Dell 30 MP3 Player User Manual
Contents
1. California 5 Track 25 stti California 2 3 Export Track List California 4 Q Tad ho Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 15 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 Step 3 Edit audio tracks This is a relatively straightforward but very tedious task that has to be replicated for each track twice or more per track if you separate songs and calls As I mentioned earlier I use Adobe Premiere other editors will differ in operation but should allow the same basic functions shown in the screenshot Adobe Premiere Premiere Screen 1 Edit Audio Track File Edit Project Clip Timeline Window Help 2 Project MP3 ppj aaga Monitor 01 Track 1 way V Source Audio 00 00 58 07 44100 Hz 16 bit Stereo Average Data Rate 172 30KB per sec 01 Track 1 way 02 Track 2 way 03 Track 3 wav O04 Track 4 way 00 00 50 OS Track S way 00 00 41 06 Track 6 way 00 00 44 OF Track 7 way 00 00 44 08 Track S way 00 00 53 09 Track 9 wav 00 00 38 10 Track 10 way 00 00 47 11 Track 11 wav 00 00 51 12 Track 12 way 00 00 45 REREEEROEEROEEROESEREEROEEEOESEOEEEGEEEOESEOESEOESEOEEOEEEOOEEOEEEE 13 Track 13 wav 00 00 4S 00 00 49 gt Clip 01 Track 1 waw 0 00 04 00 0 00 08 00 D Video 14 Transition 1 second dead space D Video 1B an O bawa Mlo ran Cd2. I didn t want to invite any software problems Consequently I ruled out Pod immediately and didn t even consider the available units I looked around at various manufacturers equipment and eventually decided on a Dell unit for several reasons it had the large display that I wanted a very easy to use selection device and perhaps most importantly I ve been a Dell computer user for a number of years two desktops and a laptop and have been very satisfied with the equipment I decided on the Dell DJ 30GB unit At the time of my purchase March 2005 this was the largest unit that Dell offered in addition to 5GB and 20GB Although such a large capacity isn t necessary purely for bird songs I chose it because I also wanted to play music man cannot live by birds alone and download photos to the unit while on the road as a backup in case my laptop hard disk fails Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 3 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 HARDWARE The Dell DJ 30 is a very compact and sleek unit that measures approximately 4 x 2 4 x 0 7 inches and weighs 6 4 ounces I use it with an optional soft carrying case which increases the weight to 7 6 ounces For output I use a Radio Shack mini speaker amplifier catalog 277 1008C The speaker amp measures 3 5 x 2 75 x 1 4 base 1 2 top inches and weighs 5 4 ounces when equipped with a rechargeable 9 volt battery wei
3. 02 5 White throated Flycatcher 0840 Flycatchers SE AZ Sonora 2 0 30 cD Ni wilow Flycatcher 0840 Flycatchers SE AZ Sonora 1 0 31 Ni wilow Flycatcher 0840 Flycatchers Rocky Mtn States Provinces 2 0 42 Now Playing F Willow Flycatcher NW race 0840 Flycatchers California 2 0 21 OPY Ni wilow Flycatcher SW race 0840 Flycatchers California 2 3 1 08 Copy from CD Ni Loggerhead Shrike 0860 Shrikes Rocky Mtn States Provinces 2 sal NI Loggerhead Shrike 0860 Shrikes California 3 16 0 58 Bum to CD Ni Northern Shrike 0860 Shrikes Rocky Mtn States Provinces 38 0 32 P Daia bese Vireos SE AZ Sonora 69 Ma 0880 Vireos Rocky Mtn States Provinces 40 0 28 Copyright Stuart Healy 5 Bell s Vireo Least N Black capped Vireo sin s Vireo B Plumbeou F Plumbeous 0880 Yireos 0880 Vireos 0880 Vireos 0880 Vireos 0880 Vireos 0880 wi 0880 Yireos 0880 Vireos 0880 Vireos 0880 Vireos 0880 Vireos 0880 Vireos 0880 Vireos 0880 vire 0880 Vire 0880 Vire LRGY and SW Texas California LRGY and California SW Texas SE AZ Sonora SE AZ Sonora Rocky Mtn States Provinces LRGY and SYY Texas California SE AZ Sonora v and SW Texas California SE AZ Sonora Rocky Mtn States Provinces LRGY California and SVV Texas www aztrogon com NHN SS NY ND N e NN NN yN N N A 0 42 0 59 1 00 0 57 0 44 0 53 0 51 0 50 fA NWN WN A 0 A OF OF GW w KI 53 1 46 0 39 sue 0
4. receive I knew that I would be dropping the equipment on a regular basis For this reason I decided that I wanted a solid state unit i e one with a memory card rather than a hard disk The second most important aspect was ease of use in the field I wanted to be able to quickly and easily access any bird song using just one hand With a binocular micro recorder often times a scope and sometimes a camera to carry this is obviously an issue Two main features were important here 1 a large display that could be read easily in poor light and 2 an easy to use selection device Secondary but nevertheless important issues that I considered were storage capacity a field replaceable battery unit size and weight Compromises Now to reality When I first looked at the market in February 2005 I soon realized that I would have to compromise on my most important requirements All of the solid state units were low end in terms of display and controls Most didn t have a display at all let alone a large display and the controls for selection of songs were quite primitive To get a large display and decent controls for selection of songs meant that I would have to buy a unit with a hard disk I also settled for an integrated battery Decision PDAs can play MP3 files but the dorky touch screen pen control ruled that out as a viable option IPOD seems to be the main choice for most music MP3 users but since I m a PC and not a Mac user
5. the destination equal to the source Since the pathname isn t shown in the display it s easy to forget to change the destination eventually you ll realize that the converted files aren t where you intended Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 18 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 Step 5 Add MP3 files to Birds Library Okay now we re getting close to creating a sausage after lots of handle cranking This step is almost identical to adding the source CD tracks to the Raw Birds library In fact it s actually the same library since as I mentioned earlier Musicmatch only supports one library Operationally adding MP3 files to the library is identical to adding the source CD tracks see Step 2 only the tagging is different First Genre is set to Birds instead of Raw Birds This enables all tracks in each Genre pseudo library to be manipulated independently as though they were separate libraries Secondly I use capital letters in the family names and species names to improve readability on the player as shown in DJ Screens 1 6 I could also have done this on the Raw Birds library but I find that lower case provides better on screen readability on a monitor Before adding tracks to the MP3 Birds library for the first time I performed steps 2 4 for a base of about 300 tracks significantly less than that in terms of actual speci
