My first days with a Windows 8 phone

[e000r1w2]

Spare Phone Tech support told me that the APP on the phone and the Google chat email address must be the same to push incoming calls. Mine were different but correcting them hasn't solve the problem.

Note: I read in the comment section for the Spare Phone App in the Windows Phone Store, that the app will not work after Google tightens their app structure in May.

 

[whs]

I posted the incoming call question on the Google Voice forum. We'll see whether I get a useful answer. If that does not work, I'll try the Android forum guys.

I hope it will still work after Mai, we'll see. Maybe someone just wanted to scare us.

 

[Tepid]

Google is still pissed at MS. So, yeah, they (google) are trying really hard to sever all ties and block all their services form WP.
It's won't serve them well in the long run.

 

[whs]

Let's hope they have second thoughts on that. My W8P VoIP is tagged onto an Android Nexus7 account. Maybe they will spare that.

 

[whs]

Another good day with my W8P. I installed the Pocket File Manager - cost me the fortune of $1.99, LOL.

That is what I call a file manager. Very logical structure and I can very easily get to all my files, including the files on the SD card. The system files are hidden and that is OK. You don't want to delete one of those inadvertently. But deleting any user file is a breeze.

I now have to explore the more advanced functions. But the basics are already worth the investment. Now I can put more stuff on my 32GB SD card.

 

[Tepid]

I agree about Pocket File Manager
The FTP server is pretty cool too. But it will disconnect when you leave the app,, that's ok,, cause it can be a security risk
I just wish I could access my Office Files from it as well. Such as OneNote and other docs in the Office Hub.
However, you do have access to the cloud services

I do think that the Pocket File Manager is one of the best out there. And getting Better, but I have not tried them all.

 

[whs]

All I want is on my SD card. I have stuff in Skydrive but those are not files I would use on the phone.

I have, however, discovered another problem. The W8P PowerPoint can display the PP files but it cannot play the sound - neither embedded music nor embedded narration. I wonder how that can be fixed.

 

[Tepid]

Huh, that's not cool. Maybe that will get fixed in WP8.1.
I tried also making them Auto run, but that didn't work either.

 

[whs]

Huh, that's not cool. Maybe that will get fixed in WP8.1.
I tried also making them Auto run, but that didn't work either.

Yeah that's really a good one. I shot myself into the knee by using this smart trick for my PP presentations:

PowerPoint – Embed MP3 files - Windows 7 Help Forums

I guess I outsmarted myself. Normal PowerPoint can easily deal with those files but the retarded W8P PowerPoint does not seem to be able to deal with it. I tried a .ppsx file with .wav music and that works. This is too bad because all my PP shows use .mp3 files. The good part though, for normal music, .mp3 files work.

 

[e000r1w2]

I posted the incoming call question on the Google Voice forum. We'll see whether I get a useful answer. If that does not work, I'll try the Android forum guys.

WHS,

I now have Spare Phone working for both incoming and outgoing calls. To make it work both google voice and Spare Phone must use the same gmail address. Make sure you have a google voice phone number, then on the google voice page, click your phone number, box that opens will show Google Chat info, make sure the box is checked and your gmail address correct. Above the Google chat box you will see the phone number you gave to get the google voice phone number, make sure the three boxes underneath your forwarding number are each checked. Close out google voice and your should be good to go. Only problem I see is your forwarding number tends to ring before Windows Phone, which can be problematic if your forwarding number goes to voicemail before Windows phone rings. See if it works for you.

 

[whs]

Thanks a lot. I will try that again.

 

[Tepid]

Thanks for that tutorial WHS, not sure I will use it, but it's good info none the less.
Could come in handy some day.

 

[whs]

Thanks for that tutorial WHS, not sure I will use it, but it's good info none the less.
Could come in handy some day.

See my comment in the tutorial thread about a little caveat I just found out.

 

[whs]

There is another interesting detail I found in the W8P. I made myself a playlist of music files (just a folder with a bunch of files) hoping they would play one after the other - but no deal. Those were all WMA files. I later found out that it works perfectly with MP3 files. Go figure.

Another problem I had with the videos. I converted a bunch of FLV videos to WMV using Format Factory so that I could play them on the phone. They appeared a WMV but the bitrate was all screwed up. I could play them on the desktop but they would not run on the phone. A second conversion with Freemake fixed the problem.

 

[Tepid]

There is another interesting detail I found in the W8P. I made myself a playlist of music files (just a folder with a bunch of files) hoping they would play one after the other - but no deal. Those were all WMA files. I later found out that it works perfectly with MP3 files. Go figure.

Hmmm, I will have to check this out as well.
But, you can add music files to the now playing list and save that a a Playlist.
Strange about WMA's... I have all MP3's on the phone, but I have some WMA's, will check it out...
Also, check out

Windows Phone app for desktop (Preview 3) | Windows Phone 8 | Windows Phone How-to | Windows Phone (United States)

It has some growing to do, and hopefully it will get developed on further.

