3G support

[dman777]

I am surprised not to see 3g support as this is what most people use on thier phones. Hope to see it soon. Congrats on the winamp android app! That's awsome.

[Stupifier]

By 3G support....you mean the ability for the phone to connect to your Desktop Winamp via IP address (over the internet)....correct?

I agree. This would allow connection to NOT be limited by location...meaning I do NOT have to be in range of my Wireless Router to connect to my Desktop Winamp....I can be ANYWHERE!

I understand Wi-Fi has its speed advantages...but these days....3G and 4G are pretty fast. Furthermore, assuming Android Winamp developers are planning on expanding features, simple control of Desktop Winamp with your Phone does not require much bandwidth at all.

[kustodian]

I think that both of you don't see what problems would you get if you wanted to access your Winamp via 3G, since you would try to access Winamp from the internet and not from your local network like ove wifi. If you wanted to access Winamp through 3G:

1. your router would need a real and staic IP address,
2. your router and firewall would need to forward ports from Winamp, so that it can be accessed from the internet

Also 3G is very slow and expensive if you want to use it for synchronizing music with you PC, and when you do sync, you are at home where you have wifi, so 3G is not needed.

[subliminalurge]

your router would need a real and staic IP address,

There are very simple ways around this. Simply set up an account at one of the many free dynamic dns services, and your dynamic ip is, for most purposes, just as good as a static ip.

your router and firewall would need to forward ports from Winamp, so that it can be accessed from the internet

While this is a true statement, port forwarding is trivially easy to set up. This isn't a roadblock at all.

Also 3G is very slow and expensive if you want to use it for synchronizing music with you PC, and when you do sync, you are at home where you have wifi, so 3G is not needed.

As for 3G being "slow", I would like to point out that I've done a lot of travelling this past year, and probably 75% of the time I tether my laptop to my phone and access the Internet over 3G since it is so much faster than the free "high speed" Internet offered by most hotels. Regarding "expensive", I pay the same amount for my unlimited access every month whether I transfer 5kb, 5mb, or 5gb.

I'm also uncertain why you assume that people would only be interested in syncing when they're at home. With a nearly 200GB music collection, and only about 4GB on my phone available for music, I would LOVE the ability to remove an album from my phone and replace it with another when I'm away from home. (Currently, I handle this by hauling music and movies around on a portable hard drive, but OTA would be much handier.)

[kustodian]

There are very simple ways around this. Simply set up an account at one of the many free dynamic dns services, and your dynamic ip is, for most purposes, just as good as a static ip.



While this is a true statement, port forwarding is trivially easy to set up. This isn't a roadblock at all.

All this is easy to setup for me and you, but not for an ordinary user which is probably 90% of all Winamp users. Anything that is not "out of the box" is not user friendly.

As for 3G being "slow", I would like to point out that I've done a lot of travelling this past year, and probably 75% of the time I tether my laptop to my phone and access the Internet over 3G since it is so much faster than the free "high speed" Internet offered by most hotels. Regarding "expensive", I pay the same amount for my unlimited access every month whether I transfer 5kb, 5mb, or 5gb.

I'm also uncertain why you assume that people would only be interested in syncing when they're at home. With a nearly 200GB music collection, and only about 4GB on my phone available for music, I would LOVE the ability to remove an album from my phone and replace it with another when I'm away from home. (Currently, I handle this by hauling music and movies around on a portable hard drive, but OTA would be much handier.)

The reason why I said it's slow, is because home users usually don't have a fast upload speed. It's very rare to find people who have 1Mbps+ of upload, which means you will only be able to copy at 100KB/s, and that is if you are a lucky one. Also 3G might be cheap for you, but it's not cheap in the majority of countries.

You have to understand, I'm not against 3G support, I just think it's not a high priority, since there is not that many people who could use that feature, so it's better that the developers use their time on different things and features.

[subliminalurge]

All this is easy to setup for me and you, but not for an ordinary user which is probably 90% of all Winamp users. Anything that is not "out of the box" is not user friendly.

And most of that 90% is going to have at least one friend who could walk them through it. If nothing else, instructions could be posted here on the forum.

The reason why I said it's slow, is because home users usually don't have a fast upload speed. It's very rare to find people who have 1Mbps+ of upload, which means you will only be able to copy at 100KB/s, and that is if you are a lucky one.

I guess this depends on the scenario, but loading an album onto my phone at even 25KB/s is still going to be WAY faster than waiting until I get home if I happen to be in a hotel halfway across the country.

Also 3G might be cheap for you, but it's not cheap in the majority of countries.

I'm in the U.S. I've been given to understand that we're the ones with outdated and overpriced mobile tech compared to the rest of the developed world. And yet I've still been able to find a reasonably priced unlimited 3G plan.