6. unit on and off many times a day I know that it wouldn t last long Looking at the unit in the orientation shown in the photo on page 4 I hold it in my right hand with the bottom right hand corner resting in my palm My index finger operates the push button and my thumb can easily rotate the volume control Managing the two units is definitely a pain when I have lots of other stuff to carry However I give pride of place to the speaker amp and carry that it in my right pants pocket I m right handed the DJ is in my left pocket The connecting cord is behind me passed through my belt loops DJ Settings After setting the date time owners name display contrast I use 50 and idle shutdown time I use 15 minutes the day to day changes required are minimal Play mode is the only parameter that I change on a regular basis track repeat for bird song playback and normal for music For daytime use I set the backlight to off and either a 15 or 30 second timeout at night I leave the DJ volume set at 17 max 25 and use the volume control on the speaker amp Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 21 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 DJ Operation The DJ plays tracks belonging to a temporary list of tracks known as Selected Music and the track that is currently playing is known as the Current Track Very logical you say Tracks can be added to
7. whatever is present in the selected music list or the list can be replaced entirely with either a new list or just a single track For example you can select a bird family artist and add to or replace the selected music list with all species in that family or do the same with the contents of a predefined playlist The selected music list survives power off and the track that was playing when the unit was powered off starts to play when it is powered on again However it s important to realize that although the Selected Music list can be loaded from a stored playlist an entire family list or created on the fly by adding species one at a time the list cannot be saved to disk as a named playlist either on the DJ or when connected to the computer Consequently I create all regularly used lists on the computer and transfer them to the DJ The Selected Music list is accessed by selecting Now Playing from the Main Menu DJ Screen 7 Initially the current contents of Selected Music are displayed DJ Screen 8 then after five seconds the currently playing track is displayed DJ Screen 9 To get from the currently playing track to another track already in the Selected Music list all that is required is to roll the scroll select dial which immediately redisplays Selected Music and allows a new selection to be made To add a species from a playlist or family requires returning to the main menu see DJ Screens 1 6 on page 9 or hitting the bac
8. 50 4 08 0 40 0 53 ho Page 8 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 DJ Screens 1 6 show the basic menus and navigation needed to access a specific species within a family Getting to a bird All operations to select a bird are done with my right thumb almost all operations are done with the scroll select dial SSD 1 The main menu can be reached instantaneously no matter what state the DJ is in by pressing the home button 2 Accessing the library menu only requires a single select i e one push of the SSD since Music Library is already highlighted Accessing the family listing requires scrolling down to Artist then select 3 4 Getting to a specific family requires SSD operations scroll to the family select then scroll to View Tracks and select to display the list of species 5 6 Getting to a species is the same as 3 4 above You can then play the track directly or add it to the current play list Note The Find Artist Find Track functions can be used instead of scrolling through the displayed names However since the lists are relatively short I ve found that scrolling is much faster Minimizing access time I use captial letters in the family and species name displays to improve readability I wear glasses for reading but obviously don t want to mess around with them in the field The number sequence to force families t
9. GI D audioz nel 4 D audio 3 1 2 Second gt jes Dich fesles lt In Premiere I import raw tracks into the project window drag the track to be edited into the source window then select the portion that I want here I m extracting a call which is typically at the end of a track Finally the selected portion is dragged to the timeline where it can be saved to disk Note that I placed the selected audio one second from time 0 to ensure clean transitions when playback is looped Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 16 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 I saved the edited WAV files in folder Audio Files Birds Edited and sub folders organized by family as shown in the following partial folder display The MP3 format files subsequently created see next page are organized identically within the MP3 Birds folder My naming convention for the species files is to use the four letter banding codes adding song call and any sub species race information as appropriate Folders Organization of edited tracks O My Documents B O audio Files E Q Birds Edited Blackbirds O Cardinals O Chickadees O Corvids O Cuckoos B Dippers B Doves Finches B Flycatchers O Gnatcatchers O Grosbeaks O Grouse etc B Herons etc Mightjars Nuthatches O Orioles O owls Partridges O Pipits O Quail O Rails etc O Raptors Shorebirds O Sparrow
