[ninjikiran]

But not hearing anything new in the windows scene, its mainly foobar, winamp, and the other regulars.  Only toys are VST plugins.
 
Anything new? Cool features? ect ect.

 

[Bones13]

There is room for improvement on the Mac, which has had very few players in the past.  The Mac market share is growing, especially in the audiophile world it appears.  Being a Mac user, it is quite exciting and refreshing to see good audiophile player programs out there, competing no less.  Consider what Amarra used to cost when it was the only one, and there is still no direct Foobar2000 analog, there are some free players, but they are not extensible, and most are not being actively worked on like Foobar2K is.
 
In the Windows arena the two champs are Foobar2000 (FREE!) which is quite excellent.  Hard to compete with Free.  J River seems to be the choice for a paid player, and handles all sort of media, not just audio.
 
Currently I think these two products are ruling, and competition is rough, with many other competitors.

 

[Dublo7]

I think it's great that there is a burgeoning variety of music apps on Mac OS, but I have to say... I find it impossible to tell a difference between any of them.
 
Maybe it's my system? Maybe I'm doing something wrong, or maybe there really isn't a difference. Bit Perfect = Bit Perfect, etc etc. Of course, I would like to be proved wrong - I simply need evidence. Expectation bias appears to be rife when dealing with these types of things, and anecdotal evidence appears to be taken as truth all too often. If you download the hottest new audiophile music app expecting great things, chances are, when you look for differences, you will find/conjure them.
 
I'm perfectly happy with Vox. It's free, lightweight, and I love the interface. 

 

[ninjikiran]

It was actually Vox that lead me to post this It seems to have some nice functionality.
 
Only difference between Foobar and Stealth audio player for me was that stealth isn't effected by a GUI.  Not so much SQ, just if I moved a window around, running an intensive app the audio didn't hiccup as it did with foobar.
Quote:

I think it's great that there is a burgeoning variety of music apps on Mac OS, but I have to say... I find it impossible to tell a difference between any of them.
 
Maybe it's my system? Maybe I'm doing something wrong, or maybe there really isn't a difference. Bit Perfect = Bit Perfect, etc etc. Of course, I would like to be proved wrong - I simply need evidence. Expectation bias appears to be rife when dealing with these types of things, and anecdotal evidence appears to be taken as truth all too often. If you download the hottest new audiophile music app expecting great things, chances are, when you look for differences, you will find/conjure them.
 
I'm perfectly happy with Vox. It's free, lightweight, and I love the interface. 

 

[vert]

 
Quote:

I think it's great that there is a burgeoning variety of music apps on Mac OS, but I have to say... I find it impossible to tell a difference between any of them.

 

Maybe it's my system?

Yup. I can easily hear the difference between Ayrewave, Audirvana, and the latest one I tried Fidelia. I prefer Ayrewave.

 

[Vitor Machado]

Quote:

 
Quote:

I think it's great that there is a burgeoning variety of music apps on Mac OS, but I have to say... I find it impossible to tell a difference between any of them.
 
Maybe it's my system?

Yup. I can easily hear the difference between Ayrewave, Audirvana, and the latest one I tried Fidelia. I prefer Ayrewave.

 
Quote:

foobar2000: Frequently Asked Questions  
[...]
 

Does foobar2000 sound better than other players?

No. Most of “sound quality differences” people “hear” are placebo effect (at least with real music), as actual differences in produced sound data are below their noise floor (1 or 2 last bits in 16bit samples). foobar2000 has sound processing features such as software resampling or 24bit output on new high-end soundcards, but most of the other mainstream players are capable of doing the same by now.

 

[bixby]

Quote:

Quote:

 
Quote:

I think it's great that there is a burgeoning variety of music apps on Mac OS, but I have to say... I find it impossible to tell a difference between any of them.
 
Maybe it's my system?

Yup. I can easily hear the difference between Ayrewave, Audirvana, and the latest one I tried Fidelia. I prefer Ayrewave.

 
Quote:

foobar2000: Frequently Asked Questions  
[...]
 

Does foobar2000 sound better than other players?

No. Most of “sound quality differences” people “hear” are placebo effect (at least with real music), as actual differences in produced sound data are below their noise floor (1 or 2 last bits in 16bit samples). foobar2000 has sound processing features such as software resampling or 24bit output on new high-end soundcards, but most of the other mainstream players are capable of doing the same by now.
 
You have no idea about what people hear with real music.  Players sound different period hard stop.  If you cannot hear it do not try to hypothesize that some bits in a noise floor are the only differences.  Obviously you are not very experienced at listening and perhaps have not tried a bunch of players but to come off and tell folks that they are experiencing a placebo effect.  Please!  Take an asprin and come back in the morning!

 

[Vitor Machado]

 
Quote:

Quote:

foobar2000: Frequently Asked Questions  
[...]
 

Does foobar2000 sound better than other players?

No. Most of “sound quality differences” people “hear” are placebo effect (at least with real music), as actual differences in produced sound data are below their noise floor (1 or 2 last bits in 16bit samples). foobar2000 has sound processing features such as software resampling or 24bit output on new high-end soundcards, but most of the other mainstream players are capable of doing the same by now.
 
You have no idea about what people hear with real music.  Players sound different period hard stop.  If you cannot hear it do not try to hypothesize that some bits in a noise floor are the only differences.  Obviously you are not very experienced at listening and perhaps have not tried a bunch of players but to come off and tell folks that they are experiencing a placebo effect.  Please!  Take an asprin and come back in the morning!

 

Coming from the developer of one of the most respectable players among audiophiles, I figured he should know better.
Perhaps there are differences, but caused by some signal processing done on purpose, instead of trying to be as neutral as possible.

 

[Valens7]

Whether or not it sounds any better, I can't say.  What I do know, though, is that I love Decibel's simplicity.  It's exactly what I've been looking for.  If the developer can polish that UI, it would be perfect.

 

[ninjikiran]

This isn't a "does X sound better than Y" thread, please don't flame
 
I am more interested in functionality.  Anything not VST or Winamp plugins   Vox interested me because it supposedly has a pretty good built in crossfeed plugin

 

[vert]

The Mac platform has always had high quality third-party software and early adopters, so I guess it's not that shocking that its taken off as the audiophile choice for music server.
 
I like Decibel's simplicity, but have a love/hate relationship with the UI. I'm just glad though there are so many good audiophile playback solutions for OS X.