Music on Android phones

jonseyblub

Hi,
I'm really interested in getting an android device i.e. HtC Desire , legend or The nexus one. Everything I've read about them suggests that its the phone for me in that I use gmail, google calender, picasa which all seem to naturally integrate nicely with the android devices. However my concern is with their music capabilities. I have an iphone at the moment and no matter what complaints i have about it the one thing (i feel) is that the ipod part of the phone is superb. The ability to download music. podcasts on the fly is brilliant and it all seems to happen without any major problems. While I really don't like iTunes I understand its a necessary evil in order to make the music experience what it is. My question is that while I know earlier versions of Android didn't necessarily do well with music, has it improved?

Thanks

Hmmm....I haven't heard the best reports about the HTC android handsets though some of the earlier problems have been resolved with the newer OS updates. I've tried the new Samsung Galaxy/Spica and found it to be a very responsive touch screen as well as being an intuitive handset to use.

I was about 3 minutes into playing with the handset before i had some music playing and found it to be easy to navigate as well as quick to change track. I have to admit however that the handset was fresh out of the box and had no added music/photo/video that may slow down the processing of the next track.

From what I've gathered from reviews and news from reps, the Sony Ericsson X10 is their flagship handset and, given Sonys' history with music devices, will be the bees' knees when it comes to media playback in a multi-functional device. I, unfortunately, have to wait and see next month but from what I'm told, SE are producing a serious iPhone competitor with this model.

bionic.laura

I have a macbook and I like itunes so I want a phone that can use itunes to transfer music as I organize all my music and podcasts through itunes. As far as I can see the htc phones don't seem great for music.
I was looking at the htc legend but all the talk of problems with the meteor network really put me off. I know a few people with htc hero on meteor who are having big problems with it. It's a pity as the phone itself seems great.
I'm going to get the new SE xperia x10 as it ticks all the boxes for me. I discovered you can use it to sync with itunes if you download a program from their website. It also has a very decent camera which is something else I was looking for. It's been released with android 1.6 and it seems like they do have plans to upgrade that to 2.1 in the near future.

R28

I've not had any problems with playing music on Android. Sure the bog standard music player that comes with it isn't very flashy but there's some great music apps you can download. I personally use tunewiki which does the job for me.

If you want to sync playlists etc from itunes there is a programme called doubletwist which will do the job for you.

nmesisca

R28 wrote: »

I've not had any problems with playing music on Android. Sure the bog standard music player that comes with it isn't very flashy but there's some great music apps you can download. I personally use tunewiki which does the job for me.

If you want to sync playlists etc from itunes there is a programme called doubletwist which will do the job for you.

search for "rockon" on the Android Market. His "3" player is a real work of beauty! brilliant.

bionic.laura

Got the SE Xperia X10 at the weekend and I love it. I've never had a smartphone before so I have nothing to compare it to. I downloaded the media transfer for the mac from SE's website and set up a phone playlist in itunes. I then synced the playlist with the phone with no problems. It will also sync your podcasts. The player is very nice easy to use and the sound quality was great. No complaints at all.
The phone itself is fabulous, I'm loving android and SE's timescape.

R28

nmesisca wrote: »

search for "rockon" on the Android Market. His "3" player is a real work of beauty! brilliant.

Wow. It is a thing of beauty. Thanks for that!

flynnduism

Just trying out "3" now

Best android music app I've seen, really great!

jonseyblub

Thanks for all the advice everybody. I think I'll go for the Desire when it comes out on O2. Could I ask maybe one more question. Is it possible in any of these apps to download podcasts directly from the phone or does it need to be done on computer first?

R28

jonseyblub wrote: »

Thanks for all the advice everybody. I think I'll go for the Desire when it comes out on O2. Could I ask maybe one more question. Is it possible in any of these apps to download podcasts directly from the phone or does it need to be done on computer first?

Google Listen and Doggcatcher allow you to do download podcasts directly on to the phone. Doesn't have quite the number of podcasts that you can get from itunes but more and more podcasts are being added all the time.

ceejay

+1 for TuneWiki, but must check out this "3" player.

For podcasts there are several good apps - personally I use ACast. They download direct to your phone, no PC required.

Zagato

nmesisca wrote: »

search for "rockon" on the Android Market. His "3" player is a real work of beauty! brilliant.

Thanks for that, it looks great; I'm looking forward to showing it off to my iPhone wielding buddies at the weekend

nmesisca

Zagato wrote: »

Thanks for that, it looks great; I'm looking forward to showing it off to my iPhone wielding buddies at the weekend

no thanks needed..
..just remember to take a picture of their faces :P

bionic.laura

Thanks for the recommend. That player is very sweet.