CONNECT Player - bugs and limitations

[NoOneHome]

Hi all . I've just bought a NW-A3000 but have encountered a number of bugs and limitations in CONNECT Player . I haven't seen any of these mentioned elsewhere, so here goes:

Current scenario:

- I'm running CONNECT Player 1.0.2.11170 (the latest at the time of posting).

- I'm running SonicStage 3.2 (I had an MZ-RH10 prior to the A3000).

- I've imported 1,000+ OMA files from SonicStage.

- I've transferred 1,000+ imported OMA tracks to the player using CONNECT.

- I've transferred 250+ OMG tracks to the player using SonicStage.

Bugs and limitations encountered so far:

- Bug: CONNECT Player grinds the empty floppy drive numerous times on startup and at random intervals when loaded and left idle (very annoying).

- Bug: 99% of imported SS OMA tracks have lost the year info. Apart from songs in 3 albums, nearly all songs now have a year of "1" and a dozen or so have a blank year. In SonicStage, all the years are present.

- Limitation: It's not possible to select an album or multiple tracks and then set the year, meaning all 1,000 tracks would have edited one by one to correct the year entry!

- Limitation: Unlike my MZ-RH10 (Hi-MD with A-series like OLED display), you can no longer load play tracks on another PC over USB. Previously I used to take my RH10 to work & connect it to USB on my work PC with SS loaded (with an empty library) and was able to list and play the tracks, albums, etc in SS directly through my PC connected speakers (superb feature).

- Limitation: Although argueably nicer looking than SS, grey text on an almost grey background doesn't make for the easiest read, especially on a high-res laptop screen. A text colour option would nice (skins, mentioned in another thread, may help if ever implemented).

- Bug: Player will not remember it's window size or column sizes, or whether it was last launched maximized. Setting the launch icon on the desktop to 'start maximized also doesn't work.

- Limitation: The info in CONNECT when transferring tracks is very limited compared to SonicStage. There's no progress bar, no. of tracks transferred so far, total tracks to be transferred, etc.

- Limitation: SS still has to be used to transfer OMG files but can't be loaded at the same time as CONNECT, preventing easy comparison of what tracks you have in each (eg. in order to see what you may want to be import from CD into CONNECT).

- Limitation: CONNECT Long startup time means it's not viable as a general player etc (so not worth associating with any file types except OMAs when prompted during install).

- Bug (kind of): NW-A3000 displays always displays 'connecting' implying it's still trying to connect. 'connected' would be a better term. It Often transfers

- Bug: Scroll bar often jumps back up the list on it's own during some tasks (can't remember which ones, sorry).

As CONNECT is only v1.0 at present, I'm guessing we're going to see a lot of these in the early days. It'd be nice to have a single topic with just an overview of common CONNECT player bugs & limitations (this one or another if better done elsewhere, admins?).

[lamewing]

I don't see why we're seeing these bugs at all. You would think with years of practice with SonicStage that Sony would get it right, especially considering that their new line of players are supposed to reinvent the Sony Walkman line. While the hardware may be solid, they have put themselves in a difficult postion...again.

I really don't understand Sony.

[Beethovenian]

Good summary, NoOneHome. I also noticed that if you add any info in SonicStage to the liner notes field, it will show as an unreadable mess in Connect. I suppose the same would apply to the lyrics field.

[willykyu]

Everything you sumed up happens to me too. If you don't mind, I will use your model and complete what I found too (same version):

BUG: Importing with drag and drop several folders with atrac files results as half empty albums. The import takes some of the files, but not all. (ex: 6 tracks instaed of 20).

BUG: star display don't work properly. You set a rating, and you can't see it. Or it doesn't stick to the rating you gave, and disapear later.

BUG: One of the worst one: impossible to import -for example- a japanese CD with japanese infos. The cddb infos are well displayed, but then once imported, the genre, the album title etc. disapear. The tracks are named with their track number. And more, it happens that the tracks can't be read or transfer afterwards. (I guess it's the same with Chinese or else).

