I'm having a ton of fun with the empeg and listening to music that I've ignored for years. But I'm finding it way more cumbersome to use in the car than I'd like. I have to do too much dangerous menu navigation while in the car.

I have my playlists organized in an Artist/Album hierarchy. I usually listen by navigating to a particular album or by shuffling an entire genre. But since I'm in a music rediscovery mode I find that hearing a particular song often triggers me wanting to listen to a different album by the same artist. So then I have to navigate through a long menu list or search on an album title (if I can remember it). I'm not proud to say that my impatience gets the better of me and I've been focusing on this dangerous diversion while driving.

Now the hard part - what sort of UI would make my life easier? For the case where I've navigated to the particular album via the playlist, there is a solution that would be perfect for me. I would like the top button (the one that currently pauses) to return me to my previous location in the menu.

I realize that Empeg couldn't just make this the standard behavior of the top button because it probably wouldn't be desired by many (majority?) people. I think what would make the empeg so much more pleasant to use in the car would be a way to allow the user to assign the shortcuts of their choice to the front panel and remote buttons. Obviously, I would choose this particular shortcut for the top button. But I would also like shortcuts for the different ways of searching, instead of cycling through them.

If Empeg could implement the above idea that would be killer. But that still doesn't solve my problem of how to quickly get to a particular artist's playlist when I started by shuffling some larger playlist or genre. I can't think of a decent solution for this one in the context of the empeg's current organizational paradigm. I guess, in general, I'd the empeg to provide more default organization based on artists and albums. This is something that I really liked about the Creative Nomad Jukebox. It's top level navigational hierarchy had Playlists, Artists, and Albums (and I think Genre, too). Playlists were explicitly created by the user but the others were generated from ID3 tags. If the empeg had some automatic hierarchy based on Artist/Album then a shortcut could be created that would allow me to hop over to the playlist for the current playing artist with one button press.

Before someone asks, the empeg's searching categories don't duplicate the Creative Jukebox's auto generated playlist hierarchy because the empeg flattens it out beneath the first category and doesn't allow continued navigation into subcategories (i.e.. Artist into Album).

While we're talking about the Jukebox, I liked it's model of queuing up a temporary playlist when picking something to play. It solves the problem of being on the highway and having the current playlist run out. You could dynamically queue up a few things before the trip begins without needing to construct a playlist in Emplode. I'm not very interested in constructing static playlists on my computer. I never know what whim will strike me when I'm in the car. I want a dynamic way to queue up artists, albums and tracks.

So those are my ideas and primary complaints about the empeg's in car usability. I probably haven't suggested anything new. I think the empeg is a great product with a ton of potential but I don't think the current UI realizes it's full potential. While they've put in some great features it's still awkward enough that I couldn't recommend it to someone else without reservation.

Does anyone have any ideas how I could make the current empeg UI work better for me? I'm all ears. Thanks.

-Dylan

What you're saying, if I understand it, is this:

Say I'm listening to the whole unit, shuffled. Then a song from Rush's "Moving Pictures" album comes on, and I decide that I want to listen to all of Moving Pictures. Or perhaps I want to listen to all of their "Permanent Waves" album instead.

The way I'd handle it (with the current user interface) is this:

Press 0 on the remote to turn off shuffle. Now I'm in the middle of my unshuffled playlist, at some point in the middle of "Moving Pictures", in the middle of that artist's catalog (since I, too, store everything by artist/album). Then I use >> or << to get to the song I want in the Rush collection.

Admittedly, it might take a lot of hits on that << button if you have a lot of albums by that artist. But at least you don't have to take your eyes off the road. And if you know the artist's catalog, then you know approximately how many times to hit the button. For example, if I'm in the middle of Moving Pictures, about seven hits of the << button will drop me somewhere into the middle of Permanent waves, and I can fine-tune from there.

There's a problem with this, in that when you unshuffle, there's a bug where it doesn't always drop you back into the playlist in the middle of your artist/album collection. Sometimes it drops you into one of your other "misc" playlists (for instance, one of my mood playlists). For a while, Mike was interested in fixing this bug, but I haven't heard from him on the subject recently.

___________
Tony Fabris

Say I'm listening to the whole unit, shuffled. Then a song from Rush's "Moving Pictures" album comes on, and I decide that I want to listen to all of Moving Pictures. Or perhaps I want to listen to all of their "Permanent Waves" album instead.

