Clip Zip Feedback and Feature Request Thread

@jk98 wrote:

Hello tb. Welcome to the forum. I have been pleading for variable speed playback with automatic pitch correction for a long time. I have not used Rockbox since the display items with it look too small, and the interface seems too complex. Is it true that with Rockbox when you change the playback speed the pitch must be changed separately, or does Rockbox automatically correct the pitch when the play speed is changed? besides being worried about possibly bricking a player with rockbox, I am also worried that if Rockboxed it might not play Slotradio cards anymore. does Rockbox have the autoresume feature that the original firmware has?

 

I just edited all my tags to get rid of the v1 tags. It does significantly help speed up refresh rates. It was so easy to do with mp3Tag.

I hope more people see this and follow suit. Only the older players need those ancient v1 tags.

New Clip Zip; 16 g Kingston class 10 micro sd card.

Am I correct in assuming that there is no way to go back or forward in a song?

sure there is. press and hold the << button to rewind the track and press and hold the >> button to fast forward a track. 

Not only that, but mp3Tag itself works so much faster without the v1 tags.

@tokadap wrote:

My headphones have a mic and a button.  It would be nice to use the mic for recording and to use the button to control the Clip.  On my Palm Pre, a single button press pauses the music, a double press skips to the next track.  I know that this might involve a hardware change so I don’t have my hopes too high.

 

Thanks for listening!

 

Paul

Would love to see a remote control dongle for the Clips!  But not permanently attached to a set of phones–a cable that you could plug your own phones into, like those made by iLuv and other companies for Apple players.  My Panasonic portable CD player has this and it’s great for outside and exercise use. 

@miikerman wrote:



Would love to see a remote control dongle for the Clips!  But not permanently attached to a set of phones–a cable that you could plug your own phones into, like those made by iLuv and other companies for Apple players.  My Panasonic portable CD player has this and it’s great for outside and exercise use. 

Heh, heh, you said “dongle!”  :smileyvery-happy:

“Feature Request: “Timed Auto Pause” (for audiobooks primarily). I listen to audiobooks a lot when I go to sleep, and I keep an ageing “iAudio U2” for this purpose alone. It has a feature where you can play 1 track, it pauses and waits for you to press play to play next track and if I don’t press play within a certain time the device turns itself off.”

Imo even better than a timed auto pause would be a function that is optional which allows the user to set a time limit, and if no buttons are pressed within that time limit, then the player goes into pause mode(then it will later shut off based on the power saver setting). When one presses a button, then the count down timer resets and starts again. This continues until the mode is disabled.

@jk98 wrote:

Hello tb. Welcome to the forum. I have been pleading for variable speed playback with automatic pitch correction for a long time. I have not used Rockbox since the display items with it look too small, and the interface seems too complex. Is it true that with Rockbox when you change the playback speed the pitch must be changed separately, or does Rockbox automatically correct the pitch when the play speed is changed? besides being worried about possibly bricking a player with rockbox, I am also worried that if Rockboxed it might not play Slotradio cards anymore. does Rockbox have the autoresume feature that the original firmware has?

 

I just edited all my tags to get rid of the v1 tags. It does significantly help speed up refresh rates. It was so easy to do with mp3Tag.

If you truly want the benefits of Rockbox, just go ahead and install it.  Once you take the plunge, you’ll not regret it.  I was hesitant before installing Rockbox also, concerned it’ll brick my clip+, then I installed it on my fuze, the player I could do without if it got messed up and, now, I’m a happy Rockbox user.

Of course, no Rockbox for the Clip Zip (yet).  Also, always a legitimate concern of even a small bricking possibility and the effect on DRM playback under the original manf. firmware.

@marvin_martian wrote:


 

Heh, heh, you said “dongle!”  :smileyvery-happy:

Marvin, you need sleep today!   :wink:

@mags1230 wrote:


@jk98 wrote:

Hello tb. Welcome to the forum. I have been pleading for variable speed playback with automatic pitch correction for a long time. I have not used Rockbox since the display items with it look too small, and the interface seems too complex. Is it true that with Rockbox when you change the playback speed the pitch must be changed separately, or does Rockbox automatically correct the pitch when the play speed is changed? besides being worried about possibly bricking a player with rockbox, I am also worried that if Rockboxed it might not play Slotradio cards anymore. does Rockbox have the autoresume feature that the original firmware has?

 

I just edited all my tags to get rid of the v1 tags. It does significantly help speed up refresh rates. It was so easy to do with mp3Tag.


If you truly want the benefits of Rockbox, just go ahead and install it.  Once you take the plunge, you’ll not regret it.  I was hesitant before installing Rockbox also, concerned it’ll brick my clip+, then I installed it on my fuze, the player I could do without if it got messed up and, now, I’m a happy Rockbox user.

I gotta agree here, about Rockbox. Up until I received the Zip and started testing it, I had not used the OF on my Clip+ in a year or so, and it’s been used a lot in that time and it still runs like a champ.

