Wow. I'm just so taken aback about how much of a DOWNGRADE the new media sync app for Windows Phone 8 is compared to the Zune desktop software. Virtually every great and popular feature of Zune has been removed in favor of a basic, lackluster sync toy that doesn't even allow you to organize music/media easily. The interface is downright horrendous for managing media. Period. On top of that, the fact the new sync app must manually scan for media EVERY TIME I launch the software is......I don't have words for how silly this is.

I'm thankful for the fact that I discovered a work-around for syncing music with Windows Phone 8--The dated circa 2003 WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER (thank you Adam @ Pocket Now for showing this to us). Link to how-to article:

http://pocketnow.com/2012/11/05/how-to-sync-windows-phone-8-automatically

While I appreciate still being able to sync via Media Player, the fact that the NEW sync software is so God awful and we just can't get something with the same great features we had before is beyond me. The new software makes it extremely difficult to manage playlists due to the horrendous interface, and Microsoft refuses to listen to what people actually WANT. While I HATE the forbidden fruit's restrictive platform with a passion, this has now forced me to go a completely different direction than Zune.

Zune = 10 steps forward. Windows Phone 8 sync tool = 100 steps back.

Come on WindowsPhone development team!!!

(sorry for my rant - I'm just very upset about the many feature downgrades in the Windows Phone platform in general)

Opus is a great new format with excellent audio quality even at extremely low bitrates (nice for music even at 48 kbps). This makes it a highly appealing codec for portables, especially for those with limited storage. Yeah, like all current WP7 handsets.

Please add support for this amazing codec so that we can carry much more music with the same storage. And please, support it both in WP7 and WP8, don't leave your users behind.

Skype will also be using this, so instead of supporting it just in Skype, you could add support for this in the underlying framework instead.

Thanks in advance!

Okay i was deeply in love with the MUSIC + VIDEO hub of Windows Phone 7, because of the huge artist background image that was left in the background after the song played, this image was also shown the MUSIC + VIDEO tile but know, all i see is the green Xbox music icon and that dull grey color in the XBOX MUSIC HUB, the artist image even disappears after music stops playing.
Please Microsoft and Windows phone do something about Xbox Music on Windows phone and make it look interesting by living the artist background image on. That live tile made my phone look extremely attractive, lots of my friends like seeing the artist image zooming in and out, and the artist image in the Music + Video hub instead of that dull grey color in Xbox music.
And another problem is with the XBOX Music artist background image, my goodness, several of those artists and bands have really outdated pictures, some of the images are really unclear and blurry and completely outdated. those artist background images may seem to be a trivial image but as a music addict, they are a HIGHLIGHT and its something that has interested my friends. its sort of unfortunate that both UK and USA windows live accounts have really outdated artist images, and then the problem of the dull grey XBOX MUSIC background. Please updated the pictures, this artist image problem is present with several artists and bands. i really hope Rovi would also fix this issue with the artist back image but nothing seems to be done about it. I am truly obsessed with Windows Phone and mostly use to listen to Music and Messaging but please WIndows Phone Support! Fix these issues and help windows phone fans