[grokit]

All it means is, "the market has spoken"

Quote:

Originally Posted by aimlink /img/forum/go_quote.gif And so??..... Does this mean iTunes and Apple are better? So we should look in the direction the wind is blowing?

 

[jawang]

itunes consumes a lot of resources and lacks features, but...

The bigger problem is that there is ZERO reason to use anything other than foobar2000 right now. foobar can do everything that every other player can do COMBINED, plus more. You can make foobar look 100% exactly the same as any other media player, or customize it to anything imaginable. Plus, it's extremely efficient with system resources and has huge 3rd party community support. If you don't like foobar, it's because you haven't put in the effort to customize it, end of story

 

[krmathis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jawang /img/forum/go_quote.gif The bigger problem is that there is ZERO reason to use anything other than foobar2000 right now. foobar can do everything that every other player can do COMBINED, plus more.

Besides running native on Mac OS X.

 

[SoupRKnowva]

Quote:

Originally Posted by krmathis /img/forum/go_quote.gif Besides running native on Mac OS X.

+1 foobar wont work on my macbook pro. iTunes works great, so does Play with you want a more resource friendly player.

 

[aimlink]

Quote:

Originally Posted by grokit /img/forum/go_quote.gif All it means is, "the market has spoken"

The market is fickle and trendy. So it's not surprising that it speaks that way. Give it a few years and they'll find some new toy to flock to. Apple is having its day. Yesterday, it was M$. Before that it was IBM.... etc.

Today, it's the HD800 and Foobar.... etc., etc.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jawang /img/forum/go_quote.gif itunes consumes a lot of resources and lacks features, but... The bigger problem is that there is ZERO reason to use anything other than foobar2000 right now. foobar can do everything that every other player can do COMBINED, plus more. You can make foobar look 100% exactly the same as any other media player, or customize it to anything imaginable. Plus, it's extremely efficient with system resources and has huge 3rd party community support. If you don't like foobar, it's because you haven't put in the effort to customize it, end of story

Wow! You seem so resolute, I've got to try me one. Is there a Mac version?

 

[m1abrams]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jawang /img/forum/go_quote.gif itunes consumes a lot of resources and lacks features, but... The bigger problem is that there is ZERO reason to use anything other than foobar2000 right now. foobar can do everything that every other player can do COMBINED, plus more. You can make foobar look 100% exactly the same as any other media player, or customize it to anything imaginable. Plus, it's extremely efficient with system resources and has huge 3rd party community support. If you don't like foobar, it's because you haven't put in the effort to customize it, end of story

Besides not having a mac version, foobar suffers the same issue that iTunes suffers and that is if you do not agree with the SOLE developers vision well you can suck it. The developer behind foobar is not really open to ideas. Yes foobar is extremely customizable on the surface but as soon as you try to do anything slightly different than how he thinks it should be done you hit a brick wall.

If you like podcast foobar is not the player for that, sure it can "do" em but it does a piss poor job at it. I believe one of my issues the last time I tried to use it was how it handled metadata, it seems on the surface to be very customizable in this aspect but it is not. Sorry I can not remember my exact issue with metadata but I remember it being one of those "its not a bug, that is how foobar does it" items.

foobar is a great app if it works for you, I have tried on many occasions to get it to work for me. I love how you can tweak it to "almost" no end, but I just could never get it to do exactly what I want. For something that you have to put a good bit of effort to configure and not get exactly what you want is just not worth it.

My list of media players that I have used in great detail include, JRiver Media Center, MediaMonkey, foobar, and iTunes. Paid copies of JRiver and MediaMonkey. They all have pluses and minuses, but I am now using iTunes because well while it is not perfect for me it is better than the others.

