Looking for a Music Player for Windows...

[andras artois]

I don't like WMP, iTunes, Winamp or Media Jukebox. I do like musikcube (windows), Rhythmbox and Banshee was alright.

Rhythmbox is definetly the preferred so far. It was light, simple, doesn't mess around and had a few nice little features.

musikcube although it seemed nearly perfect at first is lacking a few things I like. The controls are at the bottom and it won't remember to stay on my second screen.

It needs to be able to minimise into the tray, controls at the top, layout similar to jukebox, rhythmbox and musikcube.

So whats out there that I'll like?

Cheers.

[pwnst*r]

foobar by a landslide.

default is quite minimalistic aesthetically, but behold what you can do with it:

http://webupd8.blogspot.com/2009/08/11-beautiful-foobar2000-themes.html

[hoppipolla]

I always end up going for Foobar because it "just works", and it also scrobbles. Amarok and Banshee walk all over it though.

I've heard MediaMonkey is good o.O

Oh, sometimes I play around with Winamp though but it still pales to nothing when compared to Linux players IMO :o


EDIT -- Oh incidentally, what IS wrong with normal Media Player? I haven't used it in YEARS! heh :)

[RiceMonster]

foobar by a landslide.

/thread

[pwnst*r]

I always end up going for Foobar because it "just works", and it also scrobbles. Amarok and Banshee walk all over it though.

Oh, sometimes I play around with Winamp though but it still pales to nothing when compared to Linux players IMO :o


EDIT -- Oh incidentally, what IS wrong with normal Media Player? I haven't used it in YEARS! heh :)

walk all over it.

LOL. please enlighten us in what way(s)

[hoppipolla]

walk all over it.

LOL. please enlighten us in what way(s)

I dunno man I mean compare them:

Amarok
http://i35.tinypic.com/5nndp0.jpg

Banshee
http://i35.tinypic.com/123usqs.jpg

Foobar
http://www.foobar2000.org/images/img/main.png

[konqueror7]

when i switched to linux, there was no native foobar client, but it can be run under wine...i'm not so fond of installing windows apps on linux (just doesn't make any sense for switching)...currently i'm using Songbird, which is a terrific player for both windows and linux...:D

[kellemes]

vlc

[pwnst*r]

I dunno man I mean compare them:



LOL, you know NOTHING about foobar or what it can do.

http://www.neugablonz.de/foobar2000/foobar.jpg

http://fc00.deviantart.com/fs34/i/2008/299/2/c/IBIZA_foobar_config_by_Br3tt.png

http://fc01.deviantart.com/fs21/i/2007/268/d/2/FooBear_by_lassekongo83.png




you can take that shoe out of your mouth now.

[hoppipolla]

that's quite cool, how did you do that?

[pwnst*r]

http://customize.org/foobar/skins

[RiceMonster]

that's quite cool, how did you do that?

You have to install additional components like panels ui. foobar is really ahead of everything in all areas, including customization (even in the default UI) and playback capabilities.

[hoppipolla]

Yeah it's kinda cool :)

I guess it can do some sweet stuff, it's also very responsive and functions well, I find it more reliable than Amarok.

Amarok kicks *** though, I love it, same goes for Banshee :)

[madhi19]

Wait wait somebody named a media player "Foobar"! lollll

[Dragonbite]

I think they are trying to port Banshee over to Windows (if they haven't already) and there is some project for being able to run KDE apps (or rather, Qt apps) on Windows. I don't know if Amarok is included in that list.

But Foobar does look pretty good.

[andras artois]

Thanks for the replies. Foobar is looking pretty good but how do I setup it up to look pretty much like rhythmbox?

Cheers.

[hoppipolla]

I think they are trying to port Banshee over to Windows (if they haven't already) and there is some project for being able to run KDE apps (or rather, Qt apps) on Windows. I don't know if Amarok is included in that list.

But Foobar does look pretty good.

Yeah it does, I must admit, the skins do look very good :)

I do wish Amarok or Banshee was that skinnable.

I do think that both Linux alternatives do offer a more cohesive and complete package though, without the need for plugins or themes or hard work to get a fully-featured media player. I mean I never even NOTICED you could do all that stuff with Foobar I was just using it the way it installed normally.

[konqueror7]

I think they are trying to port Banshee over to Windows (if they haven't already) and there is some project for being able to run KDE apps (or rather, Qt apps) on Windows. I don't know if Amarok is included in that list.

But Foobar does look pretty good.

ah, the KDE for Windows project,,, porting banshee would be that difficult i think, because i heard that its written in c#...

what should be done, is port foobar to linux...:D

[pwnst*r]

Yeah it does, I must admit, the skins do look very good :)

I do wish Amarok or Banshee was that skinnable.

I do think that both Linux alternatives do offer a more cohesive and complete package though, without the need for plugins or themes or hard work to get a fully-featured media player. I mean I never even NOTICED you could do all that stuff with Foobar I was just using it the way it installed normally.

there's a reason for the plugins - not everyone needs them. so the less stuff you NEED, you don't GET by default. isn't that something most of you cry about around here anyway? now it's a bad thing? oh yeah, because it's on Windows.

