the best (most useful) media center software . . .

khushy · 20 Oct 2007 at 09:36

I love iTunes - very easy to use and the search function is excellent - now I have a different MP3 player - what options do I have?

WMP 11
Cowon JetAudio

Ease of use and simplicty is what I am looking for!

khushy

Supercow · 20 Oct 2007 at 11:11

Literally just got a Cowon 8GB IAudio7 and got jetAdio with it. I have to say I'm extremely impressed with it.
I was aways a iTunes fan, but liked all the functionality of Foobar - which unfortunately is not very user friendly.

Phil99 · 20 Oct 2007 at 11:56

If you know how to set it up Foobar can be very simple/easy to use, however you've got the hurdle of learning how to set it up first.

WMP is very simple/easy but will struggle with large numbers of tracks in the library.

khushy · 20 Oct 2007 at 12:04

whats foobar?

Flibster · 20 Oct 2007 at 12:40

Foobar is the best audio player you can get. With the various UI plugins you can download you can make it very user friendly - personally I just leave it as installed with a couple of small tweaks.

I like that it's complicated and low footprint.

http://www.foobar2000.org/

khushy · 21 Oct 2007 at 19:34

hmmmmm - foobar = FUBAR!!!

Didnt suit me I'm afraid - too simplistic and not very useful IMHO!

I think I've settled on MediaMonkey - very simple - the library is excellent with instant search just like iTunes - which I like - you can even rip using LAME (even though I will stick with EAC for that) and its just SIMPLE!

Khushy

Flibster · 21 Oct 2007 at 19:42

foobar is anything but simplistic - you can make it look how you want.

What didn't it do that you wanted it to do? If it doesn't do it by standard, there's a plugin.

As for the ripping - foobar does that, can use LAME or FLAC or whatever else... Single large file with a playlist, or seperate files....

Phil99 · 21 Oct 2007 at 20:59

khushy said:
hmmmmm - foobar = FUBAR!!!

Didnt suit me I'm afraid - too simplistic and not very useful IMHO!

This is a mistake many people make (and indeed I did at first). Fubar is anything but simple when you take in to account all the (excellent) plugins out there. Yes, the app on its own is very basic, but virtually no-one uses it in that form.

http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?title=Foobar2000:Foobar2000
http://www.fooblog2000.com/getting-started-with-foobar2000
http://www.neowin.net/forum/lofiversion/index.php/t175690-0.html

If you want to put the effort in - it's worth it, but it's certainly not the easiest thing to set up if you don't know what you're doing.