Comments on: CorePlayer Review

TCPMP (The Core Pocket Media Player) has a long and illustrious history on not only Palm OS devices but Windows and Symbian-based handhelds as well. The developers of TCPMP, after honing their skills on the freeware version, have now decided to move forward to a next-generation, commercially released media player.

Now CorePlayer, the freeware app formerly as TCPMP, has finally arrived on the Palm OS scene after numerous delays and false starts. Read on to see if the new commercial version can unseat the quirky but rock-solid free version of TCPMP.

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CorePlayer

bquin @ 11/28/2006 7:39:55 PM #

I am using TCPMP and am very happy with it. I would gladly pay for the new version but not without a trial to see if I can get the same good results that I am now getting with TCPMP. It boggles my mind that they are not offering a trial download!

This is very bad business planning...

Bquin
...laughing at a world too absurd to take seriously...

If you liked TCPMP, you should get it!

scottm @ 11/28/2006 8:00:55 PM #

I bought it the other day when 1.04 came out. My biggest complaint about tcpmp was the inability to remap the controls on the PalmOS platform. You can do that now. I haven't found anything it didn't play and it seems like a nice upgrade from tcpmp. The only thing I could ask for is background playback, but at least for my usage, that's a very minor complaint.

It also helps that I bought it through http://store.justanothermobilemonday.com/ and used the 20% discount code they have prominently posted. That brings it down to $15.96...

4GB

t3h @ 11/28/2006 10:35:31 PM #

Since 4gb looks to be the absolute cap for SD cards under Palm OS 5.x devices, local storage is finite; but as more users migrate to Treos, online streaming would permit users to view fresh content on their devices.

As far as I can see.. 4GB looks to be the cap for SD cards on any device - I've never seen or heard of anything bigger...

Palm TX + 1GB SD + Motorola v3x = awesomeness

RE: 4GB

rsc1000 @ 11/29/2006 10:09:35 AM #

Toshiba is shipping it's 8GB SD card in Jan,:
http://www.macworld.com/news/2006/11/20/toshiba/index.php

..and pretec has announced theirs a few months ago.

Also, the article question s about larger then 4GB but if you have the fat32 driver then these *GB cards should be fine. Devices without the driver can search the web to find out how to get and install it on their devices.

RE: 4GB

hkklife @ 11/29/2006 2:11:59 PM #

Doesn't the Palm OS have an inherent limitation to 4gb volume size regardless of FAT cluster size?

I think the best we can hope for would be what the LifeDrive currently has--a 4gb internal drive and a 4gb SD card in the external slot.

I always assumed that (combined with the lackluster reception given to the first LD) was the reason we never saw the mythical 8gb LifeDrive 2 that Brighthand liked to speculate about all of last year.

Pilot 1000-->Pilot 5000-->PalmPilot Pro-->IIIe-->Vx-->m505-->T|T-->T|T2-->T|C-->T|T3-->T|T5-->TX-->Treo 700P

RE: 4GB

freakout @ 11/30/2006 3:33:36 AM #

If Garnet's limited to 4GB volumes, then mightn't it be possible to get around it by reading an 8GB SD card as two separate 4GB volumes?

Techies?

Tim
I apologise for any and all emoticons that appear in my posts. You may shoot them on sight.
Treo 270 ---> Treo 650

RE: 4GB

AdamaDBrown @ 11/30/2006 11:37:23 AM #

I don't believe it's possible to partition a card in that way and still have it recognized by a device. In any event, as far as I'm aware all the larger than 4 GB cards coming out are SDHC, which won't--to my knowledge--work in existing hardware.

hmpf...

2xs @ 11/29/2006 2:25:27 AM #

I bought the coreplayer at mobihand. I had problems in purchasing it via the german paypal-service, but there was a great service. Kudos to mobihand on that!
I copied a bunch of small videos on SD-card (you know, these funny shorties you get via email all the time ;-) ... and none of the about 10 examples worked for me. Missing sound or missing picture or missing everthing cause of multiple decoder-issues. By the way, nearly the same with kinoma4... I really like these trial-less software [/irony]

'hope these issues will be fixed in the near future

gr33tz 2XS

Palm Professional -> Palm III -> Palm Vx -> Palm m505 -> Palm TT2 -> Palm TT3 -> Palm TX

streaming support

sbono13 @ 11/29/2006 10:05:59 AM #

I wish that this review had dedicated provided a little more detail on the "streaming support," especially since you criticized the vendor for lack of same. Is the streaming launchable from blazer (ie, can you click on a link to a video file)? How does the 700p decide whether to use Core or the Kinoma pluggin? Or are you only allowed to enter a URL from within the Core app itself? Can you stream any file format that Core supports? Does it buffer the stream if it's high bitrate? Did you try it with Orb?

RE: streaming support

hkklife @ 11/30/2006 2:29:39 PM #

To be perfectly honest, Core's information on streaming support is clear as mud. I should have made it clearer within the review but I just glossed over that for brevity's sake. Essentially, streaming audio support in this version of CorePlayer is nigh useless. Stick to the 700p integrated Kinoma/Blazer combo or PTunes deluxe if you want to stream on your Treo. I couldn't mention much because the developer gives no info and I was able to glean very little on my own or from elsewhere online.

To answer your questionss to the best of my knowledge:

-Blazer still defaults to Kinoma for streaming purposes. You can (at this time, at least) only directly enter a URL into CorePlayer.

-I was unable to get any streaming media to work properly (either to open at all or to play w/o crashing) on the initial 1.02 version. 1.04 gave me slightly better performance but I still get a ton of "file not supported" messages. Here's one of the handful of sites I was able to link directly to and got consistently good sound quality from (Chicago public radio station)

http://wbez-sclo.streamguys.us/

-The app really needs an integrated mobile-friendly channel browser ala MobiTV and/or better URL entry & keyboard support (plus cut'n paste capabilities) when entering in those lengthy streaming site URLs. Also, Blazer integration would be phenomenal but no sign of that at this time.

Pilot 1000-->Pilot 5000-->PalmPilot Pro-->IIIe-->Vx-->m505-->T|T-->T|T2-->T|C-->T|T3-->T|T5-->TX-->Treo 700P

MIDI?

orev @ 11/29/2006 10:33:53 AM #

You're complaining there's no MIDI support? Are you kidding? Does ANYONE actually use MIDI to listen to music? It might not be taxing, but it's CERTAINLY not one I would focus on if I were developing a media player. Complaining about that is just a joke.

RE: MIDI?

hkklife @ 11/29/2006 2:13:59 PM #

I'm not complaining about the lack of MIDI support per se; rather it's calling MIDI a supported file format then having fine print underneath it saying it's not going to be available until version 1.5. We have no idea whatsoever what Core's release roadmap looks like or if there will ever be a version 1.5. I think that they should just omit MIDI/Windows Media from their supported format list and just say that these formats are forthcoming in a future release. Pinning it to an exact version number might lead to too much wishful thinking.

Pilot 1000-->Pilot 5000-->PalmPilot Pro-->IIIe-->Vx-->m505-->T|T-->T|T2-->T|C-->T|T3-->T|T5-->TX-->Treo 700P