PC MP3 player recommendations

[Randy Cornhole]

I don't know why but I have never had a real problem with itunes. It has always worked well for me, maby I have just been lucky!

[Big Boy]

This probably sounds stupid (and maybe it is), but there are a lot of MP3 players around these days that won't play MP3 files - they are actually geared up to play WMF files, which actually increases the hard disk capacity substantially.

I will substantiate the above statement by saying that we have noticed this when my son tries to download part of his substantial music collection on to friends MP3 players (of the lower capacity/cheaper type).

[buksida]

Another revival to this as I now have a dedicated music only computer but am still looking for a good MP3 Player/Organiser.

Been using Winamp lately and just downloaded the latest Musicmatch to find it full of bloatware.

Need something that will do the following:

Organise and tag files
Convert formats/bitrates
Rip DVD and CD to MP3 or AVI

And not do the following:

Connect to the internet every 2 minutes
Use more memory than Quake Arena
Install a bunch of other stuff on the machine
Rename any of my files or folders to suit itself

I may go back to an earlier version of Musicmatch, 8.2 was the most stable I think.

Any suggestions ?

[SSD]

I use winamp because it just gets the job done. And when it's playing it sits in your system tray and doesn't get in the way of anything else. That's efficiency. I prefer my apps to be simple and to just get the job done.

[buksida]

Winamp is what I've been using recently, its by far the simplest and gets the job done but isnt too good with managing large collections.

Anyone using Musicmatch out there?

[Guess]

I have gone full circle and given up completely with Music Match. It seems that more than one on you system can cause problems. Both MM ans iTunes leave processes running even when you are not using them. It is quite easy to stop the processes and frig the registry (by hand or better with a specialist tool for editing startup up processes. However I am now back to WinAmp and organizes my files myself. I build a playlist every time before I start and change it when I want to hear something else. I organize the files myself. If you let iTunes or MM do it you get in a right mess with duplicates all over the place.

Tagging must be done by a specialist piece of software and MP3Tag is freeware and the best I have used.

So in the last year or two it seems that nothing has appeared on the freeware market that offers any improvement and the old faithfuls keep getting update and filled with unwanted slothware.

I do have a list of new ones to try but have not got round to it yet but will report when I do. At the moment I am having a nightmare installing Nero Premium version 7.

BTW Roxio is a good bit of software but large and not aimed specifically at music.

So after all the waffle it's still iTunes or WinAmp. iTunes is better on a MAC but OK on a PC if you get rid of all the crap from autostart.

The observation made about iPod downloading reckognizing illegal copies is a indication of what the future holds. The FBI and MP3 owners along with the major publishers and Internet Security are right now planning how to stop it completely across all platforms.

[STEVE G]

Lucky you're not in the US:

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A jury has handed a victory to the music recording industry, which had claimed a Minnesota woman infringed song copyrights by using online media to illegally download and distribute music, according to court documents.

In the civil case, a jury in the U.S. District Court of Minnesota on Thursday found that Jammie Thomas infringed copyrighted song recordings, according to documents. The jury awarded damages of $9,250 for each of 24 recordings, or a total of $222,000, according to documents.

The companies included EMI Group's Capitol Records, Sony BMG Music Entertainment, Arista Records, Interscope Records, Warner Bros Records and UMG Recordings.

Media reports described the case as the first such file-sharing lawsuit brought by the music industry to go to trial.

The recording companies sued Thomas in April 2006 after 1,702 music files were traced to a computer tied to her, according to court documents. Investigators on February 21, 2005 located an individual with the screen name "tereastarr@KaZaA" using the Kazaa file-sharing software program, according to the documents.

"This individual was downloading copyrighted sounds recordings from other users of the Kazaa network, and was distributing copyrighted sound recordings stored on her computer to other Kazaa users," the plaintiffs said.

Thomas, in documents, denied the allegations of the complaint "that relate to any allegations that she ever used any (peer-to-peer) network, including Kazaa."

[dolly.samson]

This is so crazy - supposedly this woman simply copied her commercial CD to a personal CD. Even with software, the EULA says you can make a personal copy as backup.

The music industry is so stuck in the 1970's when people started copying to cassette tape. They really can't stop the copying, so they need to figure out a revenue model where they can live with it.