[RiceMonster]

Yeah it does, I must admit, the skins do look very good :)

I do wish Amarok or Banshee was that skinnable.

I do think that both Linux alternatives do offer a more cohesive and complete package though, without the need for plugins or themes or hard work to get a fully-featured media player. I mean I never even NOTICED you could do all that stuff with Foobar I was just using it the way it installed normally.

I don't even customize Foobar that much and I find it more appealing and fully featured out of the box than Amarok and ESPECIALLY banshee. Even in default it's more customizable and has far better playback capabilities than either of them.


what should be done, is port foobar to linux...:D

I agree, but the developer has said multiple times that he will not port it to Linux. He's also said he will not release the source code either, so there's no hope of anyone else doing it. As for as I know though, it's very tied into the Windows api and would be very difficult to port.

[konqueror7]

that sucks...the only option maybe is to make a port similar to the early google chrome browser, wherein it runs on top of wine, but configured to look relatively native...

[hoppipolla]

I don't even customize Foobar that much and I find it more appealing and fully featured out of the box than Amarok and ESPECIALLY banshee. Even in default it's more customizable and has far better playback capabilities than either of them.

It really does depend what you want from a media player. I mean when I was on Windows I did really miss Amarok, but then again I didn't know that I could theme Foobar. Most aspects of Foobar I hated, but then maybe you could change those too I don't know.

The only reason I chose Foobar is because it ran fast and was compatible with the Last.fm scrobbling thingy o.O

[andras artois]

Okay, so I quite like the layout for the iTunes theme but was wondering if I can use it without all the itunes graphics?

Link (http://guistyles.com/2009/03/03/itunes-for-foobar2000/)

Thanks.

[armageddon08]

For music I use AIMP2 (http://www.aimp2.us/) and for videos I use KMPlayer (http://www.kmplayer.com/forums/index.php) on Windows. God, I so wish KMPlayer was ported to Linux.

[hoppipolla]

For music I use AIMP2 (http://www.aimp2.us/) and for videos I use KMPlayer (http://www.kmplayer.com/forums/index.php) on Windows. God, I so wish KMPlayer was ported to Linux.

AIMP2 looks good :)

KMPlayer... is that a different KMPlayer than on Linux then? What's wrong with SMPlayer?

[Dragonbite]

ah, the KDE for Windows project,,, porting banshee would be that difficult i think, because i heard that its written in c#...

what should be done, is port foobar to linux...:D

C# isn't the issue, since it Mono's C# will run fully in Windows .NET. I think it involves other things moreso.

Sounds like they're still working on it, from this blog (http://georgeslavov.com/2009/06/15/the-status-of-banshee-on-windows/).

Miquel wrote (http://tirania.org/blog/archive/2008/Jun-10.html), in 2008:
In the next couple of weeks we will package Banshee for Windows to expand the reach of Banshee to more users. And as part of this distribution we will also distribute templates for Visual Studio developers to create their own extensions.

On the Banshee page:
Windows

We are working on getting Banshee to run well on Windows. XP, Vista, Server 2003, etc should all work. Follow these steps to get Banshee building:

Make sure you have .NET 3.5 SP1 installed
Install Gtk# for .NET (Mono itself is not necessary)
Install msysgit with these options:

"Run Git from the Windows Command Prompt (only adds git to PATH)
Choose Plink, not openSSH (this is only important if you have a GNOME git account)
Choose to always use Windows line endings

Optionally, install TortoiseGit for a GUI git environment
Install one of MonoDevelop (free/open-source), SharpDevelop 3.0 (free/open-source), Visual Studio, or Visual C# 2008 Express Edition
Download and unzip banshee-dev.zip. This is a snapshot of Banshee from git master, as well as some pre-built libraries.
Get any changes made since the snapshot for both the banshee/ and banshee/bin/ directories, using git pull
Open Banshee.sln in your IDE, change the build configuration from Debug to Windows, right click on the Nereid project, and build it

Github has a nice guide for getting started with git on Windows, including instructions for using git GUI tools.
Report bugs and file patches according to the normal process.

[RiceMonster]

AIMP2 looks good :)

KMPlayer... is that a different KMPlayer than on Linux then? What's wrong with SMPlayer?

Yeah, I was confused at first too. It's an entirely different thing than the KDE Mplayer front-end you're thinking of by the looks of it.

[konqueror7]

C# isn't the issue, since it Mono's C# will run fully in Windows .NET. I think it involves other things moreso.

Sounds like they're still working on it, from this blog (http://georgeslavov.com/2009/06/15/the-status-of-banshee-on-windows/).

Miquel wrote (http://tirania.org/blog/archive/2008/Jun-10.html), in 2008:

thanks for the link,,,i used banshee too for awhile, but wanted something uniform for both my systems...

yes, i know theres no issue regarding c#, as you said, it mabe some other,,,more likely the depencies and system specific functions that had been used...:D

[armageddon08]

AIMP2 looks good :)

KMPlayer... is that a different KMPlayer than on Linux then? What's wrong with SMPlayer?

Yes this KMPlayer is different from the KDE one. The video playback on this is so much more smoother than VLC or any other video player on the same hardware. That is just my experience though.

For a better comparison - Link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_media_players)