You have to understand, I'm not against 3G support, I just think it's not a high priority, since there is not that many people who could use that feature, so it's better that the developers use their time on different things and features.

On this point we agree. Given that synchronization doesn't even work AT ALL (at least in a usable way) at this point, it would be silly for them to spend time making it work over 3G. Along with several other problems with the app which, in its present form, make it seem very amateurish and not worthy of the "Winamp" name.

Once it's of actual beta quality, though (it's more alpha quality at the moment, if that, IMHO), then mobile syncing would be an excellent feature to have.

Here's how I would suggest it be implemented:

From the phone, allow the option to browse the entire library on your PC. Next to each item (album, artist, or individual song) have a checkbox. When the user checks the box, those items get synced to the sd card and become available for playback. Clearing the checkbox removed them from the card and frees up space (either for different music, or for use by other apps). A simple "Allow synchronization over 3G" checkbox on the settings page (off by default) would be sufficient to protect those not fortunate enough to have an unlimited data plan.

[Stupifier]

I understand all the above involved in this 3G topic perfectly well.....and I agree with virtually everything subliminalurge has said (well put btw, from a technical standpoint).

Now an extremely important point that you guys have not even considered:
This discussions does not even need to be on the technical side (I can go there certainly...as an Optical Engineer on the matter, I understand all the in's and out's of Wireless technology). This is a marketing argument though (and IMHO, a much more important discussion to be having on the issue):

1. Have you (kustodian) looked at the Android Market at all???? Are you (kustodian) even remotely familiar with what is currently out there? I can easily throw like 50 apps (not exaggerating) at you that connect computers to phones over 3G networks for anything from file transfers, to simple send commands and information retrieval. To say the Android community is too dumb or 3G networks are too slow is plain wrong. These Phone-2-PC connecting apps are THRIVING!

Point being.....if Android Winamp is going to be any bit competitive.....in this day and age....SUPPORT IP CONNECTIVITY! This isn't something Winamp Developers should be shorting on.

2. Compared to the other Feature request undertakings.....this feature request is NOT that hard to implement. This would not require that much work at all. It really isn't.

You guys agree with me here or what?

[kustodian]

1. Have you (kustodian) looked at the Android Market at all???? Are you (kustodian) even remotely familiar with what is currently out there? I can easily throw like 50 apps (not exaggerating) at you that connect computers to phones over 3G networks for anything from file transfers, to simple send commands and information retrieval. To say the Android community is too dumb or 3G networks are too slow is plain wrong. These Phone-2-PC connecting apps are THRIVING!

Point being.....if Android Winamp is going to be any bit competitive.....in this day and age....SUPPORT IP CONNECTIVITY! This isn't something Winamp Developers should be shorting on.

First of I never said 3G is slow, all I said is that the home users' upload speeds are generally below 1Mbps, and that is slow. I'm in contact with many people around the world and I know this as a fact, it's very hard to find user who have more than that. Secondly I didn't say the community is dumb, I said that people usually don't know this stuff, since not everyone is into computers, but I have to agree that if someone doesn't know how to set it, but they know it's possible, they would probably find a way to do it. And please name 5 phone 2 pc 3G file transfer applications, since I know only one...

2. Compared to the other Feature request undertakings.....this feature request is NOT that hard to implement. This would not require that much work at all. It really isn't.

You guys agree with me here or what?

It isn't hard, at least it shouldn't be hard. But, what I would like to see from Nullsoft is something super easy, probably by introducing a new services for this, so that you won't need to setup anything, but allow Winamp to connect to some service and all would go through it, that would be the real marketing boom.

[Stupifier]

I can easily throw like 50 apps (not exaggerating) at you that connect computers to phones over 3G networks for anything from file transfers, to simple send commands and information retrieval.

File Transfer is more constrained than what I said but here you go. All of these are free too if I remember right....forgot to recheck that...but I think so.

Also this is a quote from your 1st post in this thread:

Also 3G is very slow and expensive if you want to use it for synchronizing music with you PC,

If you are going to try to defend that statement by saying that your Home Internet Upload is slow therefore the 3G is slow...that is incorrect. The 3G is not slow...it is actually your Home Internet Upload. I know you already know this.....I'm just pointing out that you DID actually say 3G is SLOW.



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Now, if you include Sending/Receiving commands between Phone and PC over 3G....the list is ENDLESS.....really....just endless. People use phone apps to control a multitude of programs on their PC's. They even have an array of apps that allow users to Control their Phones through their PC's over the Internet. My big point here is that the Community is really embracing the use of 3G for Phone-2-PC contact...and they aren't slowing down because their Home Internet Upload is not worthy. People just demand information and control at their fingertips these days.