Thanks for visiting Palm Discovery

(Last edited Dec 11, 2007)

A BIG THANKS to Sammy of Palm Addicts for the mention of Palm Discovery on their front page again!

It’s about time I brought back the Essential Treo app series (the link is actually to the essential app category (I didn’t bother separating between the Treo and Palm since a lot of them work on both) since the last one was written last year Essential Treo App# 2: Pref Doctor (now renamed Reset Doctor). I recently discovered (pun intended) a program that I think all Treo owners (especially those who have a data plan or Wi-Fi) (via the Enfora Wi-Fi sled) should have. Read my Enfora Wi-Fi sled review here.

Please excuse me for another lengthy review but I feel that I should take the time to provide enough details and information to help persuade you to try what Palm Discovery considers as an essential Treo app.

Kinoma Player 4 EX is such an amazing media program that offers so much more than a media player program that unless you try it for yourself, you won’t know how much you’re missing. Unfortunately, Kinoma doesn’t offer a trial download, which is the main reason why I held out from trying it until recently. It wasn’t until I started reading so many great reviews and news about Kinoma that I started thinking about this program and decided to plunk down the money to try it for myself and see what all the “hoopla” is all about. Needless to say, I wasn’t disappointed. In fact, I was so totally blown away by what it can do.

So, I can already hear some of you ask “what’s so special about Kinoma Player 4 EX that other media players can’t do?” Well, quite simply, many other media players don’t offer nearly as much ongoing and excellent support for online media streaming that Kinoma Player 4 EX does. The last time I checked, the greatest media player that most of us use and rely on, TCPMP, doesn’t support online streams. Its successor, CorePlayer (no longer a freeware), although also doesn’t support streaming either (unbelievable, I know, considering that they’ve been talking about it for years). I unfortunately, due to such great experience with Kinoma Player 4 EX, bought the Core Player and needless to say, I’m extremely disappointed. But that’s another story which I will likely be discussing in a future review.

PocketTunes, on the other hand, does offer online streaming but only support audio streams (currently). Kinoma Player 4 EX, beats them all by offering online streaming for both audio and video. That means, if you put in the url to a media stream, you are very likely to be able to listen and watch the media stream on your Treo via Kinoma Player 4 EX even on the Treo 650. As most of us Treo 650 owners know, our Treo is not capable of receiving audio never mind video streams, well that is, until now.

While we’re on this topic, to give you an even better idea how amazing it really is, you should take into account that the majority of audio or video streams available on the internet is designed for a computer, *not* a phone, PDA and smartphones like the Treo. Most of us are aware that computers offer much more computing and processing power than our little Palm Treo smartphone. It has a lot more memory available for caching, and dealing with the high frame rates of most video streams. But yet, Kinoma Player 4 EX can still handle a good bulk of them without dropping a frame on our very underpowered Palm Treo smartphones. Of course, not every media stream can be seamlessly handled by Kinoma Player 4 EX, but considering that the engineering behind this program can allow us to view them without much of a hitch, I would say that’s quite astonishing! But, as an end user, you don’t really need to know all the technicalities. You just need to know that it works! Just enjoy the videos or music as if you were at the TV or by the radio.

Even when some broadband video stream have a high kbps rate, Kinoma can still play the audio without much problem although the video can only be displayed as frames of pictures that change from one scene to another. And, although you will notice the “insufficient bandwidth” at the bottom of the program, if you wait a while, the stream will come, albeit, the entire video stream isn’t going to be played as smoothly but it will still play. This will obviously only happen on broadband streams that normally can’t be handled by underpowered smartphones and handhelds.

For those who want to skip over all the detailed review and just want a summary, you can jump to the review summary

In my mind, what sets Kinoma Player 4 EX apart from many other media players is its enormous support for online media streams. Even a lot of video streams meant for broadband connections can still be handled by Kinoma Player 4 EX. And Kinoma is also a podcatcher application so it supports podcasts, which I am now discovering this wonderful world with amazement. Actually, what really blows me away about their program is that it can handle and bookmark rss podcast feeds.