DRM is not an issue for me…I avoid it.   In JK98’s case, I don’t buy worrying about  that as a legitimate excuse:stuck_out_tongue:, since he has at least four players…surely he can live with the possibility of  just one of them not being to play a SlotRadio card. In fact, he could go to Radio SHack and buy a Clip+ for $30 and Rockbox one of his old ones.:wink:

Except that, not losing DRM capability on one’s primary player or the player that one may be using at the time is a legitimate preference.  DRM files and capability still can be an understandable concern–for library borrowings, Audible offerings, etc.

The player I might consider Rockboxing is my my Clip V2. It is one of my oldest Sandisk players. It doesn’t have a card slot, so it already can’t play my Slotradio cards. My reasons for hesitating about Rockbox is that some mentioned that Rockbox doesn’t have the autoresume feature that the Clip original firmware has. I need the player to remember not just the place in a file, but which file is playing in a series of podcasts. I am also concerned that the display in Rockbox may be hard to read. There is more information on the screen, and each item is smaller than with the original firmware.

As to screens, Rockbox has many different options from screen layouts that users have created–some of them mimic the original Clip screen, in variations.  They all are easy to install/select.  A gallery of screens:  http://themes.rockbox.org/index.php?target=sansaclipplus

@jk98 wrote:

The player I might consider Rockboxing is my my Clip V2. It is one of my oldest Sandisk players. It doesn’t have a card slot, so it already can’t play my Slotradio cards. My reasons for hesitating about Rockbox is that some mentioned that Rockbox doesn’t have the autoresume feature that the Clip original firmware has. I need the player to remember not just the place in a file, but which file is playing in a series of podcasts. I am also concerned that the display in Rockbox may be hard to read. There is more information on the screen, and each item is smaller than with the original firmware.

 

 

I recently switched to one that I find just as easy to read, if not more so, than  the original…I haven’t used any other theme since.

http://themes.rockbox.org/index.php?themeid=1323&target=sansaclipplus

Very easily installed with the Rockbox Utility installer.

@miikerman wrote:

Except that, not losing DRM capability on one’s primary player or the player that one may be using at the time is a legitimate preference.  DRM files and capability still can be an understandable concern–for library borrowings, Audible offerings, etc.

 Absolutely, it’s a legitimate consideration, especially since it apparently has been reported that that has happened.

@jk98 wrote:

The player I might consider Rockboxing is my my Clip V2. It is one of my oldest Sandisk players. It doesn’t have a card slot, so it already can’t play my Slotradio cards. My reasons for hesitating about Rockbox is that some mentioned that Rockbox doesn’t have the autoresume feature that the Clip original firmware has. I need the player to remember not just the place in a file, but which file is playing in a series of podcasts. I am also concerned that the display in Rockbox may be hard to read. There is more information on the screen, and each item is smaller than with the original firmware.

 

 

With rockbox installed on the original Clip V2, is there a dual-boot, like on the fuze?  If there is, then you may not lose any functions of the OF other than what you are already aware of, although you may want to look into that.  If all goes well with the install, and you find you don’t like rockbox, you can just boot into the OF. 

Sometimes, after charging my fuze and then disconnecting it from the computer, it’s still in the OF so I just use that instead of shutting down and rebooting into rockbox.   When I’m in the OF, it resumes where I left off the last time I used the OF, and the same for rockbox.  In rockbox, after booting up, it doesn’t go directly to where I left off, it goes to a menu where I have to select “resume playback”.  This is for music files.

The button and mic on my headphones sits right at my chest.  That is very convenient.  I’ve seen the r/c dongle and I agree that would be fine as well.  Since the Clip is so small, it might turn out that the dongle won’t add much convenience.  Even now, I just have to reach down to my belt to control my Clip!

@marvin_martian wrote:


@jk98 wrote:

The player I might consider Rockboxing is my my Clip V2. It is one of my oldest Sandisk players. It doesn’t have a card slot, so it already can’t play my Slotradio cards. My reasons for hesitating about Rockbox is that some mentioned that Rockbox doesn’t have the autoresume feature that the Clip original firmware has. I need the player to remember not just the place in a file, but which file is playing in a series of podcasts. I am also concerned that the display in Rockbox may be hard to read. There is more information on the screen, and each item is smaller than with the original firmware.

 

 


I recently switched to one that I find just as easy to read, if not more so, than  the original…I haven’t used any other theme since.

http://themes.rockbox.org/index.php?themeid=1323&target=sansaclipplus

Very easily installed with the Rockbox Utility installer.

^^^

+1  Switched to that one myself.  Very easy to read.

The biggest issue I have with the Clip Zip and previous models is the media refresh. To put it simply, this should be completely eliminated. Period. Yes, I’ve read the forums, updated the tags, reformatted, updated the firmware, etc…, but that’s all just trying to minimize an issue that shouldn’t be there in the first place. Some people are happy to reduce their refresh time from 20 minutes to 2 minutes or whatever but for me that’s still 2 minutes too long. Whatever process the device needs to do should be done in the background, or while the media is being synced. We want to unplug the device, press play, and enjoy our music/podcasts/audiobooks.

Other than that, and some issues already mentioned like the missing “Play All” and song count display, the Clip Zip and previous model players are pretty fantastic.

+1. Having had some audiobook issues this morning and needing to try transferring content repeatedly to the player, I am very tired of refresh delays today, with a 16GB microSD card installed . . . .