10. IO MASTER SRaw Birds California Disc1 mn e co Make Sub Path using T Artist MV Track Number I Album I Artist M Track Name Name Track File using i m Directory Information 4 Available 66878 MB T Album 5 Total 238370 MB 6 Type Hard Drive Separator B ry RS AI KI KO MA KI Ry a cA ea en k c A cn A a an Sample Path C AUBIO MASTERSA aw Birds California Disce1 TrackNumber TrackName Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 11 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 Step 2 Add source tracks to Raw Birds Library Adding tracks to a library in Musicmatch involves three basic steps a import the tracks b add tag information c name the tracks Many music discs already contain the track names and other information that Musicmatch recognizes and tags automatically If not Musicmatch provides an on line lookup service free for name artists and other data for tons of albums Unfortunately however we birders are destined for manual labor Steps a and b can be performed on multiple tracks simultaneously step c is obviously once per track Performing tag edit operations in the optimum order minimizes the number of edits that have to be made and makes selection of tracks easier during the editing process Step a is very simple After clicking on Add Tracks navigate to the loca
11. J ships with two software components Musicmatch Jukebox This is the main component that facilitates the conversion of CD tracks to MP3 files and provides extensive features to catalog and tag the tracks prior to copying them to the Dell DJ I talk more about this in the implementation section The Jukebox can also play CDs and MP3 files on the computer Musicmatch Jukebox is a free software package that you can download from the web I invested 20 to upgrade to Musicmatch Jukebox Plus which offers faster conversion speeds from WAV format files to MP3 files as well as a few other features that I don t use Note I refer to this software simply as Musicmatch throughout this document Dell DJ Explorer This software has the look and feel of Windows Explorer and allows files to be copied from the computer hard disk to the Dell DJ using drag and drop or cut and paste The DJ connects to the computer via a standard USB 2 port DJ Explorer can be used to create playlists which I use to create species lists for specific locations as well as client target lists It s very easy to select tracks from the displayed master list library and to save them to a named playlist that shows up on the DJ when you select playlists from the music library screen I also use it to copy photos from my laptop to the DJ as extra backup when on the road Audio Editing Since most source material for bird songs will undoubtedly have an announcement at the be
12. OS ES ss cosicies nsec tinscesasndpsesesswasmseidwoulnea satenniaesuciacdaeasiadondetnedscmuceleaneseendarasusdedsndatued tedtnoasapenudescnes 8 SOFTWARE WORKFLOW 000 0 ccccsccsssssssssccssessccsessstscncesscseccsenssnecssssnsessesscescestseacestcesseseeesaesenseneeses 10 Step 1 Copy the source material to disk ccccccccccesseceececesseeceeseecesseeceseeecsseeeceeeeesseeesseeeesaes 10 Step 2 Add source tracks to Raw Birds Library 00 cccccccscecsseceseceeeeeeeeeeseeceaeceeeeeeeeeeaeeesaeens 12 Step 3 Editing audio tracks gis sssshaidaciaudccieeaccaiaaicbaeecseasieate ei 16 Step 4 Convert edited tracks to MP3 format ccccccecsseceeseeeeescecseseecnseeecsseeeceseeecseeeesseeeesaes 18 Step 5 Add MP3 files to Birds Library cccccccccccssecesssecesseecesseeceseeeceeseecseeeceeeecsseeecseeeesaes 19 Step 6 Copy Birds Library to Dell DJ 0 0 0 0 cccccessecesseceeseecesscecnceecesaeecsaeeceseeecseeeecsseeeesaes 19 PRACTICALMATTERS sicasasasaisaoveswiesasasaauiansassedntasicdatunuasastoneniawtsucnoia ssavassasteaaatenumiesustisassisnnuaatwntouias 21 DJ SCS eirati riirii an oE EEEE VETE EREE ES 21 DJ Op ration eseon E E E A E E E EOE E O 22 Problems and Annoyances oc ja2csccconiesssacasvwaseniir dsiacusuviaasninencdinsevsusanisnsstaselwndsanniecaiasudevan das iisedaiusniduwmenenisas 23 O sone Concerns csi cc ea ed cs aca es 24 Desired FC GO saa sca icacencgaccaessda ica coo
13. Western U S Bird Guide Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Stuart Healy Western U S Bird Guide Specializing in Southeast Arizona and the White Mountains 220 Stardust Street Sierra Vista AZ 85635 Tel 520 458 7603 Fax 520 458 7353 E mail stuarthealy earthlink net Web http www aztrogon com Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 Table of Contents INTRODUCTION Represents pe prime eee rr rot rrr a a a oP Oot p Nap PST DNR Pee ERE PTE a a eee EEN 3 Original Requirements 565 lt 62 ccsnisepesduaiecdscansereaninnapasivadeaeaapusoienaai ar oariorasnaaeianioeenieGpanlameion 3 CCOMMPTOMMISES ecinnronicenmiann iea anid Ga ee a ae wei ees 3 DECISION eere E EE pees cas awa ea EEE E 3 HARDWARE iia cacissssancpasnaargodasseasacanstwsaensasyenantonrdedsigsiavaaiaattamssasiesscnvgadereniedenheatesasaaintagmaviateaanmuscuavesnets 4 SOFTWARE icien aba ene EEE a gaa A cu eda aan inn A EAEE 5 Musicmatch Jukebox 3s sasnt ceca easees gst casaseceanceuqeten ceanavnaedaatensenetnn tea anarntie aan ea endoe een eee 5 Dell DJ ROA is ccs vcpescvs snes eins anshnd aise cutumse E E E E E E R e is 5 A dio Edith sorea A EAEI ERAO AEA AEEA OARS 5 IMPLEMENTATION OVERVIEW osssccsinsescsssssneiassastseesanssegadsnsdsasanccesdcdnenanesunesenesstansniasaacengsduneandeanecaseedens 6 Sourc m t riAl osisssa EEn aa eS 6 Orsamizati 5225555 oi sass isis E RATOVE ERTA O EAE A A 6 Looking at the
14. addition to using Artist to define bird families I use Playlists to define species lists for specific locations and for client target lists I might eventually use this feature to define lists of species by habitat type when I get a spare minute perhaps Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 7 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 Looking at the results A picture is rumored to be worth a thousand words so I think it s useful at this point to look at examples of Musicmatch and DJ display screens Musicmatch Screen 0 is a partial display of the Raw Birds library The columnar fields are customizable for content width and display order I ve scrunched up the columns to fit the page File Edit View Musicmatch Jukebox Plus Options Help Current Playlist y musicmatch JUKEBOX PLUS Musicmatch Screen 0 Login Accont Library Met Logged in View Library by AutoDJ v ET View by Gi __ Artis Albi Track On Demand Ni rn Kingbird 0840 Flycatchers SE AZ Sonora 1 67 0 46 Ni Western Kingbird 0840 Flycatchers Rocky Mtn States Provinces 2 35 0 55 Ni Western Kingbird 0840 Flycatchers California 2 ET eal Radio tern Wood Pewee 0840 Flycatchers SE AZ Sonora 1 53 0 46 Ni Western Wood Pewee 0840 Flycatchers Rocky Mtn States Provinces 2 23 0 34 joa B Western VWWood Pewee 0840 Flycatchers California 2 1