No longer do we have to find and manually type in the url of the media link (I personally hate having to type in all those obscure letters and characters), we can simply type in the podcast feed url, bookmark it and it’s done! The next time you need to check for new podcasts from your favortie podcaster, simply click on the podcast bookmark and you will be provided with a listing of podcasts available. Wow! Now keep in mind that podcasts and related stuff are something new to me since I only recently discovered this new and wonderful world after buying Kinoma Player 4 EX. As far as I know, I am not familiar with any other media player program that supports rss feeds for podcasts. If there are other similar programs that offer this, please leave me a comment below and I’ll update the posting. Thanks!

Since I have a Treo 650, the Blazer web browser doesn’t handle podcast links very well. Actually, it handles it rather poorly. There’s no way that I can do a “right click” like I can do in Windows and copy a link, I am stuck trying to just trying to launch the link. But, I am unable to because Blazer will then tell me that it can’t download any file larger than 2 MB in size. I can’t save it and I can’t launch it. Also, considering that a lot of podcasts redirect to another hidden link it’s practically impossible to download a podcast onto the Treo even with apps like SharkDownload or Downloader as these apps require the exact link and doesn’t handle redirects. But, thank goodness for Kinoma Player 4 EX, I now don’t have to deal with this anymore.

Aside from rss feeds, Kinoma offers a very extensive listing of podcasts, media, audio available all over the world in their Kinoma Media Guide in the program. Just checking out this Guide, you’ll discover a vast collection of links that you may find a few that appeal to you. Not only will you find podcasts, video streams, audio streams, online radio stations, you will also find links to webcam and traffic webcam links and many others. Here’s a listing (and by no means is it a comprehensive one as there are new links added frequently)

Kinoma Media Guide:
- (folder with subdirectory of links)
= rss feed (contains additional individual links)