BUG: If you scan with the "analyse" function the same folders you drag and droped, to add some files connect forgot to import, Connect will import a second time the tracks. Then, in your library, you'll have twice the same title as it was new.

Limitation: once you lost your library after it has been re-initialized, the ratings still in your device can't be imported again if you import your tracks again. waste of time.

BUG: it happened that when importing an album from CONNECT STore, one track lost its entire infos, and is placed as Uknown genre etc.

Limitation: once you plug an A3000/1000 to the euro connect player, you loose the Kana (japanese caracter) search fonction. It's really too bad, as it was an excellent way to find japanese artists and songs. There should be boxes to check in CONNECT player to activate or disactivate this function.

BUG: importing tracks must not take a long time, otherwise, the virtual memory goes full, and CONNECT player violently shuts down. This is one reason the library can be corrupted, then re-initialized, then lost.

Limitation: impossible to play gapless even with atrac files through CONNECT Player. Am I wrong?

miss: No cross fade play (I mean smooth transitions). Sony should add this to CONNECT player AND the A player itself! We could even choose what albums play smooth transitions (Chek boxes, with cotumizable time 0sec to 12, like in Itune or Winamp). But for this, albums should be costumizable first (like in sonistage, which tags very good-cd cover, titles years, etc. you can even search again once imported the cddb infos!)...

Limitation: CONNECT player organises itslef the folders from a ropped cd. We could have a choice not to let it do this! (like Itune option).

More to come!

[Pooh]

F*** a duck (do excuse my French), there are more bugs in this thing than the average I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here bush tucker trial.

I can see I'm going to be in for a fun ride.

[Tetsugaku-San]

pooh, honest it's not that bad, all software does have it's bugs at releae, Connect does seem to have more than it's fair share however . . .

One more to add:

Bug: Transcoding files just does not work. At all. Specific example, transcoding 320Kbps MP3 to 192Kbps ATRAC, Connect maxes out, sits there for a bit, then locks up completely.

I suggest we send multiple copies of this to Sony (when it's complete) to see what they are going to do about them (even if a patch is coming out)

Edited November 30, 2005 by Tetsugaku-San

[NoOneHome]

Keep up the good work everyone

Many worthwhile developers will usually keep an eye on the main forums discussing their products, especially when launching a new product, so hopefully Sony are doing the same on these forums, and already have an idea of CONNECT's faults.

Edit: By the way, I've just visited the 'TROUBLESHOOTING' section of the CONNECT PLAYER FAQ on Sony's website (http://www.sonydigital-link.com/DNA/FAQ/FAQ.asp?l=en&c=DNA&sc=NWH&f=soft_connectplayer). Here's what's there at the moment:

- Closing CONNECT Player takes quite a long time (aprox. 30 seconds).

This is normal as CONNECT Player backs up your music data base before closing.

- CONNECT Player has become very unstable and I would like to reinstall it.

If the database is corrupted during transfer and CONNECT Player becomes unusable, it is advisable to uninstall and reinstall the software with the add/remove program function in the Control Panel. Your library may be deleted.

Please, follow the instructions in the Installing CONNECT Player section.

Edited November 30, 2005 by NoOneHome

[nbaki82]

Do you think the SonicStage software was better and these players shoud have been left with that as well? Are there any pluses for the CONNECT software?

Hi all .  I've just bought a NW-A3000 but have encountered a number of bugs and limitations in CONNECT Player .  I haven't seen any of these mentioned elsewhere, so here goes:

Current scenario:

- I'm running CONNECT Player 1.0.2.11170 (the latest at the time of posting).

- I'm running SonicStage 3.2 (I had an MZ-RH10 prior to the A3000).

- I've imported 1,000+ OMA files from SonicStage.

- I've transferred 1,000+ imported OMA tracks to the player using CONNECT.

- I've transferred 250+ OMG tracks to the player using SonicStage.

