Clip Zip Feedback and Feature Request Thread

@miikerman wrote:
@kevinfreels: I agree with you, that the missing info. (time elapsed and remaining, and track no./total tracks no.) on the Clip Zip should be brought back to the music screen. (I forgot about the “play all” option, which should be brought back as well.) But SanDisk has proven that it can be responsive to customer comments and pleas–make them know to SanDisk, here/otherwise! :slight_smile:

I’ve got to also agree.  After using a couple of Clip’s and Clip+'s with Rockbox for some time; and now getting a CZ…I do miss all the extra information on the screen.  It certainly would be nice if it were brought back.  Not a FAIL by any stretch of the imagination as the unit now stands; but would make a nifty little player even better!

@longi wrote:

Availability in the UK would be nice! :smiley:

I thought I read, this month.

SERIOUSLY NEED ABILITY TO PLAY AUDIBLE.COM CONTENT!!  :cry:

Well it would be great if someone from sandisk would say that this is definitely going to be fixed. If so I don’t need to return it. But I only have 24 days left to do that. 

What I’ve heard is, both SanDisk and Audible are on this, and Audible has said, this month. 

From all of this, I take it that if it is do-able, it’s going to be done.  And I don’t see any reason why it can’t be and won’t be.  Of course, what do I know–I’m just a consumer.   :wink:

I’m currently on my second rockboxed Clip+ that I mostly use for listening to audiobooks. Rockbox is great from a features perspective, but is far clunkier to use than the stock firmware. Not a problem if I’m sitting someplace, but very inconvenient and potentially dangerous if I’m driving and trying to switch to where I left off in another book. I’d like to go back to the original firmware because of it’s simplicity (which sound like it has been enhanced by the new menu customization), but there are 2 things that keep me on rockbox, which if implemented would make me buy whichever model of clip I needed to in order to get them.

  • Variable speed playback with pitch correction. I know that the hardware can handle it because rockbox on the clip does it, and does a very good job of it. I really like the way that Sansa implements their speed control as a setting that applies to all audiobooks, but not to music, but I find the whole chipmunk voice thing to get really annoying, and only having slow, normal, and fast as options to not be particularly helpful. For different books I will vary playback speed from about 110% to 190%, with most around 145%
  • Speed up refreshing the media. A 16gb sd card leaves me without listening enjoyment for way too long. With rockbox there is no refreshing of the media when the player is unplugged from the computer or when an microsd card is inserted.

tb wrote:

  • Speed up refreshing the media. A 16gb sd card leaves me without listening enjoyment for way too long. With rockbox there is no refreshing of the media when the player is unplugged from the computer or when an microsd card is inserted.

You can change this by cleaning up your tags.  Check out my refresh times. first for Clip Zip …

OK, player now loaded with MP3’s, 6.96GB on the internal, 14.8GB on a class 2 16GB card. Still flies through menus, and the refresh time just now was 2:53.6…two minutes, fifty-three point six seconds. Of course, YMMV with regards to the refresh time, depending on your tagging practices.  That is 2,685 songs, average bitrate of the lot is 233kbps.

And then for Clip+…

OK, same tracks on the Clip+ results in a refresh time of 3:20.8…three minutes, twenty point eight seconds.  I’ll let the engineers figure out why the new player would refresh faster.

The addition of the stopwatch is a nice addon. What would be more useful for runners is an interval timer that beeped while listening to music or podcasts. People pay $20+ for dedicated timers like the Gymboss (http://gymboss.com/). This type of function could easily be embedded in a player. This would make the Clip Zip a must-have player for runners in training.

+1 on the lap timer and audio cues for time and such. I’m still rocking along on my Clip+ which has been nearly perfect. Just repaired a broken clip. Two things would make me buy a Clip Zip today:

  1. A metal case. The plastic (on the Clip+, at least) is fairly sturdy but I’ve got to believe that a metal case would be even more robust. The plastic case’s potential weakness was a concern when I bought the Clip+ but I didn’t think it would really be an issue. Now that I’ve broken mine I feel much more passionate about clip strength.

  2. Audio cues for the stopwatch. A lap timer would be nice and I’d use it if I had one but I think I’d get even more use out of the audio cues. I had an old Phillips mp3 player with a stopwatch feature and a button that read the time when you pushed it. It was awesome. The player was total garbage otherwise but that feature kept me using it for years until it was replaced by the Clip+.

I do not use my Clip+ to its full potential. I’ll probably get a Zip sometime soon - even sooner if my clip repair fails - and I don’t expect to use it to its full potential either. I use my Clip+ almost exclusively as an exercise mp3 player. It goes running with me and it goes to the gym with me. I don’t care about the display because I rarely look at it. All I need are tactile buttons so I can turn it on, advance or repeat a track, or adjust the volume. I do very little else with it. I’m totally sold on the brand and model because it does what I want so well that I really can’t imagine getting anything else. Having said that, a Clip model incorporating my two suggested features would be purchased with little regard to price.

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

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.

@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.