What’s new?
Updates and announcements on Kinoma Player and new links
Arts & Culture
-Food
-New York Times
-NPR Art & Theater
-Playbill
Business
-Business Week
-MarketWatch
-Marketplace
-The Wall Street Journal
=Harvard Business Review
=inside Silicon Valley: San Jose
=Motley Fool Profiles
=San Jose Mercury News
=The Street - Jim Cramer
=VAR Business
Education
-NOVA
-TV
-UC Berkeley Courses Spring
-US Berkeley Courses Fall ‘06
=Australia: University of Melbourne
=A Way with Words
=The Best of National Georgraphic
=ChinesePod.com
=Colonial Williamsburg
=English as a Second Language
=ENN Sky tour of the Fall Night
=Entrepreneurial Thoughts
=Explore Pennsylvania History
=Finally Learn Spanish Beyond
=Geography for Travelers
=Grammar Girl Quick and Direct
=Jazz Piano Lessons
=LearnItalianPod
=NPR Penn State Forum
=NPR: Reith Lectures
=National Geographic Minutes
=Podicationary
=Princeton University Channel
=Trying to Learn Spanish
=US. Black History Month
=US Holocaust Memorial Voi
=Videomaker Presents
=Vlog Digest with Clark Saturn
=WGBH Forum Lecture Series
Entertainment
-Kids & Family
-Live TV
-Old Time Radio Shows (OTR)
WNAR Radio [40s/50s/60s]
Yesterday USA Radio
=ABC Radio National
=BBC Radio 1 Best of Moyles
=BBC Radio 1’s Entertainment
=CBS News Entertainment Re
=Car Talks’s Call of the Week
=The Digital Extra
=Future Tense Podcast
=HBO Late Night Comedy
=Michael Feldman’s What’Ya
=Mobifest - Film Festival Picks
=Mugglecast [Harry Potter]
=Nobody Likes Onions
=Radio Lab [WNYC]
=Rocketboom
=Scrubs cast commentary
=The Story [PRI]
=TBS Very Funny Podcasts
=This American Life [PRI]
Government
-C-SPAN Radio
-Live TV
-U.S. Govt Publications
-U.S. Govt Pubs [Spanish]
International
-Czech
-Espanol
Hong Kong
Francais
Deutsch
Italy
Polski
Portugues
Turkiye
Europe
-Middle East
Netherlands
Russkij
Scandinavia
Internet Video & Webcams
-Google Video
-YouTube
-Webcams
Literature
-NPR: Books & Story Telling
Audiobooks by LibriVox
Children’s Books
Comic Book
Detective Story Hour
Escape Pod
New York Times Book Review
Words at Large
The Writer’s Almanac
Music
-Artist & Label podcasts
-Classical Performances
-Classic Rock
-Japanese Pop
-KCRW
-KEXP (Seattle)
-Live Music TV
-Music Podcasts
-NPR Music Podcasts
-Pop-SKY.fm
-SomaFM [live streams]
-Streaming audio
-Virgin Radio
All Hit Oldies
All Music is World Music 2006
Artist Interviews MP3.com
BMI: See it Hear First
Ballasalla-FM
Bashment Radio 103.1 FM
CBC Radio 3
Classic Mix
Club Classics IOM
Coverville
DJ XStreams.NL
DanceMusic247
Definitely Not the Opera
The Folkways Collection
Great Albums [MP3.com]
Hit 40 UK Radio
MadVibes Radio 103.1 FM
Musicheinetite.it On-Line
MyRedLounge
New York Times Music Review
Power country FM [w/video]
Radio Clash
Radio NRI
Roger McGuinn’s Folk Den
Russel Brand [BBC Radio 2]
Scarlett-FM
Salon Song of the Day
Sound Opinions
Slow Radio
Smooth Jazz Favorites
Sweet Soul Music
Bluegrass Country [WAMU]
WOXY.com
WOXY Vintage.com
News
-BBC
-ABC News
-CBC
-CBS News
-CNN
-Fox News
-Live News TV
-MSNBC
-NBC News
-Newsweek.com
-New York Times
-NPR International
-NPR Media
-NPR News & Politics
-PBS
-PRI
-Reuters
-Slate Magazine
-Sky Video Podcasts 408 kbps
-Virgin Radio Podcasts
AirAmerica Young Turks -96kbps
America RadioWorks Podcast
Australian Broadcasting Corp
Discovery Channel News
The Economist
National Geographic News
Newsdesk
NPR in Business
NPR [live stream]
NPR complete podcast directory
NPR Most e-mailed Stories
The Onion Radio News
Weekend America full program
Photocasts
-Bryan Nie
-Buzznet
-Flickr
-SmugMug
-Webshots
Twango
Radio Stations
Australian Radio by TUNED
Ireland Radio by TUNED.mobi
Canada Radio by TUNED.mobi
UK Radio by TUNED.mobi
US Radio by TUNED.mobi
-SomaFM
-SKY.fm
-WGN News/Talk 720 [Chicago]
-Saint Martin Radio
Australia all Over
ABC Dig
The Breeze
California CHP
Deutche-Welle News
Fox News Talk
Israel Broadcast Authority
NPR
Orban Radio
Radio-Canada Bandepart.FM
Radio Disney
Saturday Night Country
WOXY.com
WOXY Vintage.com
Religion & Spirituality
-Live TV
-NPR
A Foundation for Living
A Light Unton the Nations
Chabad.org Daily Study
College of Judaism Podcasts
EWTN Podcast
INR Temple Talk
Israel National Radio Podcasts
KPFK’s Inner Vision
KaballahCast
Lechaim to Life! with Rabbi E
NewSpring Church
Pure Sex Radio
Sabbath Message Podcasts
Speaking of Faith
Trinity Evangelical Free Church
Vatican Radio The voice of t
Sample Premium Content
Casino Royal Movie Trailer
Buckfast “Just Like You”
Pat Metheny Group “The Way
ZooVision Live Feed
The Beach Boys Pet Sounds
Shilts “Head Boppin”
World News in a Minute /ZooVision
Business News in a MInute /ZooVision
Entertainment News In a minute
The Real Tuesday Weld Brazil
Science & Health
-Scientifc American
CBC Radio: Quirks & Quarks
Digital Planet [BBC]
Earthwatch Radio [NPR]
Environment Report [GLRC]
The Global Race For Stem Cell
Health Report [NPR]
Health Update [NYT]
Hiroshima’s Survivors: The
Hmmm…Krulwich on Science
Myanmar’s Hidden AIDS Epi
PopSci (Popular Science)
Science Channel Features
Science Friday
Science Reports [PBS]
Science Update [NYT]
Science on Guardian Unlimited
Technology [NPR]
This Week in Science [NPR]
U.S. National Institutes of H
Sports
-Live TV
-Big Ten Conference
-Canadian Football League
-Baseball
-BBC Sports Recap
-CBS SportsLine Podcasts
-NASCAR Racing
-NBA Basketball
-New York Times Sports
-NFL Football
-NHL Hockey
-PAC 10 Conference Radio
-Soccer
ESPN Radio Daily
ESPN Radio SportsCentral Podcast
Golf Talk Radio
NPR Sportsweek
Radio Horse Racing Report
Talk & Politics
-Air America
-Election 2008 (US)
-NPR Talk
Autoblog
The Commonwealth Club of
Democracy Now!
It’s Your World
National Geographic World
Sky Political News Weekly
That’s Crispy
Voices of Reform
Word for Word
WJFK 106.7 Free FM
Technology
-CNET Podcasts
-Mac OS
-Palm OS & Mobile
Cranky Geeks
DL.TV
Diggnation
Engadget Podcast
Geek News Central
Hanselminutes
InfoWorld Daily
Infot Tomorrow with Dave G
Larry Migid’s Tech Report
Leo Laporte - TWIT
NPR: Technology
NYT: David Pogue Technology
NerdTV with columnist Robert
Security Now
Streaming Media Podcast
TWIT (This Week in Tech)
Telephony Podcasts
Windows Weekly
Wired Magazine
Wired News Commentary
eWeek Daily News and Views
Traffic Information
California (Wi-Fi)
Florida
Georgia
Hawaii
Illinois
Kansas
Missouri
New Jersey
The Highways Agency UK
UK Traffic - London
Travel
AA Guide to London
AA Guide to Paris
AP Travel
Arthur Fommers Budget Travel
Conde Nast Traveler Podcast
Hawaii Vacation Connection
Sports Traveler Radio (STR)
Trapped On Vacation
Travel Channel Features
Travel with Rick Steves
Travelcommons
Traveler Magazine’s Walks
The Vegas Tourist
Weather
-The Weather Channel
-Weather Plus Stations
Eyewitness News 7 NYC [Wi-Fi]
US NoAA Feature Stories
US NoAA El Paso Weather

