Highly Upset Customer - My Issues

zorb58

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I saw the article on here today that said the most recent update fixes the issue of having incorrect/nonexistent album art in Xbox Music, and I was really excited. This has been my main issue with Xbox Music on Windows Phone 8.1. I installed the update and opened it to see... that nothing changed. Restarted the phone. And still nothing. I am very, very unhappy with my experience and so I am going to make a nice list here of everything I can't stand about Xbox music on Windows Phone 8.1. I , of course am not alone, but I do believe I have some unique issues that I hadn't seen mentioned before, but are big deals to me, and I'd like to bring them to light. Here goes:

  1. The app still shows black screens quite often. And yes, even after today's update.
  2. It is still slow.
  3. 90% of my album art is incorrect or nonexistent. On EVERY SINGLE OTHER DEVICE, it is fine. I have spent countless hours adding album art over the years, and I am raging on the inside to realize that these efforts are totally in vain when attempting to use the most modern music-playing device in my house (Lumia Icon).
  4. The swipe gesture to change the song is amazingly awful. Why is it up and down as opposed to side to side. I just don't get it. Seriously, if someone knows why this change was made, please tell me. I use a WP7 device in my car as an MP3 device. The side-to-side swipe is so convenient while driving. Oh, and it actually makes sense. Also, the WP 8.1 swiping animation lags.
  5. If the metadata I like to use for songs/artists is not what Xbox music likes, it will simply not display that song/artist. EXAMPLE: Daughtry. I have him listed as "Chris Daughtry" in Windows Media Player and EVERY SINGLE OTHER DEVICE that I own, but when syncing with my Lumia Icon, it appears where I want it, but then disappears when I attempt to open the artist or play the song. Incredible. Unacceptable. I paid for this music and I can't even play it.
  6. I like to put a single artist on and listen to them on shuffle. I am really into Paramore right now. So I just click the play button to the left of Paramore and hit shuffle (If shuffle mode isn't already on). The song "crushcrushcrush" is the second song in that shuffle 90% of the time. Literally. I just did a quick test. 9/10 times, the second song is THE EXACT SAME SONG. Like, hello? I clicked shuffle for a reason.
  7. What the hell is up with the jarringly loud split second of the previous song when going to the next one?
  8. Sometimes after being paused for a time and returning from another task, the song just doesn't play. I have to go to a different song, and then return. Unacceptable.
  9. The volume rocker doesn't work during playback sometimes. It will spaz out between the next highest level and the next lowest level when my finger is clearly on the up portion of the rocker. (I understand this could be a hardware issue, but it curiously only happens during Xbox Music playback)
  10. The volume will display a decreasing or increasing value, but will not audibly change (This only happened twice, but it is quite annoying)
  11. The background images take forever to load and do not cache
  12. There is no Live Tile
  13. When shuffling, I can see the next song listed below the current one. (Minor design issue, I know, but I HATE seeing the next song when I shuffle. Especially if its the second song in my Paramore mix, and its "crushcrushcrush" (See #6)
  14. That damned "can't play this file on your phone" message. After listening to a playlist or an artist for a long period of time, and then switching to a particular song by going through the menus to find it, this issue is still prevalent.

One final thought: As far as the performance and incomplete/non-functioning feature issues go... Is this the result of a platform that can't handle a quality music player? Is WinPRT ill-equipped to handle an app like Xbox Music. I'm no developer, but I feel like my thinking is rational.

Please, let me know your thoughts on my issues. If you have any fixes or workarounds for any of my issues, please do share. Any improvement in usage would be welcomed.
 

anon(5326758)

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I have most of your issues as well.
1. Blackscreens: same here. Open a playlist, wait a minute. Literally a minute. Then it draws something.
3. Artwork. Same here. Have you tried putting folder.jpg into the same folder as the music? In all the cases where I've done this, I can see the album art. Of course when I update an existing folder with new content I have to keep waiting and reloading before it actually appears (no UI indication that they are updating content).
7. Jarring sound: I've still got this too.
14. Can't Play this file: I see this a lot less often & haven't seen it since today's update.

Note: I'm on a 1020, not an Icon. YMMV.
 

Skamath

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Damn Right you are highly upset. Similar reasons I still stick to my mp3 discs ;) regardless of what metadata or I like the devil I know better :)
 

cummy_bears

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Great analysis of user frustration. I am literally carrying my Samsung Flash S on WP7.8 along with my Nokia 1520 so I have a functional music experience with Zune pass. Xbox music is that bad.
1. Syncing is nonfunctional if for music already own
2. Playlist syncing is impossible (I like making playlists on my computer because the Zune software UI is better at making playlists with a bigger screen, if there is music that I own and that doesn't match the database, forget about it. Have to sync and manually create a playlist.
3. Metadata which is highly documented to be terrible.
4. Separating podcasts from music. Podcast functionality was one app with music previously and I could download podcasts over cellular data.
5. Still no gapless playback. Never. In the history of windows phone. No hapless playback...how?
6. Duplicates. When I download something from Xbox music subscription and hit play all it plays the cloud version AND the downloaded version. So I have to either make a new now playing or skip every other song. Even when I sort by music only on the phone and play from there, same problem. (there has to be a fix that I'm missing, help?)
5. I don't want to stream all my music. I have a limits data plan and listen to music that isn't in Microsoft's library. Let me have a seem less music experience whether it be subscription music or music I already own.