15. ay Track 2 wav 03 Track 3 wayv Track 4 way Track 5 wav Track B way Track way Track 8 wav Track Sway Track 10 way Track 11 way Track 12 way Track 13 way Track 14 way Track 15 way Track 16 way Track 17 way Track 18 way 19 way Genre V EMILS Rating oomoo Release f Year General More Classical Lyrics No Disc Jv T of E C AUBIO MASTER Raw Birds California Disc1 01 Track 1 wav Tempo J Mood J Super Tagging Tag From Filename Lookup Tags Rename Files OK Cancel Apply Now it s time to add the family name data to the Artist tag In Musicmatch Screen 5 the first two tracks on California Disc 1 are selected American Bittern and Least Bittern and assigned to 0280 Herons Egrets and Bitterns ne Edit Track Information Musicmatch Screen 5 x Load Album General More Classical Lyrics Notes Bios Info Track Filenames Track Title Track Number 01 Track 1 way far Track 1 f 02 Track 2 way rtist Y 0290 Herons Egrets and Bitterns vi Featured aoa x Artist m Album California Genre Raw Birds Rating o m Release r T Year Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 14 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 Musicmatch Screen 6 shows a partial library display after assigning a fa
16. del T rev A00 the replacement was rev A04 At power up the unit sometimes performs housekeeping that causes a frustrating at times delay in startup by a few seconds During the first month s operation the DJ performed flawlessly In the second month the unit locked up a couple of times i e would not respond to any buttons including power off Both times I had left the player in direct sunlight When all is said and done the unit is really a computer and is thus prone to any computer problems Fortunately there s a reset button that fixes such problems accessible via a small hole in the bottom of the unit operated by a straightened paper clip or the like On a rainy day in the field I inadvertently got the unit very wet and it died My fault entirely not a problem with the unit Fortunately I had purchased a one year no questions asked replacement warranty good for any failure At 29 it was a good investment Now I Il be a more careful When I received the replacement unit it was satisfying to reap the rewards of my efforts in creating an organized library I was able to transfer the entire contents to the DJ in one fell swoop Musicmatch Software Musicmatch is in the business of selling downloadable music and I very much suspect that the free software is a necessary evil for them Although Musicmatch version 10 is feature rich it crashes far too often for my liking Fortunately however like any reliable databa
17. es also known as tags I chose to use the Artist tag to define bird families as well as the actual artist for music tracks Since the DJ lists tracks alphabetically within each category I needed a method of separating family names of bird tracks from artist names of music tracks so that I didn t see Polka Mania listed next to Pigeons and Doves I listen to Polka all the time lt g gt I solved this problem by prefixing bird family names by an arbitrary sequence number This kills two birds with the same stone since numbers sort before letters bird family names appear before artists names and the number sequence ensures that family names are displayed in taxonomic order The absolute values of the numbers are unimportant it s just the sequence that matters A reference list is in the CD Index Although Musicmatch supports an extensive list of tags the Dell DJ only provides a few basic tags and most other MP3 players will likely have a similar design Consequently I only considered the basic tags in deciding how to organize my libraries The tags that I use are Genre Artist and Album As mentioned earlier I use Genre to separate libraries Although this is really more for convenience when working in Musicmatch it also allows me to separately list all bird tracks or all music tracks on the player I use the Album category only for music tracks and for the Raw Birds library In
18. es because of separate songs and calls for a number of species Thus the work involved was a lot less than for the Raw Birds library of 700 tracks but still required a significant amount of tedious editing work I ve subsequently added to the MP3 Birds library and continue to do so as the need for specific species arises Step 6 Copy Birds Library to Dell DJ At last the final step Musicmatch incorporates software plug ins for a number of portable devices including of course the Dell DJ which connects to the computer via a USB 2 interface A couple of connection options ship with the DJ I use the cradle shown here When the DJ is connected Musicmatch can be configured to start automatically and display the Portable Device Manager window The disk on the DJ is read and the display shows all the tracks currently present on the player an example of which is shown in Musicmatch Screen 8 Music tracks appear after the bird tracks I ve scrolled down to the last bird family to illustrate this The DJ behaves identically The usage summary at the bottom shows how little disk space is required Of the 846 tracks using a total of 1 76 GB only 361 using 138 MB belong to the Birds library the rest are music tracks You could include every bird in the world and still have room for plenty of music it might take you a while though Dell DJ explorer software can also be used to perform the same functions but generally I stick w
