confused about Clear channels

[jeanwedding]

Hello all again. The more I read more confused, I get..
What are we supp to do to get Clear channels, those ACC formats ???
No way do I have a computer on, much. That is the main reason I bought the Radio. So it will play all my fav radio channels, asa stand alone unit.
Now please tell how I get all my favorite channels back.
Cause otherwise I wasted money on the Logitech Radio.
Some one explain in PLAIN English. Please. Please
Something about Radiotime ????? I dont need another doorstop.
Thank you
Jean

[toby10]

Well, I'll take a stab at an explanation, though I'm not certain I completely understand it either.....

Until 8 months ago with the release of the Radio no SB players could natively play AAC streams.
To play AAC on the pre-Radio/Touch players required server transcoding. SBS can transcode, MySB.com cannot transcode.

So I'm guessing RadioTime was directed by Logitech to not send AAC streams to MySB as this would result in streams not playable on a SB player connected to MySB.

So now the question is: what to do and how to implement it. If RadioTime just starts showing AAC streams in it's MySB menu's and searches (which are basically everything within the Internet Radio menu's and sub menu's) this will create many unplayable AAC streams for older SB players.

So how do they, Logitech and RadioTime, go about this without creating havoc and confusion for older SB players while not re-engineering the entire MySB > RadioTime interface?

I'm sure there is a solution but I think the dev's are a bit distracted with other Radio & Touch bugs right now.

Maybe an iHeartRadio App?
Maybe a "show AAC streams" selection (App?) for those with newer players?
Maybe a special RadioTime menu item within the RadioTime App that shows AAC streams?

[jwagner010]

One correction that makes this an even bigger issue for some of us. You say "SBS can transcode, MySB.com cannot transcode.". This is not true for all SBS installations on some NASes. For example, SBS on a Snology NAS will not transcode. This is one example there are other NASes that have same problem meaning we cannot get AAC streams throgh SBS or SB.com.

Wouldn't a simple answer be some communication between the SB Device and RadioTime so RadioTime knows what type of device it is serving to and can provide the most optimised stream for that device?

[bpa]

So now the question is: what to do and how to implement it. If RadioTime just starts showing AAC streams in it's MySB menu's and searches (which are basically everything within the Internet Radio menu's and sub menu's) this will create many unplayable AAC streams for older SB players.

So how do they, Logitech and RadioTime, go about this without creating havoc and confusion for older SB players while not re-engineering the entire MySB > RadioTime interface?

AFAICT The code to adjust the request to RadioTime to return AAC URLs or not is already in SBS and MySB.com - it just seems to be broken but it is now noticeable with the transition to AAC only by some stations.

[toby10]

One correction that makes this an even bigger issue for some of us. You say "SBS can transcode, MySB.com cannot transcode.". This is not true for all SBS installations on some NASes. For example, SBS on a Snology NAS will not transcode. This is one example there are other NASes that have same problem meaning we cannot get AAC streams throgh SBS or SB.com.

Wouldn't a simple answer be some communication between the SB Device and RadioTime so RadioTime knows what type of device it is serving to and can provide the most optimised stream for that device?

There is no faad or mplayer type audio transcoder for AAC on a NAS?
Obviously I don't use a NAS.

MySB detecting the type of player then deciding whether to offer AAC streams would be another option, but I'd guess that is not an easy implementation.
I suppose they could also offer a "allow AAC streams" check box within that players MySB setup options, followed by clear warnings of possible issues if older players are in use.

Like how MySB would handle Sync with a mix of newer & older players, then what? Not play stream at all? Only play on the newer player?
Dunno, just thinking out scenarios where this could all be a big can of worms for MySB usage. ;(

[aubuti]

There is no faad or mplayer type audio transcoder for AAC on a NAS?

Like jwagner010 said, not all NASs, some NASs. Depends on whether there is a build for the particular NAS's CPU and OS, and also on whether the NAS has the processing power to transcode and stream at the same.

[Plank]

My vote is for an iheartradio app!

[toby10]

AFAICT The code to adjust the request to RadioTime to return AAC URLs or not is already in SBS and MySB.com - it just seems to be broken but it is now noticeable with the transition to AAC only by some stations.

Yeah, and as we've discussed before, I think RadioTime does offer the AAC streams when SBS is in use.
Ex: The WABC issue recently posted in another thread, MySB and SBS have different search results for Internet Radio > Search > *WABC*
SBS = two streams (I presume one is AAC)
MySB = one stream

So MySB and/or RadioTime via MySB is somehow distinguishing between SBS as a player vs a hardware player.
Maybe MySB gets all of the same feeds from RadioTime but is set to filter out AAC streams?

[toby10]

My vote is for an iheartradio app!

I don't use this service myself. Do they somehow transcode their AAC feeds to MP3 or WMA?
If iHeartRadio is just a repository for feeds, passing on the feed in it's original format to the device/subscriber, then that won't solve the AAC issue.

[bpa]

Yeah, and as we've discussed before, I think RadioTime does offer the AAC streams when SBS is in use.
Ex: The WABC issue recently posted in another thread, MySB and SBS have different search results for Internet Radio > Search > *WABC*
SBS = two streams (I presume one is AAC)
MySB = one stream

So MySB and/or RadioTime via MySB is somehow distinguishing between SBS as a player vs a hardware player.
Maybe MySB gets all of the same feeds from RadioTime but is set to filter out AAC streams?

Below is an example of a RadioTime search request made by SBS. The formats= part states which formats can be played (native or transcoded - "real" is included because my SBS server has RealAudio support ) - so RadioTime will return any URL which matches the format. When this request

http://opml.radiotime.com/Tune.ashx?id=XXXX&formats=aac,ogg,mp3,wmpro,wma,wmvoice,real&partnerId=16

When this requests is made from MySB.com - only native formats are include which means for SB3: mp3,ogg and wma. For Radtyio and Touch the "aac" should be included but it is not. In the other thread I identified the piece of code which execute one branch for MySB.com and another for local SBS. The MySB.com code is closed source so I cannot examine it but it is supposed to return the native formats of a player - and it seems this routine is broken.