Best media players and must-have features

[Headdie]

I'm new to computer music and wonder what are be the best media players and must-have features for a headfier...

I'd like to play hi-def 24/96 formats (FLAC, WAV and others)
I'd like to use crossfeed
I'd like to have an full equalizer
Maybe an auto-setup (for my room and speakers)
What else would you suggest ?

I read that Foobar is for the real men and Windows Media Player for the quiche eaters... Just kidding

Take two : I read that Foobar and Winamp can read FLAC, but Apple and Microsoft don't help you very much this way...

I wonder if I should go for a specialized music player or general audio/video player...

Hey you bits and bytes headfiers ! What media players have you tried and wich one have you kept on your mighty machines? What features have you tried and... you know?

Thanks again,

 

[G-man]

i love media monkey. so easy to use, and is very nice. but i might switch back to WMC as i have a remote, and i might want to use it. it depends on how good the flac playback is on that (ie how good the plugins are)

 

[[L]es]

back when i was on windows..

xmplay - great sound quality, i'd rather not touch the options aside from output, in vista wasapi plugin was king (at least for me)

j river media jukebox - features, a lot of features.. similar to itunes

now that i'm on mac

cog - great while you're familiarizing with a new os

itunes - now this is something.. i don't know if itunes on pc is similar (but taboo to computer audiophiles), but on mac it REALLY IS SOMETHING

.

 

[cconnaker]

Quote:

Originally Posted by [L]es /img/forum/go_quote.gif ... itunes - now this is something.. i don't know if itunes on pc is similar (but taboo to computer audiophiles), but on mac it REALLY IS SOMETHING .

Agreed. iTunes on Mac is bit perfect out of the box and nobody builds a better interface than Apple.

 

[FasterThanEver]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cconnaker /img/forum/go_quote.gif Agreed. iTunes on Mac is bit perfect out of the box and nobody builds a better interface than Apple.

Actually, the iTunes interface just doesn't cut it for classical music. J. River Media Center and Foobar are the best choices I found for browsing using a wider variety of tags than Genre, Album and Artist.

iTunes has a lot of appeal to people who don't want to do any homework to spend any effort defining what they want and then finding a player that delivers that.

Bill

 

[[L]es]

ouch.

 

[G-man]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FasterThanEver /img/forum/go_quote.gif Actually, the iTunes interface just doesn't cut it for classical music. J. River Media Center and Foobar are the best choices I found for browsing using a wider variety of tags than Genre, Album and Artist. iTunes has a lot of appeal to people who don't want to do any homework to spend any effort defining what they want and then finding a player that delivers that. Bill

BURN. but he has a point. btw, does anyone know if a remote designed for windows media centre would work on any other program?

 

[cconnaker]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FasterThanEver /img/forum/go_quote.gif Actually, the iTunes interface just doesn't cut it for classical music. J. River Media Center and Foobar are the best choices I found for browsing using a wider variety of tags than Genre, Album and Artist. iTunes has a lot of appeal to people who don't want to do any homework to spend any effort defining what they want and then finding a player that delivers that. Bill

Hi Bill - Wow that's quite an uneducated statement. Feel free to give me a call sometime and we can chat about all the homework I have done with those in the industry. Nobody considers foobar anything but a lab tool. If you actually dig into iTunes a bit you can accomplish a lot more than you elude to.

While there certainly is no application that does everything for everyone I don't think there is a better interface than iTunes. The J River interface is pretty good, but foobar will never make it without some serious help.

I am seriously interested to hear what besides the things you mentioned above make the JRiver and foobar interfaces better than iTunes. PM me and I'll give you my number or email address.

 

[krmathis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by [L]es /img/forum/go_quote.gif itunes - now this is something.. i don't know if itunes on pc is similar (but taboo to computer audiophiles), but on mac it REALLY IS SOMETHING .

Indeed!

iTunes (at least on Mac OS X) is fantastic imo. Bit-perfect, fast and with a really nice library.

 

[Headdie]

I don't know if I'm an audiophile or not, but I'd like to

Play FLAC 24/96
Use crossfeed
Benefit from a full equalizer (at least 20 freqs)

I don't know iTunes... I know, shame on me

But would it fits my requirements ?

 

[The Actual]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cconnaker /img/forum/go_quote.gif Agreed. iTunes on Mac is bit perfect out of the box and nobody builds a better interface than Apple.