Another problem I had with the videos. I converted a bunch of FLV videos to WMV using Format Factory so that I could play them on the phone. They appeared a WMV but the bitrate was all screwed up. I could play them on the desktop but they would not run on the phone. A second conversion with Freemake fixed the problem.

This may have been the fault of the Format Factory.
I haven't done a lot of testing with video formats on my WP. I will see what I can figure out also.


EDIT:
Ok,, I was able to play WMA's with no issue.
One thing you may have to make sure of is that the ID Tags are setup properly.
I use Mp3tag - the universal Tag Editor (ID3v2, MP4, OGG, FLAC, ...)

I did more testing and deleted all ID3 Tag info
After the first song it took about a minute, but it did advance,, then they started advancing without issue after that
So, I did not have any problems after that with WMA's not playing the next song in the Unknown Artists list.
Also. they played just fine with all the ID3Tag info included
However, you have to make sure the tags are proper and that you are actually playing the songs from that folder
If the Album and Artist info is included, they will show up under diofferen't locations based on how you are sorting

You might be aware of this, but I will post it anyway.....
Say you drop 3 files (WMA, MP3, doesn't matter) in one folder, If the ID3Tag is configured for different albums and whatnot
It will only play the ones for that album, if that is where you sorted from and started playing from.
If you run from Songs List, then they should advance as normal.
If not,t here could be an issue with the files, or the player, but I did not have any issues after that first delay with WMA's

Side note: I converted an MP3 to a WAV with CDex and copied it over to my phone,
it prompted and I accepted to Auto Convert the file, It converted to a WMA file on it's own.

I converted an mp4 video to a WMV video and copied it over to the Video Folder
I was able to play it without issue as well.

Video... I used Freemake to convert an FLV to WMV that I downloaded from youtube
Copied it over to the Video folder and had no issues playing it.

I do not like Freemake though.

I personally recommend Download Mobile Media Converter
You can get the Portable Version and not have to install anything.
It will extract what it need to your Temp folder
But, there is no crapware bundled into it, and no ad's, very clean and works.

This app doesn't appear as powerful as it acutally is
It uses FFmpeg as it's converter and is mainly just a frontend GUI for that
If you are familiar with FFmpeg command line syntax, you can do almost anything with this app.
The advanced settings are under the Conversion to: Add and Remove Profiles
There are about 31+ different profiles, and you may (I have not searched)
be able to find custom ones if anyone has made any for this for download.
However, the Youtube download function does not work in Mobile Media Converter.

However,, one issue I have with FLV's is that they are really low quality.
If I want to save and convert a video, I want the highest res format I can get.
Generally from youtube that is about 720P using DownloadHelper in FF.

So I found this,,, Download Youtube Downloader HD
I use the Portable Version and can d/l 1080P videos from youtube.
Generally MP4's, so no need to convert.

 

[whs]

This may have been the fault of the Format Factory

This was definitely a Format Factory fault.

Regarding the WMAs - that's not a problem. Convering the files to MP3 was a breeze. My i7 loves tasks like that, LOL. But anyhow, in single file the WMAs play well.

I met the WAV conversion too. That is very strange because WAV id a MS codec. You would think they support it. WAV is lossless and for the little speaker it may make no difference. But if I play symphonies on quality speakers, you can notice the difference.

Right, Freemake is good. WMVs play well. Have not tried MP4s yet.

I'll have a look at those converters but I do not really need anything very sophisticated. But thanks for the tips.

I now got Word working too. That is handy because I have link files in Word. That way I can easily get into my TV and Radio channels.

 

[Tepid]

You should check out OneNote and get familiar with it.
It's a breeze to configure and synch automatically through Office 2013 OneNote and OneDrive.
It does work as well as Word to synch to phones. But I like the organization a lot more in OneNote.

 

[Tepid]

Going back to Audio Files
WMA is a Lossless format, and I think MS are trying to get away from WAV as a general audio format for music files
I am not sure about the differences in lossless formats. Maybe you can get them converted to WMA's?
Again, I had no issues with WMA's on my phone except when I deleted all the ID3Tag info.

I would definitely recommend adding the ID3Tag info to all Audio files where you can anyway.

Download Windows Media Encoder 9 Series from Official Microsoft Download Center

BTW, it says that the Media Encorder 9 is not compatible with Win7, but I can tell you it works on Win8.1 without issue.

 

[whs]

Thanks for all the good info. I think you are right, I should have a closer look at OneNote. That was always the stepchild in Office.

I am a big PowerPoint fan (see here) and I know Word pretty well. But Excel and OneNote were never on my radar screen.

 

[essenbe]

I am hereby subscribing to this thread. There is a lot of good information here, at least the little I understand is good. I am waiting on MS to deliver my W8 Lumia 521. As much as I am embarrassed to admit it, this will be my first smart phone and I am not sure what to expect. And yes, I am aware this is kind of the bottom of the barrel when it comes to smart Phones, but it will be great for me. I have no intention of connecting it with T Mobile. The service where I live and need it is almost non existent. So, I'm sure I will have a lot of fun trying to 'fix' that issue. Hope I can learn much here, and already have.