The file would grow during recording, but I could not get anything to play the resulting WAV file. I tried WinAmp, Windows Media Player, Xbox Media Center, and even the radioSHARKs built in player. Actually you are stuck with WMA because if I tried to record to WAV, it always resulted in an unplayable WAV file. Either way, you are stuck with WMA or WAV. Maybe they were worried about codec installation or maybe the legal ramifications. RadioSHARK only records in Windows Media (WMA) and, theoretically, raw WAV (AIFF and AAC on the Mac), but not MP3. Each of the presets are put into a drop down list box in the order they are entered and no way to reorganize them. First, I had to select “New Preset”, enter the station name and frequency in the new dialog box, then click ok and repeated the process for each station.It’s a poor way to enter information, but usable. For the 8 stations I listen to, this took about 5 minutes, mostly because I made mistakes, but also because the interface is not the easiest to use. Why doesn’t the PC? Next up, I decided to set a bunch of presets. Looking at the Mac GUI in the manual, it looks like they have tic marks and time indicators. So if you want to go back 10 minutes, you have to guess at how far that is on the slider bar. Second, on the GUI front, the time shifting slider doesn’t tell you how far back you’ve gone when moving the slider. It’s interesting to note that when you exit the preferences screen, the audio buffer resets. It’s probably just my personal preference, but I like the Tivo model of Time Shifting better. It’s a bit disconcerting to rewind through All Things Considered and suddenly hear Nickel Back. With the radioSHARK, the buffer keeps going, even through station switches. First, on the Tivo, if you switch channels, the buffer resets itself. I assume it has to do with the buffering and playback, but on a P4-2.8 HT box with SATA drives, this sound glitch is just absurd. It was also annoying because when TimeShifting was on, the audio stutter became more pronounced. A quick trip to the preferences (after figuring out how to get to it), I enabled TimeShifting and hit pause again. It turns out that the PC (and maybe Mac) version has TimeShifting disabled by default. I pressed the button again and still nothing. I pressed the pause button and waited for the audio to stop. That brought up a sub-window to the GUI that had a pause button, fast forward and rewind arrows, and two additional buttons that I later decided were ‘skip to beginning’ and ‘skip to end’ (which weren’t documented). On the radioSHARK GUI, there was a button labeled TS, which I correctly assumed meant TimeShift and pressed.
It’s a brilliant concept that I picture being integrated into the majority of consumer electronics in the future. For those not familiar with the concept, ReplayTV and Tivo pioneered the idea of allowing their users pause, rewind, and when applicable, fast-forward by displaying saved video instead of the live feed.
Of course, the first thing I had to do was TimeShift. The radioSHARK worked, just not that well. I noticed that my entire system reset when I tried to look at the size of audio buffer. I noticed the three crashes that the app had in the first four hours. Audio seemed to be poppy, interrupted with just barely perceptible stutters in audio that would come and go.
Then I started to notice the radioSHARKs flaws. I laughed as All Things Considered talked about the presidential election. I giggled like a schoolgirl when I discovered the ability to time-shift live audio almost like my Tivo. I was enthralled by the scheduler, setting up shows to record. I said I wanted to love the radioSHARK, and at first I did. I was impressed how easy it was because Griffin Technology is primarily a Mac company and I was testing on a Windows XP box. Let’s just say I plug it into my PC, dropped in the CD, and 5 minutes later, I was listening to the local NPR station through my computer speakers in all its poppy glory. A quick trip to the Apple store and I had this little fin-shaped wonder. So when I heard about the radioSHARK I was excited. I’m a big fan of radio and I’ve been disappointed that it took so long for a company to develop and AM/FM turner for the PC. I wanted to love the radioSHARK from Griffin Technology, I really did.
0 kommentar(er)