19. es per track and selected the following Cornell CDs as my master source Bird songs of California Geoffrey A Keller 3 discs Bird songs of the Rocky Mountain States and Provinces Robert Righter and Geoffrey A Keller 3 discs Bird songs of Southeastern Arizona and Sonora Mexico Geoffrey A Keller 2 discs Bird songs of the Lower Rio Grande Valley and Southwestern Texas Geoffrey A Keller 1 disc A complete index of all 9 discs is available as a separate document see appendix There are only a few tracks that have multiple two species per track Generally speaking I m happy with the overall quality of the source material for my purposes However there are a fair number of tracks with problems In some cases not enough care has been taken in terms of eliminating background noise Even worse sometimes the vocalization of another species that is supposedly in the background is almost as loud as the intended species Organization Musicmatch is primarily designed to manage music tracks using tags that allow easy organization and selection of tracks for computer playback and transfer to a portable device Unlike previous versions of Musicmatch the current version I m using version 10 does not support multiple libraries This is definitely annoying since I wanted to define three libraries Library Why three libraries The master list of CD tracks is sacrosanct View Library by AutoDJ v This is my Raw Bird
20. ght includes modifications I use a 6 cord with 1 8 inch miniplugs to connect the units Unlike some MP3 players that use four compass point buttons to navigate through the various on screen menus most operations with the DJ are done using the centrally located scroll select dial This slightly ribbed wheel can easily be rolled up and down using a thumb and pressed to activate the currently highlighted selection The main menu can always be reached quickly from anywhere in the menu system by pressing the home button to the right of the scroll select dial From there I can get to any bird very quickly The power button on top of the unit must be depressed for 2 seconds to prevent accidental operation a slide switch locks out buttons Complete information about controls and operation can be found in the DJ 30 user s guide see appendix The DJ supports selection of music tracks by Genre Album Artist and Playlists See the implementation section on how I use these features f i gt The back of the speaker amplifier is secured by a screw which I removed and replaced with a Velcro strap to facilitate easy field replacement of the battery l Min I also added a push button for easy on off control j PLiFIg Ptaki Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 4 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 SOFTWARE The Dell D
21. ginning of each track it s necessary to edit the tracks before copying to an MP3 player if you want to get rid of the announcements Also many tracks have songs and calls sequentially on the track so if you want to play them separately in the field you ll need to do some audio editing to separate them There s plenty of freeware and commercial software available for audio editing and you certainly don t need anything fancy I already owned the Adobe Premiere video editing software which can also edit audio tracks and I ve found it to be perfectly adequate for my needs Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 5 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 IMPLEMENTATION OVERVIEW For me as a guide it s imperative that I can access the song or call of a specific species as quickly as possible before an opportunity passes by No point in having tons of material on the MP3 player if I can t get to what I want quickly when the need arises With this in mind I set about designing and implementing a scheme that would meet my needs I invested many hours over a period of two months from the time that I received the MP3 player in early March 2005 until I started using it full time in the field in May 2005 Source material At the start of this project I only owned the Peterson Eastern and Western Bird Song CDs I decided that I needed something easier to work with i e one speci
22. ions state that the unit will play for 12 hours continuously and so far I haven t even come close to discharging the battery during a day in the field according to the battery level display The supplied charger recharges the battery from a complete discharge in 2 5 hours and I travel with the optional car charger for additional protection However I m more worried about how long the battery will last and what happens when it finally needs to be replaced I also have concerns about the headphone connecter used to connect the unit to the speaker amp not that it s given me any problems I try to leave the cord connected to the unit as much as possible so that I minimize the wear and tear due to repeated insertions As with the battery if the connecter dies I can t replace it myself The modified speaker amp is far from an ideal solution On the plus side it s small inexpensive and it does function well with plenty of volume if required However long term reliability is obviously an issue with such a low end unit and I m still on the lookout for something better I carry a backup unit just in case Let me know if you find a better portable speaker amp Desired Features One touch access to the Now Playing list from anywhere in the menu system is a highly desirable feature Obviously a separate button is not going to happen but a settings option to make the back button perform this function under certain conditions
23. is feasible A swap feature much like the channel recall on a TV to allow the two most recently used tracks to be interchanged would be very useful Some of the sub menu displays have timeouts of 5 seconds which is too short I d like to see the timeout value made adjustable via the settings options Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 24 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 APPENDIX Index for the Cornell source CDs that I use Adobe PDF 130KB http www aztrogon com MP3 CD Index pdf Manuals Dell DJ User s Guide PDF from Dell web site 580KB http support dell com support edocs systems P82559M en Dell DJ UG Final Draft 06 Oct pdf Musicmatch Jukebox User s Guide PDF from Musicmatch web site 3 5MB http www musicmatch com info user_guide MMJB_10_User_Guide_v3 pdf Download page for free Musicmatch software http www musicmatch com download free 0S pc amp MODE input amp DID amp OEM MMD amp LANG amp SOURCEZ getbasic_jbpromo Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 25 of 25
