4 Favorite Media Players Reviewed

I have tried so many media players over the years and they each have something good. I wish they could be mashed together to create the one media player that everyone wants and loves without the huge memory consumption.

Winamp was my first media player years ago. Then I had Windows XP for an operating system and I was using Windows Media Player. I used to strictly use Windows Media Player, because it’s already there. Why install more when it could do everything I needed? Now that I have an iPod, I have to use iTunes as well, which just duplicates my music collection. Sure, I could purchase a plug-in for Windows Media Player, but I would rather not.

The media players that I’m writing about are: Winamp, iTunes, Windows Media Player, and Songbird.

Winamp

Winamp has been around for so many years and is probably one of the top media players chosen by most. I never thought Winamp could improve. It was always lacking some features, which would require installing a plug-in. It has always been my favorite since the beginning, because it plays just about everything and supports skinning with a large community actively contributing.

I like that it now has a notification popup above the system tray. I am someone who minimizes everything to the tray if possible. I like a clean desktop. If I’m not currently using it, I don’t want it showing (less distractions). When the song title is longer or shorter than the previously displayed one, the popup shrinks or grows smoothly.

This version of Winamp is their 10th Anniversary Edition, 5.5. The last time I used Winamp, I think it was version 3.0! Winamp has improved a lot over the years.

Winamp is probably a great alternative to iTunes because it now supports connecting an iPod and downloading podcasts, too.

Another must-have feature that most media players have been including is album covers. It makes you feel like you’re looking at your CD collection, instead of just a file collection on the computer, which allows for easier browsing. Winamp now includes album art and support for it on portable devices! Winamp seems to do a better job at finding album covers than iTunes (I don’t buy all of my music through the iTunes store). Winamp is possibly just as good as Windows Media Player, but Windows Media Player allows you to search for them if it can’t find them.

A Winamp toolbar was also added for the browser, but I opted to not install it, because I hate toolbars. But, for those of you who like filling up the top of your browser with unnecessary useful toolbars, you can now control Winamp from your browser.

When using the Winamp Browser and viewing a site (e.g. fluxblog) with music on it, the music will play in Winamp as if it was local. This could save you time from using your regular browser and downloading the music and then telling it to play in Winamp.

Plays an insane amount of audio and video types: see them all!

Winamp has always tried to support most file types. File types supported by Winamp: AAC, AIF, AIFF, AU, AVI, CDA, MID, MIDI, MOD, MP1, MP2, MP3, M3U, MP4, MPEG, MPG, OGG, WAV, WMA, WMV and lots more I have never heard of!

Winamp probably has more features than other media players and uses very little resources. Check out the many (new and improved) features that Winamp has. Winamp has become my favorite again.

iTunes

iTunes is usually installed on Windows if you own an iPod. If I didn’t own an iPod, I wouldn’t use iTunes. One cool thing in iTunes that I like is the album cover view. Even nicer when used in fullscreen view.

Besides supporting iPod connectivity, you can also select what you want synced to the iPod. I do like that iTunes remembers and shows you what songs you have selected to sync with the iPod while still listing the songs that aren’t on the iPod. For podcasts, you can set it to sync only the most recent ones or even ones that haven’t been played yet.

iTunes is very easy to navigate. It isn’t overloaded with tons of features like some media players are, which can take time setting up for the first time.

A few things about iTunes I don’t like are:

• Converting most of my songs and taking forever to do it. Even though this is done just once, I don’t like having duplicates!
• iTunes also is not that great for finding album covers. I have some that just display the musical note instead of the actual cover. Windows Media Player and Winamp both do a much better job.
• When deleting a song, it displays a progress window and the progress bar takes a long time to complete.
• I can’t just click how many stars I want when rating songs. iTunes makes me right click on a song and move the cursor over ‘Rating’ and then click how many stars I want to rate it.

It’s not that I don’t like iTunes, it’s that there are too many features I don’t like. If iTunes didn’t feel the need to convert a lot of my songs, I would be happy.

Windows Media Player

Windows Media Player comes with Windows, so this may be the most used media player available. I’ve never had a problem with Windows Media Player as long as it played my MP3s.

Microsoft made many improvements to Windows Media Player which was very much needed. It now looks a lot better than it did. Although the previous versions allowed you to install skins, they were ugly.

I have to admit, Windows Media Player is fast when loading and importing songs. Possibly faster than other media players.

