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System v3.2 - New software coming SOON. Pics and details here!

josh

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First - a huge thank you to the team at Kaleidescape for agreeing to let me post details of an exciting new rev of the software that should be released shortly. It's great that they support this board and welcome feedback and ideas from users.

I've been beta-testing the new software for a week or so and have permission to share the details of the new version that should be released soon. Other beta testers who may be on this board are also free to share their thoughts, discoveries, bugs, and suggestions.

Here is the description that comes in the beta release notes:
This release contains several performance improvements as well as new features for the Music Server.

If you use the Music Server software, you can now easily select and play music from a particular artist or in a specific genre. The System automatically builds a playlist of all the music in your collection that matches your selection, and plays it for you. You will also notice several improvements to the on-screen user interface, as well as new entertaining screen savers. Finally, if you use a Macintosh computer, you will now be able to access the Web Utility using the friendly URL http://my-kaleidescape.local .

Sincerely,

The Kaleidescape Team

The release is, as described, a very nice new set of features for the music system. Some details and shots are posted below.
 
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Overall thoughts:

Wow... to many users this release may not be that exciting, but ever since I first tried the music software I found it very nicely done, but somehow lacking in the "wow" factor that we all felt when we saw and tried the movie system.

This release adds some features that, at least for me, gave me that "wow" feeling again.

In general, this update provides new ways to sort, play, and even "discover" music in your own library. It adds new tabs to the Collections view called "Artists" and "Genres" that let you find songs, albums, and artists in new ways.

Image1.jpg


Apologies for the crummy lo-res screen shots.
I couldn't find any way to get clean images
except to do screen shots from a Slingbox.


As you see above, this is no small list of genres. In my pretty varied collection of 400 CDs, I now have 47 different distinct genres according to Kaleidescape. But there's a hierarchy or taxonomy here, so there's Blues, but there's also the subset "Louisiana Blues" if you'd like to be more specific. A given album will get many different genres, so it might appear in Blues, Louisiana Blues, R&B, and Singer/Songwriters.

The system now adds new data from Kaleidescape's data partners (All Music Guide, possibly others?) including what must be thousands or tens-of-thousands of artist and performer biographies and descriptions that are fascinating and informative. It even finds songs and albums where are an artist appears, even if that artist was a guest on a song, or a composer of a song for another band. See the description of David Byrne from my music collection below.

Image4.jpg


These descriptions of artists, performers, composers, (even particular conductors on classical music albums) are very well written and some are incredibly long and detailed. I believe some of the ones I read were 15 or even 20 screens long. Some may find that too much, but I loved it. I spent hours learning more about some of my favorite bands and performers.
 
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Even genres have descriptions of what they are, and there are even links to "releated genres" that really help you find similar music or help you narrow or expand your music "discovery" process.

Image2.jpg


It contains new effects and transitions that are subtle but really improve the look and feel of the music system UI. One example is the 2x2 Composite of several album covers you see above for College Rock... it doesn't just make a single one of these, in fact as you're watching the screen above, the various albums that make up this genre start to fade/rotate in that 2x2 composite area. Subtle and elegant...

The same nice fades happen on the main Artist and Genre screens (First screen shot at top of this thread)... the album cover it shows when you hover over a particular genre or an artist will slowly crossfade into other albums in that group. Nice.
 
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And of course, you can just select a genre or an artist and have the system randomly assemble a playlist of songs in that genre or by that artist.

An evening of Soft Rock or Crossover Jazz, an exploration of your "British Psychedalia", or a few tracks of "Modern Electric Blues"... all can be had with just a few clicks, no more painstaking assembly of playlists.

Image3.jpg
 
Just as easily, you can say "I feel like some J.J. Cale" tunes... pick me a few." and off it goes... crossfading covers and all.

Image5.jpg


Doing this really helps you discover new things about your own collection... In the above screen shot, I already knew Cale was the writer of Cocaine and After Midnight by Eric Clapton, but I had not known Cale also wrote "Bringing it Back" by Kansas or "Call Me the Breeze" by Skynyrd! Thanks Kaleidescape!
 