Almost. Except for I usually use search to get to a particular genre and then shuffle that.

Press 0 on the remote to turn off shuffle. Now I'm in the middle of my unshuffled playlist, at some point in the middle of "Moving Pictures", in the middle of that artist's catalog (since I, too, store everything by artist/album). Then I use >> or << to get to the song I want in the Rush collection.

If it worked like you describe I'd be happier. Perhaps if I was shuffling the entire catalog as in your example. But when I'm shuffling on genre and turn off the shuffle I'm in middle of the correct album (which is good) but the previous and subsequent albums appear to be in random order.

But you've given me an idea. Please tell me if this will work. If I set up explicit playlists based on genre, shuffle one of those playlists, then turn off shuffle you're saying that the empeg is supposed to leave me in the middle of a big playlist but at least the album order will be as I set up in Emplode? If so, that's an OK solution - certainly not ideal but workable. (Of course how workable will depend on the frequency of the bug you mention.)

This ends up being much like my workaround for my other use case - navigating to a particular album but then wanting to listen to another album by the same artist. I now tend to play entire artist playlists instead of individual album playlists. Although it can make for a very irritating number of button presses to get where I want, at least I can hop around between different albums safely while driving. It also somewhat alleviates my problem of having my playlist run out while on the road. At least I can flow into another album by the same artist until I get to a safe point to piddle with the UI.

But even with these workarounds I still feel like I'm fighting the empeg's UI.

-Dylan

But when I'm shuffling on genre and turn off the shuffle I'm in middle of the correct album (which is good) but the previous and subsequent albums appear to be in random order.

Hmm, when Mike and I discussed the issue, he seemed to think the root of the issue was the method used for randomization. Maybe the fix for my complaint would fix this as well, but I'm not sure about it since I don't know what's going on under the hood.

Please tell me if this will work. If I set up explicit playlists based on genre, shuffle one of those playlists, then turn off shuffle you're saying that the empeg is supposed to leave me in the middle of a big playlist but at least the album order will be as I set up in Emplode?

That will work, and it wouldn't be suceptible to the bug I mentioned since you won't have duplicates in that playlist. The bug only happens if you have a song that's both in an album playlist as well as a mixed playlist. The bug happens because the shuffled playlist might have de-duped the album version on the song rather than the mixed-playlist version of the song.

Hey, Mike, if you're listening: Is it simply a case of the de-dupe happening after the shuffle instead of before it? Or did I already ask that question?

It also somewhat alleviates my problem of having my playlist run out while on the road.

If you tag all your playlists as "Automatically repeat", then this will never happen. Oh, except there's another bug where, if you remove the power in the middle of a playlist, then it forgets that the playlist was set to "Automatically repeat" and it won't repeat it if you hit the end of the playlist after re-applying power. Hmm, that one's been there for a long time as well, and I just checked it, it's still there.

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Tony Fabris

Correct me if i'm wrong fellas, but won't most of the troubles you are having with the UI be solved in v1.1 with bookmarks and the ability to append straight from the playlist menus? Bookmarks should allow (if i understand them correctly) to pop right back to the last menu location (which i also feel should be a toggleable item, so that this could be achieved straight from the menu button and without having to set bookmarks). The ability to append from the playlist menus will also solve the dynamic queing problem you are having. Eh eh eh?


|| loren.cox
|| 080000446

Bookmarks should allow (if i understand them correctly) to pop right back to the last menu location

That's not how I understand bookmarks to work. I think they're more like this: If you're in the middle of a big 1000-song playlist, and you wanna hear a particular song, you bookmark your current playlists, go search for that song, then restore the bookmark and it picks up the big playlist right where you left off.

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Tony Fabris

doh. that makes more sense...bookmarks in playlists rather than menus. The last place in the menu thing REALLY needs to be added then! My girlfriend made that same gripe when she started trying to make her own dynamic playlists while we were driving. Alternately, what if the menu didn't disappear at all, but just stayed up after you appended something to the currently playing list. It could flash to confirm you've added something, then sit for a period of time waiting for another command, if none was recieved in a specified period of time, it would dissapear. (he says probably repeating someone else....=)


|| loren.cox
|| 080000446

I would like the top button (the one that currently pauses) to return me to my previous location in the menu. ... I realize that Empeg couldn't just make this the standard behavior of the top button because it probably wouldn't be desired by many (majority?) people.