Bugs and limitations encountered so far:

- Bug: CONNECT Player grinds the empty floppy drive numerous times on startup and at random intervals when loaded and left idle (very annoying).

- Bug: 99% of imported SS OMA tracks have lost the year info. Apart from songs in 3 albums, nearly all songs now have a year of "1" and a dozen or so have a blank year.  In SonicStage, all the years are present.

- Limitation: It's not possible to select an album or multiple tracks and then set the year, meaning all 1,000 tracks would have edited one by one to correct the year entry!

- Limitation: Unlike my MZ-RH10 (Hi-MD with A-series like OLED display), you can no longer load play tracks on another PC over USB. Previously I used to take my RH10 to work & connect it to USB on my work PC with SS loaded (with an empty library) and was able to list and play the tracks, albums, etc in SS directly through my PC connected speakers (superb feature). 

- Limitation: Although argueably nicer looking than SS, grey text on an almost grey background doesn't make for the easiest read, especially on a high-res laptop screen.  A text colour option would nice (skins, mentioned in another thread, may help if ever implemented). 

- Bug: Player will not remember it's window size or column sizes, or whether it was last launched maximized.  Setting the launch icon on the desktop to 'start maximized also doesn't work. 

- Limitation: The info in CONNECT when transferring tracks is very limited compared to SonicStage.  There's no progress bar, no. of tracks transferred so far, total tracks to be transferred, etc.

- Limitation: SS still has to be used to transfer OMG files but can't be loaded at the same time as CONNECT, preventing easy comparison of what tracks you have in each (eg. in order to see what you may want to be import from CD into CONNECT).

- Limitation: CONNECT Long startup time means it's not viable as a general player etc (so not worth associating with any file types except OMAs when prompted during install).

- Bug (kind of): NW-A3000 displays always displays 'connecting' implying it's still trying to connect.  'connected' would be a better term.  It Often transfers

- Bug: Scroll bar often jumps back up the list on it's own during some tasks (can't remember which ones, sorry).

As CONNECT is only v1.0 at present, I'm guessing we're going to see a lot of these in the early days.  It'd be nice to have a single topic with just an overview of common CONNECT player bugs & limitations (this one  or another if better done elsewhere, admins?).

←

[Beethovenian]

Limitation: impossible to play gapless even with atrac files through CONNECT Player. Am I wrong?

You're not. It's ridiculous, but even the manual says that while you can have gapless playback on the Walkman, you can't with Connect Player.

Limitation: CONNECT player organises itslef the folders from a ropped cd. We could have a choice not to let it do this! (like Itune option).

More to come!

←

Can't you choose the parameters you want for folder creation? I think you can. You can define how you want the folders to be named and how many nested folders to have.

[Ascariss]

Hmm anyone know how hard it would be to write a program to just transfer music across, ie really simple with just a directory of hte mp3s and drag and drop? Xispe?

[willykyu]

Keep up the good work everyone

Many worthwhile developers will usually keep an eye on the main forums discussing their products, especially when launching a new product, so hopefully Sony are doing the same on these forums, and already have an idea of CONNECT's faults.

Edit: By the way, I've just visited the 'TROUBLESHOOTING' section of the CONNECT PLAYER FAQ on Sony's website (http://www.sonydigital-link.com/DNA/FAQ/FAQ.asp?l=en&c=DNA&sc=NWH&f=soft_connectplayer). Here's what's there at the moment:

- Closing CONNECT Player takes quite a long time (aprox. 30 seconds).

This is normal as CONNECT Player backs up your music data base before closing. 

 

- CONNECT Player has become very unstable and I would like to reinstall it.

If the database is corrupted during transfer and CONNECT Player becomes unusable, it is advisable to uninstall and reinstall the software with the add/remove program function in the Control Panel. Your library may be deleted.

Please, follow the instructions in the Installing CONNECT Player section.

