Change to lesson downloads
johnb
April 21, 2011, 02:52 AM posted in General DiscussionHello all,
This is just a quick note to tell everyone that we've changed the available lesson downloads, removing the "Radio Quality" MP3. We've done this for a couple reasons, namely because bandwidth is no longer the issue that it was years ago when we started offering two different versions of the lesson audio, and because offering two versions of the same file was consistently confusing. Thus we've decided to offer only the high quality file.
If your feed settings are currently set to download the radio quality you will continue to receive the radio quality MP3, as we will continue to produce the file for the time being (though this may change in the future).
chris
I'm inclined to agree - download speeds for those of us in China are generally disappointing at best, which can mean waiting upwards of 15-20mins to download just one audio file (although admittedly speeds seem to have improved in the last couple of years, at least in Shanghai). This is the primary reason I only ever download the smaller radio files.
bodawei
April 21, 2011, 10:01 AMConsultation would have been useful.. ??
I cannot hear any difference between radio quality and CD quality so the change means a waste of time and space for me - after testing this a couple of times I always used the smaller file when working on the site. The higher quality is wasted on my ears I'm afraid (just my view.)
I don't follow one of the arguments for the change: I wonder how the two different qualities could be 'consistently confusing'? You identify them as 'Radio' and 'CD', and give the size of the files. I can understand some initial confusion for some people maybe, but 'consistently' suggests that people (how many I wonder?) never get it sorted out in their minds. I suddenly feel better about my technical ability. :) Maybe you mean that all of your new customers are thrown by it when they visit the site first?
I note Chris's comment above about Shanghai - where I live you have a choice of three speeds, and I buy the middle one. I think bandwidth maybe is an issue for some of your customers. But even if bandwidth isn't, maybe storage space on their MP3s is？
calkins
April 21, 2011, 10:40 AMDoes this mean that Qing Wen and Newbie lessons are no longer free to non-subscribers?
calkins
Disregard my comment. I just looked at a QW and see that non-subscribers can still listen (on site), just can't download the Radio-quality mp3 (obviously since it's not available now). Makes sense.
watyamacallit
April 21, 2011, 10:46 AMMy iPod is full with Chinese Pod podcasts, and it is always a struggle knowing what to keep, and what to toss.
Now you are telling me I will only be able to store half the number of podcasts on my iPod.
So unlike the others, this is something I feel strongly about.
I have not been able to discern any difference in quality between the two formats.
Could you let everyone know how many unsolicited complaints you have received regarding this apparent confusion.
cdcjripodtouch
What I did for my ipodtouch ( assuming that chinesepod wouldn't be coming out with the radio quality)....under itunes I would go to the import cd preference and then just choose a lower bit rate after that right click on the mp3 then choose create AAC version it will then create a 50-60% compressed version( normally you won't know the difference) after that I then copy the AAC version on to my ipod and with re: to the mp3 version I store it externally USB Flash drive and that's it.....saved my pc some space along with my ipodtouch....
Pirmin
April 21, 2011, 11:34 AMI would be interested to know how many users really were confused by the choice between radio quality and CD quality files.
I really would prefer to keep the smaller files instead of the big CD ones, they are too difficult for me to download and take too much space.
fordbronco
April 21, 2011, 12:27 PMI've listened to other podcasts that were encoded at 32 kbps. That's when I really noticed the difference in quality. However there are so many other factors involved, e.g. studio equipment, encoder, etc. The radio quality ones sounded great to me. You'd have to intentionally introduce noise in the encoding to make any noticeable difference between your radio and CD versions, at least with my ears which I consider to be pretty good.
ashp
April 22, 2011, 03:43 PMNOOOO! Keep the smaller files! Radio quality is fine. CD quality is unnecessary.
watyamacallit
April 23, 2011, 12:12 AMFirstly, since Chinese Pod seems to be unwilling to respond to these comments, does anyone know of a free resource that will reduce the size of mp3s?
Secondly, I would like to make a suggestion: Please run a poll before making future changes to the site. Present users with the poll once when they login, and require that it be answered before completing the login.
