Playing music on the Pearl...

[naviwilliams]

What on earth am I missing here? I've got about 90 mp3's on my Pearl, with more to follow. But, one can't play them in succession, or even shuffle?

Come on RIM, we have to do better, surely? I know the device is not geard to 100% media, but...

[MMB916]

The BlackBerry Will Soon Become The Music Player Of Choice For Consumers | RIMarkable | The official, unofficial BlackBerry Weblog

[kasperapd]

I havent had much of a chance to listen to music on my 8800, or even when I had a Pearl. There has to be a way to get it to shuffle.... doesn't there???

[MMB916]

Navilyn....I came across this bit of information - hope it's helpful. I will continue to look.

---The media application, itself, is pretty basic. It lacks any notion of genre or style of music, simply playing whatever music it finds on the memory card. The tools for loading music onto the card consist of the Blackberry transfer tool – a basic file transfer application — or the bulk transfer mode using Windows Explorer. Once loaded, you can play or pause the music from the application, but all other controls (like next track or previous track) are buried on a sub-menu. Moreover, the application itself has odd quirks. For instance, you can tell it to “play all” to play all of the music on the card, which, when combined with “shuffle” is a pleasant way to listen to a selection of music without having to make the selections yourself. However, play all isn’t offered until an MP3 file is found in the directory from which it is being invoked. In my case, I had loaded several CDs onto the card, and then had to place one MP3 file in the root music directory in order to be able to get “play all” functionality.

A welcome addition to the media application would be integration with any of the popular media player applications on the market. Because the Pearl has the capacity for such large storage, integrating the Pearl with Windows Media Player, for example, would make track management and conversion much easier.

---from..Alec Saunders Log....

Originally Posted by navilyn

What on earth am I missing here? I've got about 90 mp3's on my Pearl, with more to follow. But, one can't play them in succession, or even shuffle?

Come on RIM, we have to do better, surely? I know the device is not geard to 100% media, but...

[naviwilliams]

...we're getting there! I went to the 'root' of the music directory, and now I see the 'play all' option. Not found 'shuffle' yet though.

Nonetheless, thanks for the info. Am still looking online for a 'real' music application...

[j_mcc99]

When I read your post on not being able to have your pearl shuffle music... I thought, "That's weird... I do it every day on my walk to work.."

That is until now. I just updated my device to 4.2.0.67 (today) and now that I've checked the 'shuffle' option that used to be displayed when you were in the music player and clicked your option button.... and now it's GONE!

From what I've seen... the 4.2.0.67 update has turfed it. It was the first update I've performed since my company purchased the Pearl for me last September.

Can anybody else confirm this? I swear I'm not crazy!

[naviwilliams]

I've found it on the .64 version...

[swtrainer]

The Pearl could really benefit from a more reasonable approach to music. You don't need a "Media Player" app that shares duty between music and pictures. You need an MP3 Player that goes directly to the Music directory on the MicroSD card...when you want to play music, you shouldn't have to do all the navigate crap just just to get to your music files.

I also think it would be nice if the menu of other apps had the controls for the MP3 player on them when you were playing MP3s.

I'm amazed that RIM could put such an advanced voice dial app on the Pearl and then were willing to accept such a rudimentary MP3 app.

[MMB916]

From everything I am reading, everyone is quite disappointed in the music app. I'm not quite sure how they missed such an integral part of this great device with focus on media.

Glad that you found it, Navilyn. Something better than nothing!

[coldchill]

Pearl has the option of shuffle in it, i m not sure wich version i have but yes mine does have it.

[naviwilliams]

...but, now if only it would take me back to the last played song when I exit, and go back in...

We expect so much more...

[MMB916]

Someone out there - if you're listening...we NEED a music application for The Pearl with much better functionality!!

[apcarandang]

I love my Pearl but the only thing that really keeps me from using it as a full blown MP3 (put a 2G card on it) player is it doesn't take regular stereo headsets. It sounds great when I have used an adapter but it will be nice you can plug in any headset on it.

A nicer music interface would be good too.

Anthony
Houston

[lmcdunna]

I love my Pearl. However, the music player needs some serious help. I'm hoping someone at RIM passes these onto the Product Manager. Here are some suggested product requirements to write in to your next release (all "P1's IMHO):

Improve Sound Playback Quality
If the current "muffled" sound quality of the mp3 playback on the 8100 is due to poor software and can be corrected, please do so. I love my RIM, but if the email and websurfing on the iPhone turns out to be pretty good, I'll consider switching cause I need my music. If, on the other hand, it's a hardware problem, fix it asap and give me a discount coupon to upgrade; I'll pay a reasonable price for the improved audio version

Provide A Decent Player
Ok, so you have Play, Play-All, Skip, and Pause. I want Shuffle back, Plus: Balance, and a simple (perhaps 3 range) Equalizer. Also, the Play-All option should start from the current song. If you want to skip the first 6 songs and start playing from the 7th song onward it's a serious pain. Try it...

Intuitive Menuing
One thing I'm always amazed about is how intuitive the BB is. It's like the darn think knows what I want to do next. That is, except when I'm playing music. The "Shuffle" option is at the same level as the "Repeat" option and only shows up when you've starting playing a track. What sense does this make? I think about whether I want Shuffle at the time I decide to "Play" or "Play-All". I'm using v4.2.0.64.

Improve the Audio Quality
Oh, did I mention this already? Well, it should be mentioned again I suppose.

[ngregory00]

It took me forever just to stumble upon this "Music App" you guys were referring to. I only found it once I clicked on one of my music files. I know I'm a wee bit slow but that seems a bass-ackwards way to access a music player.