I keep reading about the mythical 3.0 alpha build which was given out during the empeg meet. I wish people would stop, as the gnashing of my teeth at the fact that I live one mile away and was actually at home for half an hour during the event and yet didn't stop by is wearing away my molars. Rob, do you happen to have a CD left lying around in the house, and would being present in spirit make me eligible for it?

Anyway, my question is if the fact that the team are apparently working on version 3 means that there will be no bug fix release of version 2? Of course I very much appreciate that they are still supporting the software at all, only the tuner part of version 2 is so buggy that it's quite useless for my situation; I can't listen to the radio at all because of the bugs in the tuner code. It'd be great if the team could try to fix at least the major ones (not being able to seek and not being able to turn off AF) and release a bug fix release of version 2 quickly, so that it won't matter if it takes a long time before a public beta of version 3 is released.

Of course the easiest solution is to just give me the source code, I'll fix it for you.

Can anyone from empeg, or otherwise in the know, comment?

release a bug fix release of version 2 quickly, so that it won't matter if it takes a long time before a public beta of version 3

Interesting point - I think on balance it would be better for us to be up and running with (a useable) 3.0 earlier rather than later, so as to maybe 'lead the charge' on new code development, instead of getting left behind. Or something.

Im thinking of downgrading to B13 to get me tuner working again.

Hey, Pepijn, I was wandering why you weren't there.
You're lucky enough to live in Amersfoort and you still didn't show up!

I haven't tried the tuner at all with v3.00-alpha3, but supposedly
some of the code in this release is actually older than in v2.00,
and the tuner code was mentioned by Rob as an example.

He also said that you're probably better off with the older tuner code
than with the latest stable release.

Pim

In reply to:

---

Interesting point - I think on balance it would be better for us to be up and running with (a useable) 3.0 earlier rather than later, so as to maybe 'lead the charge' on new code development, instead of getting left behind.

---

I agree, but I'm a programmer and I know my bugs, and I would guess that these two bugs have a very simple cause and could be fixed quickly, without taking much time away from developing on 3.0.

In reply to:

---

I'm thinking of downgrading to B13 to get me tuner working again.

---

Me too, and it would be a shame if it would have to come to that!

Sure, but then the results still have to be verified, and it all adds up.

In reply to:

---

I was wandering why you weren't there.
You're lucky enough to live in Amersfoort and you still didn't show up!

---

Tell me about it... It couldn't be helped, but next year I'm disconnecting my phone and not reading my email for a month in advance so nothing can come between me and the next meet...

I don't see why downgrading would be such a bad thing, Beta13 was bloody good. In fact I still have B13 and an old version of Hijack on my main machine, I've never had any problems so I'm in no hurry to move to 2.0final. I do have 3alpha and the latest hijack on my spare though but I haven't given it nearly as good a going over.

In fact I still have B13 and an old version of Hijack on my main machine, I've never had any problems so I'm in no hurry to move to 2.0final.

I waved a rusty fork over a severed serial cable and am running the results of whatever bits it generated.

In reply to:

---

I waved a rusty fork over a severed serial cable and am running the results of whatever bits it generated.

---

What does that mean?

What does that mean?

Well, I assume you downloaded what you're running, or got it from a CD...

In reply to:

---

I don't see why downgrading would be such a bad thing

---

Beta 13 doesn't have (useable) AF support, which I can live without but it's a pain in the butt to have to switch stations so many times. My commute is 100 km's with no radio masts nearby so I have to change frequencies a lot...

Of course none of this matters terribly, the empeg is still a fantastic machine and as I said I'm very grateful to the empeg guys for continuing to support the empeg like this in their spare time. It would just be nice to have a release in which all the features work, instead of having to pick which one doesn't...

Sorry I still don't get it. I have a copy of V3 because I attended the euro meet.

Sorry I still don't get it.

A joke. Apparently not a very good one.

I thought b13 had functional AF support, I thought it was 2 final that broke it.

In reply to:

---

I thought b13 had functional AF support, I thought it was 2 final that broke it.

---

Well, it sort of works in B13, but the way it works is that when the signal strength becomes too low, it scans all the alternenate frequencies to look for a stronger signal. This can take up to a second or two, during which the sound is muted. In my case the stations I listen to have adequate reception along my commute, but lower than the empeg's threshold, so it does a sweep about once every minute. You can image that this gets very annoying, very quickly, especially since I mostly listen to talk radio.

2.0 final has better AF in that it looks for stronger stations continually in the background, but it has other problems that make it equally useless in my specific case.

Me too, and it would be a shame if it would have to come to that!

I already did that few months ago.
Personally, I woudl be happy with both solutions: quick fix to 2.0 and later release of 3beta, or quicker release of 3beta (including tuner fixed). Honeslty, which ever could happen first would be my favorite.
Whatever fixes the radio problems and allows me to keep staying updated with latest player softwar would make me happy. I really hope 3beta does not have the same problems as 2final, since that woudl mean that I have to stay with beta13 and not enjoy the fun of having better and better sw, which is on of the great things of empeg, of course.

Anyway, Mark's latest releases of hijack should come with a fix of the radio problem. I did not have the chance to test it yet because I am stll waiting for my new car, and my empeg now is at home waiting to be installed. Did any of you tested if latest Hijack solveds the problem of radio station "random" switching ?

2.0 is pretty much a dead branch. 3.0 is our live trunk which is also used for current products, so it's much easier to justify working on it. When we have released our seven new products we'll be able to find the time to merge the 2.0 fixes to 3.0, fix the problems that alpha testers have found (such as the disk never spinning down), and release that as Beta. Then we can address bugs in 3.0.

Nobody has ever succeeded in squashing RDS bugs, though. Maybe it's a black art. We certainly put a lot of effort into it for 2.0 are were incredibly disappointed that it was still broken.

Rob

Good job too, otherwise I wouldn't be able to organise next year's meet!

Robert David Schofield (and yes, I copyrighted it first, the buggers)

That's correct: B11 (INI bug) and B13 were good AF/RDS. 2.0 busted AF, but RDS seemed OK to me.

Good, one of the few things I managed to remember correctly.

Nobody has ever succeeded in squashing RDS bugs, though. Maybe it's a black art. We certainly put a lot of effort into it for 2.0 are were incredibly disappointed that it was still broken.

Just thinking... Is it possible that RDS is being used differently in different countries? Here in Italy I notice that all radio stations want to use RDS, still none seems to be using them properly or fairly. You get traffic info rds signal that makes your cd player stop and switch to the radio, and all you get is commercials. Also, we have a real chaos concerning frequencires. Same frequencies being used by different stations as you move just few km, rds clocks never properly set, and so on. I would not be surprised if the alternate frequency list is poorly compiled/updated.
As a matter of fact, however, the empeg is the only radio unit I had that switches stations randomly, so I guess besides RDS mess we have here, something else must be brocken. My father's Golf (brand new), which I am driving in these days, has the standard basic radio/casset player VWs come with, and the RDS seems to be working decently...