls to seemlessly edit metadata
- add decent syncing experience
- add wireless sync and or add a music locker to allow you to sync (not just stream) own music collection through the cloud
- vastly improve the performance
- bring back music ratings and reinstate it as a syncing filter
- stop cloud matching overwriting metadata of your own collection
- stop cloud syncing creating duplicate tracks
- properly reinstate recommended music suggestions

Oh, and seeing as its the #1 suggestion on the uservoice page they might want to look at providing gapless playback too!

Actually, that goes well beyond WP7 was capable of (and you know it)--don't get me wrong, I'd love to see those features, but WP7 didn't have anything close to metadata editing on the phone proper, and even would occasionally read metadata wrong (hence the need for the Zune software).

As I've said, those are great features, but some of them weren't on WP7. I for one would absolutely settle for a WP-only tagging tool like the Zune software, acknowledging that it wouldn't be perfect either (in the end of the day, music metadata's a mess). There's nothing wrong with reaching for the stars, but I'd settle for "get back to where we were" myself.

 

[Simon Gregory]

I meant a companion desktop app (i.e. Zune Desktop), not editing metadata on the phone.

All these features were in WP7 except gapless playback. Most of these are fixes for ridiculous bugs introduced in 8 and 8.1.

It just shows how bad it's got, that people can't even remember what was lost in the previous iteration because so much was broken in the most recent one.

 

[Neve12ende12]

I'd just be happy if it could get ALL of the metadata right. For instance, I have every single possible detail I can about an album (including the album art), but half of the art is missing in Xbox Music.

The number one thing that really pisses me off is every time I add Zedd to my phone...he gets turned into Demi Levato ...WTF is up with that?

It makes me sad because I think Zune/Xbox music is the most beautiful/awesome music experience...when it works

 

[supadryz]

As much I want to love Xbox Music on my Lumia 930 it is fallen short in many areas, if I am missing something let me know.

1. Cover Art (If I upload music from hardrive most the time if it does not match the the Xbox Music Store Catalog it will not bring it through, which sucks, should have option to upload your own or manually pin from there catalog.

2. What happened to the little heart symbol for favorites? Should be like itunes so you can rate up to 5 stars.

most other things have been mentioned like the slowness etc. but this App is miles behind itunes or then the Xbox Live on Windows Surface. I have the trial for the unlimited music but I don't fee I will continue with it as the search engine sucks as well.

 

[hotphil]

Well, the poor stats of Xbox Music just gave money to Apple. A colleague asked me if I prefer Windows Phone or iOS. I said iOS, he asked why and I had to be honest - it plays music and Windows Phone just can't.
He went back to his desk and ordered an iPhone.
I never thought I'd recommend Apple to anyone.