←

This last one is new! the last version of CONNECT delets the library if corrupted, not the previous ones. If you unistalled and installed again, the library remained the same... to delete the entire library, gotta go to documents and settings/allusers/applicationdata/sonycorporation/connectplayer/library; and erase what's inside, It's no good if you spent hours to rate your tracks...

[Ascariss]

I seriously have a love and hate relationship with this software. After reorganizing and adding albums and genres to all my files, took almost 3 hours or so, I decided to delete the library and re import. Tough luck, CP doesn't like that.

So after count, 4 reinstalls and removals, I have finally gotten it to the point where I am able to import the mp3 files in. I am doing it a few files at a time, because upsetting CP isn't a good idea. I have no idea why it is working now and it didn't before. it crashes on me when I choose to import a lot of files at once, so I have to go slowly sadly, but it works and I am happy for now. Hope Sony gets that update out soon.

[Brucem]

Hello

Have any of you got the auto update or even the "check for updates" on the player to work?

I am the only user and administrator on my PC (I have checked to make sure) so it is not that I don't have permission and I was logged in as administrator when I installed CP.

To get the latest update, I had to uninstall the player completely from the PC then re-install it - the sony website does not give option of manual download but when I click on check for updates absolutely nothing happens - no pop up box, error message...nothing at all!

Auto updates are set to detect and install themselves but this obviosly doesn't happen, as it didn't notice the latest one.

Any ideas?

[willykyu]

Hello

Have any of you got the auto update or even the "check for updates" on the player to work?

I am the only user and administrator on my PC (I have checked to make sure) so it is not that I don't have permission and I was logged in as administrator when I installed CP.

To get the latest update, I had to uninstall the player completely from the PC then re-install it - the sony website does not give option of manual download but when I click on check for updates absolutely nothing happens - no pop up box, error message...nothing at all!

Auto updates are set to detect and install themselves but this obviosly doesn't happen, as it didn't notice the latest one.

Any ideas?

←

Same for me. The "check for updates" function doesn't make any signs of life. As Connect player doesn't clearly tell what it's doing... No remaining time for transfer, no clear progress bar or pop up window, nothing clear! we use this program as blind people... The auto update downloaded once an update for me, but it was after this installation of the last version, automatically downloaded when installing with the provided cd. It looks like they have not implement anything but the minimum to run the program so far... and plenty of functions are written, but not available.. or they're running, but we don't know it!

[riggsby]

Hi just managed the latest update to install and can confirm :

BUG: No track view for Enhanced CD's

Still

[Guest Stuge]

Hi just managed the latest update to install and can confirm :

BUG: No track view for Enhanced CD's

Still

←

So update haven`t solved that problem .

Does anyone facing the same problem after updating to new version?

[NoOneHome]

There's a new version of the AutoUpdater, v1.0.02.11150.

Maybe now it'll update . I know I had to download it myself, having waited long enough to see if the AutoUpdater would bother to.

[Tetsugaku-San]

I recomend we use the feedback form on the Sony Website to tell them all these propbelms

http://www.sony.co.uk/view/ShowArticle.act...&site=odw_en_GB

If enough people piss and moan to them maybe they will get more of a hint.

[Darth_fool]

quick update on

Bug: Scroll bar often jumps back up the list on it's own during some tasks (can't remember which ones, sorry).

remembered seeing this one and i think i've spotted when it happens

if you try and expand any of the views i.e. expand the album info to display the tracks by clicking the + it jumps back to the last highlighted item. You can stop it happening by highlighting the album / artist etc BEFORE you click the +

[Ascariss]

The jumping back to the previously highlighted item is a real pain, and should be fixed stat, but I have found a way around it, while selecting files, using the mouse scroll wheel, you can keep going down, selecting more files and it won't jump back to the first files.

Once the files transfer, it will jump back to the first highlighted files though.

[NoOneHome]

More bugs:

Bug: Importing a compilation album from SonicStage3.3 often results in a separate album for each song (eg. in SS3.3 "80s Hits" has 19 songs, when imported to CONNECT I have 19 "80s Hits" albums containing 1 song each! After importing from SS to CONNECT I had over 100 more albums listed than listed in SS3.3! Album Artist has to be changed one by one to get them all back into one album.

