The service lets me upload my music collection, and that's the key part of the service. I get MY music. Not a streaming service based around my music selections. As I write this, I'm listening to my 'Good Tunes' playlist that's around 800 songs strong. I updated it this week with a few new songs on my computer. But those songs are now available on my phone, my ipad, my alarm clock (an old phone), my TV, and any computer that I log into. The only place that didn't end up working out was my car. I wanted to put my old Nexus 6 in there and it ALMOST worked.
I successfully connected my Nexus 6 to my Fusion and used it with Android Auto. I had my full Google Music collection and the full Google Maps instead of the Ford Navigation system. Buuuuuuutt... having that phone connected as an Android Auto device made it so that my real phone (my Pixel XL 2) does NOT connect to my car. So if I were to receive any phone calls or texts while driving, I would have no way to see who was calling or seeing the text without grabbing the phone or pulling over. And while getting the music through Google Music was nice, it was now a pain to get back out to the regular radio and I actually listen to the radio about half the time I'm driving in the city. So this is not an ideal solution.
Google Music is a full on Go, but it just wasn't going to work in the car. I could at least ditch iTunes as my everyday listening device on the computer and start using the Google Play Music Desktop player. But the more I got into Google Music everywhere else, the more I started to see the flaws of iTunes in general and the iPod Touch in particular. Yeah, it was nice that I could pull the iPod touch out of the car and back it up wirelessly, but that was still pulling it out of the car. It wasn't the dream of updating it anywhere and everywhere, which is the dream I want. Even if it requires a WiFi signal, I can MAKE a WiFi signal with my phone! But nope... it can only do that if all songs are purchased via iTunes and it won't sync up all my playlists. And then there are the constant 'upgrades'. I swear to God, each damned update would make my iPod touch run slower and slower. It got to the point that just skipping to the next track took 4 seconds. Now that doesn't sound like all that much, but count it out in your head. The song you're listening to ends, and the next one starts. You don't want to hear that one so you hit 'next' to skip it. One. Two. Three. Four. And no, you don't want to hear this one either. One Two Three. Nope, not that one either. One. Two. Three. Four. Hmm... this one sounds kind of... well, no I'm not in the mood for this one so... One. Two. Three. Four... Fuck all this is taking way too long.
And then to throw salt on the wound of my hate, one update made it so that the damned ipod would go into a semi permanent pause mode whenever the power would go out in the car. Here's how it should work; I turn the car on, the audio system boots up, and it starts playing the iPod where it left off when I turned it off. If I turn it to the radio, I simply change the input and listen to some NPR, then minutes later change the input back to the iPod and it just picks up where I left off. No fuss, no muss. But this 'update' made it so that I would have to turn the car, wait for the audio system to boot up, then hit the damned play button. This is an extra royal pain if I'm backing up as the audio controls are on the same screen where the backup camera is displayed. So backing up... no turning on the fucking music.
Fucking iPod.
And then it just started to act wonky. I'd use the voice commands to change playlists, and it would act like it changed playlists, but it wouldn't. It would just blissfully continue playing my 'Drive' playlist. So I'd tell it to play a single song (Minority by Green Day), and it would start playing that song. After playing that song, it SHOULD then go into a list of ALL songs, but it would then just be in a list of about 500 songs that would be near that song playing alphabetically. So I'd then have to go back into a playlist... but it would then not even acknowledge the 'Drive' playlist that it was just playing. I'd tell it to play a genre of music and it would go to a particular genre.. but not the genre I asked for. And trust me, when I ask for Classic Rock and I get Country, I am NOT happy about it's decision.
So getting rid of the iPod was becoming a necessity. I looked into the possibility of just using a thumb drive, but that's evidently a sore spot for Ford Sync systems. They evidently don't like playlists on those and no software system seems to play nice with it. I did find an English blog that found a work around, but it required four pieces of software, a little bit of coding, and some spreadsheet manipulation.
Fuck that noise.
