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Topic: Best Audio Playing Application for Windows (Read 34412 times) previous topic - next topic
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Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #50 –
Quote
The downside? GOOD professional D.J. software costs anywhere between few thousand dollars to a whopping $25,000 for Traktor.

I'd like to point out mainly two things:
1.) Traktor DJ Studio 2.5 costs 199€ in the German online shop of Native Instruments. For 699€ you get both Traktor DJ Studio and Stanton's Final Scratch hardware. That is the highest price I could find.

2.) According to this[/url, version 2.0 was using the Fraunhofer engine. On other websites, where you can buy the 2.5 version, the Fraunhofer engine is also advertised. What v2.5 of Traktor does offer is high quality pitch/tempo shifting algorithms, which should be irrelevant for regular playback.

BPM-Studio Professional costs 499€. Together with a "Chrome" hardware controller you pay 1499€.

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #51 –
Quote
Quote
The downside? GOOD professional D.J. software costs anywhere between few thousand dollars to a whopping $25,000 for Traktor.

I'd like to point out mainly two things:
1.) Traktor DJ Studio 2.5 costs 199€ in the German online shop of Native Instruments. For 699€ you get both Traktor DJ Studio and Stanton's Final Scratch hardware. That is the highest price I could find.

2.) According to this[/url, version 2.0 was using the Fraunhofer engine. On other websites, where you can buy the 2.5 version, the Fraunhofer engine is also advertised. What v2.5 of Traktor does offer is high quality pitch/tempo shifting algorithms, which should be irrelevant for regular playback.

BPM-Studio Professional costs 499€. Together with a "Chrome" hardware controller you pay 1499€.

The official Traktor page,
http://www.nativeinstruments.de/index.php?...p_us&no_cache=1

quotes the price of TRAKTOR DJ Studio 2.5 @ 229,00 USD.

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #52 –
Quote
If you use winamp which io plugins are you using?

Not an io plugin, but the main reason I use winamp is the vis plugin called AcidSpunk2.

Hook that up to a Head Mounted Display and you are trippin' on virtual acid.

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #53 –
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If you use winamp which io plugins are you using?

Plugins I've installed:
in_CDReader.dll to replace in_CDDA.dll
in_FLAC.dll
in_mp4.dll from audiocoding.com to replace the default in_mp4.dll
in_mpc.dll
in_mpg123.dll to replace in_mp3.dll
in_tara.dll
in_vac3.dll
out_filewrite.dll (never really use it though)
out_nogap.dll
Nero AAC 1.5.1.0: -q0.45

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #54 –
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1by1 is insufficient as an audioplayer for me as it lacks the following, essential features:

- Diskwriter
- Gapless Playback
- Metadata support
- Playlists
- DSP support
- ReplayGain support
- PlugIn architecture
- HTTP streaming

I'm sure I missed some things, but these should be the most obvious defficiencies of 1by1.
And it's not that much smaller than a minimal fb2k installation either (which still provides a lot more features), so there's absolutely no reason to use 1by1.

I've tested the cpu usage of many players.  I have an older AMD K6-2 550 and with fb2k I have never gotten any less than 17-22% (and it skips like mad), so fb2k has a low memory footprint, so what, I have 512mb ram, it's a cpu hog.  I play my music from an external NewMotion Tech USB2.0/Firewire (I have a 4 port usb2 pci card) enclosure with a Western Digital 160gb ata 100 7200rpm drive.  And so far neither WinAmp or fb2k can match the low cpu of XMPlay 3.0.  It uses the BASS audio library. 
Check it out, it has so many features for a 246kb EXE, it adds nothing to the registry and the only dll's it uses are a 39kb WMA support module and 6kb Winamp DSP plugin wrapper.  It supports Winamp DSP plugins and Sonique visulisations.  And for you Old Skool MOD trackers, it has the best play back for your mods than Winamp. 
It's called XMPlay because in 1998 the mod file format XM was the only format it supported, now it supports natively:
OGG / MP3 / MP2 / MP1 / WMA / WAV / MO3 / IT / XM / S3M / MTM / MOD / UMX
and playlists: PLS / M3U / ASX
And for what it doesn't support natively check out: http://support.xmplay.com/
Which has plugins, visualisations and skins.  There's even a skinning kit so you can make your own skins http://un4seen.com/download.cgi?xmp-skin

I'm not sure about gapless playback, replaygain support or metadata support (I know it has fade in, amp reduction). It has a wav writer: "Writes 8/16/24/32-bit WAVs, supports external encoders (MP3/OGG/etc...), optional automatic level normalization, dithering & noise shaping"

It can play from compressed archives ARJ, LHA, ZIP, RAR, etc.