24. ith Musicmatch to maintain library integrity The library is backed up on any day that I change it as part of my routine daily backup I typically only use DJ Explorer for creating temporary client playlists more convenient than Musicmatch for this function and to copy photo files for temporary storage Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 19 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 The Add Tracks window is shown in Musicmatch Screen 9 In this example I ve selected View by Genre and collapsed the display to show the pseudo libraries Copying tracks to the DJ is very simple expand the display select all or specific tracks using the standard select commands CTRL click and SHIFT click to pick out whatever you want Click OK and you re done The transfer doesn t take much time at USB 2 speed Musicmatch Musicmatch Screen 8 2 la lx Find Portable Device Manager Sync Add Tracks Select Dell DJ stuarthealyy Tools v A VVWHITE THROATED WAHE D R BIRDS Musicmatch Screen 9 Up Select All D BALTIMOR NI 8 e he BULLO D PINE G H PURPLE FINC A A B Algo Natural B Angeles Caidos Device 26 13 GB Free 27 92 GB Total B46 track s 32 41 52 1 76 GB Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 20 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 PRACTICAL MATTERS Ab
25. k button step back through the previous menus I usually opt for starting at the main menu which only requires one button press To retain the current contents of Selected Music it pays to be careful when adding to the list Refer to DJ Screen 6 on page 9 If Play Track is inadvertently selected instead of the intended Add to Selected the new track becomes the only track in Selected Music All this may seem a little complicated but it soon becomes second nature Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 22 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 Problems and Annoyances DJ player I ve found the DJ to be very reliable and durable In fact dropping it from a height of 3 feet hasn t caused a problem even when the unit was powered on and playing I ve done this at least four times in the past six months not on purpose of course and no doubt P Il continue to do so While I really like the scroll select dial which is very convenient for one handed operation the first unit that I had was too sensitive and the act of pressing down to select an item often caused the dial to inadvertently move to another selection This is exacerbated when I use my left hand I had occasion to replace the player see below and although the new unit is much better in this regard I still have the occasional problem with incorrect selections Note The first unit that I had was the Mo
26. mily name to the first two tracks Selecting a track with a right click will get you to the rename operation where the task of tagging is completed by typing a species name Repeat ad nausea In my case I had 9 discs to work through and needless to say it took a while Unfortunately even more work is ahead After the raw birds library is in place now comes the task of creating edited versions of each track to be transferred to the MP3 player File Edit View Options Help Current Playlist y musicmatch JUKEBOX PLUS Playlists Save Clear Burn Sendtov ge gee Musicmatch Screen 6 LogIn Account Library err Not Logged in View Library by AutoDJ v GET On Demand oul Music Store iD a 01 Track 1 0280 Herons Egrets and Bitterns California 1 N 02 Track 2 0280 Herons Egrets and Bitterns California 2 Radio Z By 03 Track 3 Artist California 3 Play Now California 4 PLAY nr California 5 Sn a i ds California 6 cD Preview California 7 Shuffle Play California 8 Now Playing Erma AutoDJ California 9 copy California 10 Send to Aree California 11 Copy from CD Add Tracks California 12 Bum to CD 5 pes California 13 EEES E California 14 P mos Repair Broken Library Links California 15 Super Tagging California Edit Rename Show Location on Computer Edit Track Info Show Recommended Music Remove Track Tags Create Radio Station Prepare for Volume Leveling
27. move voice announcements and to create separate output files of songs and calls as necessary This step constitutes the bulk of the work I used Adobe Premiere to perform the audio editing tasks I saved the edited files in WAV format which I then converted to MP3 format and created a second library that would eventually be copied to the DJ 30 Step 1 Copy the source material to disk The first step is to copy the CDs to disk which is very straightforward using the Musicmatch software Simply insert a CD select format and destination see Musicmatch Screen 1 and hit Copy from CD Note I didn t do any conversion to MP3 at this point I just copied the tracks in waveform format Folders Organization of CD tracks x Name Size Desktop A 01 Track 1 wav 5 965 KB amp E My Documents 02 Track 2 wav 9 172 KB E W my Computer A 03 Track 3 wav 2 419 KB E Jb 31 Floppy A A 04 Track 4 wav 5 752 KB E gw Local Disk C AQ 05 Track S wav 10 244 KB B B AUDIO MASTER A o6 Track 6 way 5 125 KB E Music A 07 Track 7 wav 5 283 KB a Rew Birds A 08 Track 8 wav 3 671kB This partial folder 2 California A 09 Track 9 wav 9 394KB display shows how I O Disci A 10 Track 10 way 9 452KB organized the master O Disc2 Ay 11 Track 11 wav 7 279KB CD tracks on disk Disc3 Ay 12 Track 12 wav 5 007KB Note Tracks from the Lower Rio Grande and SW Texas A 13 Track 13 way 9 514 KB Peterson Eastern and 3 Peterson Eas
28. nd disc are added since they apply to all tracks This is shown in Musicmatch Screen 4 Next all tracks belonging to a given family are edited and tagged with the family name This operation is performed as often as necessary for all families on the remaining tracks Musicmatch Screen 5 shows an example of how this is done The final step is to rename the tracks to actual bird names This can be done sequentially after each family name is assigned or all at once after family names for all tracks on the disc have been assigned Either way X edits have to be performed where X is the number of tracks on the disc Very tedious Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 13 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 Edit Track Information Checking the Album and Genre boxes in the General Tab allows data to be entered for those categories values are memorized and can be accessed via drop down boxes in future sessions The More Tab allows a specific disc to be entered in a multi disc set Clicking OK applies the Album Genre and Disc data to all selected tracks in this case all tracks on the disc A Edit Track Information Musicmatch Screen 4 x General More Classical Lyrics Notes Bios Info Load Album Track Filename s Track Title Track Number for Track 1 fi Artist farts Featured en 1 Artist E Album V BE iniTE Track 1 w
