Is there such a thing as an audiophile music player for windows?
Sep 30, 2019 at 12:21 PM Post #47 of 138
Currently auditioning Audirvana. Seems pretty slick. Interfaces seamlessly with Tidal. I have it set to upsample everything to 24/192k and I swear it sounds better. It also buffers the file so that playback occurs as if the stream was ON your HD. Having too much fun with audio!
 
Oct 3, 2019 at 6:15 AM Post #48 of 138
JRiver is an excellent sounding program, is highly configurable and can stream via web players such as Tidal , Spotify and Internet radio web players.
The sound to my ears is more detailed and open sounding than Foobar and other free players I have tried.
It also has a great selection of streaming options from within the program.
It also is regularly updated and a new version comes out every year or so with noticable improvements in sound quality.
It also has a well supported forum for any configuration problems or glitches.
I feel the cost is very reasonable for what you are getting.
 
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Oct 3, 2019 at 1:27 PM Post #49 of 138
Yet another plug for Foobar2000. The musical spectrum visualization is awesome. I doubt anything else comes close to being as customizable as it. It keeps track of play counts. The ABX track compare utility is a very useful tool.
Only beef with it is it won't play WMA lossless above 44kHz. They limited it as a fix to a Windows 10 bug. Windows has since fixed their end, but last I checked, Foobar left theirs in.

I would just like to add that I am using the Creative Sound Blaster Audigy Rx sound card that has a bit accurate playback option. It basically does something similar to ASIO on all lossless sources. So with that enabled, any difference I hear between players is the result of digital sound processing from the player.
 
Oct 3, 2019 at 1:41 PM Post #50 of 138
foobar. it's free, it plays everything beautifully, i couldn't be happier with it.
 
Oct 12, 2019 at 9:35 PM Post #51 of 138
Oct 13, 2019 at 5:34 AM Post #52 of 138
Oct 15, 2019 at 4:55 PM Post #53 of 138
I like JRiver the best, MusicBee second choice as a free player.
Foobar, I don't know, too much work to make it look decent and hunting for required plugins, configs, etc.
 
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Oct 16, 2019 at 2:01 PM Post #55 of 138
BTW, JRiver is running promotion right now, you can upgrade to upcoming JRMC 26 for $19.98, that also includes JRMC 25 license.
Seems like they have plans integrating Amazon HD, but nothing except talks at the moment.
I used JRMC 24 before, just upgraded and seems like the SQ improved quite noticeably, not sure why, using the same ASIO driver output for my DAC. Definitely not a placebo as I wasn't looking forward to that, was just in the middle of album listening, upgraded, restarted, and it jumped out at me. Odd.
 
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Oct 17, 2019 at 9:40 PM Post #56 of 138
Dawnrazor said:
What else have you tried?
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Yes. Its seems obvious but the point is to establish credibility. If you havent tried anything but foobar its not as helpful as having experience with more players. Usually people who do say something like "I have tried a bunch and xyz player is the best so far". You just basically said foobar works and thats why you like it...
 
Oct 17, 2019 at 10:09 PM Post #57 of 138
Well to be honest, the best easy-to-use music player I have ever used was the Windows Media Player 10 series.
I used to open it. Click on like 10 songs I wanted to hear in the now playing menu. It would play those songs in the order I clicked them, then start playing random songs. It was pretty intuitive in that it would give a good mix of songs that have not been played in a while and high rated ones.
They removed a ton of the awesome features in all versions after it. And to set it in stone, Windows itself will not let you install the 10 series if you're not using Windows XP. After trying the Creative Labs Media Source Player, and using a plugin for newer WMP versions called WMP plus, I found Foobar and did not like it at first because of the learning curve, but once I spent the time to figure out the features I wanted, I think it is better than WMP10. (Granted I still don't think it can sync the lyrics to the song so that it will play like a sing-along [As WMP10 could], but I like the bars visualization better anyway.)
 
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Oct 18, 2019 at 4:30 AM Post #58 of 138
Dawnrazor said:
Yes. Its seems obvious but the point is to establish credibility. If you havent tried anything but foobar its not as helpful as having experience with more players. Usually people who do say something like "I have tried a bunch and xyz player is the best so far". You just basically said foobar works and thats why you like it...
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That's correct. Why isn't it valid? It plays every format, it costs nothing. When I find something I'm satisfied with I usually don't spend any time looking for something else. And I don't care if I have credibility with you or anybody else. I'm not on your payroll. Understand this.

The thread is "Is there such a thing as an audiophile music player for windows" and I answered that. My answer was on topic.

Many other people said the same thing before I did. Why are you trying to gang-bang me? If you want to know you and you buddy could have asked "For the people who like foobar, do you think it's better than other players?" Or you could start a new thread. Because this thread is only about whether there is an audiophile player for Windows. Many of us responded to that with "foobar."

I don't understand the bellicose attitudes of some of the people here lately. Somebody asks a question, people answer, and then somebody doesn't like the answer. Nobody is paying us and it's free for everybody to participate. If you don't like my answer and the answer of the rest of the guys who said foobar, just ignore us. This could be a pleasant place with people expressing their opinions based on their experience. It doesn't have to degenerate into a needless of mindless arguments over nothing.
 
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Oct 18, 2019 at 5:32 AM Post #59 of 138
He isn't saying it itsn't valid mate. You're taking it way too personally IMO :) By the looks of it he just stepped in here and took a chronologically ordered answer to which he asked a question with a clear explanation of why he is asking.
 
Oct 18, 2019 at 7:13 PM Post #60 of 138
Andrew_WOT said:
BTW, JRiver is running promotion right now, you can upgrade to upcoming JRMC 26 for $19.98, that also includes JRMC 25 license.
Seems like they have plans integrating Amazon HD, but nothing except talks at the moment.
I used JRMC 24 before, just upgraded and seems like the SQ improved quite noticeably, not sure why, using the same ASIO driver output for my DAC. Definitely not a placebo as I wasn't looking forward to that, was just in the middle of album listening, upgraded, restarted, and it jumped out at me. Odd.
Click to expand...

Hi Andrew: Interesting to hear you are perceiving an audible increase with the new Jriver 26. Everytime I check Jriver forums, the official word seems to revolve around feature or functional differences, never audio. And even when I ask a friend who buys every upgrade from Jriver, he is not sure he hears any difference, but he is on a mac.

Not to question your ability to hear a difference, but I have had to walk back many of my audible proclamations over the years. Lots of times I go back days or weeks later and relisten and then call it too close to call, haha. I did that a lot with upsampling way back with Audirvana on a Mac platform.

Can you quantify the change a bit? I know it also may be impossible to go back to a previous version and give it another listen, unless you still have both on your pc. I am tempted to upgrade after I tried Roon and while liked many aspects, still prefer the smallest of audible change in favor of JRiver.

Cheers,
Bixby
 
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