 

[aimlink]

Quote:

Originally Posted by m1abrams /img/forum/go_quote.gif Besides not having a mac version, foobar suffers the same issue that iTunes suffers and that is if you do not agree with the SOLE developers vision well you can suck it. The developer behind foobar is not really open to ideas. Yes foobar is extremely customizable on the surface but as soon as you try to do anything slightly different than how he thinks it should be done you hit a brick wall. If you like podcast foobar is not the player for that, sure it can "do" em but it does a piss poor job at it. I believe one of my issues the last time I tried to use it was how it handled metadata, it seems on the surface to be very customizable in this aspect but it is not. Sorry I can not remember my exact issue with metadata but I remember it being one of those "its not a bug, that is how foobar does it" items. foobar is a great app if it works for you, I have tried on many occasions to get it to work for me. I love how you can tweak it to "almost" no end, but I just could never get it to do exactly what I want. For something that you have to put a good bit of effort to configure and not get exactly what you want is just not worth it. My list of media players that I have used in great detail include, JRiver Media Center, MediaMonkey, foobar, and iTunes. Paid copies of JRiver and MediaMonkey. They all have pluses and minuses, but I am now using iTunes because well while it is not perfect for me it is better than the others.

Interesting contrasting opinion. Just as how an obsession about the sound of equipment can make one lose focus on the real subject, the music, one can become all taken up with the player, metadata etc., and lose focus on the fact that one wishes to play music. iTunes is perfectly fine on a Mac for playing music. As to speed, modern apps typically require modern machines to run them. iTunes can be a bit cranky at times, but I usually settle down once I'm back into my music and not into organising, skins, plugins etc.

 

[m1abrams]

Quote:

Originally Posted by aimlink /img/forum/go_quote.gif Interesting contrasting opinion. Just as how an obsession about the sound of equipment can make one lose focus on the real subject, the music, one can become all taken up with the player, metadata etc., and lose focus on the fact that one wishes to play music. iTunes is perfectly fine on a Mac for playing music. As to speed, modern apps typically require modern machines to run them. iTunes can be a bit cranky at times, but I usually settle down once I'm back into my music and not into organising, skins, plugins etc.

Actually to be honest I really do not use a computer for listening to music that much anymore since I could not find a decent player

. I have several Squeezeboxes around the house, even when at my computer I use my Squeezebox. It does one thing well and that is play music, use an ipod touch to control it which provides a pretty decent interface. I do use iTunes but that is on my work laptop and I usually just create a playlist once for the day and let it play.

 

[mark_h]

Horses for courses.

 

[grokit]

Foobar seems like a lot of work to get it right, but I can see how it could be very rewarding on a PC, and open-source lossless is a nice option to have. When I use a PC, I still run iTunes and Realtek whatever because my "real" music library is on my Macs, and I just haven't gotten around to spending the time to customize my PC for audio. iTunes doesn't run as well on a PC as it does on a Mac, but it runs well enough for my needs, so I see no need to change unless I start craving something higher than 16/44.1, and I am not sure I would do that on a PC either. Right now I will let iTunes do the work, and I will enjoy the fruits of its labors

 

[Blisse]

iTunes is simple. Start up iTunes. Drop music files into library in iTunes, automatically transfer to computer Music library. Press play. That's all I need it to do.
I spent 20 minutes trying to figure out how to get foobar to recognize my music library, and play the files. Gave up and haven't looked back since.
Do you really need all this customization? It plays music when I tell it to. Good enough for me.

 

[RobLikesBrunch]

Rhythmbox remains my player of choice. It's open-source, has built-in GNOME notifications, very simple, actively watches folders for content, plays every format imaginable, has built-in Last.fm support. It actively & automatically fetches album art.

Linux only!

 

[aimlink]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blisse /img/forum/go_quote.gif iTunes is simple. Start up iTunes. Drop music files into library in iTunes, automatically transfer to computer Music library. Press play. That's all I need it to do. I spent 20 minutes trying to figure out how to get foobar to recognize my music library, and play the files. Gave up and haven't looked back since. Do you really need all this customization? It plays music when I tell it to. Good enough for me.

This is the difference between wanting to play the music as opposed to wanting to organise, enjoy an interface, see how quickly it loads, admire skins etc., etc.. I've been there!! Being confined by iTunes in the Mac environment brought me back home as a reminder. I now appreciate the simplicity of just listening with simple organisation.

I wish I could say the same about my gear. I have 4 cans now and I plan to get another. I fuss mentally and discuss on these forums over how each sounds. I long for yet another. You can replace cans with music player installations for some of us.

 

[bowraboy]

A lot of people (usually Windows users) seems to think the more mucking around you have to do to get something done is better and it makes them feel superior because they can get it to work.

I love iTunes but I am a Mac user.

 

[Pangaea]

^ well said.