Comments on: Ogg/Vorbis Audio Player for the Tungsten T

A group calling themselves Aerodrome Software have released a public beta of an Ogg/Vorbis media player for the Palm Tunsgten T handheld. The player inititally supports only ogg/vorbis encoded files, a new open source audio format, but promises to have mp3 support in the near future.
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SD Card required.

Bumbleluck @ 12/3/2002 12:38:48 PM #
The software requires the music files to be stored on a SD card for anyone wanting to try this out.... I haven't had teh chance, because 256Meg cards are too expensive still.

RE: SD Card required.
Xian @ 12/3/2002 12:47:03 PM #
I've loaded about 14MB worth of Ogg files (4 songs) on my Tungsten T's 32MB card. It sounds pretty good though headphones and decently though the internal speaker.

RE: SD Card required.
TypeMRT @ 12/3/2002 2:46:45 PM #
That's actually a Palm OS restriction; nothing but .prc's & .pdb's allowed in RAM. One of the few things I miss about my PocketPC was the ability to put anything in RAM, making file transfer from CF to CF really easy.
RE: SD Card required.
hotpaw4 @ 12/3/2002 5:26:33 PM #
Has the RAM disk been updated for OS 5? It creates a virtual memory card in RAM, and thus allows you to put anything you can put on a SD/MMC card in RAM instead.
RE: SD Card required.
Pepper @ 12/3/2002 5:31:49 PM #
Actually, any filetype can be put in RAM, but only prc and pdbs is you are using the standard tools. There is a program out there called filebox which lets you store any and every type of file you can fit in the space

-Pepper

I love my Palm . . . do you?

RE: SD Card required.
aardvarko @ 12/4/2002 1:48:33 AM #
no, hotpaw

-aardvarko
webmaster at aardvarko dot com
http://aardvarko.com
RE: SD Card required.
cykalan @ 12/4/2002 6:44:20 PM #
>Actually, any filetype can be put in RAM, but only >prc and pdbs is you are using the standard tools. >There is a program out there called filebox which >lets you store any and every type of file you can fit >in the space

Actually, it is still prc and pdbs, the software contain other files to some fake prc file by adding certain header to trick the system as far as I know.

Alan
----
Read your manuals before you ask!!

RE: SD Card required.
ganoe @ 12/5/2002 10:20:25 AM #
> Actually, it is still prc and pdbs [...]

Actually you can't put any filetype in RAM. prc's and pdb's are actually loaded program code and program data when in system memory on a Palm. There is no filesystem in the system memory on a Palm unless you use some kind of 3rd party RAM disk.

MP3 to Ogg?

Hotoru @ 12/3/2002 1:05:39 PM #
Anyone know of a freeware Mp3 to Ogg converter? I found
http://www.litexmedia.com/audio_wizard/
but it runs $24..

Hotoru

RE: MP3 to Ogg?
thenightfly42 @ 12/3/2002 1:12:33 PM #
There is no good reason to convert an MP3 to an Ogg. Each format is lossy in it's own way. Since you have already "damaged" the original by creating an MP3, you will "damage" it further by creating an Ogg. If you want to acheive the benefit of Ogg compression format, start with the original CD and rip it directly to Ogg.
RE: MP3 to Ogg?
mtt @ 12/3/2002 1:13:24 PM #
http://www.vorbis.com/download.psp
(haven't tested any of them yet)

MTT
RE: MP3 to Ogg?
devilstower @ 12/3/2002 1:16:20 PM #
Actually, Mp3 to Ogg is not a great idea in most cases.

MP3 is a lossy compression scheme. Ogg is a -different- lossy compression scheme. So, when you go from MP3 to Ogg, you get loss in converting to MP3, then more loss in converting to Ogg. The results can be closer to FM radio than CD in quality.

Instead, it's better to use an Ogg-based ripper. For example:

http://www.thekompany.com/projects/tkcoggripper/

RE: MP3 to Ogg?
Psyborg @ 12/3/2002 1:21:06 PM #
I used "MP3 to All" converter by Kongsoft,
http://www.8to32.com with excellent results. This software converts MP3's to Wav, Ogg, Wma and Vqf formats. I undrestand that the software decompresses the MP3 before converting to the other formats.

RE: MP3 to Ogg?
Saxtus @ 12/3/2002 1:34:31 PM #
Try MP3 to WAV from WinAMP to get great quality from it's Nitrane decoder and then use the only the latest official encoder that currently can be found here:
http://www.vorbis.com/files/1.0/windows/oggdrop-win32.zip

I agree with the other post. If you have the original CD handy, get a WAV from it, instead of creating it from the (low quality) MP3.