Judging by the comments, had a poll been run on this matter the Conservatives would have won in a landslide. Does Chinese Pod have it within them to admit they got it wrong?
cinnamonfern
April 23, 2011, 01:22 AMGosh, I wish I'd paid more attention when I set up the account. I'd have picked the smaller file sizes to start with. It would save me some space now on my crowded i-Pod nano. Too much hassle to go through and redownload everything though.
cdcjripodtouch
If you synced your cpod thru itunes and not manually managed it you can then still right click and compress it using lower bitrate option in your itunes library then synchronize it with your nano......it will save you some space by around 50%++
cinnamonfern
Mmm...but it makes a copy and moves it to the music folder. I'd like to keep them in the podcasts section. To do that I guess I'd have to manually replace the old files with the new compressed files. I guess that might doable.
chris
Hi cinnamonfern, this is obviously all down to personal preference, but just to share my own experience....if i recall correctly it was around the end of 08 when i realised that my religious downloading of every lesson as it came out was maxing out my ipod. I realised that at any one time I'm probably only actively studying a handful of lessons/podcasts, so what I've done since then is just to keep those handful of 'active' podcasts on my ipod. I then use Chinesepod website itself as my master database, as it were. If I subsequently need to go back to a podcast that is not currently active, I just download it next time i'm online and then remove it from itunes again when I've finished. By doing this it helps keep my ipod and itunes libraries themselves quite clean with only a max of 10 or so podcasts at anyone time.
Of course, this strategy doesn't work too well if one rarely has the opportunity to get online (in which case it's probably more convenient to have all podcasts on your harddrive/itunes library). Also, if, heaven forbid, anything happened to the chinesepod website, there is of course the risk that you'd lose the podcasts if you don't have them separately backed up somewhere.
Anyway, just my two pence worth :-) chris
cinnamonfern
Well, I've already compressed and replaced all the files this afternoon. It wasn't too hard, but it took a while. And I actually do something similar. I don't keep all the podcasts on my iPod. In fact, I delete the actual podcasts that I've already listened to because I figure the odds of my listening to them ever again is minimal (except the UIs - because I just started and those are very difficult for me and completely in Chinese).
My podcasts folder is CHAOS. So when I download new lessons I relabel them based on a system I have and then put them in playlists of the dialogues and lesson reviews based on the level. When they get old and I've reviewed them zillions of times, I move them to a different playlist for old dialogues and reviews. So if I really do run out of room, I can take the old ones off the iPod, but I haven't needed to do that yet. (Though I have removed all the Newbie reviews because I don't really need to go over those anymore.) And I still magically have room for music, not that I listen to it because I'm too busy reviewing podcasts... :P
chris
haha, I can totally relate to the second half of your last sentence!
bodawei
April 23, 2011, 02:51 PMI've noticed two problems in the past couple of days and I wonder if or how they are related to the switch to 'high quality' files? First, I am unable to listen to the lessons directly from the site, which I used to do 95% of the time, because the sound is broken up, as though it is buffering. Second, my i-Tunes downloads are unsuccessful about half the time; they end in an error message. Sometimes when I refresh it they complete the download, sometimes they don't.
I checked my preferences and apparently I have always had the i-Tunes downloads set to high quality (it doesn't actually say 'CD' and 'radio' in the preferences - just that the high quality one is optimised for iPod.) So maybe it is a recent problem with Internet speed. Never had this problem before; maybe the timing of the removal of the lower quality option on the site is coincidental.
johnb
I just responded to your PM on the same topic, but since you asked here too... the problems are almost certainly coincidental. We're continuing to publish the lower quality file for the time being to make sure such issues don't crop up, and so the on-site player is using the same file it was a few days ago, and your feed downloads are downloading the same files they were a few days ago as well.
bodawei
Thanks for the quick response John, my you work late!
Agree with that except that I am now obliged to use the CD quality on the site - I never used this before. So the on-site player is not using the same file as before; I always used the radio quality before.
You are right about the downloads to iTunes - they are the same files as before. That is why I wondered if my problems (with my iTunes downloads at least) are coincidental.
hamshank
April 21, 2011, 06:02 AMMy two pence worth....(for what it is worth)would be to keep the radio downloads rather than the high quality ones...
Does such a high bitrate make a lot of difference for spoken audio? In my opinion it doesn't. Also looking at the numbers, the average size of a radio lesson is around 6-7mb where as the CD quality are about 12-13...Over 1000 downloads that is about 6GB which is still a considerable chunk.
Having said all that, it is not something I feel strongly about, just thought I would chirp in.