Whew! That was quite a long list (and new links and channels are added daily) and I haven’t listed everything under the folders and the rss feeds so you can imagine how many more links there are in the directory. According to Kinoma’s blog, they claim of having over 20,000 links! Oh my! If this list hasn’t convinced you how much media content there is out there that may appeal to you, nothing will! Not only are you entertained by music, informed by news and podcasts, you can also learn a new language, become more devoted to your religion, listen to live streams of tv and radio, sports and special events, plan your drive home via traffic cams, etc. This is amazing!

In case you aren’t yet convinced, check out this huge listing of video and audio streams from around the world (again, keep in mind that Kinoma may not support some streams as they may require their own web embedded player to play or other reasons) at wwiTV.com. A lot of times (but not always), if you take a bit of time examining the source of the page (but that would entail you know a bit about html or know what to look for), you may be able to find the media stream.

Here are some streams that I don’t think are in Kinoma Player’s Media Guide that I totally love:

CNN TV audio stream
CNN Radio stream

CBC’s The National video stream (too high broadband stream but you can listen to audio and watch still frames of the video)

The National
CBC News: Sunday Night
Canada Now - Vancouver

These are direct links, so if you click on them, you will start viewing the video. Or, you can copy the link and then enter the same url in your Kinoma Player and bookmark.

If you know of other similar sites, please either leave a comment or contact me and I’ll update the posting so everyone can benefit! Thanks.

All I can say is that even though some streams can’t be played on my Treo, it’s still nice to be able to view them on my computer. Wow!

Considering I am a fan of Audible (read my review of Audible here), you can understand how much more I love Kinoma Player 4 EX! With the language podcasts, this really allows me to listen and learn a new language while I’m doing anything or just relaxing. Talk about being productive! And of course, practically all the benefits I’ve noted in my Audible review can also be applied here, with the extra feature of live media streams!

