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Media player in 8.0 actually got worse (for local music)

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...so perhaps Tesla purposely disconnected Gracenotes from some or all services with 8.0 -- but then again, they never really said it was a feature we should expect except IIRC seeing a credit being given to Gracenotes on some obscure panel or page somewhere. ;)

While Gracenotes certainly has its challenges with not always displaying appropriate art, and I agree having something is better than nothing (BTW, SiriusXM never had album art even with 6.2 or 7.x), if Tesla did away with it completely and now just displays art if you have it embedded in the USB track per MP3 standards, the internal result for them could be saving some memory for another more important purpose (no more cached art in the fixed 2GB); less network traffic Tesla may be paying AT&T for or that interferes with the increasing amount of and more important AP data; maybe a financial saving to Tesla if they had to pay Gracenotes for fleet usage; and/or less processor cycles dealing with Gracenotes album display that our MS can use for other things including letting the CID be more responsive as some have reported with 8.0. (See how optimistic I can be? :))

...I should add FWIW that while I have always wanted my own imbedded art to display with my USB music, I have been spoiled with my MS more dynamically accessing Gracenotes for some other media sources. Every one of my former vehicles -- Lexus, BMW and MBZ had a static subset of that database installed on an internal hard disk, that was not able to be updated in most cases unless you purchased a new MY car.
 
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Sadly, the only way Tesla will make changes that owners demand is when Tesla has more competition and they start losing sales to someone like GM over self-inflicted, unforced errors of the kind it has been making lately. Steve Wozniak is selling his Model X in favor of a Chevy Bolt. According to him, it is much more practical and offers a ton more convenience features. At some point in the next couple of years, Tesla is going to start feeling the pain of not listening to its ownership base.

Possibly true, but Woz has shiny object syndrome.
 
Cover Art is also now missing from TuneIn

I noticed that. It pulled the album art from the podcasts that I had as favorites, but not from the streaming station I own. It doesn't even show the logo right now, but I was having trouble getting the main Tunein page to load today and could only access my favorites that I was able to get to Friday night when I first got the update.
 
We are currently planning to purchase a 100D to replace our classic P85 and have a reservation for a Model 3 to replace my wife's commuter ICE.

However, Tesla's software quality and limited functionality (not counting AP) has been the greatest source of frustration with our P85. And, despite the claim 8.0 was the biggest software release Tesla has made, with a revamped media player - the changes seem to be more visual than functional, and the new improved interface appears to have some usability flaws (no first letter quick scrolling?).

Until now, Tesla has been alone in offering a long range EV - that will be changing in the next few years. And when that happens, the onboard software functionality and quality could start having an impact on Tesla sales.

While we are planning to wait for a Model 3, we will take a close look at the Bolt when it comes out.

Tesla should be more proactive to anticipate the increased competition, some of the changes they could make:
  1. Officially announce a road map for planned software changes. Most of those changes aren't "proprietary", like improvements in the AP algorithms. Current and potential owners want to know - do they plan to add requested features like playlists, waypoints, route customization, online maps (instead of annual updates of already out-of-date maps), Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, improved browser performance, 3rd party app store, ...
  2. Be more open about the specific changes in the next product release - at least areas that aren't proprietary (it's understandable they would want to keep secret anything related to an unannounced hardware change).
  3. Open the beta program to allow owners to opt in or opt out
  4. And, give owners more control over the software being installed in their cars - when it is installed and what version they want to run
 
I'm also hoping for better USB support, since it's the only way to get CD-quality audio into the sound system. And I'm hoping they'll also add more robust support for larger USB devices -- I have an SSD with all my music that I plugged in to the USB port and froze my screens. Now I don't dare go larger than 32G.

All flash drives will work, I'm using a 256GB flash drive manufactured by SanDiskwithout a problem.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00YFI1A66/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o05_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I also have a 1TB USB 3.0 portable hard drive. You need to reformat as FAT32. You can't do it with Windows (which I think has a 32gb max) but rather download 3rd party tool to do so (just Google it).
 
