New details emerge about rumored Microsoft Xbox Music Locker service

Microsoft is expected to expand OneDrive in the near future to include your music collection in the cloud. Such a move should probably not come as a surprise after all Microsoft has been very generous with storage lately, including bumping it to unlimited for Office 365 subscribers.
Now, some new information has come forward to suggest that the transition to enabling this free feature is getting much closer to a release.
An anonymous tipster who leaked information about Xbox Music and OneDrive integration back in May to LiveSino, has passed on some more information to Windows Central today.
According to the insider, OneDrive already has some rudimentary support for the Locker, including the creation of a Music folder:
"Going to https://onedrive.live.com/?id=music today will automatically create a "Music" folder on your OneDrive - this will be where you place all your music files to add to your Xbox Music collection for playback across all your devices (Windows Phone 8.1, Windows 8.1 PC or tablet, Xbox, or on the web.)"
Additionally, when this Xbox Music locker launches it will reportedly only be available in the following countries: Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, and United States.
Reasons are unknown for the limited-rollout, but it likely has to do with regional licensing agreements, which could interfere with Microsoft hosting of people's music.
Furthermore, Microsoft will allegedly dole out a bonus 20GB of OneDrive storage to users who upload music to their new online Music folder. This mirrors a similar offer for those who backed up their phone's photos to the Microsoft cloud service.
Free to use
Perhaps the best part of the OneDrive + Xbox Music Locker service is it is supposedly free. Since the music uploaded is technically yours, there should be no restrictions on its usage. The concern though was that Microsoft would link its paid Music Pass service to this locker, however, that does not seem to be the case, at least according to this source.
First look at Xbox Music Locker?
Finally, some graphics for the Xbox Music Locker via OneDrive can be found right on Microsoft's own servers (and seen above), including http://music-cache.xbox.com/Content/images/onedrive-banner-v0.1.png{.nofollow}
Those graphics will reportedly be used for the web version of the Xbox Music player to indicate that the music being streamed originates from OneDrive and not Microsoft.
There is no word on when Microsoft will throw the switch on their Xbox Music Locker. However, with free streaming from Xbox Music coming to end in December, the timing appears to be too coincidental to not be connected.
Will Microsoft's move let them catch up to Amazon and Google who already offer similar services? It is too early to tell, but at least Redmond is headed in the right direction, albeit belatedly.
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Daniel Rubino is the Editor-in-chief of Windows Central, head reviewer, podcast co-host, and analyst. He has been covering Microsoft since 2007 when this site was called WMExperts (and later Windows Phone Central). His interests include Windows, laptops, next-gen computing, and for some reason, watches. Before all this tech stuff, he worked on a Ph.D. in linguistics, watched people sleep (for medical purposes!), and ran the projectors at movie theaters because it was fun.
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That would be great, especially since I can't access my Amazon Cloud Music from my Windows Phone.
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Woohoo, stepping forward in Free cloud services with Microsoft! Best part, available in my country!!! (Netherlands)
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Woohoo!!! +929
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CloudMuzik. Works great http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/cloudmuzik/5735ed0a-4a0b-455e-95dc-193016da392e
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+920
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And there is a big update currently in developement for 8.1. Anyone curious about developement can check out his facebook page. He updates fairly frequently and always answers questions!
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I can already get music that I place in a Music folder in OneDrive on my laptop. WP app doesn't support it, but my desktop XBox Music app does. I noticed this functionality several months ago.
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Are you sure it's not because it's syncing then ru your PC target than streaming directly from OneDrive?
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It still downloads to your computer, it doesn't stream from OneDrive .. you can make it avaiable online only after, but when you click play it downloads to your local storage. This would be a proper streaming service. ISPs must hate all of this streaming/cloud stuff
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Lol. I bet most do. Mine doesn't.
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Thanks Microsoft!!! :D
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Another Xbox music feature bound to be half-baked. Sorry, but we all know it is true.
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Why do you say that?
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He's a lemon.
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I'd liken him to a small shiny cherry.
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Because of the way they screwed up xbox player, and zune desktop. We lost auto playlists, wifi sync, a ton of cool useful features, and they still won't put it back.
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Say all you want about Xbox music, but Zune desktop was/is the best piece of music management/playing software ever!