I know I sound like a salesman from un4seen but I can't stress enough how much this kicks arse for such a small program.  I know you guys love your Fb2k, but give it a try at least.

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #55 –
true, xmplay unfortunatelly does not get enough attention. Its maybe the perfect full-featured player for portable use. In the past its downside was its bad gui (which even compared to foobar was unintuitive), but since the skin-format changed some more usable skins appeared for xmplay.

Actually, if it wouldn't lack some nice masstagging plugin it would probably be the perfect player for those who want something in-between winamp and foobar. You can even use your winamp input-plugins with it.

- Lyx
I am arrogant and I can afford it because I deliver.
 

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #56 –
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Quote
BTW,the development of sonique2 has ceased now.

At last? I thought they were still coming up with betas every few months.

I guess Lycos finally gave up wasting money on Sonique.

I wouldn't call Sonique development a 'waste'. The player has its own niche, though I'd say most in HA.org don't belong to that niche. It never hurts to have another audio player in the arena (ok, besides the zealots and trolls).

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #57 –
IMHO:

Sound guality:

1. Foobar2k
2. JetAudio
3. XMPlay

General:

1. Foobar2k )
2. JetAudio
3. Winamp
4. QCD
5. XMPlay

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #58 –
Quote
1. Foobar2k
2. JetAudio
3. XMPlay

I want to remind you that our beloved TOS#8 also applies to audio players.

Very few test have been done in regards of the quality of different MP3 decoders.
"To understand me, you'll have to swallow a world." Or maybe your words.

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #59 –
And may I remind you that your average audio player can play more than just mp3s?
A riddle is a short sword attached to the next 2000 years.

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #60 –
My vote's for Foobar2000. Main reasons:
  • Low memory footprint. Compared with Winamp or WMP it uses very little RAM and so you don't need to worry about system load.
  • Spartan interface. Everything is operated by keyboard shortcuts.
  • Tabbed playlists.
  • Supports the most formats out of the box. What other player supports MPC without a plugin? Also Speex, SHN, etc.
  • Masstagger.
  • Customizable title formatting. You can make the display look like just about anything.
  • Ability to get freedb tags for ripped files.
  • If you select APE tags for MP3s it'll automatically remove the ID3v2 tags, which helps with a lot of compatability problems. MP3 files that messed up on other players all worked fine after I redid the tags with foobar.

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #61 –
Quote
Supports the most formats out of the box. What other player supports MPC without a plugin?

  RadLight?

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #62 –
TCMP?
Wavpack Hybrid -c4hx6

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #63 –
I like Coolplayer. It is very very simple and sounds very nice to my ears.

website

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #64 –
I love the simplicity of Foobar and its quality oriented performance. I would use it in a second.

But I have to use Winamp because I use the Waves Linear EQ and I can't use the Adapt-X plug-in with foobar.

I would love to have someone correct me on this.

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #65 –
I really don't see why a low memory footprint is important, Fb2k uses about 3mb of ram, xmplay about 5-7.  but this program here, uses about half that of Fb2k:
http://www.spidaware.com/winmms/  and uses the BASS engine, hell I've seen DOS players with a smaller memory footprint. 

I think the best player would be a mixture of Fb2k, XMPlay and Winamp.  Low Memory, Low CPU, Flashy Visuals and Great Sound.  But of course I'm sure I could find something wrong with it

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #66 –
I may be wrong, but as far as I remember, the reason why "quality" is better in Foobar isn't in the decoders themselves, but in the plug-in architecture. Although the actual decoders are top-notch, there shouldn't be any real audible difference (for most people) between straight, no-DSP output Foobar, and straight Winamp, or almost any other regular audio player for that matter. Start tossing in a few DSPs and, I'm sorry all you Winamp fans out there (I used to be one too), but Foobar's much better implemented. Foobar's power is in the clean, flexible implementation. Over time, this will mean that the looks will "improve" (by way of third-party plug-ins), as well as the visualizations. If you're really looking for a low-CPU solution for your MP3s, just plug in your bloody portable player into the line-in of your computer! There, no CPU or memory usage at all above what your soundcard uses. Perfect for gaming, isn't it?