As far as I'm concerned that wasn't even worth trying. That left me with two options; Connection my phone every single time I got into my car (a pain) so that I could use Android Auto properly or buying a cheap MP3 player with some sort of external storage solution that could at least get me up to 16 Gigs (I have about 14 Gigs of music now, but the players always take up some of the storage themselves). I had hoped with Apple leaving the market that a bunch of companies would be rushing in to fill the void, but it seems that the only people rushing in are cheap Chinese iPod knockoffs and Sandisk. Sandisk isn't bad... I use a lot of their storage devices... but their clip MP3 players only got up to 16 Gigs and are considered 'cheap' at best with shoddy playback. Not exactly what I'm looking for in my car. They're not going after audiophiles at all, instead they're targeting fitness people that plan on destroying their cheap plastic toys and don't mind buying a new one at $10.
But that word made me remember something I saw a few months back... audiophiles. Wasn't there something a few months back about some old rocker pushing HiFi Audio and a new HiFi portable player? It turns out it was a few years ago and that particular player was entirely too expensive and really turned out to be trash... but it DID start a trend. High end Digital Music Players for audiophiles specializing in HiFi music!
Now most of these players go for over $1000 and I'm not dropping that much into a replacement for an iPod.. but their 'entry level' players are a far more reasonable $200. And it turns out when you're talking about a player specializing in high end audio, an entry level product is still a pretty damned nice product!
I was looking between several devices all around $200. Most of them were from brands that I'd never heard of, but they all made products that sold for over $1000 and some made products north of $3000. I figured if they could get $3000 for a set of speakers, they probably knew what they were doing in making an MP3 player. I mean, seriously, if it can play a FLAC file flawlessly, it can certainly play an 128bit MP3 as good as an iPod right? I through out any brands that were based on Android as I didn't want any chance of it activating Android Auto but that still left several to choose from.
Sadly, it came down to brand name. The reviews had them all about the same, they all felt good in the hand, they all sounded good, the user experiences was good, they had extra features I wouldn't use... they were fine. So rather than seeing what Fiio, or Pono, or Cowon, or Astell & Kern were all about, I went with Sony. I went with the Sony Walkman NW-A45/B. It's the refresh for 2018.
I won't got into all the details... suffice it to say that it has 16 Gigs of storage and a Micro SD slot with storage capability up to 400 Gigs. It'll play any audio format I know of plus so many more.
I got it from Amazon the other day and got to play with it a bit today. It unfortunately won't be any better than the iPod when it comes to getting music onto it. I'll have to use another piece of software that doesn't play well with Google Music. I had to convert my purchased music from iTunes again (thankgod I bought that program back in December!). And when I add music to my collection, I'll have to download it, add it to that software, and then sync it to the walkman specifically. A pain when compared to the ease of adding it to a Google Music playlist and immediately having it available everywhere else.
I did get some music on it and a couple playlists then hooked it up to Isabela... and as it started playing I noticed one thing that I had forgotten: Sony makes the stereo on Fords. !!!
With all the reading on high end audio, one thing I got down pat was that the listening experience is improved if you have a good connection between each and every piece. From the original sound file, to the player to the DAC, to the amp, to the speaker. Now obviously in a car, the DAC, amp, and speakers are all basically one component, controlled by one manufacturer. In this case... Sony. And now, Sony controls the player too. They control everything except for the source files. And it DOES make a difference!
The songs with Bass are Bassier. The songs that hit, are hittier. The songs that rock are rockier. The songs that are loud are loudier... well, I guess louder. But everything is just MORE! I think the best example is The Lumineers' Stubborn Love. It's a great song and I really love it. On my old computer speakers (my Bose Companion IIs) I could barely hear that there was a female singer that would come in and sing with the male singer for parts. I'd get the chorus, but not much else. Here... take a listen to the official video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJWk_KNbDHo
Now watch a Live@Home track and watch 'her' and see how much she actually comes in a sings. Admittedly her voice is MUCH louder in this track, but it just shows how much she actually sings in the song.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cXhlpq9I_is
The difference between her voice in the official video and the live@home video is the difference between the iPod in my car and the Walkman in my car. It's night and day. I get SO much more out of nearly EVERY song on the Walkman. And I"m not even playing with HiFi soundfiles! Some of my MP3s are low level files that I downloaded in 1997. They're freaking 21 years old!!!!
To say I'm happy with the purchase is underselling the joy I'm currently experiencing. Seriously. If this thing could hook up with Google Music and download the playlists and songs automatically it would be perfection personified.
Now if I can just get rid of the iPad, I could be free of Apple all together!
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