Limitation: Cannot select multiple songs and change the Album, Album Artist or Genre properties (and others). Must be done individually, which is impractical.

I'm going to email Sony with a summary of all the above and see how I get on.

[Darth_fool]

If you get a reply let us know as i'm stuck with the same situation myself

[Ascariss]

Woke up this morning to find an update was available for CP.

pressed ok, and it updated no problems.

apparently the scrolling issue has been solved, I have 1 album selection and it isn't jumping back anymore. Here is my version: 1.0.02.11150

edit player is now: 1.0.02.11170

[willykyu]

Your version is the same as the one released a week ago. About the scroll problem, I still have it, even with 1.0.02.11170.

I realised that Connect player auto update can indeed download the last version of the player...but takes its time: several hours to several days (weeks?).

It's still awfully slow (even on my Vaio A series!!) whereas sonicstage is pretty fast.

Can't wait for this so called "V.3" or else...

[Ascariss]

That's the thing, I am not sure each region gets the updates at the same time. Dinko tried updating to this version before and then his CP stopped working at all.

Perhaps each region does their own testing before releasing the updates.

Interesting that you still have the scroll problem and I don't. Do you guys have a bar now going across the logo when it open, the purple one, like it's loading something?

What are your OpenMG versions? I got:

PxEngine Version: 2.4.35.500

OpenMG version: 4.3.00

Doubt this has anything to do with it, but it might. When does it jump back though? when you have the player connected or even with general browsing?

[willykyu]

I guess updates are released at the same time, as on SONY japan walkman download/support page, the updates are displayed the same day (or the day after) Europe. And the updates numbers are the same.

About the scrolling, I think the roblem is...all the time! but I'll check it again. I don't use CONNECT Player too much. I'm scared to loose all my library again. I just use it to sync my player, so the infos are the same in CONNECT and my walkman, and of course to transfer the latest added tracks. Strict minimum untill a true edition of this soft comes out.

[HoodedClaw]

I was phoned by Sony Support about a problem I logged (wish I could find the page I reported it on!! Edit: found it http://www2.sony.co.uk/feedback/feedbackform.asp) last week, I couldn't get a few CD's to rip using connect as they were the ones with their own PC player on.

I was told it was fixed in Mondays release, but it isn't, I still can't rip these 3 CD's. The temp solution is to create MP3's and use/rip them.. not really ideal.

I logged another problem at the same time, whilst he was on the phone and all, about the trash option on the A3000 marking the track for trash but not deleting it when connected to PC.

My other problem is that I can't delete tracks from the PC Connect software (when A3000 isn't connected, not tried it with it linked), I use remove, and the blooming files just re-appear.

I've not just deleted the librarys and let it re-initalise from scratch.

Proving to be a pain in the butt.

Still totally love the A3000,

Hooded Claw, hoping the speaker docking station will be excellent.

Edited December 7, 2005 by HoodedClaw

[willykyu]

Hey, I think we forgot this one, and a pretty one!!

Limitation: You can delete tracks and albums from your library, but the "real" tracks gently stay on the hard drive. There should be a check box, like in SS or Itunes, to delete the tracks on the Hard drive! especially if you want to rip again a CD with a different bitrate for example! and not to forget to leave 30 gigs of Atrac or MP3 unsued conuming space ! checking folder by folder to delete unused tracks can be time conuming!

[Ascariss]

Nevermind the damn highlight problem is back, seems to only happen when I transfer songs. arrgghh.

[willykyu]

I confirm a bug: it's not only jap, but any small tiny little "foreign" caracter in a track info within a whole album, and you can be SURE the track goes to "Unknown" genre, with no album title, no artist, and sees its name transform to xx(number of track)-title, and of course no more cd cover!!!!! then it's a real "PLEASURE" to re enter the whole list of info in the track properties, with copy-paste, or you own good memory... be careful to be really PRECISE entering the infos.... siiiigh....