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Still no gapless playback from USB either. I've emailed Tesla about this for a year now. Maybe I'm just being a bit OCD but I listen to lots of electronic and live rock music that should have no gap between tracks. Super annoying because the seamless transitions are so nice when you DON'T notice them
 
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Still no gapless playback from USB either. I've emailed Tesla about this for a year now. Maybe I'm just being a bit OCD but I listen to lots of electronic and live rock music that should have no gap between tracks. Super annoying because the seamless transitions are so nice when you DON'T notice them

Kinda doesn't matter if it's gapless or not if it's playing in alphabetical order instead of track order :(
 
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Kinda doesn't matter if it's gapless or not if it's playing in alphabetical order instead of track order :(
Agreed, it just keeps getting worse for us FLAC audiophiles and/or old people who just like their old school file structure to browse. I have spent years moving audio files into folders and all I care about are file names, don't give a hoot about album art or id3 tags, I just want to browse my folders and listen to my albums IN TRACK ORDER.
 
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[rant] How can they make things WORSE??? How can the album art for terrestrial radio stations disappear? Why does the logo of one station appear while that for others doesn't? Why does the logo for one station "stick" to any subsequent station that does not have a logo? Good lord, the minute BMW comes out with a 5-series pure EV I am outta here. [/rant]
 
Agreed with all the comments here.

The new interface is pretty, but they have basically implemented iTunes circa 2006 -- Cover Flow and all.

If they are truly just copying iTunes, we have another five years of this since Apple abandoned that nonsense in 2011.

Cover art navigation is great -- for example, if you only have 10 albums or if you don't know how to read.

However, the English language (with alphabetical tic navigation and all) allows a far better classification scheme.

Ugh!
 
Today I wanted to kick the media player in the face. I have a 32GB flash drive for music, and it's all FLAC, so there's not a ton on there. I wanted to listen to something starting with an R.

The Search "Anything" field, as you know, didn't work. That's a baffling lie, but whatever, I'll find it manually.

I kept scrolling down. It took forever. Occasionally it would register a scroll as a select, then I'd have to hit back and start all over because it goes back to the top of the list. Infuriating.

Also, the name of my USB drive is apparently:
\xbc\xbd\xdc\x2f\xcbk7\xce\xe0\xa2b
So that's awesome. I miss "USB1".
 
Still no gapless playback from USB either. I've emailed Tesla about this for a year now. Maybe I'm just being a bit OCD but I listen to lots of electronic and live rock music that should have no gap between tracks. Super annoying because the seamless transitions are so nice when you DON'T notice them
Me too. I've been emailing and phoning Tesla about gapless play since 2013.

Musk needs to get a shitstorm on his Twitter feed about how bad they've been doing with the media player. And the constant software regressions. This is just terrible.

Media? Media who like to bash Tesla? If you're reading this, please DO feel free to quote me and raise a huge stink about it. It seems like the only way to get Tesla's *attention*.
 
[rant] How can they make things WORSE??? How can the album art for terrestrial radio stations disappear? Why does the logo of one station appear while that for others doesn't? Why does the logo for one station "stick" to any subsequent station that does not have a logo? Good lord, the minute BMW comes out with a 5-series pure EV I am outta here. [/rant]
Back in 2013, everyone was talking about how software updates would make the car "better" over time.

I warned people that they'd probably make the car worse. Nobody believed me. Now I can say I told you so.

I'm still disappointed. Tesla can do better and should be able to do better. This is just gross incompetence.
 
Agree that the devs broke album art and how radio stations are stored. Even on TuneIn I've lost my favorites. Lastly, I now have to take over auto pilot more than I used to. Instead of trying to stay in the middle of a lane it likes to hug the left line, to the point where it drifts over the line at times. With opposing traffic in the lane to my left, hugging the right line would have been a better choice.
 
Back in 2013, everyone was talking about how software updates would make the car "better" over time.

I warned people that they'd probably make the car worse. Nobody believed me. Now I can say I told you so.

I'm still disappointed. Tesla can do better and should be able to do better. This is just gross incompetence.

I don't recall your saying that :).

Agree: terrible update. Terrible.

I hate to admit that I am resolved to simply stream from my phone because I can't imagine Tesla ever getting the media interface useable.
 
I am also super disappointed with new player - completely ruined my experience. I spent countless hours sorting the songs on my USB drive - but now everything is playing alphabetically and without ability to create a "playlist" there are only two options: alphabetical or random.