In addition, Kinoma Player 4 EX also supports YouTube videos! That’s right! You can play and stream YouTube videos, a feature many other media players are not capable of doing! With Kinoma Player 4 EX, you don’t need to convert the flv videos at all to view them. Nor, do you get stuck with the very sad and limited videos offered by the mobile version of YouTube ( m.youtube.com ). You simply enter the direct link or url to the YouTube video in Kinoma and enjoy the video! Of course, you will first need to find and jot down the url but once you have it, simply type it in and let Kinoma play it. EDIT. It looks like the Kinoma blog has provided a good tip to help you with this problem too by creating a playlist and bookmarking. Check out Two ways to enter YouTube URLs without retyping. Now, even that slight problem is solved! I strongly suggest checking and subscribing to the Kinoma blog for more information on the program that you may not have known.

Besides being able to view the media stream, you also have the option of saving the media file either in the internal memory (RAM) or external flash memory card (SD card). So, you can now be able to play back that podcast, or video stream later on or archive it.

Also, very much like the Media program found in the Palm Treo smartphones, the Kinoma Player 4 EX also offers to provide a slideshow of your pictures.

Are you aware that Kinoma Player 4 EX can also support webcams and network cameras, similar to those home cameras/webcams that display still images? Well, it does! A question regarding this feature was originally posted to the Kinoma forum here which Kinoma responded by posting the solution on their blog here. Again, this only shows how dedicated Kinoma is at providing customer support.

The latest Kinoma Player EX verson 4.3 offers so much more features and support than ever before! Here’s a list of what’s new (taken from Kinoma’s website):

More compatible and reliable
* This release includes workarounds for ususual network behavior that prevented some Sprint customers from being able to stream podcasts and other media.
* This release adds support for RTP/RTSP streaming over UDP for AT&T customers. Since UDP is a more efficient low-level protocol than TCP for realtime streaming, this will often result in better streaming performance.
* This release enhances Kinoma Player’s RSS/XML feed support, supporting more types of media feeds.
* This release includes enhanced JPEG network camera (webcam) support, improving compatibility with more camera models. Additionally, this release supports an optional refresh interval for network cameras/webcams that deliver still images.

Proxy support
* Kinoma Player 4 EX v4.3 now supports an optional HTTP proxy, which you can specify in the Streaming Preferences dialog.

(Edited Nov 7, 2007): I love it when developers update with more features. We are now at version 4.4!

It’s a free update for Kinoma Player 4 EX customers. Either download over the air to your Treo or download to your PC and then transfer to your Treo and install.

New features in version 4.4:

* Kinoma Player now always remembers whether you had Enable photo slideshow turned on or off.

Can you name another program that can offer you support for media (video, audio) streaming, video and audio playback, photo display, podcatcher features, bookmarking, and playlist support? You may find some but not all of them together in one package.

File Format Support
File format (file extension):

MP3 playlist (.m3u)
Playlist (.pls)
RSS (.rss)
Windows Media metafile (.asx)
Outline Processor Markup Language (.opml)

The above information was taken from the comprehensive documentation of Kinoma Player 4 EX (manual)

Video of Kinoma Player 4 EX

Part 1 at YouTube

Part 2 at YouTube

Okay, enough raving about the program, it’s time to go into my personal opinions of this program and some suggestions (which I hope Kinoma will at least take note of).

Here are my observations: First of all, this program does not support background playback, which some users may find a sticking point that may deter them from getting the program. I personally have found that background playback is not a big deal for me anymore since I have found some programs to interfere and give me trouble when I get an incoming phone call. I hardly ever have the need to do something else while I’m listening to music anyway. And since RAM space is something I can’t afford, I have to use PowerRun to run it from the card. This works for me. But, you may need to consider this point if background playback is important to you.

Second, with some audio streams (obviously due to the originating server), they can be quite soft. Even at the highest volume on the Kinoma Player 4 EX, it’s barely much beyond speaking level. Thanks to Charles of Kinoma at the Kinoma forum, I was given the tip of enabling their audio boost, or more specifically called audio overdriving in the Kinoma Player. This can be found in the General Preferences menu. Check or make sure that the box next to “enable audio overdriving” is checked. Of course, this bit of information was found in the Kinoma Player 4 EX documentation (which I didn’t read completely through originally). But regardless, Charles does a great job of keeping up with the questions and support in the forums, which I am very thankful for.