Saxtus

RE: MP3 to Ogg?
Ben S @ 12/3/2002 4:18:05 PM #
Keep in mind that MP3 is a lossy compression format: that means that even if your converter "decompresses" the MP3 back into a WAV before converting it to Ogg/Vorbis, you've still lost a great deal of the original quality. Lossy compression methods don't allow a 100% accurate reproduction of the original source, unlike lossless compression methods, like ZIP.

Poor soundquality

Ce @ 12/3/2002 1:18:33 PM #
Used several encoders to encode different files with different bitrates. Used some files ripped from CD.
While using a pretty good headphone I noticed the soundquality was very poor. Sounded a bit like an AM radio broadcasting. Higher bitrates did not improve the quality.....only the filesize. No matter what I did...the soundquality didn't get any better.

Carel

RE: Poor soundquality
McMagnus @ 12/3/2002 1:39:19 PM #
This is due to the ~4kHz low-pass filter that Palm for some unknown reason installed in the TT. I measured the audio from the TT, and above ~4kHz, there's not much of a signal left.

Rumor has it that Palm is working on a fix so my guess is that it's a DSP filter.

RE: Poor soundquality
bcombee @ 12/3/2002 1:40:13 PM #
There are posts on the PIC Forums on this... the DSP used to drive audio on the TT has a bandpass filter running on it that drops frequencies about 4kHz, eliminating highs from the audio range. This should be disabled in an OS patch, rumored to be out when the Real player is released. See http://www.palminfocenter.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=9110 for the details.

--
Ben Combee, CodeWarrior for Palm OS technical lead
Programming help at www.palmoswerks.com
RE: Poor soundquality
Take1 @ 12/3/2002 6:58:43 PM #
Is there going to be a fix for the weak volume as well? I can't say the bass response coming out of the device was any where near stellar. I'd say the volume is about 1/2 that of the Clie and 1/10 that of the iPAQ 38xx series.

Hopefully this is a Palm OS screw up and all will be fixed by a magic patch!

RE: Poor soundquality
Altema @ 12/5/2002 10:48:15 AM #
"Is there going to be a fix for the weak volume as well? I can't say the bass response coming out of the device was any where near stellar."

I don't have a TT yet, but other reveiwers have said the TT was the loudest Palm OS device to date. Perhaps yours is defective?

In regards to bass response, I would not expect anything stellar on an element that size... even if they did exaggerate the bass response via equalization. Bose does not get "real" bass even with 4 inch drivers and preamp eq. You can't always use electronics to compensate for physics.

RE: Poor soundquality
Wollombi @ 12/6/2002 4:06:56 PM #
The Tungsten is not (unfortunately) the loudest PalmOS device to date. That title STILL belongs to the Handera 330, along with very flexible volume control.

_________________
Sean

It is not very comfortable to have the gift of being amused at one's own absurdity.
-Somerset Maugham-

RE: Poor soundquality
Take1 @ 12/7/2002 3:13:57 AM #
Sorry, I meants the volume throught the headphone jack. I don't bother with the external speaker except for the occasional movie clip :)



RE: Poor soundquality
Altema @ 12/9/2002 1:17:35 PM #
Thanks for both the updates.

RE: Poor soundquality
Lemon @ 2/1/2003 11:54:18 AM #
I try the MP3 music on my TT with Aeroplayer. The external speaker (not the earphone) gives a very loud output with a very acceptable quality or I would say good in the standard of MP3. My NX70V disappointed me and I can barely hear the loud speaker.

You can even use a over drive function of Aeroplayer to give even louder volume but with jumpy sounds.

Again TT is a very good machine in term of its external speaker and only iPaq can match.

It can beep me for the appointments while all other PPC (including iPaq) and Palm handhelds CANNOT!

Lemon



Best SD card for music?

wwiiolds @ 12/3/2002 3:15:09 PM #
There are many brands out there, so which is the best for music? I want to avoid Sandisk, and have been leaning on Lexar Media's 64mb card, but I am not sure if there is a particular card that formats .mp3's the best on them.

"Lost are only those who abandom themselves."

- Oberst Hans-Ulrich Rudel

RE: Best SD card for music?
bcombee @ 12/3/2002 3:36:47 PM #
I got a 128MB "I-O Data" SD card at Fry's Electronics a few weeks ago that eneded up being a rebranded Panasonic card. It has been working very well, and doesn't suffer the slow write speed problem that the high-capacity SanDisk cards have.

