The Media Player application on the Samsung A920 divides the media providers up by channels.  At any time, you can type a two digit number to switch channels.  This won't actually start something else playing.  In fact, after you switch channels you then have to find your content from this particular provider.  However, I can never seem to remember what channel belongs to what and I can't find a listing anywhere.  Well, now others can:

• Sprint TV:
• 01: Sprint TV Plus
• 09: Sprint TV Live
• 20: Fox
• 21: Universal Pictures & DVDs
• 22: 16 Blocks (yes, the movie -- this shows the channels may change) Show's up as "Warner Bros." once selected
• 49: Previews
  
• 50: Sprint TV Ultimate
• Radio:
• 16: MSpot Radio
• 23: SIRIUS MUSIC
• 39: Rhapsody Radio
• 53: SIRIUS Hits
• 42: Sony Music  Box Connection
• Music Video:
• 06: MUSIC CHOICE
• 26: VH1 Mobile
• 28: GoTV AltRock
• 36: MTV Mobile
• 46: CMT Mobile
  
• Sports:
• 03: FOX Sports
• 13: ESPN
• 45: SportsEdge
• 55: Maxx SportsTV
• Cartoons:
• 10: Cartoon Network
• 40: Saturday Morning TV
• 11: Adult Swim
• 12: Looney Tunes
• News & Weather:
• 02: CNNtoGO
• 04: The Weather Channel
• 05: GoTV
• 54: ABC News News Now
• Stylez:
• 25: GoTV DIVA
• 27: THE STREET TV
• 38: GoTV Hip Hop Official
• Movies & Shorts:
• 07: mFlix
• 18: SmashTV(TM)
• 19: Fun Little Movies
• 31: BlipTV
• 48: MSpot Movies
• Entertainment:
• 08: E!
• 15: Comedy Central Mobile
• 17: Access Hollywood
• 24: Black. White.
• 29: Varsity Mobile
• 30: Swimsuit Model TV
• 34: GoTV Pure Comedy
• 37: Comedy Time

The thing that I haven't fully figured it is how many of these really do overlap.  For instance, under channel 50 (Sprint TV Ultimate) there is a Weather Channel folder.  It has regional, city, national, and various other clips.  None of it seems to be live streaming.  Under Sprint TV Live there is a Weather Channel that is the same as the cable channel (live streaming).  For this research, I went ahead and got channel 04, as well.  As it turns out, it does have some of the same content, but it's organized differently (the city list folders are different, even) and it's not all the same.  However, it's close enough.  You only get a couple of different things, such as "Sneak Peak" and "Daily Feature" that you don't seem to get with the channel 50 Weather Channel section.  The extra $5 per month wouldn't be worth it, in my opinion.

There are other overlapping channels and content providers like this. 

For instance, channel 16 contains a "podcast" section that has a bunch of NPR and PRI audio clips (e.g. The World, Studio 360, and Open Source, which is actually live streaming).  Channel 39, Rhapsody Radio, contains some other podcasts like KCRW Film Reviews and Left, Right, and Center.  On a side note, it would be great if there was a general purpose podcast player or something instead of having to rely on the various content providers to bring the podcasts to us.

It's hard to know exactly what you might want.  It's also impossible to see the content available without subscribing.  The descriptions are alright as are the previews.  Even with this program I haven't fully explored everything.  I have plans of trying to list it all, at least on a given day.  It's also impossible to tell if a particular piece of content is a live stream or a clip until you load it up and see if it has a time range on it or not.  Even more confusing after that but at least one piece of content, Looney Tunes on channel 50 plays a clip each time it's loaded however the clip changes every few minutes or so. 

So, to wrap up, there are fixed clips, dynamic clips, and live streams.  Beyond that, the fixed clips change as the content changes.  For instance, The Daily Show (on channel 15) has two clips every day after the full show airs.  They are dated, so it's easy to tell what you've seen and not seen.  The icons don't differentiate.  Much of the time, a live stream will have "live" in it's name.  This isn't always true, though.  In one case, Open Source (on channel 16) doesn't have live in it but does stream live.  It repeats often, though.  (That is explained on their website, though.)

In any case, I hope the above list is useful to someone.

Posted by Shane on March 11, 2006 6:25 PM | Permalink