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Because it's MS' modus operandi.
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No need to be pessimistic.
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No, it'll be perfect.
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They have no track record on perfect.
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What company does tho?
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Just about everyone has a track record on getting a working product and leaving it alone. MS has a track record of taking a working product, cut its arms and legs off, slap colorful bandaids on the gaping wounds... Then bump the version number up and put it back on the market.
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Office? Seems improved compared to 2003.
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Not even Office, they ripped out object handling then slapped this flat UI crap all over it in drab coloring making it a pain in the ass to focus.
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all i got to say is sweet :D onedrive is becoming the best cloud service out there :D
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Well, they desperately need to resolve flakey shared folders system!
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Yes! If they could hit the usability of Critix's ShareFile, it'd be all over.
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Me and my fiance have this problem sharing files across the same account. Things frequently re-download or are moved to a different place.
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Yep, we could do with an update on co-owner folders really.
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It is cool when I can use for my company about memory foam mattress topper with new advantages.
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Yep! When it first came out it was cool but I hardly used it. But now I find myself saving everything there.
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Wow! Unlimited storage plus an extra 20GB!!!!
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To infinity and beyond!
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can i upvote you twice? that comment deserves it!
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You only get unlimited if you're on 365. That 20gb is for people who use the service but don't have 365.
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Only for home, premium, University, no MSKU or Business yet.
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I don't subscribe to Office 365. For me it is 40+20 gb: quite an increase.
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I have both!
Storage must be cheap these days. -
If there ever comes a day when you don't have 365, that 20 GB will still (supposedly) be there free of charge. Not to mention I have 365 via my school email and so my personal MS account (Xbox, WP, tablet, laptop) would love the additional storage.
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How do you add 20gb to unlimited storage? Like Steven Wrights' "extra medium"
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Unlimited is for Office 365 subscribers only.
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I just uploaded my music last night to onedrive so thats good to know.
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This, combined with unlimited space for Office 365 subscribers is going to be awesome
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Hey Daniel
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What happened to mix radio?
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Nothing...
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Still oxicash is down. When they will start the subscription?
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Moreover Nokia care centre are out of stock. I need voucher.
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Same here... Xbox team have no love to India....
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Why don't you just use your credit card?
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The best player Mix Radio is available with Microsoft but zero focus...for that reasons MS is way behind its competitors...
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They are going to spin it off. Article in WPC months ago.
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I have a relatively small collection that would even fit on my internal storage so not really a service I was missing. I find it doubtful though that it would be free, I would expect it to be tied to their music sub.
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Why, this is for music you already own. I have a music pass but also have about a hundred albums on MP3, it will be those that I can upload to the cloud and access from anywhere (Although I already have them on all my devices) along with any XBM pass albums, in theory this would allow me to see my local albums in Xbox music on the Xbox instead of having to exit music and launch media player. Bob
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I find it interesting that it's free, it seems to me it'll enable those who like to pirate the convenience of Xbox Music streaming and syncing (aka: Exactly what I wanted before I got a Music Pass). Not necessarily a bad thing, but also seems like it could potentially be a loss of revenue for Microsoft, because people be buying (or lack thereof) music elsewhere, then just using Xbox Music Locker to sync it for free.
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They in effect already do that as you can load all your MP3's on all of your devices, it just means you have to copy it which is what I have done already. This will bring convenience for lots of users, especially Xbox One owners. I didn't subscribe to my Xbox Music pass for the albums I already own, but for the thousands I don't. To be honest for a lot of people why would you stream stuff and then stream it again, when you can copy once and then play over and over without using bandwidth, but the ability to do it when it's convenient is still a good idea. And although MS like most companies (Especially being a software company) would probably prefer people buy music rather than copy it from friends, they cannot police this, and if they want people to take up the cloud philosophy they need to allow music to be a functional part of it. Especially if it encourages them to then give MS more pennies for their Office 365 subscription as it's now such a good deal (As someone as already said, unlimited + 20 is some going). Bob
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the recent OneDrive news coincides perfect with this. You said it, Now they can add to the list of Office 365 subscription "With unlimited storage, Now with OneDrive Music locker service you can store your entire music collection to the cloud and access it anywhere" bla bla lol makes sense. and Them announcing Xbox music free streaming is ending on the PC hmm seems about right timing. They either get people to buy into Xbox music or get them to buy into office 365 OR more people start using OneDrive for music storage and eventually want more memory.