29. o be displayed in taxonomic order also helps assuming that you know the order You ll also note that I ve prefixed the species names with a letter or number if more than 26 to force species to be displayed in taxonomic order When I first started using the player I used only the names which automatically display alphabetically I m still undecided about which system is best and to date I ve added a prefix to less than half the tracks on the player The alphabetic system means that you can definitely find the bird reasonably quickly unless you suddenly forget the alphabet whereas the taxomic system may slow you down if you forget where a bird is located taxonomically in a long list of species names such as flycatchers Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 9 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 SOFTWARE WORKFLOW This section describes in detail how I used the Musicmatch software to achieve my objectives First in order to efficiently evaluate the source material I copied all the CDs to disk in WAV format and created a master library using Musicmatch Once I had the library I created a hard copy index so I could see at a glance all the species represented duplications track locations times etc I then listened to the material and decided which tracks I was going to use especially in the case of duplications The next step was to edit the selected tracks to re
30. out the only downside I ve found since abandoning tape players and switching to CDs and now to MP3 is the fact that two pieces of equipment are required the player and the speaker amplifier However now that I ve used the system for a while and figured out the best way of physically managing the equipment I feel fairly comfortable with its operation As it turns out most of the time it s the speaker amp that is being operated not the MP3 player After a species is selected judicious playback involves on off operation and volume level adjustment Obviously then these functions need to be optimized I modified the Radio Shack speaker amp shown on page 4 to facilitate easy operation Even though there isn t much room to work with inside the unit I was able to add an on off push button in exactly the location that I wanted I wired it in series with the existing on off switch that is integral with the volume control During operation I leave this switch in the on position and the volume set at a moderate level Adding the push button solved two problems the unit cannot be powered on inadvertently when stowed in my day bag both switches need to be on and the volume need not be adjusted each time the unit is powered on It also minimizes the likelihood of a failure since the volume control is a rather flimsy potentiometer switch of the type often found in cheap electronics transistor radios etc If I had to use this switch to turn the
31. ple files for simultaneous conversion In fact if you don t organize files in family name folders as I do all files could be selected and converted in one fell swoop Not my style though In the Musicmatch Screen 7 example I m converting three additions to the Quail family to five previously converted f A Musicmatch File Format Conversion x j Select source and destination locations Musicmatch Screen 7 Source Destination Owls Partridges Pipits Quail Rails etc ddd d ddi fa fa fone n n aa r n Select tracks to convert Destination location contents CAQU wav MOQU mp3 GAQU call way MTO 3 GAQU song way i Choose source track format and conversion settings then click start Source track format Convert selected tracks to MP3 M Select All Select None a kbps F Apply active signal enhancement during conversion Start Close There are a couple of minor operational annoyances associated with this operation Firstly the full pathname of the source and destination locations are not shown in the display In this example note that the locations for source and destinations seem to be the same However even though I m using the same sub folder names I locate the edited WAV files source and the converted output files destination in separate master folders as shown in the folder display on the previous page Secondly the issue is compounded by the fact that by default the format function sets
32. rs a tn cae psa Era erases aan E E N ENS EEE A e E aS 24 APPENDIX osica A E E E eh mannan nt hr E enna ee TT ee 25 Copyright Information This document may be freely copied for personal use No part of the document may be used for commercial purposes nor incorporated into another body of work for any purpose without my explicit permission Please respect my work by complying thanks Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 2 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 INTRODUCTION This document describes my experiences configuring and using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs in the course of my work Topics covered include how I went about defining what I wanted the compromises involved when I checked into what was on the market the hardware and software that I ended up using how I implemented the project and the practical aspects of field use Even though your application hardware and software may not be exactly the same as mine the information contained here will hopefully help you to implement an MP3 solution that works for you Original Requirements Life before MP3 with a myriad of portable tape players and briefly a portable CD player had given me plenty of insight into potential problems with field use of electronic playback equipment First and foremost on my mind was robustness the ability of the equipment to withstand the knocks it would undoubtedly
