New Commercial Free Stream

[jamiebk]

I was lucky enough to get to test the new beta stream (see Chris' post on this.) Not only did it NOT trip our formidable firewall here at work, but it sounds absolutely great. (Selma...are you "listening" to this?) It's a 128 bit stream. Chris explained that the new fee based stream will play short classical pieces instead of the commercials, but all of live bits, news, discussion and banter we have all come to love, will be there.

I will be the first in line to sign up when this becomes fully available to everyone.

[navneeth]

[The new beta stream] sounds absolutely great.

I completely agree. I could even clearly hear the little sounds from within the studio when Nicole was talking.

[Trumpetmaster]

I'll be signing up as soon as it is available!!!

[Nicole Marie]

You could hear our background noise? Uh oh... we are going to have to put away the flying monkeys now.

[BigJon@Work]

No farting either.

[Shapley]

I keep trying to sign up, but the message just says:

The Beethoven Commercial Free Members Club will be open on April 16th

[Nicole Marie]

Yeah sorry about that... There is a wait with the credit card company. They held us up for some reason so it is supposed to launch this afternoon.

[Shapley]

I'll keep checking. I'll sign up once it's available. In the meantime, the free stream is working fine.

(And I really don't mind the commercials.)

V/R
Shapley

[Trumpetmaster]

can hardly wait!!!

[Shapley]

Well, I'm signed up to the new stream.

I miss the commercials, though....

BTW, is there any plan to add a 'now playing' window to the stream. I notice that the "World's Classical Radio Station' banner rolls across in a pop-up when I sweep the mouse over the taskbar controls, which would be an excellent place to provide a 'now playing' feature. As it is, I have to open the website to find out what piece is playing.

[CLarsen]

Hi Shapley, Thanks for registering! The new stream is setup like the old Media Player in that it should open Windows Media Player and display the old Now Playing screen inside the window. If it doesn't, you may need to enable "show enhanced content" under one of the tabs in WMP settings. Give that a try and let me know if it works. Thanks!

[Shapley]

Chris,

Thanks. If I click 'restore' on the taskbar player, it will open the window full screen and display the 'now playing' window, but I prefer to keep it minimized. The WMP appears to offer only two choices - full screen or minimized. I cannot resize the window to a size that will only encompass the 'now playing' window, even though it is only about 1/4 the size of the full WMP window.

When it is minimized, rolling the mouse over the control bar opens a streaming banner, which reads Beethoven.com Commercial Free - The World's Classical Radio Station - 128 Kbps'. This would be nice place to put the 'now playing' feature, so that one could merely roll over the taskbar control to find the name of the piece playing.

Just a suggestion to improve convenience, not a complaint. You guys are doing a wonderful job! The stream sounds great!

V/R
Shapley

Oops! I was able to resize it. I now have it reduced down to the size of the 'now playing' window.

[CLarsen]

Gotcha. I'd love to put the Now Playing information directly in the player so it shows up when you hover over it, but it takes some messy programming to get that to work correctly. It's on my list of things to do so hopefully I'll be able to get to it eventually. Thanks!

[Shapley]

No problem. I've got it set now so I can click on the 'restore' button and it'll bring the player with the 'now playing' window, without going full screen.

Thanks, again!

[Trumpetmaster]

Just signed up!

Stream sounds AWESOME!!!

[Trumpetmaster]

came into work tonight... i have an overnight software deployment.... ugh..

anyway... i turned the stream on and it seems like i hear 2 different works at the same time.

[Trumpetmaster]

definitely listening to 2 streams .... right now Moonlight Sonata is playing and another piano work can be heard in the background...

[Serenity]

Whaddaya mean 2 streams? Free stream versus Pay stream? What kind of output do you have there? Woofers and sub-woofers? Is the magic in the input, the output or a little of both? If they play a "record", can you clearly hear the snap, crackle, pop?

[Trumpetmaster]

Whaddaya mean 2 streams? Free stream versus Pay stream? What kind of output do you have there? Woofers and sub-woofers? Is the magic in the input, the output or a little of both? If they play a "record", can you clearly hear the snap, crackle, pop?

Windows Media player opens....
and I hear 2 streams..
it seems the free stream and commercial free stream are both playing and there is a delay...

I am listening now to the free steam not commercial free stream and there is no conflict.
only when i connect to the commercial free stream does this occur..

[Serenity]

DUDE! You are in another dimension and I totally envy you!