Third, also related to audio and radio streaming, is that some stations may offer a much more muffled audio stream and it would be great if Kinoma Player 4 EX offers something like an equalizer feature similar to that of other mp3 players. That way, I can decrease the low end of the sound or increase the high end or vice versa to improve the audio. The reason for me is that I tend to listen to news radio streams while I’m in the shower while I’ve got the bathroom steam fan going and of course the water running. So, in order to be able to hear the news cast while I’m in the shower, I need the volume to be at least a certain level and audible through the shower curtain. Yes, I’m a bit excessive about it but I do enjoy being able to keep up with news even in the shower. So having an equalizer, even if it’s not as sophisticated as those found in Aeroplayer or PocketTunes whereby I can adjust the sound quality if even by a slight bit, would make it so much better. I’m sure that some of us do like to listen to our music with Kinoma player since we are capable of receiving audio music streams. So, hopefully Kinoma can add equalizer support in a future update.

Fourth, personally, I have found that as time goes on, I’ve been my usual self of adding tons of media feeds in the bookmarks (not terribly surprising since I can boast about having well over 1000+ feeds in Bloglines and increasing by the day). I would like to suggest that the program be able to better organize or sort the bookmarks in a way that I can quickly find the stream I want. So, for example, I can create a folder where I put in all my Jazz radio stations, Salsa stations, Palm podcasts, news video casts, etc. You know what I mean. That way, I can click the folder and then the feed, rather than scroll down this long list of feeds that I currently have. So, I would suggest adding a feature where we can create folders or be better able to manage all the links we have.

EDIT. There is a workaround solution provided by Kinoma and it’s by created a custom opml feed. Check out Optimizing feeds for Kinoma Player 4 EX here. Again, Kinoma comes to address these issues.

For me, I’ve found that it’s probably easier to set up another feed reader subscription and then add in these podcast links and then export the opml files to your computer. Then, use a card reader and put that file on your SD card. Launch Kinoma Player 4 EX. Bring up the menu (tap top left hand corner of screen or press Menu button). Select “Synchronize Media Library”. If done correctly, you should be able to go to the right most icon at the bottom of the program and find your personal opml file. Tap on that and you should find all your neatly sorted podcast feeds. Cool! The only problem is that if you decide to remove or make additions or changes that you have to do it to the opml file and update it in the Treo to reflect the changes.

Fifth, I know that this problem is more related to the Treo device itself but it really annoys me. The timeout period for my Treo 650 seems to be about 1 minute or two (or at least it seems like it. It seems way too short). So, I may be downloading a podcast and then I find out that it has timed out and I have to exit out of the app, disconnect my Wi-fi connection and restart it again. Does anyone have any idea on how to increase the timeout period? I already have set my Enfora Wi-Fi sled to disable the Power save option. I have also set the “idle timeout” in Network to *NEVER* but yet, the Treo times out (way too soon) and I lose my streaming connection.

Now mind you, if I get a live radio stream, it is very unlikely to get timed out, since the packets are coming at a consistent and constant pace. But when downloading podcasts, there is not always a continuous stream of data coming, and when enough time has passed by since the last data packet was received (it seems like seconds), the Treo times out. I am suggesting that Kinoma be able to find a way to “trick” the Treo into thinking that there’s a continuous stream of data going through so that the connection stays live, even when it’s requesting a podcast download, so that the connection doesn’t drop or time out. Hopefully Kinoma can understand what I’m saying.

(EDITED Sept 18th:) It looks like there are a few DA (Desk Accessory) apps that can do that, allowing me to stay in Kinoma Player and disconnect and reconnect. Obviously, first, you’ll need to get a DA Launcher in order to use any DA apps. Most people suggest DA Launcher (from developer of PowerRun) but most others will likely work as well.

Next, get either NetSwitchDA which simply connects and disconnects the connection. Or, get NetConnectDA which gives you the option of disconnecting the connection or going into the Networks pref and you can select the network to disconnect or connect. You may need to use RescoLocker to lock these apps as I personally have gotten a few resets when trying to launch the DAs. So, at least, I now have the ability, (somewhat) to stay within the program and hopefully the podcasts can resume the download without having to exit, disconnect and re-connect or worse yet, restart at the beginning. I have not yet been able to continue the stream successfully, however.