New Screen Saver

And when your screensaver kicks in while music is playing, there's a new and much nicer screen saver... a big album cover and the track name, artist name, album name.

It fades out and reappears somewhere else after a few minutes, and the text moves to different locations around the album cover.

A big improvement over the jumping blue-box-of-text in the previous release.

Image6.jpg
 
Some other improvements and additions:
1) When you assemble your own music in "Now Playing", by picking albums and tracks and choosing "Play After Currently Playing Music Stops", there's now a new command called "Make Playing Music Into a Playlist". Nice addition. Just like making a Favorite Scene, it pops up a window that asks you to name the Playlist (I guess for some people who have an IR keyboard or a touchpanel that can enter ASCII characters). But it defaults to the current date and time. You can change the name of the playlist later on the web interface.

2) Scrolling through a movie or music collection now crossfades the album/dvd covers on the right side, rather than the blit function that was used in the past release. Not sure personally if this is an improvement... it's elegant, but seems slower.
That's what I've found so far... any other beta testers care to post other details or thoughts?

I'll try to answer any questions as well...

--josh
 
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Just found another new little feature... when no music is playing, the default screen saver (Kaleidescape logo) now does some strange things... decays, rearranges itself, etc. Kinda trippy... :cool:
 
I like the improvements on the Music side of things with the Beta. Creeating playlists from Now Playing was a definite must have. I also like the random playlist assembly by genre, artist, etc. For On Screen control, this is a very quick way to jump right in and start listening. The trippy new Kaleidescape logo screensaver is pretty cool too. My wife noticed it the first night and said something like "well that's something new".

Jeff
 
Excellent

This software looks like it completes the package.

The addition of the genres for me is perfect. I actually spent alot of time creating all of my own genre folders which was not very user friendly since it would list only the songs in each genre.

So when do we expect it?
 
I have been pretty happy with the new software. My only complaint is not getting an emailed list detailing the changes in it.

The additions to the music collections have been very good, although I have been listening to Pink Floyd and nothing else for the last couple days. Shine on, Syd Barret.
 
cmcjo said:
So when do we expect it?

I don't know of a specific release date, but they've said there's a few bugs to track down before they have a release candidate.

I suspect it's weeks, not months, but I'll see if I can find out.

--josh
 
Anyone else who is beta testing notice that the DVD-cover view and CD-cover view screens seem much slower when "flying" around your collection. Seems to me that the panning/scrolling on these screens is much slower now.

I've reported this and they're looking into it, but they haven't confirmed to me if they've found it's an issue or not. Anyone else notice it?

--josh
 
Mr.Poindexter said:
I have been pretty happy with the new software. My only complaint is not getting an emailed list detailing the changes in it.
I've made the same suggestion to Kaleidescape... I really like detailed release notes that show all the changes, fixes, and new features. I realize some users don't care or don't want it, but there should be a way to get it for those of us that do.

Mr.Poindexter said:
The additions to the music collections have been very good, although I have been listening to Pink Floyd and nothing else for the last couple days. Shine on, Syd Barret.
heh... as you can see by some of my screen shots, I've also been 'rediscovering' some great Floyd deep cuts.
 
josh said:
Anyone else who is beta testing notice that the DVD-cover view and CD-cover view screens seem much slower when "flying" around your collection. Seems to me that the panning/scrolling on these screens is much slower now.

I've reported this and they're looking into it, but they haven't confirmed to me if they've found it's an issue or not. Anyone else notice it?

--josh

Yep, I noticed the same thing immediately. It's a tad slugigsh making the cover art navigation less smooth.

Jeff
 
They sent out another version of 3.2 a few days ago, and the pan/scroll slowness is gone... it's faster than ever, though I still think it's not quite as smooth. I've heard they know the issue and are working on it... the framerate is down from pre-3.2 versions.

Anyone think the pan/scroll speed is now TOO fast? It seems slightly harder to see the cover you wanted and stop in time IMO.

--josh
 
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