Another reason why I like Windows Media Player over some is that I can display a mini version of it on the taskbar giving me access at all times. It displays the current song playing and also the visualization if you choose. Even watch a movie in a tiny screen.

With a large collection of CDs, it can take a very long time to rip them. Windows Media Player does this very quickly. This may vary depending on your computer.

The new version lets you share media to the XBox 360 or another digital media receiver. Before, you would have to install another program to share. Also browse and sync your library to a portable device. No iPod support! Thumbs down, Microsoft!

If you need to play many different file types, Windows Media Player may not be the right one. It’s limited to just several. I’m surprised it even plays MP3s!

Songbird

As you can see in the screenshot, Songbird can have a similar album view like iTunes. It’s pretty, but slow. The album view in iTunes is faster and a little better looking.

Songbird^â„¢ is a desktop Web player, a digital jukebox and Web browser mash-up. Like Winamp, it supports extensions and skins feathers. Like Firefox^®, it is built from Mozilla^®, cross-platform and open source.

Besides looking good, it has some really nice features:

• Supports many file types.
• Themes
• Three repeat modes.
• Mini mode
• Create your own custom mixes.
• Browse the web for music to play.
• Extensions
• Sync your iPod!
• and more.

Since I use iTunes to download new podcasts and sync them to my iPod, the library changes. When I loaded Songbird, it popped up a window saying it detected changes in my iTunes library and asked if I want to import those changes into Songbird. Of course! This is a great feature if I must have iTunes and another media player installed together.

I’m not very fond of the Cheesy Video Window when watching a video. Yes, it’s really called that. I’d like to see it open in the main Songbird window. It’s okay when playing videos. I had noticed it skipping a little, may have been my system actively doing something.

Songbird is fairly quick when importing, but don’t expect to do anything in Songbird until the importing process is complete. It wouldn’t let me. I’m sure that will change as newer versions are released.

Another great feature is that it will check for any updates just like Firefox and download and install the updates for you. No manual work involved!

Watch the screencast to see what Songbird is like. If Songbird keeps improving, it may replace the other media players for me. But, that Cheesy Video Window must go!

Other Media Players

Other media players that didn’t make my list:

• BSPlayer would have made the list if it wasn’t for the free version having advertisements. The cost of the pro version isn’t too bad though, but I’m not interested in buying a media player when I can get a good one for free.
• Amarok would have also made it if it was cross-platform. Unfortunately, it’s only for Linux. It is my favorite media player when using Linux! Can also sync the iPod with Amarok.

Check out some screenshots of media players over at Lifehacker’s Media Player Show and Tell. Many of the screenshots are of Foobar, which is a media player I have never tried.

I want a media player that is fast like Windows Media Player, has a mini player window like Winamp and Songbird, has an album view like iTunes, syncs to my iPod, displays what will be synced to the iPod like iTunes does, minimizes to the system tray, lets me rate songs like Winamp does, and has a notification popup displaying what song is playing. Or, I guess depending on the mood I’m in, I can keep all four installed and use either one. I really don’t want to.

Which media player(s) do you use and why do you prefer it/them over the others?

iPod vs. Zune

I recently listened to the Diggnation podcast, If London’s Calling…, starring Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht. During part of the podcast, they were discussing the old Zune getting new features and then they started talking about the new Zune and the features that the iPod Touch is missing.

I have never really been a fan of the iPod, but I do have one (30GB iPod Video). I love it because it takes up very little space and I can listen to music and podcasts and watch videos no matter where I am. There are a few things I don’t like about it:

• The click wheel is the most annoying way to move through menu options. Sometimes it even causes me to bypass the option I want. Having to remember which part to click to go back is annoying as well. If the click wheel was labeled better, it might be slightly easier.
• The battery drains when I’m not using it. Maybe mine came with a bad battery, I don’t know. But, it could be just a week that I haven’t used the iPod (fully charged battery) and I will turn it on and it tells me it needs to be charged!
• The blinking “Do not disconnect.” icon.
• iTunes may have a few nice features, but it is slow! Let me choose how I want to put my music on my iPod, please. And, in the format I want it in!
• Calendar, Contacts, Notes, etc. I don’t really care about any of that if I can’t edit directly from the iPod.
• It’s not wireless. (I know the iPod Touch has this, but I don’t own one.)

