Using a Xoom with a Mac?

[barkomatic]

I am thinking about getting a Xoom but I'm hesitating because I have a mac. The build quality is steller, I love Honeycomb and the spec's are fantastic. It has such a different look and feel to the unchanging iPad that is refreshing.

I know its a device for a tinkerer, but I don't want to be too frustrated. Is anyone out there successfully using a mac to load content onto their xoom? Does it mount to the desktop? The only reason I'd ever hook it up to the mac is to get movies and music on it. Is there a good app yet that handles playlists (similar to the iPad) available yet? I used doubletwist for my EVO, which worked only ok when it didn't crash but was hoping something better is out there. It used to take hours just to transfer a movie using doubletwist. I've heard about rockplayer but wasn't sure it would work using a mac to load music onto it.

Does the iPad preset in handbrake make movies that look good on it? It seems from the comments here that the Xoom is a love it or hate it device.

 

[MarqBland]

I have a Macbook Pro and a xoom. There is an android installer application for Macs that essentially turns the Xoom into a hard drive on the Mac. So you can do drag and drop that way. For my music, I have Doubletwist and Airsync. So when I go home and have my Xoom on my wifi network, it automatically has my playlists synced for me. The I pad preset leaves movies a bit choppy so I havent quite figured out the best preset for the Xoom. I'm not sure why doubletwist crashes on your Evo...I never had it crash on mine. For the first night, I just started the sync for the 14 gbs of music I was putting on there and let it go while I slept. Now when it syncs, it only takes a minute or two to get my playlists updated. Hope this helps!

 

[barkomatic]

I'm not sure why it crashed either except I have a 5 year old MBP so maybe the old thing wasn't able to keep up.

Thanks for the tips! If anyone figures out the right preset on handbrake for a Xoom movie I'd love to hear what you did.

 

[CypherMax]

I am also using a xoom with a imac. Android file transfer works great and is surprisingly fast. I am in the process of converting all my itunes movies to mp4 using noteburner which is taking forever its been going all week and has only converted 6 movies. But the final product is excellent. I haven't loaded any music on the xoom I have all my music on my droid x via double twist. I just noticed today that double twist would randomly stop playing every 5 minutes while I had it bluetooth connected to my motorola t505 in my car. It used to work fine but I think the latest double twist update screwed a few things up. Oh well hopefully they fix it. Happy xooming!

 

[thechidz]

I don't really care about music as I use iPhone for that but def want my movies and pictures on xoom. So does the file transfer just convert your pictures and movies when you drag and drop? Sorry for newb question

 

[strauss884]

I am also using a xoom with a imac. Android file transfer works great and is surprisingly fast. I am in the process of converting all my itunes movies to mp4 using noteburner which is taking forever its been going all week and has only converted 6 movies. But the final product is excellent. I haven't loaded any music on the xoom I have all my music on my droid x via double twist. I just noticed today that double twist would randomly stop playing every 5 minutes while I had it bluetooth connected to my motorola t505 in my car. It used to work fine but I think the latest double twist update screwed a few things up. Oh well hopefully they fix it. Happy xooming!

That's odd. I was able to do about 10 movies in 36 hours from my I tunes Library, what settings are you using. I used customized MP4 with 1024x768 res. Are you doing higher?

 

[CypherMax]

Yea I did the next resolution up from that can't remember exactly what it was. I also have a 6 year old imac. G5 non Intel. So its a little slow when it comes to converting movies. On another note double twist updated their app and it stopped crashing.

 

[joereist]

I don't really care about music as I use iPhone for that but def want my movies and pictures on xoom. So does the file transfer just convert your pictures and movies when you drag and drop? Sorry for newb question

I don't think there is any conversion when you drag and drop. I don't think there is a need to for pics, and for movies you'll probably want Handbrake.

 

[southflguy]

I am also using a xoom with a imac. Android file transfer works great and is surprisingly fast. I am in the process of converting all my itunes movies to mp4 using noteburner which is taking forever its been going all week and has only converted 6 movies. But the final product is excellent. I haven't loaded any music on the xoom I have all my music on my droid x via double twist. I just noticed today that double twist would randomly stop playing every 5 minutes while I had it bluetooth connected to my motorola t505 in my car. It used to work fine but I think the latest double twist update screwed a few things up. Oh well hopefully they fix it. Happy xooming!

I'm also using noteburner but am getting a hissing/popping sound when I listen via headphones on the xoom. It's not noticeable when playing through the xoom's internal speakers. Are you having this issue? I've tried a few different settings including upping the audio bit rate but it still persists.

 

[CypherMax]

I haven't noticed any audio artifacts through the speakers or headphones yet. I haven't watched an entire movie yet so there may be issues. Here are the settings I used. Video resolution 1280X720 audio aac 128k stereo customized mp4.

 

[Stang68]

Has anyone noticed Android File Transfer not working on the Mac after the latest XOOM update? It opens when I connect the XOOM and then just closes or becomes unresponsive.

Edit: Re-installed the Android File Transfer and it seems to be working now.

 

[88 FLUX]

Just adding another confirmation that using the Xoom with a Mac works great using the Android file transfer software.

http://www.android.com/filetransfer