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Not me its using ur existing free storage or paid, and if u want more u gotta pay or those with xbm get more maybe plus xbm is convenient for me for new music and searching songs relevant to what I'm listening to... That's how I found Coheed and Cambria been hooked ever since
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I actually already do this. All my owned music is in a music folder on my OneDrive and I have Xbox Music on all my Surfaces monitoring it. So any new music I add is added to all my devices. I don't do that too often because I do subscribe to the Xbox Music Pass.
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This reminds me... It would be great if our Xbox Video could be synced/ integrate with Vudu/Ultraviolet. :)
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If your small collection is in your internal storage, you can only play on this device. Music stored in the cloud will be available on all devices with Xbox Music support.
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For people with small collections this still will provide two huge benefits: 1) Syncing your collection from your computer to your PC and adding music later without plugging in your phone over Wifi. 2) Device resets. If you get a new phone your music is there without any action on your own part.
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Need this now, we have some great apps that do this but it would be nice to access my music from Xbox Music
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I just don't understand how these types of services are even worth it in the US when you have to pay for the data you use for the top 2 carriers in the country. Just make a working music app to play collections on your sd card.
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FYI, these Artists/albums/tracks will probably show up on your phone just like the cloud service works now. Then while you're on wifi, you can download them for offline use. And also FYI, I have a 65 gig card in my 630 and it's got 20 gigs of music on it. It works just fine. I listen to music all day long without using my phone's data.
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Plus, capped data has come down since the "double your data" promotions have gone into play. I get 30GB of data a month for $100 on Verizon with my employer discount ;) (yes, those outside of the US, it is higher than you're used to paying, but really, that same data used to be $375 ;) lol)
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$100? I pay 20€ ($25) for unlimited everything. Of course I had to pay 370€ for my Lumia 830 but.. still cheaper.
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In Ireland I got this contract with Meteor: 60€ a month, Lumia 1020 for 129.99€, Unlimited Mins+Texts, 6GB 4G Data. That's the highest available. Though there is an add-on for Unlimited Data for 14.99€
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There's free wifi around everwhere I live from my ISP, I don't use much data because of that.
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Well there is free wifi some places,wifi in most homes, friends homes the few times ur out and about doesn't eat much data I average an hr or two of stream a day and my 30gb is nowhere near going over, videos is another subject
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Happy to see that the rest of the world will be able to have this too.... Well at least those countries that are mentioned
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Yay Canada!
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This could FINALLY solve the syncing problems that have dogged this platform since WP8.
(http://xboxmusic.uservoice.com/forums/209733-xbox-music-suggestion-box/s...).
I really hope its not just stream only, that it'll automatically download to the device and that there is a decent way to manage tracks and tags when they are in the cloud. -
I hope so but only if its done right haven't had much luck with regular Xbox music auto downloading my collection
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Finally. I plan to upload Gigabytes at a time. Could this work like system folder OneDrive and you pick what's online only and what's local?
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Well its about time we heard something new about this. Hope it wont take too much longer to get implemented. Can't wait!
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Really awesome :) hoping they'd do something like this sooner than later :)
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No rumormetre? Regardless, I'm liking this -- hoping it's legit.
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Love this, and I can't wait! It'll be nice to stream my music from my computer to my phone without taking up much space!
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Woohoo!!!
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Oh wow I hope this is true....
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What if I already created a folder called 'Music' - is that going to mess anything up?
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Mine was already full of music, don't remember if I did that or what but it's all music I own rights to
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I've been eagely looking forward to the day when Microsoft enabled this feature. What would make this an absolutely killer experience for me - Artist and Album art Playlist Shuffle. Sort of unrelated, but what are the odds of Microsoft being able to license the rights to digital movie storage on OneDrive? I know that there are numerous obstacles and pitfalls, but it would be awesome if we could store our legal UltraViolet - or similar - copies. Edit: Hopefully, we will have the ability to sync to a local music folder on a PC.
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Why can't u OneDrive has a desktop app that allows u to sync an offline folder that allows u to use as you please just like normal folder on your computer , ex.... Add to video or music libray
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Uhhh.... In English, please???
