Windows Media Player and iTunes
Wednesday, 30 December 2009 14:55![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
claidheamhmorSince I started using my Blackberry for music, I've been using Windows Media Player to manage my music on my PC. Previously, I used to use WinAmp, which has nice features, but the Blackberry sync software supports only Windows Media Player and iTunes. It wasn't a big hassle to move to WMP.
However, since I recently won an iPod Shuffle, I was left with a bit of a problem: the iPod is supported only by iTunes; there don't seem to be any working alternatives. (I thought we'd moved away from this whole proprietary software thing, but apparently not.)
So I had to install iTunes, and I thought I'd see if it could satisfy my needs well enough to replace WMP. After some googling, I exported my WMP playlists to iTunes, and they came in OK. I tried creating Smart Playlists, and they were OK except that you cannot create a Smart Playlist that is based on the path to any particular music folder, unlike in WMP, and I found that really irritating. WinAmp's dynamic playlists are a fair bit more flexible than iTunes's or WMP's, however.
The interface of iTunes is quite slick, but I prefer WMP's "stacked covers" when viewing artists. iTunes is also unable to retrieve album information and album art unless the album's on iTunes with name etc. exactly the same, which seems to eliminate 95% of my music. WMP, by comparison, is really flexible in that respect, and even lets you choose close matches and edit track names appropriately. iTunes seems to only support album art embedded in the ID3 tags, whereas WMP will read the hidden album art files too. It's also easier to add album art in WMP, with a "paste album art" option. Weirdly, iTunes doesn't dynamically update changed music within the music folders, where WMP does; you have to rescan the folders. iTunes does sync really easily to the Shuffle, but that's what I'd expect.
At the end of the day, I prefer WMP; I'll keep iTunes loaded (though I uninstalled Bonjour almost immediately), and I'll export my playlists from WMP to iTunes every now and again so I can update the Shuffle.
During this whole process, I did manage to do a lot of cleaning up on my music, adding album art (since it's supported on my Blackberry), and finding a whole lot of albums that had never showed up (because they had no appropriate ID3 tags). MP3Tag worked very well for mass updates and cleanups of the tags - things like automatically correcting the case of track names.
However, since I recently won an iPod Shuffle, I was left with a bit of a problem: the iPod is supported only by iTunes; there don't seem to be any working alternatives. (I thought we'd moved away from this whole proprietary software thing, but apparently not.)
So I had to install iTunes, and I thought I'd see if it could satisfy my needs well enough to replace WMP. After some googling, I exported my WMP playlists to iTunes, and they came in OK. I tried creating Smart Playlists, and they were OK except that you cannot create a Smart Playlist that is based on the path to any particular music folder, unlike in WMP, and I found that really irritating. WinAmp's dynamic playlists are a fair bit more flexible than iTunes's or WMP's, however.
The interface of iTunes is quite slick, but I prefer WMP's "stacked covers" when viewing artists. iTunes is also unable to retrieve album information and album art unless the album's on iTunes with name etc. exactly the same, which seems to eliminate 95% of my music. WMP, by comparison, is really flexible in that respect, and even lets you choose close matches and edit track names appropriately. iTunes seems to only support album art embedded in the ID3 tags, whereas WMP will read the hidden album art files too. It's also easier to add album art in WMP, with a "paste album art" option. Weirdly, iTunes doesn't dynamically update changed music within the music folders, where WMP does; you have to rescan the folders. iTunes does sync really easily to the Shuffle, but that's what I'd expect.
At the end of the day, I prefer WMP; I'll keep iTunes loaded (though I uninstalled Bonjour almost immediately), and I'll export my playlists from WMP to iTunes every now and again so I can update the Shuffle.
During this whole process, I did manage to do a lot of cleaning up on my music, adding album art (since it's supported on my Blackberry), and finding a whole lot of albums that had never showed up (because they had no appropriate ID3 tags). MP3Tag worked very well for mass updates and cleanups of the tags - things like automatically correcting the case of track names.
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no subject
Date: Wednesday, 30 December 2009 16:53 (UTC)And how does it compare with TheGodfather, which I believe you recommended to me a while back when I needed to batch-edit ID3 tags?
no subject
Date: Thursday, 31 December 2009 07:03 (UTC)I must admit, I'd long since forgotten The Godfather; I can't even remember how well it works.
no subject
Date: Wednesday, 30 December 2009 23:13 (UTC)Oh, that's right, you're using Windows, aren't you? Tough luck, I guess.
no subject
Date: Thursday, 31 December 2009 07:04 (UTC)no subject
Date: Friday, 1 January 2010 07:57 (UTC)no subject
Date: Friday, 1 January 2010 08:01 (UTC)no subject
Date: Friday, 1 January 2010 11:19 (UTC)no subject
Date: Friday, 1 January 2010 11:21 (UTC)I do intend to get around to running a Linux VM though.
no subject
Date: Thursday, 31 December 2009 05:10 (UTC)For mass tagging and fixing up, I found Picard (http://musicbrainz.org/doc/Picard_Tagger) from Musicbrainz to be the best, as it can create a digital fingerprint of the song, and find it's information, which is great when you have some unknown MP3s from questionable sources.
no subject
Date: Thursday, 31 December 2009 07:12 (UTC)no subject
Date: Thursday, 31 December 2009 17:23 (UTC)Happy New Year! Big party plans for tonight?
What kind of music do you listen to on your Blackberry/iPod?
Take care.
Bodine
no subject
Date: Friday, 1 January 2010 07:52 (UTC)Music-wise, I have playlists for a lot of 80s stuff, plus Mike Oldfield, The Alan Parsons Project, Eric Woolfson, Mike Batt, ELO, Blackmore's Night, Abba, Enya, Katie Melua, OMD, etc., and then playlists for movie soundtacks.