(Edited Nov 7, 2007): I have finally settled on using McPhling as my DA Launcher instead as I’ve found that I no longer get a reset when I launch it (something that DALauncher for whatever reason would cause most times). And it works very well. I can now easily disconnect and reconnect within Kinoma and get the stream back. Cool!

(EDITED Dec 11, 2007)

To explain how I use these apps together, I’ve created a video on YouTube where I demonstrate how it’s done:

Using NetConnectDA to connect/disconnect within Kinoma Player

Sixth, in a similarly related issue, I would like to have the option of being able to fully download a podcast and save it BEFORE I start listening to it. This is because sometimes I like to be able to grab a whole bunch of podcasts and then listen on the road. What happens frequently in my experience is that the podcast would download to a certain point and then stop and eventually, the connection times out. So, I end up with part of the podcast which I have to discard and restart over again when I restart it.

Or, maybe Kinoma can provide a “resume” feature (I know they do offer a resume feature for some streams) where I can continue the download at where I last left off and that sometimes work but sometimes it doesn’t (probably server dependent). Right now, if my connection times out, I have to get out of Kinoma, disconnect the data connection, reconnect and then go back to Kinoma and to the stream. Unfortunately, it will start back at the beginning. Going through this scenario a few times, you’ll get an idea of the frustration.

Or, if someone can provide me with a downloading program that will allow me to download the podcast and save onto the SD card since Blazer is so sad in that department, disallowing me from downloading anything larger than 2 MB in size (podcasts are pretty much out the window there). Is there a downloading app that can do it? SharkDownload and Downloader won’t work for whatever reason (probably because the links are dynamic and not the true link to the file). I’d love to find a solution to this problem.

Of course, an alternative to this problem is to use the computer to download all those podcasts via something like iTunes or Juice (ex-iPodder) and then move all those podcasts over but sometimes I may not be at my computer (ie. traveling) so having that download and save capability in Kinoma Player would be great. Or, have something similar to what mass downloader apps can do in that I can resume the download when I get back to the stream. At one point I thought that I could try a downloader app like SharkDownload or Downloader but most podcasts are redirected to a different url, and these apps can’t support that. Maybe someone understands my problem and has an idea? If so, please either leave a comment or contact me with the details.

Seventh, although Kinoma Player 4 EX supports a lot of media streams, obviously, some are not necessarily supported. For instance, those of us who are Palm Addict fans who enjoy watching Sammy McLoughlin’s PATV would most likely *LOVE* to get streaming support for PATV (well, at least *I* would). As well there are a lot of other media that seems to not be supported by Kinoma Player 4 EX. Right now, my only workaround is to download the videocast first on my computer and then transfer it to my SD card and play it, since Kinoma does support the playing of .mov files. Unfortunately, Kinoma currently doesn’t seem to support PATV’s .mov (I’m not sure why) files either (even though Kinoma does support .mov files) so I have to view it with TCPMP with extra plugins. Maybe Kinoma can look into this.

Here are a few other formats that currently are not supported by Kinoma: m4v, .mp4

Eighth, although the Kinoma Player 4 EX makes it much easier to enter a url for a media player by provide a few popular characters such as http://, www., I would like to be able to get more. As well, it would be helpful if we, the end user could be able to add in our own special sets of characters so that we can make it even easier and faster to input urls that we tend to visit often. For example, if we live in Canada, having a .ca would be helpful or, if you’re mostly accessing university sites, .edu would prove handy, and so on.

Ninth, a poster at the Kinoma Player forum has brought up an interesting tibit. Apparently, with some devices and on some networks, you can’t receive a call when in an active data transfer session. I have tried it on mine (HK unlocked GSM Treo 650 on Rogers Wireless in Canada), having streaming radio on the Treo as well as listening to a podcast that a call (from SkypeOut) will break the data session and ring my Treo. So, I guess I’m in the minority. You may want to test this out and see. Or, remove your SIM (if you have a GSM Treo, the beauty of GSM) and put it in your backup GSM phone while streaming with Kinoma. As Charles of Kinoma has pointed out, it is a “device/network constraint rather than a Kinoma Player constraint” so obviously, there’s nothing that can be done on Kinoma’s end. But still nice to get an answer.