At this point in the operating system it is laughable. People say it's a developer preview, but it's rolling out already. This IS the music app. Biweekly updates are great in theory, especially when the app is so nonfunctional; but there have been no appreciable improvements, especially when compared to old music hub or Zune. Other than the "it's faster" jokes after update releases my music experience has not changed with these updates.

Sad. Just sad.
 

hemanlive

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Of the 14 odd points listed above, I have faced only a few (about 4 or 5). But I agree that these all are unacceptable on a music player that is paid and is supposed to have 'evolved' over a period of time.
There is one thing I want to add which is not an bug, but a lack of option.
The Music we download is DRM locked. There should be an option of downloading the DRM free version as well. I understand that it will consume more data and space on my card, but at least I have a choice. there are softwares that convert DRM locked to DRM free, but that is a pain to go through that process. Moreover, for me music on phone is often different from what I have on the PC. I don't like to connect my phone to my PC every now and then. the way Lumia creates a back-up on the cloud, syncs contacts, photos etc. is excellent. That allows me not to connect my phone very often with a PC.
If they provide an option of downloading a DRM free version of the songs, it would be great for me
 

Simon Gregory

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Great analysis of user frustration. I am literally carrying my Samsung Flash S on WP7.8 along with my Nokia 1520 so I have a functional music experience with Zune pass. Xbox music is that bad.
1. Syncing is nonfunctional if for music already own
2. Playlist syncing is impossible (I like making playlists on my computer because the Zune software UI is better at making playlists with a bigger screen, if there is music that I own and that doesn't match the database, forget about it. Have to sync and manually create a playlist.
3. Metadata which is highly documented to be terrible.
4. Separating podcasts from music. Podcast functionality was one app with music previously and I could download podcasts over cellular data.
5. Still no gapless playback. Never. In the history of windows phone. No hapless playback...how?
6. Duplicates. When I download something from Xbox music subscription and hit play all it plays the cloud version AND the downloaded version. So I have to either make a new now playing or skip every other song. Even when I sort by music only on the phone and play from there, same problem. (there has to be a fix that I'm missing, help?)
7. I don't want to stream all my music. I have a limits data plan and listen to music that isn't in Microsoft's library. Let me have a seem less music experience whether it be subscription music or music I already own.

At this point in the operating system it is laughable. People say it's a developer preview, but it's rolling out already. This IS the music app. Biweekly updates are great in theory, especially when the app is so nonfunctional; but there have been no appreciable improvements, especially when compared to old music hub or Zune. Other than the "it's faster" jokes after update releases my music experience has not changed with these updates.

Sad. Just sad.

1,2,3,6 & 7 are all listed in my user voice suggestion. Please add your votes if you have any spare.

http://xboxmusic.uservoice.com/foru...4685-fix-sync-experience-it-needs-an-overhaul

I agree with all the points above. My understanding of the situation is this:

Zune was a slick 'music centric' service. XBox Music appears to be a Cloud centric' service that happens to play music (in many cases unsuccessfully), and they are struggling to make it work.
 

RTGent

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I have none of these issues; but then I am patiently waiting until my 1020 updates to the real 8.1. The Preview version is interesting, but not compelling or even tempting for this experienced user.

On Issue #13: I can see the next two songs on a shuffle -or any other playback, which I like; plus, it's in a significantly smaller, non-bold font that I can easily avoid/overlook.
 

zorb58

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I have none of these issues; but then I am patiently waiting until my 1020 updates to the real 8.1. The Preview version is interesting, but not compelling or even tempting for this experienced user.

On Issue #13: I can see the next two songs on a shuffle -or any other playback, which I like; plus, it's in a significantly smaller, non-bold font that I can easily avoid/overlook.

Yeah, issue 13 is a personal preference. And you mean to tell me you haven't even experienced #7? It happens about 60% of the time to me (I will admit, less so since last weeks update, but it did happen on multiple occasions today).

And I'd like to add one:

15. When choosing a song from a particularly long list (all songs by an artist or a long playlists for example) the player will begin playing a completely random song in that list. I notice and think "that's weird," thinking I bumped the song that ends up playing by accident. When I go back to look for the song I actually wanted, the one that was incorrectly playing is not listed anywhere near the one I meant to hit! This happened today and on a multitude of occasions in the past.
 

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