Media Player 11 search problem

[Extracampine]

When I do a search in media player, with "library" selected on the menu
(rather than songs, albums, etc), items which should show up during a search
don't.

The search option does search "contributing artist" also, right ?

 

[Dale]

Nope. The search doesn't include contributing artist.

If you follow the thread in this link, at the bottom click Next to get to
the second page (sorry, it's a long thread), you'll see the results of my
rather extensive testing of the search feature in WMP 11. While the search
is fast, it is flawed.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/wi...crosoft.public.windowsmedia.player&sloc=en-us


Dale

 

[MICHAEL]

Dale,

I agree with your criticism of WMP 11.

I will add one more that pushed me to
*never* buy DRM crap again.

<rant on>

In WMP 10 you could backup your licenses
and then easily restore them if something
happened ("somethings" can happen at any moment).
Well, with WMP 11 you can no longer backup your
licenses for music you bought and paid for.
With DRM crap, having the songs downloaded is
useless without the licenses, if something happens
to corrupt those licenses, you may be SOL.

I had a terrible time with MSN Music- seriously,
it was the worst computer experience I have ever
encountered. Basically, to make this short, there
was a point that my several thousand songs I had bought
and paid from MSN Music were in jeopardy of never
working again. It wasn't until I took matters into my
own hands that I finally got the problem corrected.

I tried to embrace the new technology, and at first,
thought it to be convenient and easy. When MSN
Music came on the scene, they had some great
deals- cheap album prices, that I'm sure MSN sold
for loses. I literally downloaded hundreds of albums,
seeking to create my ultimate library. These were not
the subscription pay monthly to play songs, but fully
paid for songs. Then, later on, I updated to WMP 11.
The dung hit the fan. "Something" happened. My licenses
no longer worked. And, with WMP 11, I could no longer
restore the backup WMP 10 allowed me to make.
Every time I went to play a song, it would tell me it
had to download the license- it never would complete
the task. I spent a lot of time on the phone with MSN.
Tried numerous things. MSN Music said they needed time
to investigate the matter, they'd be in touch. I was pissed.

There was one silver lining- MSN Music allowed you
to authorize three computers to put your licenses on.
One of those computers had a dual boot setup of XP Pro
and XP Home. I had updated the XP Pro to WMP 11.
But, not XP Home, it still had WMP 10. I signed into
my MSN Music account deauthorized that XP Pro, and
authorized the XP Home. Went to my network drive and got
a backup of my licenses, restored them with WMP 10.
I could now play all the music I had stored on another drive,
but only on that computer, and on that partition.
Which means I could also now burn the songs to a CD.
I had my mind made up to sit down and just start burning all
that music to CDs. Then, I read about FairUse4WM. A
program that rips the DRM out of wma files. Microsoft was
having a cow about this. For the program to work, you had
to have a license for the music you were converting. In that
way, it actually upset some thieves who thought they could just
rip the DRM out of the subscription based songs. It wasn't that
simple.

Anyway, I converted all my music to the crapless format (no DRM).

I will never buy another DRM protected song again.
If you download music, burn it to a CD immediately.
Or, just go to the store and buy them, rip them to the computer.
There are several music stores in Charlotte that sell used
CDs. Some good finds, great prices, and crapless.

Speaking of used CDs, I wonder why the music industry
has never had a cow about that. Do they get a cut of
used CD sales?

<rant off>

I warned you this rant was coming. ;-)

Take care,

Michael

 

[Dale]

Great DRM, WMP 11, and MSN Music story, Chad.

You were able to save your music but many others won't be so lucky. As I
understand it, FairUse4WM has changed program and it can't do DRM'd WMA
files anymore but I could be mistaken.

Supposedly, WMP 11 is supposed to get those licenses automatically from the
provider but that depends on the provider being still in business. That
policy allows WMP to disable your music remotely by not getting the license
for whatever reason they may ever choose to do so.

You're aware, aren't you, that MSN Music has shut its doors; gone down the
tubes. In the WMP newsgroups, Microsoft keeps repeating that the license
servers for MSN Music are still operating so, supposedly, if the process in
WMP 11 worked, you could still get your license. But how long will those
license servers be in service now that MSN Music is defunct? 5 years?
Possibly. 10 years? Probably not. 20 years? Not a chance.

So you paid Microsoft good money to buy the right to listen to your library
with a perpetual (as in forever) license and Microsoft has chosen a business
path that will just take that away. I'm not a lawyer but, in my opinion,
Microsoft broke the contract. You're pretty much free to do what you want
with it, don't you think?

Dale