Review Summary

The Kinoma Player 4 EX is a well rounded media package. It is a media player, a music player, a podcatcher, media streaming player for both audio and video, picture and image viewer and photo slideshow presenter. The most amazing feature I find about it is its ability to accept a wide range of video streams, normally which are designed for broadband connections to computers. So, Kinoma Player 4 EX can receive video streams of a lot of different news sites, the newest being from Reuters. Remember that I’m news junkie so it’s a godsend! I’m totally amazed at the quality and that it doesn’t even drop a frame. Although it may not be “live” streams, but the capability to even receive an audio never mind video stream from a lot of different sites is unbelievable. And now, Kinoma can play YouTube videos without converting. Add to this the capabilty to add a podcast/videocast feed in the program really saves me a lot of time. I absolutely hated having to type in a videocast or audiocast url so that I can listen to something. And Kinoma offers us the convenience of tapping on the most used sets of characters like http://, www, .com , etc. Rather than typing all those characters, I simply tap on the button and the program will fill it in for me. I only have to type the rest of the url, bookmark the feed and click on the individual streams I want and it’s playing. Obviously, Kinoma knows the consumer experience. I love it when programmers pay attention to details.

Keep in mind that although I have listed the Kinoma Player 4 EX to be an “essential Treo app”, it can also be an essential Palm device app as well. The reason why it’s listed as an essential Treo app is because the Treo is a connected device whereas the other Palm devices are normally not (except for a few with Wi-Fi and if you connect it to a cellphone). So it makes sense to refer it more to the Treo than to a standalone PDA device. The nice thing about the Kinoma Player 4 EX is that it supports a wide range of devices. Check that page I’ve just provided and see if your device is listed. It may very likely support it. And if they don’t, contact them and they may very well provide support for it in the future.

To better acquaint yourself with all the features of the program, I’d strongly suggest you spend a bit of time reading the Kinoma Player 4 EX documentation as there’s a lot of information about the program that you may not necessarily figure out by yourself. It’s offered as a webpage here and you can also download a pdf version from here.

Disclosure: Originally when I wrote this positive review, I did not have an affiliation with Kinoma. I have since become an affiliate. Purchases made with the affiliate links to the Kinoma products in this review as well as other affiliate links will help keep Palm Discovery running. I donate a portion of the proceeds to Plan Canada (ex Foster Parents Plan Canada) at the end of each year so that others less fortunate can benefit from your generosity.

Regardless, Kinoma Player 4 EX is still an amazing software that I strongly recommend although now, I do have a slight conflict of interest that I wanted to disclose. Considering that the review was done before I was an affiliate, I hope that you will consider that fact so that you can understand as a consumer that I really love Kinoma Player and endorse it.

Overall, I really like Kinoma Player 4 EX and only wished that I had gotten it sooner. Although there is no trial download available, if you own any of the devices listed as being supported, I’d strongly suggest you get it ’cause you have no idea what you’re missing! Although there aren’t any free live video streams available, if you have a Slingbox, plus Orb or other similar software, you can stream your home’s TV feed to your Palm and get your own TV feed streamed to your Treo. Or simply stream your mp3 collection from your computer to your Palm or Treo.

It’s like having your own portable TV but you don’t pay for a monthly subscription like you do with MobiTV. And at a price of $24.99 and considering that the competition doesn’t offer video streaming and even some doesn’t offer any streaming at all, I’d say Kinoma is a great deal. You can get it at Palm Discovery’s affiliate store here.

Or, consider getting the bundle of Kinoma Player 4 EX and Kinoma Producer 4 for Windows or the Kinoma Player 4 EX and Producer 4 for the Mac. Thanks for your support and for reading.

Check out the other great products available from Kinoma:

Kinoma Producer 4 for Windows

Kinoma Producer 4 for Mac

Del.icio.us categories: archives categories palm software-review essentialapp essentialtreoapp kinoma kinoma-player kinoma-player-4ex mediaplayer

Popularity: 71% [?]