I don't have experience with much other than Windows Media Player, iTunes and VLC.


I will say though that I much, much prefer the WMP interface to iTunes. I prefer the way WMP does album art which is minor. The main reason is the accessibility of the playlist sidebar.
Creating temporary playlists in WMP is significantly easier than iTunes. I just drag a few album cover icons or individual tracks over to the sidebar and am ready to listen for hours, while in iTunes I would have to create a new playlist which only shows up as a small title in the left bar.



In general I think Apple's largest strength is their interface combined with marketing but I find your statement "...nobody builds a better interface than Apple." to be extremely subjective and even comes off as ... uneducated

Just curious, what are your favorite features of the iTunes interface?

have a good one

 

[Redo]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cconnaker /img/forum/go_quote.gif foobar will never make it without some serious help.

Ever since the update to 0.9.5, I find foobar's interface much better than iTunes. The pre-defined layouts are great in the new versions of foobar, and it lets me sort by my folder structure (which is exactly how I like it).


Plus I hate the one giant predefined playlist as default. Custom temporary playlists ftw, and in iTunes, their playlists aren't exactly intuitive.

 

[FasterThanEver]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cconnaker /img/forum/go_quote.gif Hi Bill - Wow that's quite an uneducated statement.

You don't know how much homework I have done on iTunes. I spent 6 months researching alternatives before settling on s/w that did what I needed. I spent lots of time trying to use iTunes. I visited the Apple support forums and asked questions. I looked for websites with info on adapting iTunes for classical music. I gave up on iTunes only after giving it several months of effort.

Read what I said about the appeal of iTunes. I didn't say that the only appeal of iTunes was to those who didn't want to do their homework. There are people who decide that iTunes fits their needs. However, it is the only alternative that many users consider. Some of those people might be better served by something other than iTunes but they will never know.

--- about browsing a library of classical music

For me, efficiently browsing a library of 2500 CDs with 60% classical music was the crucial requirement in picking a music player. I knew that my most common method of picking classical music to play was to select tags in this order

genre --> composer --> work name --> artist

Sometimes I might want to select a sub-genre to narrow down choices

genre --> composer --> sub-genre --> work name --> artist

and sometimes I might have more than one performance of a work by the same artist so I'd select

genre --> composer --> work name --> artist --> version

I can define the browser panes I want with J. River MC. And I can have a number of view schemes for different types of music. My normal scheme for classical music has browser panes for sub-genre, composer, work name, Artist and Version.

With a lot of work, I think I could accomplish enough of this with Foobar. Fortunately, I found that J. River MC 12 did the job with no pain for me.

Quote:

Originally Posted by cconnaker /img/forum/go_quote.gif If you actually dig into iTunes a bit you can accomplish a lot more than you elude to.

Ok, why don't you show me how to do what I want with iTunes?

Quote:

Originally Posted by cconnaker /img/forum/go_quote.gif While there certainly is no application that does everything for everyone I don't think there is a better interface than iTunes. The J River interface is pretty good, but foobar will never make it without some serious help.

I consider being able to browse using the tags I want to be an essential improvement over iTunes. Functionality matters to me. If an interface doesn't provide what I need, it isn't the best for me even if it gets the most glowing recommendations.

Other people will have different needs so they should make their own choices.

Quote:

Originally Posted by cconnaker /img/forum/go_quote.gif Feel free to give me a call sometime and we can chat about all the homework I have done with those in the industry.

I've read the content on your website already.

Bill

 

[Headdie]

I've downloaded Foobar2000 yesterday. I have a good feeling so I'm going to try it for a while. FLAC and SQ are essential to me. I wouldn't trade them for a clever GUI or anything else. The equalizer is fine and I hope it's going to help me solve a room/speaker problem. I undersatnd that Foobar has plug-in or add-on. Which one do you like?

 

[doctorcilantro]

iTunes simply doesn't cut when compared to J. River.

You can't even make a custom tag field in iTunes. iTunes is a JOKE for archive, exploring, organizing, and playback of music.

It is a portal to a store 1st. Audio player 2nd.

J. River uses a 4+ million track for testing their unrivaled database system.

Endless functionality, view schemes, high quality DSP, UPnP, Library Serving (over Wan or Lan), Secure ripping, supports all major formats, the list goes on.....you don't need us to call you. Download it and explore...it's a great app. I get irked about this because Apple should offer a better product to its customers; end of story.

DC