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That feature is already available. If you have Windows 8.1 it's already enabled; if you have Windows 7 you need to download the OneDrive For Desktop app from Microsoft.
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I'm probably being pedantic, but the music is not "yours". You have a license to play it, but you don't own it.
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Yes, you are being pedantic. I bought it, I paid for it, it's mine.
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Awesome! This might bring back my faith to Xbox Music a bit. I hope other highly requested feature will come soon......I hope.
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If we get a new feature it would take few more updates to make it work as it should.
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Well I can accept than. I think its better than nothing.
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That's a great tagline for Xbox Music Locker: "It's better than nothing."
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Now, if they can make that DRM-protected music I bought back on their pre-Zune music store work again...
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I have been waiting for this. I have all my music on Google's service but I'd love to finally be free of them.
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I'm a bit off topic here, but has anyone noticed that since the last x box music update, you can't choose a new song and switch apps BEFORE the first song starts? If I switch to any other app, the x box music just hangs until I switch back, at which time it proceeds to play the new song... Very annoying, and it was never a problem before the update.
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Not happening to me, though. Just tested after reading this.
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No more shitty matching!? YAY!
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This service can't come soon enough. It droves me nuts I own a bunch of Beatles stuff and can't listen to via my Xbox Music collection.
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Or led zeppelin, or Metallica
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Or Exodus, or most of my favorite bands..
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Brazil yay!!!! And I am near having infinite storage on OneDrive.
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He's right. It'll work better on non-WP devices and get more updates/features.
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Microsoft, no one WANTS cloud music streaming! It's too slow, eats into our data allowance, hangs, messes up our album metadata etc. etc. etc. Fix the darn device side app, not the cloud side storage!!!
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On the internet, you speak for yourself, not for all the citizens of the earth.
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I am Emperor of the World and I gave him permission to speak for all citizens of the earth.
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I have unlimited data so i am loving this.
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Yes we do so all my mixtapes can be synced in the cloud and not just commercial garbage, imagine bit torrent sync to download ur mixtapes on home computers OneDrive and its available on all ur devices no need to sync music by plugging in
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eryker, get off your Developing Nation data plan you cheap bastard. Then stop speaking for everyone and telling companies to cripple their services so they fit your broke ass rice farmer connection.
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This is a great move. I've loved the concept since amazon and google introduced their own lockers to upload music, but the problem lies in where it requires a dedicated music player to access them. If native music players like the music app on iOS or third party music players like Poweramp on Android can access these lockers and stream directly, then I'd be happy.
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I don't understand how this is different to me syncing my Windows 8 music library with OneDrive like I currently do. Will it just add a music player to the website?
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It will work different by allowing to sign into any device and having those some show up in it collection instead of being a folder on ur hard drive, ex... Songs in ur windows 8 OneDrive folder can be stream via ur windows phone or Xbox one, or tablet so any changes made to ur collection whether its on xbm or not will show on all
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Now they just need to let us edit the metadata for those songs that Xbox music struggles with.
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Yesssssss a million times yes
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+1520
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On PCMag I saw an early signup for the unlimited storage. When I check my OneDrive storage it now says 10.2 TB available. Wonder when I'll hit that.
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Wow! I didn't expected Daniel was an Anti-flag fan! I wonder if you like Bad Religion too :)
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Goodbye Google music, hello Xbox :)
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Unless Microsoft make their products work worldwide they will keep missing out
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Yes! Sweden is in there! Wohoo.
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Sweet - this is exciting. But... they block OneDrive at work :(
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Give me this and I'll re up my Xbox Music pass as a thanks Microsoft! Hell I'll buy your next phablet and the OneBand (what the Microsoft Band should be called) and a first party Xbox Game. I'll literally support your entire ecosystem if you make this both free and efficient. That's how much I loves my music.
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No it should have been Band 10.
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If only i didn't live with constant 2G speeds. None of these streaming this will ever apply to me unless I move to a city. No thanks
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Can't wait until its enabled, PC tablet, Xbox and phone with all MY songs without actually opening individually
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Well, maybe they will do something like http://10tracks.com but now this cloud locker for music is best.
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Love seeing Rise Against in your collection every time! Favorite band!
