Audio Navigation

Audio Formats | Audio Players | Internet Radio |

Latest news

10 Oct 2007: Winamp 5.5 Full released with the new Bento Skin plus numerous enhancements.

30 Jul 2007: Version 3.4.2 of XMPlay has been released along with improvements.

30 JulMay 2007: Version 2.3.0.3 of BASS audio library released with support for internet playlists and much more

Links:

• Winamp
• Bass Audio Library
• XMPlay

Audio Players

There are so many good music players available for free on the net that the criterion boils down to personal choice. You should definitely not need to pay a licence fee or make do with a crippled version of the premium software. The following are listed because I have first hand experience of using all of these.

Most of the audio players listed here are capable of playing audio in a variety of formats, the most popular being MP3. They also offer facilities for listening to netradio and can also be used to store favourites and help you classify your music collection by finding album details based on record titles. Some carry a lot of advertising and can be rather intrusive when all you want to do is listen to the music. It is also wise to be on the watch for spyware and links to dodgy sites when using the audio player connected to the net.

Winamp

I have just re-discovered Winamp after trying several alternatives. It is still regarded as the benchmark against which most of the other players are measured. It provides effortless listening experience for MP3's and a very comprehensive set of facilities for playlists. It also excels when listening to net radio whereas I have noticed that several of the other players produce crackle when tuned in to net radio, whereas Winamp seems to have the crackle effect reduced to a minimum. The later versions of Winamp are beginning to have many of the features which are present in Windows Media Player, with the latest version occupying over 25 mb of memory.

Installation

I see no need for Winamp Agent which helps to associate file types for playing with Winamp. It is an extra process which as far as I am concerned is not required so when installing I always deselect this option. Under the options menu you can also select whether you want the program to be always connected to the Internet. If I am listening to music locally then I find it useful to disconnect from the internet.

Media library

Winamp can automatically load in all the audio files on your hard drive to the Media library and catalogue them. The View File menu item also allows you to correct or update the file tag information. Information in the library can be displayed by amongst others Artist, Album, Track no and Title.

CD Recorder

Windows Media Player

This is vastly improved since the release of version 10 and now I sometimes even use it because it has a much improved library facility. There are still some very annoying things such as it constantly want to communicate with the Microsoft web site and also incessantly pushes everything Microsoft. There may be ways of blocking this activity, but my own opinion is that these facilities should be set to blocked by default. I now understand why the EU has insisted that this be unbundled from the XP operating system.

Bass Player

If you are into Borlands Delphi programming language, then this is the one to look at. With these delphi components you can integrate an audio player into your own applications. Version 2.3 of the Bass Audio Library is the most recent release and now supports Mac OSX as well as having a number of enhanced add-ons.

XMPlay

XMPlay is quite a nice little player and you can find it at the un4seen Developments site. You will have to go to this site to appreciate all that's on offer here. As there is so much I suggest you start by downloading XMPlay, then try some of the plugins and then you can maybe explore the Midi format.