33. s library and does not get modified nor View byGenre alo ooo copied to the MP3 player it s used only as a source The edited i ane versions of the tracks that are converted to MP3 format belong to MUSIC ENGLISH my Birds library I also have a Music library The tracks in MUSIC LATIN the latter two libraries are copied to the DJ 30 Raw Birds As it turns out I was able to achieve the same functionality using the Genre tag so it was only a little inconvenient Thus I was able to create pseudo libraries whose contents can be selected and manipulated independently of each other e Oi ycatchg This partial screenshot shows how the libraries appear In this Alen example Raw Birds is expanded and sorted alphabetically s Hummingbird 0740 Humming D Altamira Oriole 1420 Blackbird N American Avocet 0480 Avocets Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 6 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 Before I got very far into the project I looked at the Dell DJ features to see how they would fit with the way I wanted to work in the field What I required was to be able to get to a particular species as quickly as possible after I turned on the player I wanted to see a list of bird families which could then be selected to display a list of birds in that family The music library menu of the DJ allows tracks to be selected by several categori
34. s O Tanagers O Thrashers Thrushes Trogons O Vireos O Warblers O Woodpeckers O Wrens O Mms Birds Blackbirds O Cardinals C Chickadees Copyright Stuart Healy x a Ul Name AV ACFL call way A ACFL song wav AL ALFL wav A ATFL wav A BBFL wav Ap BCFL wav A BLPH way A CAKI wav A COFL wav A COKI way A DCFL way A DUFL song wav A EAKI way A EAPH wav A EAWP wav A GCFL way A GKIS wav A GRFL song wayv A GRPE wav AQ HAFL call wav A HAFL song wav AQ LEFL wav A NOBT call wav A NOBT song waw AQ NUFL way A OSFL song wav AQ PSFL wav A RTBE wav A SAPH wav A SBFL CALL way A SBFL SONG wav AL STFL way A TBKI wav A TRKL way A VEFL way Ay WEKI way A WEWP wav A WIFL song wav A YBFL call way 4 YBFL song way www aztrogon com Size 782 KB 1 144 KB 2 305 KB 10 111 KB 6 122 KB 9 111 KB 4 932 KB 2 426 KB 7 628 KB 6 260 KB 7 283 KB 7 025 KB 3 518 KB 3 041 KB 1 455 KB 2 156 KB 6 162 KB 6 611 KB 8 094 KB 1 190 KB 3 311 KB 1 415 KB 5 162 KB 2 616 KB 8 887 KB 7 996 KB 9 618 KB 8 404 KB 6 030 KB 794 KB 4 978 KB 6 622 KB 5 703 KB 7 605 KB 4 760 KB 4 426 KB 7 743 KB 6 180 KB 1 231 KB 949 KB Page 17 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 Step 4 Convert edited tracks to MP3 format This is another fairly straightforward task which is simplified by the ability to select multi
35. se software should data is saved as it s created and doesn t require explicit saves Consequently I haven t lost any work because of the instability They have balls though the conversion speed of the free software is deliberately slowed so they can charge 20 for a high speed version Do you think I can get away with finding birds slowly so I can charge more to find them quickly The inability of the software to support more than one library meant that I had to sacrifice the Genre tag to create pseudo libraries In my case this didn t result in any lack of library organizational ability but may be a problem for users with more sophisticated requirements The software has a background process that keeps the database open at all times which prevents my backup software NTI Backup Now from backing up the database I have disabled this process from starting when the system boots but it still starts whenever I use Musicmatch Before running my daily backup on days that ve used Musicmatch I use the Task Manager to stop the process However if I forget I m obviously exposed Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 23 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 Ongoing Concerns The Dell DJ is a sealed unit without any visible screws and it s even unclear to me how the unit is assembled Unfortunately this means that the battery is not field replaceable The specificat
36. tern Central Ay 14 Track 14 wav S164KB Western CDs do not Ga Peterson Western Ay 15 Track 15 way 61090 ynear in the CD track Disc 1 A 16 Track 16 wav 8 931 KB adex B Disc 2 A 17 Track 17 way 7 295 KB i B O Rocky Mtn States and Provinces AQ 18 Track 18 wav 5 977 KB Disci A 19 Track 19 wav 9 091 KB Disc2 A 20 Track 20 wav 9 842 KB Disc3 A 21 Track 21 wav 10 155 KB a SE AZ and Sonora A 22 Track 22 wav 14 921 KB Disci Ay 23 Track 23 wav 15 523 KB Disc2 A 24 Track 24 wav 8 696 KB Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 10 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 Before starting the copy you can set the disk file format from the recorder settings window I use WAV for ease of editing and set the destination on disk from the Tracks Directory window File Edit View Options Help Current Playlist A musicmatch JUKEBOX PLUS Musicmatch Jukebox Plus Playlists Save Clear Burn Ser Musicmatch Screen 1 anal Music Library CD Lookup Connectivity Display e i General Player Online Music Recorder cD 6 m Recording Quality Now Playin ve 8 Recording format CCo COPY Tri on 0 CD quality 1411 kbps Delayed Record i Burm to CD 5 A Add to Playlist Window Portable Device J New Tracks Directory Options Copy music to this location C AUD
37. tion of the source files then click Select All or select specific tracks This is shown in Musicmatch Screen 2 using Disc 1 of the Cornell California three disc set oe Add Tracks to Library Musicmatch Screen 2 x ja Raw Birds Up Select All California tio Grande and SYY Texas My Music Desktop pag PERR ld My Computer CD Drives i site Desktop a pr i on mM Formats BAU m nn Copyright Stuart Healy www aztrogon com Page 12 of 25 Using a Dell DJ MP3 player for field playback of bird songs Rev A2 November 2005 After the tracks are added the library display appears as shown in Musicmatch Screen 3 Playlists Save Clear File Edit View Options Help Current Playlist 1 Musicmatch Jukebox Plus musicmatch quality JUKEBOX PLUS OQO z Musicmatch Screen 3 Log In Account Library are Not Logged In View Library by AutoDJ v oer vewsycone Al Att Atum tres me On Demand aaa Unknown 01 Track 4 Artis Album 1 Music Store P 2 02 Artis Album 2 Radio z DELE Artis Album 3 DECE i Album 4 PLAY Artis Album 5 Library gt 06 Artis Alburn 6 cD 07 y Album Artis Album Now Playing 09 A rtis Album are Album DON Album Album Now the work really begins it s time to add tag information using Edit Track Information Tags should be added in decreasing order of most tracks affected First the album name a
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