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Slooooooooow
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It would be great if OneDrive would detect the song that I've uploaded and make it available as a 64kbps AAC+ to stream. Streaming my 192kbps AAC's doesn't make much sense with my 1GB data plan.
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That's why Xbox Free it was discontinued.
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Neat!
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You can also do https://onedrive.live.com/?id=videos to have it create a videos folder.
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One drive to rule them all...
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okay lets be real for a sec. half or more than of our music collection are considered acquired elsewhere. will they still allow those ? lets say.. you know itunes, amazon music, google, bittorent..
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Eh, have you ever seen a song disappoint from your OneDrive because you acquired it elsewhere? I am quite sure that this is meant to bring people to OneDrive and the MS-data-ecosystem at first. When they see that the Xbox music-content will automatically be available on their OneDrive, some customers may not buy it elsewhere anymore.
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They said it was coming 2 years ago.
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If you already have a music folder, what happens?
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Well that's just perfect if I can access ask my music from there... But then would it be stored locally for offline playback as well? Also I have 22gb of music sooo...
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They need to add a FAMILY sharing feature to OneDrive including this, then it would be awesome - I.e. for a Family to share their photos and music.
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Yes! I've wanted this like yesteryear! PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE!
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Not that locker. I want Other awesome locker that it was fake
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I've already had this folder for about a year. if I put anything in it, it pops up in all my xbox music programs except on the xbox one
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You can play music files by doing this? Music files not acquired from Xbox Music?!
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Yep for around a year
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Why metro dont have a file explorer design like the onedrive web design? It's much more intuitive layout!
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Anyone knows why the title bar in Onedrive is black? o.O
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If this is true it's a brilliant move really looking forward to this.
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yeah another 20 GB. Mabey about a year we have 500 GB free storage
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You should be able to sync any devices local storage with the locker... if not, major wasted opportunity,
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Bring it to Malaysia, MS!
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Anti-Flag, Rise Against, Bad Religion...loving your taste ;)
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Meh.
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Finally! I think i'd prefer the track number way of doing things ala Google Music, instead of the amount of space tracks take up, but oh well, can't have it all. This would be a great addition to the MS ecosystem (if done right).
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I really like this on Amazon but their musical selection leaves a lot to be desired. Huge music selection+OneDrive integration makes it better than Prime Music, that's for sure.
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Can't wait for the extra 20 gigs!!!
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Yes I want this albeit I'm an Xbox music subscriber!!
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I use "10tracks" for this on my Windows Phone, works fine, and scrobbles to last.fm.
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Why not in India??? :/
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They saw all the annoing "When is launch India??!!" spam comments on every article here and pulled it just for fun.
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Mix radio is better than XBox music...make tht to be more advanced instead of wasting time on XbOX
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When I went to https://onedrive.live.com/?id=music I already had some music uploaded.
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Still waiting for Microsoft to launch Xbox services in India :(
Wonder how long it's gonna take since they haven't even announced anything. -
Since this only works on my desktop and since I'm waiting to buy me a surface Pro 3 it's not that usefull for me. If it could work on my phone it would be great.
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I just hope that I can store all my non-licensed music on this and stream it.
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Update your app :-o
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Shirt finally!!!!
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Good... I already use Onedrive as storage for my 32+ gigs of Anime music.., so its good
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Microsoft is really delivering those 1, 2, punches. I have been a MS fan for years, so they're not converting me. Nevertheless it does make it much easier to share MS news with others when we have this kind of news.
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I eally hope that Microsoft takes a page out of Google's book and gives us unlimited storage for our music because 20 GBs is just not going to be enough for my collection.
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When will the update release?
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I think that’s the reason why some music I know I got with music credits back with the $15 Zune Music pass has to be repurchased. Unfortunately the Microsoft account purchase history doesn’t go back that far, but when they add it to the app, I’ll be able to see. I spend most of time in my Minnesota design firm. Anything I see that I can no longer download, I will call them and demand they credit my account so I can repurchase them if I choose too. I’ve never had an issue with them refunding me. They just recently did it for season 4 of the Boondocks because it was censored, but uncensored everywhere else. I have a suspicion they are working on getting them because the third episode hasn’t been added yet and the fourth airs today.