Don't be so sure. This feature has been requested more than once.

One possible way to do this might be to assign the pause/unpause function to the button-press on the rotary (volume) knob. I don't have my empeg handy at the moment to check this, but I don't think pressing the volume control knob does anything important in play mode. It seems like this would leave the front panel buttons both more functional and more intuitive when you have selected a song or playlist and the empeg is playing: left/right buttons move you left and right in the menu structure; top/bottom buttons move you up and down through the menu structure; turning the volume knob makes it louder/quieter and pressing the volume knob would pause/unpause.

Am I missing something here?

tanstaafl.

"There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch"

There's a problem with this, in that when you unshuffle, there's a bug where it doesn't always drop you back into the playlist in the middle of your artist/album collection. Sometimes it drops you into one of your other "misc" playlists (for instance, one of my mood playlists). For a while, Mike was interested in fixing this bug, but I haven't heard from him on the subject recently.

Tony, I wouldn't call this a bug, but, say, a lack of feature . Currently, player has no way of knowing which of multiple playlists a tune appears in you consider the 'base' or 'home' one. I guess one could easily add a tag to tunes specifying their home playlist (with default being the one they ended in when originally copied to the unit). So, if one starts building the playlist forest by first creating the Artist/Album (or Genre/Artist/Album) tree (as I and, I suppose, you do) and later build 'secondary' lists, de-dupping and subsequent de-shuffling would lend us in the album playlist.

Mike?

Cheers!

Dragi "Bonzi" Raos
Zagreb, Croatia
Q#5196, MkII#80000376, 18GB green

Currently, player has no way of knowing which of multiple playlists a tune appears in you consider the 'base' or 'home' one. (...) with default being the one they ended in when originally copied to the unit...

I discussed this at some length with Mike, and although what you said sounds logical, that's not supposed to be the case. At least not according to what Mike told me.

Supposedly, the list it starts with when shuffling and de-duping isn't based on FID order, it's based on playlist order. So if my artist/album playlists are first in Emplode, then those are the ones that should take precendence in the de-dupe algorithm. But for some reason, they don't. If they did, then the "un-shuffle into the middle of an album" would work every time on my unit.

___________
Tony Fabris

I discussed this at some length with Mike, and although what you said sounds logical, that's not supposed to be the case. At least not according to what Mike told me.

Supposedly, the list it starts with when shuffling and de-duping isn't based on FID order, it's based on playlist order. So if my artist/album playlists are first in Emplode, then those are the ones that should take precendence in the de-dupe algorithm. But for some reason, they don't. If they did, then the "un-shuffle into the middle of an album" would work every time on my unit.

Aha, so lacking the more convenient way to tell the 'home' playlist, the tune instance that appears first in the flattened list before de-dupping and shuffling is supposed to be the surviving one, but even that is not always the case? Sounds usable, but not that convenient. IIUC, for this scheme to work, Artist tree should either be first, or those before it should only contain complete artist sublists. (The later is more or less my case, so that's why I also end up in intended place when unshuffling.) Aha, wait, we are not talking alpha order, but emplode order, right? I admit then, when the bug gets squashed (and emptool gets its documented, but nonfunctional ordering options in move command working) this will be satisfactory solution.

Cheers!

Dragi "Bonzi" Raos
Zagreb, Croatia
Q#5196, MkII#80000376, 18GB green

Tony, I appreciate your help. Your suggestions have made the empeg behave closer to the way I want.

Also, in the midst of my complaining I don't think I made the point that I think the empeg is a very good product. I do feel like I'm fighting it sometimes, but that could be said of almost any product I own. I'm very picky. It happens that in the car I naturally have much less tolerance for a UI that is, at times, clumsy for my needs. But that doesn't change the fact that I think it's a very good product and I don't regret for a moment the money I spent.

-Dylan

So if my artist/album playlists are first in Emplode, then those are the ones that should take precendence in the de-dupe algorithm. But for some reason, they don't. If they did, then the "un-shuffle into the middle of an album" would work every time on my unit.

I've just fixed this; 1.1 will work as you expect.

Peter

I've just fixed this; 1.1 will work as you expect.

SUH-WHEET!!!!

Thanks!

___________
Tony Fabris