Really, my vote is going to remain Foobar because of its flexibility. What's the difference between one or two megs of RAM, and a CPU cycle or two? Foobar does everything it needs to, and everything else is being developed via plug-ins.

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #67 –
"If you're really looking for a low-CPU solution for your MP3s, just plug in your bloody portable player into the line-in of your computer!"

If only I could pull one out of my arse, that would be great :-)

"What's the difference between one or two megs of RAM, and a CPU cycle or two?"

Being able to hear the music without it skipping on your less than 600mhz cpu while you browse the web, download music and do other things, i.e. multi-task.

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #68 –
Quote
I have an older AMD K6-2 550 and with fb2k I have never gotten any less than 17-22% (and it skips like mad), so fb2k has a low memory footprint, so what, I have 512mb ram, it's a cpu hog.

Quote
Being able to hear the music without it skipping on your less than 600mhz cpu while you browse the web, download music and do other things, i.e. multi-task.

What components did you use? I have an old Celeron at 450 Mhz with 128 MB under W2k. I currently run TeXnicCenter, R, Firefox, Foxmail - and foobar, playing Vorbis files. It never skips, using 3.5 MB of memory and no more than 3% CPU according to the Task Manager.

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #69 –
Slow decoding on K6 machines is to be expected because of inferior FPU. Doesn't apply to Athlon or Pentium2 or anything newer.
Microsoft Windows: We can't script here, this is bat country.

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #70 –
That is very interesting zZzZzZz. Anyway, for me it would have to be Foobar2000 . I use/d iTunes because I have an iPod (Gen 4, 40GB) but now I have foo_pod and it will be a great day when I can uninstall iTunes . That being said I still like iTunes because of the ease of use and the nice "skin". When playing a song and in the front view Foobar uses about 14-16MB of RAM (fine by me, I have 1GB) and when it is minimised and not playing it uses a whooping 665KB . On my Athlon XP 2600+ I have yet to see Foobar2000 use more than 0% CPU cycles .

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #71 –
Speaking of JetAudio, that's a cool little program.  I like how easy it is to record with that program.  Unfortunately, I don't need in-line recording enough to justify keeping it around.

foobar2000 for me.

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #72 –
I dropped winamp at around version 2.8x, mainly because the good alternative appeared: Foobar2000.

I use fb2k mainly for: its gui (non/skinned, light, classical, notepad like  and its replaygain built in support.

As for decoding speed, try with different decoders, like mpg123 or mad. I have used it with a k6-2 500 and a very cheap pcpartner motherboard, using win2k with 128megs of ram without any issues. Had some playback problems with an older celeron 400 tho, but that was using stock decoder.

The only thing i miss from fb2k is having it running in linux (without wine...).

I do have xmplay but only use it for playing tracker files. Its gui is annoying.
She is waiting in the air

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #73 –
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Slow decoding on K6 machines is to be expected because of inferior FPU. Doesn't apply to Athlon or Pentium2 or anything newer.

Ahhh.. Thanks for clearing that up :-).  Can anything be done about this at all?

Best Audio Playing Application for Windows

Reply #74 –
Quote
I dropped winamp at around version 2.8x, mainly because the good alternative appeared: Foobar2000.

I use fb2k mainly for: its gui (non/skinned, light, classical, notepad like  and its replaygain built in support.

As for decoding speed, try with different decoders, like mpg123 or mad. I have used it with a k6-2 500 and a very cheap pcpartner motherboard, using win2k with 128megs of ram without any issues. Had some playback problems with an older celeron 400 tho, but that was using stock decoder.

The only thing i miss from fb2k is having it running in linux (without wine...).

I do have xmplay but only use it for playing tracker files. Its gui is annoying.

yup. I dropped WinAmp around 2.81 it kept crashing constantly and came with more crap.  I know what you mean about XMPlay's GUI, it is kinda sucky, there are different SKins though which can make it suck a bit less.  Listening to tracker mods sucks on most other players though as you know.  So XMPlay is a great play for Old Skool tunes.
I'll give the different decoders a try.

Don't get me wrong, I don't hate Fb2k, it's definately the best audio player out there, it just isn't the best for me :-).

"On my Athlon XP 2600+ I have yet to see Foobar2000 use more than 0% CPU cycles"

That's because AMD's are L337 and do more work per clock cycle than cheating Intels which just up the FSB.  AMD pWns Intel at the moment with it's 64 bit processors.