Hi,
I plan on posting a list of wishes for MM3 (not necessarily 3.0). From past experience it seems that separating the wishes into separate posts, one per topic, works better for clarifying the position of the MM user community on the specific issues. This message provides the background for all the other messages. It should give the developers a way to asses how much I represent the users they target, and what priority they should give to these wishes.
First thing, putting things into perspective. By its very nature a wish list focuses on things that, IMHO, are not done right or could be done better. That doesn't mean I think MM sucks. On the contrary. I have the lifetime gold version, I'm very happy with it and I recommend MM to everyone. When v3 will be stable, and assuming it won't be a total disaster, I plan on buying lifetime gold licenses for my 3 kids.
Personal background: I'm not a "naive" user. I've been working with software for some 35 years now. I don't have the time to be an alpha or beta tester. When I used the early 2.5 beta version I got hit hard by a volume leveling problem that resulted in me having to re-process the leveling of some 20k tracks. Now I don't take risks.
Platforms: My main machine, my workstation is XP Pro, always fully updated. The one unusual thing about it is that I have my LCD monitor in portrait mode instead of in landscape mode. I DON'T plan on switching to Vista. My next workstation, in 6-12 months, will have Linux. I will have one or more XP machines for longer and I may end up having a Vista machine for compatibility reasons, and if needed I'll run MM on one of them, but eventually I'll have to find a Linux solution for dealing with my music.
Music needs: I want my computer to play music while I use it. I have two MP3 players, a generic 1GB one (memory stick) and a 20GB Cowlon iAudio M5. I make playable audio/mp3 CD's & DVD's. I backup my tracks on DVD's. I have a large vinyl & CD collection.
Current MM usage: Some 45K tracks, all "normalized" to MP3 128 CBR with volume leveling. About 25% of the tracks are on the hard disk, the rest on backup DVD's. No art, no lyrics - just the music. I use version 2.5.4.978. Version 2.5.5 didn't add or solve anything important to me and there were some reports in the forum about problems I didn't wish to deal with. I've had too many problems with burning CD's & DVD's from within MM and now I use MM to prepare the tracks but I do the actual burning with Nero. I don't use visualizations or skins and I don't use scripts unless I really have to.
What I want from MM: I don't want to see MM, except for when I tell it what to do (play music, process tracks into my "normalized" standard, etc). And I want the time I need for telling MM what to do to be as short as possible.
Later: I finished writing the posts for about half of the items on my wish list and I don't have the time to continue. At least I got the important ones. Maybe I'll finish the list next weekend.
Ariel.
Background for following posts
Moderator: Gurus