Even though there are several things I don’t like about the iPod, I still like it. But, the Zune has some nice features that the iPod is lacking:

• Playing Windows Media Audio (.wma) and Windows Media Video (.wmv).
• Wireless. (Again, I know the iPod Touch has this feature.)
• FM Radio! There are many times I’d like to listen to just the radio.
• Faster charge time.

I would gladly trade my 30GB iPod Video for either a new Zune or even better, an iPod Touch. I know the iPod Touch is currently at 8GB and 16GB, which is much less than 30GB, but I know the size will eventually increase, right Apple?

Meebo Firefox Extension

Meebo has released a Firefox extension for its web messenger. Lots of people have been waiting for them to release something to eliminate keeping Meebo in a tab. Although this doesn’t mean you can close the tab, it doesn’t need to be currently active to know that you have received a message or that someone is online.

I first heard about this extension from Chris over at Solo Technology. He’s the same one who made it possible to Run Meebo As Its Own Application.

I am impressed with this extension. I don’t install very many extensions, because I don’t like to slow Firefox down, it already uses enough memory by itself. Besides, the browser is perfect as it is.

As you can see from the screenshots, it visually notifies you that you’ve received a new message or that someone has gone online/offline.

What I Like

• I like the notification popups above the system tray.
• I like that there are several different ways of letting me know that I have new messages.
• I like the look of Meebo in the sidebar, even though it could be improved (see What I Don’t Like).

What I Don’t Like

• I like that it shows the recent messages, but does it necessarily need to list all of them? I should be able to customize this to display at least the last five recent messages so my contact list doesn’t scroll so much.
• When listing the recent messages, they should be separated from any messages above or below. It’s easy to see that each message has a timestamp and is in quotes, but they are just too close to each other.
• I like the notification popup above the system tray, but it moves too quickly! I would like to see an option to set the length of time it sits there and how many popups are shown at a time. Currently, if there’s a new message right after another one, it displays the most recent one, so the previous popup disappears too quickly.
• The tab must go. Even though I don’t need to constantly look at it now, it still adds to the memory usage. It would be great if messages could appear in the current tab even if Meebo isn’t the current tab. And, possibly minimize to Firefox’s status bar (or above it).

Overall, I like this extension even with a few annoyances. I hope to see more improvements in the future. Just don’t take away the features that I like, please!

Trillian Is Slow

I used to use every Instant Messenger and liked the idea of a program that put them all into one place. I have tried Trillian many times only to go back to MSN Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, Google Talk, etc. While it might save time going from each one to update your online statuses, what other reason do you have for using an all-in-one program?

A lot of people use Trillian, but I don’t know why anymore. I recently tried it again to see how it performs and if it had any newer features that I might like, and it started up very slowly! I immediately uninstalled it. It had started up slower than it takes Windows to load and everything else that starts up with it. Anyone have a similar experience with Trillian?

Trillian used to be faster (on a slower computer), but I think with more features it has slowed it down some. I am looking forward to seeing what Cerulean Studios does with the new Trillian Astra.

Anyone looking for an alternative to Trillian, here are a couple:

• Miranda IM
• Pidgin

The History of Backup

History of Backup is a very well written article, which discusses the different backup solutions that have been used over the years. It all starts in 1951 with punch cards and ends with network and online backup solutions.

For years and years, people have always known the importance of backing up information and files. This caused the need for larger storage. I even find myself making more than one backup of the same thing. Paranoid? Maybe, but at least I’ll know when one backup fails, I have another.

I remember when using floppy disks were very common and now it’s hard to find computers with floppy drives in them. Eventually though, with stacks of floppy disks, it made more sense to purchase larger storage solutions, such as CDs and then DVDs. With the constant need of backing up more and more files, better solutions are created.

According to Graziadio Business Report, Pepperdine University, hardware failure in 2003 was the number one cause of data loss, which means you would need to create multiple backups because of the possibility of a backup becoming corrupted due to hardware failure or physical damage. This article shows a table of causes and episodes of data loss.

It is very interesting to see how backup solutions have evolved over the years. There is even a timeline at the end of the article displaying when backup storage from punch cards to blu-ray disks and HD-DVD first came into use. It also shows when network storage and online backup solutions started coming around.

Besides reading History of Backup, check out the links provided throughout the article for more related information, especially The Evolution of the Major Computer Storage Devices PDF.

Read this article if you’re interested in seeing how data storage is evolving through the years. And, as always, I recommend backing up your data and if needed, make a second copy to be stored online so it’s in another location in case of fire or water damage.

Where do you think data solutions will be in several years from now?

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