Hey SONY, don't forget to give us tag options a la Itunes/sonicstage, with scrolling menus of previousl entered infooooos and full UNICODE suppoooooort! are you listeniiiiiing? (echoe echoe...)

[nbaki82]

The new walkman is so ugly in reality. it lookes like soap and so nasty. I wouldn't buy it.

Hmm anyone know how hard it would be to write a program to just transfer music across, ie really simple with just a directory of hte mp3s and drag and drop? Xispe?

←

[Ascariss]

The new walkman is so ugly in reality. it lookes like soap and so nasty. I wouldn't buy it.

←

If you're going to bash the player, why post at all?

[willykyu]

Limitation: when you insert a CD previuosly entered, CONNECT has to search again the infos through CDDB. With Sonicstage, the program remebered the infos brought with CDDB, and even your changes when you inserted again the same CD. it is useful when you want to rip a cd again with a different bitrate. It could also be cool that the program remembers the CD cover...

[HoodedClaw]

Just had another call from Sony Support Helpdesk asking if the new version of Connect (11170) fixed the problems I raised.

When I said it made no difference, bless him, he actually sounded supprised.

They are looking into it further.

So - submitt a problem on their support system, if nothing else you get someone phoning weekly, at which point you can get more problems added to the list

[willykyu]

Limitation: as far as I know, but I could miss it, there is no "cd info" option available after ripping a cd. For example, if you ripp offline a cd, and you can't have the infos right away, you can't bring them afterwards. That's a very useful oprtion, that's a big miss in Connect player

[willykyu]

It seems like AGES we don't have news about any updates or improvments on our beloved CONNECT Players and its attached A-series...

I feel very uncomfortable with the lack of adds on A series... It's obvious that SONY does'nt push it as hard as they should... CONNECT Player's fault? New wonderful walkman out in January in US with colour screen, video playback etc.(arrgh)? they just missing christmas. Could they allow this? I don't think so. What's the hell is happening? I can't even tell my friends to buy one! I 'm too ashamed of this shitty software!!! SONY!! ANSWER US, go* dam* it!!! ARE YOU REALLY HARD AT WORK TO GIVE US A PERFECT SOLUTION??? SOOOON???????!!!!!!!

[Ascariss]

I am sure they are working on it. No need to panic. I didn't tell my friends to buy it, they can stick to their ipods. lol

[NoOneHome]

I've had an email reply from Sony, having sent them a long list of most of the faults raised in this topic. Let's hope it helps get the problems sorted.

Here's their reply:

Dear Sir,

Thank you for your recent e-mail. Please allow me to apologise for the delay

in replying.

I would like to thank you for taking the time to contact us and provide us

with your feedback regarding the Connect Player software supplied with your

NWA3000. I wish to assure you that I have forwarded these comments to the

relevant department, although no direct feedback will be given to you

regarding this.

Thank you for your comments.

With regards

Tanith Hooper

For and on behalf of

Sony United Kingdom Limited

Customer Information Centre

[NoOneHome]

Forgot to add that I now have an RM-MC35ELK LCD Remote (officially supported by Sony on the A series) and it works a treat.

I no longer have to get it out my pocket all the time, can change EQ at the press of a button and can listen to it in bed without having to reach for the player etc

[Spacecase]

Have to agree with the floppy drive going nuts, got so annoyed with this that i disconnected the drive !

I tend to use mine on 'Full Sync' at the moment as i'm never quite sure if the manual sync is actually working ???

The only way i can get the trash bin function to work is to make sure that the track/album is removed from the library manually before i sync the unit otherwise they stay on the player.

'Do Not Disconnect' does not always disappear from the bottom of the screen after the unit has been unplugged from the PC, even though the unit was in 'screensave' mode and not displaying do not disconnect.

Does anyone happen to know what the 'enable network features' function in internet settings actually does ?

Currently using version .11170