--
Ben Combee, CodeWarrior for Palm OS technical lead
Programming help at www.palmoswerks.com
RE: Best SD card for music?
Altema @ 12/5/2002 10:45:11 AM #
Ben, how does the Lexar 256Mb card stack up speed-wise? I've been looking at one to replace my 128Mb Panasonic which works fine.

RE: Best SD card for music?
bcombee @ 12/5/2002 4:57:04 PM #
I've not used the Lexar card, but I've not heard any complaints either.

--
Ben Combee, CodeWarrior for Palm OS technical lead
Programming help at www.palmoswerks.com
RE: Best SD card for music?
cbulock @ 12/6/2002 3:12:20 AM #
I believe the Lexar cards are also rebranded Panasonic cards

RE: Best SD card for music?
MP3 @ 12/7/2002 11:57:40 PM #
Help! I've got a SanDisk 128MB card which seemed awfully slow. After reading a couple of comments here, I ran VFSMark and was horrified to see my card score a measly %6 write speed. Does that mean my card's condition is terminal, and I am destined to be stuck with a slow piece of crap? Or is it just defective, and I have to call SanDisk Tech Support?
RE: Best SD card for music?
rkane @ 12/9/2002 2:09:56 AM #
I've got a Lexar 256 SD card that I use on a Tungsten. It says "Made in Japan" so perhaps it is made by Panasonic. It's been excellent; I've had no problems running movie clips or anything else off of it.

RE: Best SD card for music?
Altema @ 12/9/2002 1:21:23 PM #
6% for file write? That's pretty bad. The score for my 128Mb Toshiba running in a Palm M515 with no hardware acceleration is below:

File Create: 69%
File Delete: 54%
File Write: 32%
File Read: 116%
File Seek: 114%
DB Export: 65%
DB Import: 99%
Record Access: 108%
Resource Access: 109%

VFSMark: 85


Nuts to the "RealVirus" Player

sandbuck @ 12/3/2002 9:05:21 PM #
We have the low-pass filter issue, but we're very very close....

running player in the background...?

bjh @ 12/3/2002 10:21:08 PM #
Does anyone know if there are plans to support this? I believe that I've heard RealPlayer will allow this...

tt resets...

gemikon @ 12/4/2002 5:23:58 AM #
Hi, whenever I try to play an ogg file (from the sd card) I get the following error:

Memory Mgr.c,Line:3649,Nil Ptr

and the tt resets...

Any ideas?


RE: tt resets...
vdonabed @ 12/4/2002 5:47:18 AM #
Yes, I read that on software FAQ. It is probably due to ID3 tags in your file. Try to generate your files without ID3 tags.

RE: tt resets...
gemikon @ 12/4/2002 6:29:29 AM #
Thanks
can somebody post a link for a ogg sample file that has been tested and is working with tt

RE: tt resets...
rvdw @ 12/4/2002 7:48:37 AM #
http://www.vorbis.com/music.psp

RE: tt resets...
bcombee @ 12/5/2002 4:57:36 PM #
I saw this crash with 40Kbps OGG files, but not with 128Kbps OGG files... I don't think these files had ID3 tags embedded in them, it was just a bitrate handling problem.

--
Ben Combee, CodeWarrior for Palm OS technical lead
Programming help at www.palmoswerks.com

when may the ROM patch come out

Tech72 @ 12/4/2002 2:17:12 PM #
se subject

RE: when may the ROM patch come out
emceephd @ 12/4/2002 5:15:00 PM #
The Aerodome folks are not sure. Here is their response to my question:

"It will work once the patch is available. The fix that we have here isn't publicly available, yet, but it should be available soon (from Palm). No, we can't send you the patch, because in present form it has significant unwelcome side effects."

Another issue I have seen in the forums is having the player run in the background. I asked them the question and here is their answer:

"That's frequently requested, and very tricky on the Tungsten, but we have some ideas and the present plan is to expore them sometime after the 1.0 release."

FYI, they are working on having the application remember the "Mode" and "Sort" preferences when you return to it from another program in Beta 2.

So, they are thinking of releasing at least one more beta before the 1.0 release.

MP3 Plug-in Available

Berty @ 12/18/2002 8:02:53 AM #
YESSSSS !

It's here, on Aeroplayer web site (at http://www.aerodromesoftware.com/plugins.html).

It's the V1 but seems ok to me.

Also, Beta 2 is here, with skins (cool one)...

The Audio war on T/T Palm is not over, far from it

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