Winamp or Windows Media player or what?

[carlton68]

Hi,

 

I just ask myself which program I should use to play audio cds. Currently I use Windows Media Player 9 for WinXP, but there are a few things that I don't like. So I want to switch. I'll give Winamp 5 a try as it is free.

Any other interesting options?

What I want it for is to play audio cds and mp3s. For mp3s it should show a playlist of the selected files. Stupid animations are not wanted. Small size just showing the control buttons and said playlist.

 

Biggest problem I have with WMP is that it wakes up the monitor with every new track in the list.

 

Thanks guys.

[Straycat]

WinAmp. Less gloat. Cleaner interface. Has automatic retrieval of song titles as well (for legit CD:s that is).

[Khun_Kong]

Have not seen anything better than WinAmp, especially in it's price range (0 baht).

 

WMP sends nfo back to M$, unless you actively disable those features.

 

Love the auto song titling. Usually works for Kazaa'd files. Sometimes will get it wrong on a CD rip.

 

Plus- it's not M$!

[Guest]

I use Musicmatch Jukebox for MP3s, it will sort all your tracks, create playlists and operate just as a regular jukebox does.

 

Have recently found a program called MediaMonkey (free on download.com) thats great for MP3 file management (dont realise how many duplicates you have in a collection of 7000 tracks).

 

Theres also iTunes if you're into the Mac thing. All these proggys are good for big MP3 collections, for simple audio CD playing you're better off with Winamp.

[carlton68]

Hi guys,

 

thanks for the recommendations. I tried Winamp, Musicmatch Jukebox and MediaMonkey (and WMP of course).

I didn't like WMP, otherwise I wouldn't look for others. I managed to shut up WMP so it won't call home to Bill, but there were other things I didn't like. Like waking up my monitor with every track it played. I had my system turn off the monitor after 3 minutes, with most songs a bit over 3 minutes the monitor was turning off and on like traffic lights.

Musicmatch Jukebox: The basic version (free) I downloaded didn't install without checking back to mama. I blocked that in the firewall with the effect that setup was cancelled. I don't like that. After installing it was still talkative to mama. On startup it took about 30 secs before it was usable. Guess it waited for a connection until it timed out. Couldn't fix this via the preferences. Uninstalled it right away.

MediaMonkey: Downloaded standard version (free). Installing easy, could turn off automatic updates and other connections. Think I have seen easier prefernces setups, but managed anyway. Got it to retrieve infos for CDs. Was able to minimize it to just controls and playlist (Window frame made it double the size than needed). Nice feature, to mute click on the icon in system tray. Click again to turn on the noise again. For this it used short fade out - fade in. All in all nice tool.

Winamp: Downloaded free version. Setup no problem. Preferences setup no problem. Retrieved info for unknown CDs. Minimized I liked it more than MediaMonkey cause Winamp misses the Window frame and shows a few more controls. Does a short fade out when I close it in the middle of a song. Good.

Both MediaMonkey and Winamp did not wake up my monitor from standby, this being the main reason why I was unhappy with WMP. For now I choose Winamp over MediaMonkey for the nicer design and easier preferences setup. Both programs do what I need for now.

Thanks for the help.

 

A few recommendations from my side:

For CD-ripping I use exactaudiocopy with Lame encoder for MP3s.

For downloaded MP3s I use MP3Test to check the quality of the files. When I create MP3-CDs and normal mixed CDs I need to 'normalize' the volume. For this I use MP3Gain.

For any questions about these tools please PM me.

[Guest]

If you use the 'pantip' versions of these programs they come with a crack key that gives you the 'full' or 'pro' version. It wont call to mama then unless you ask it to, also set your firewall to block any unauthorized access out and you can tell them to get stuffed everytime they want to take over your bandwidth!

[carlton68]

buksida,

 

I have done that. And because of the problems with the basic version I got the füll version of musicmatch. No need to go to LOS for that. Still had the problem that it needed 30 seconds after startup until it was usable. My guess is that it's been a timeout because my firewall was blocking internet access from musicmatch (completely and without further notice). Anyway was fed up with it and had other alternatives.

For the other two (Winamp and mediamonkey) I don't need the functionality of the full versions and even the basic versions don't give me headaches. So I'm fine for now.