I think options are always good, but from a user practical point of view do you really think that most people have music in mp3, wma, ogg, aac, flac, wavpack and mpc at the same time in their music library? Do you? And if you do what is preventing you from converting to flac/ogg/mp3 that the karma supports? IMO the benefit is marginal for most people, but that's just my opinion.

In my case I got the karma for the ogg support some time ago, and to my surprise i almost never use it. I just use mp3, and there's a simple explanation for that: MP3 is good enough for portable use and is compatible with everything

From a common user point of view, I believe most people are running into more and more different formats - so the answer to your first questiosn is definetly yes. Probably most people are not running into Wavepack and/or MPC, but the rest - yes.

And most people don't want to bother converting one format to another. It takes time. For many, I think they would end up not transferring the files at all. Ask John Doe how to best convert a 64 kbps wma to an mp3 file

Consider this as a general answer, since I don't believe John Doe would bother upgrading his firmware either.

Fair enough for AAC, MP3, and WMA because of major online stores selling it. For Vorbis and FLAC there's some movement that's really small compared to the formats above. Of course I am not considering music obtained illegally.

My point is that compared to MP3 and WMA (and maybe AAC) other formats are almost unknown to the vast majority of people. Except for audio geeks such as the ones that post in this forum.

HA is not an audio geek community?

Both iHP and Rockbox are not for "iPODians" (ie people who don't care advanced features)... I've bought an iHP140 from eBay recently, it had still the 1.33 engineers version of iRiver firmware (a version that hadn't been publicated by iRiver)...

I don't think people who will update with Rbx are WMA users... Just my two cents...

this is such a ridiculous point of view...

wtf are these developers doing supporting anything but MP3? huh?

it isn't even a pertinent question to ask if one user will need all supported formats, either. only that they need 1 or more. and when that "1" isn't mp3/wma/mp4/wav, then that's a feature worth talking about.


later

Not more than yours....

If you don't care to read the whole thread just refrain from posting. We'll all be better off that way.

In no previous post I said or implied that developing other formats is a bad thing so you can stop right there. In fact in my first post in this thread I said that "it is always good to have options" and I have nothing but the deepest respect by the developers that are doing such a great work supporting other formats in their firmwares.

My comment was just to discuss adlai's opinion above that apparently is dissatisfied with the Rio Karma because of lack of support for "exotic" formats when compared to the portables being discussed here.

Anyway, enough is enough and I think I already made my point. No further flaming needed.

I agree about the silly point of view stated earlier. If the firmware is for your average joe then yeah, you don't need anything but mp3 or wma. But is this firmware project for the average joe, or is it by audio geeks for audio geeks? I have all my music in one format: monkey's audio. Since I have no choice but to convert for use on a DAP, and I'd want to anyways, having choice is where its at. There is no such thing as having too many choices, especially when you consider that everybodys preferences tend to differ, sometimes greatly. Me? I have a Rio Karma. I use Vorbis because it gets me the smallest files for the quality I want. WMA is terrible (even at high bitrates), MP3 isn't much better to me, and I find MP4 very similar to MP3 (yes I can usually ABX the occasional 320k MP3 file, so don't even try to get on my back about it). The only problem is that Vorbis tends to eat battery life more quickly. It's been hypothesized by others that MPC could be very good on DAP battery life, possibly even better than MP3/WMA, and at the same bitrates I use for my Vorbis files Musepack sounds very good to me (my tests tend to be agreeable with rjamorim's tests). So if I had the option, I would definitely switch formats without hesitation. Thanks to a total lack of choice by all the developers out there, Musepack is not an option sadly. The first developer that makes a good DAP with a big hard drive (20GB isn't nearly enough IMHO) and can play MPC gaplessly will likely get my money. Heck, I'd probably buy two.

how have you extracted my opinion solely based upon my statement of your own?

anyways, perhaps this board doesn't suite your needs...

this is where we talk about a multitude of formats and technologies, their advancement, and adoption.

what you want is a soapbox near [edit] somewhere other than redmond [/edit]


later

Straight to the point, and very well said.

No more flame please... Anyway Beto you say support for exotic formats are useless but why are you using Monkey Audio?

The real point is that: what's the matter if Rockbox supports MPC, Vorbis, Wavapack or what you want since it also supports the standards (mp3, and Vorbis)???
Absolutely no problem...

Let everyone enjoy the great Rockbox work on iHP... That's it...

I never said or implied that. I think people here are not acting in good faith towards my posts. Some people are just distorting what I said so they have a reason to flame and make their opinion prevail to the less attentive reader. Just look above that people quote only parts of my posts to deliberately change the original idea.

This attitude is sad but I really couldn't care less... I just hope this does not become a rule in HA.

I won't reply to this thread anymore.

Just to be clear, my posts were not intended to be flames for what it's worth. It all comes down to what I've quoted above. Beto, I would hazard a guess that your opinions about the benefits of having more formats supported as being marginal to be in the minority, and possibly even a tad heretical to many here at HA. Same goes for you opinion that MP3 is good enough. That's the joy of posting your opinion on a public forum though, everyone is entitled. If you don't want people to disagree with you, then it probably is best to simply refrain from posting, which you have wisely chosen to do. Take care, and hopefully no hard feelings.

Oh yes, let's kick beto out because he DARED to suggest that just maybe, supporting every codec under the sun would be of marginal benefit to most people.

Despite the fact that that's absolutely true.

I mean, let's face it. I have an H340 with 30 GB of Vorbis -q6 on it. When Rockbox with mpc support becomes available, will it really be of any real benefit to me? No. I'll still install it and convert my entire lossless archive to mpc, of course, but that's because I'm an audio geek!

blah blah blah blah blah

...this thread isn't a count of hands of how many people should use <insert format here>. this is a thread about an unofficial firmware being developed which aims to PROVIDE MORE FEATURES THAN THE ORIGINAL.

but lets not fill this thread with meaningful posts, lets rather keep talking about what random people think should be available to users.

cuz that's progress.


later

i don't give a rats a** what ISN'T useful to anybody. what i care about is anything useful to anyone. these are entirely different concepts (you can reread it again if you like)

oh, and my 100GB of musepack encoded files becomes supported, and everyone on this board who uses musepack now have a supported device... wtf is so hard to understand about that? why knock it? who benefits from that? do you?


later

Sorry Beto, i had no intention to hurt... Maybe i misunderstood your posts, english isn't my native language...
Regards,
Tang

Neither you nor I represent the majority of people who use digital audio players. The average user has never even heard of Musepack and thus has no need for a player that supports it, which was the only point I made to begin with.

And as far as "knocking it", I believe I said that I will be installing Rockbox the minute it becomes available, did I not?

I'm happy for you that your Musepack archive will finally be playable on a DAP, and for the rest of the HA community who use it.

As you said, this thread is getting quite off-topic. Peace.