Old school user here

[adc2000974]

Firstly Winamp till I die for a few reasons

Windows shade mode
- Winamp is always on, moment till the moment I shut down my pc [which is never!] I live by its windows shade mode. You cannot underestimate the nicety of this feature in classic mode, the ability to switch from full size to compact non-obstructive to other windows is priceless. That meant I've never stuck with modern skins there clunky horrid [alas feature rich.]

Winamp modern skin
- doesnt have windows shade button in winamp library window. I dont want to have to press alt+q I want to double click it compact or normal.

bout it really with 100's of skins none of them are too my liking

Thanks for reading would be interested in Windows Classic alternative skins

[swingdjted]

Welcome back! It's always good to hear from old members!

[knocksense]

Been using winamp since i first downloaded my MP3 for the internet.. but has move on to iTunes now.

[White Raven]

I kind of use foobar. Hi guys.

[knocksense]

Never heard of foobar .. but then there are a lot of media player out there :P

[swingdjted]

Originally Posted by White Raven

I kind of use foobar. Hi guys.

Hi WR! How have you been? I still remember the epic gift card call center thread! Better job now?

[socialoutcast]

Well, I've been using winAmp since before it was aquired by AOL, and it's been great in those days. since the AOL take over, I've bounced from on play to another, but I've always found my way back to winAmp here and there just to check out the new versions to see if it has made any real improvements. So far, there has been NO real leading edge improvements, it has just managed to keep up with the other guys software. Lately, I've been checking out the aimp2 player, and it's awesome with much cleaner sound quality. Luck for me winAmp is modular enough that I can drag and drop new plugins as I see fit to suit my needs.

So to even get winamp to sound even close to aimp2 I had to remove/disable the stock im_mp3 plugin and use the MAD mp3 plugin instead. I'm not sure if it's winAmp or the MAD mp3 plugin, but aimp2 still sounds better, cleaner and has better definition. Nullsoft's in_mp3 plugin sucks lamas arse and distorts the bass and muds up the highs. Thompsons mp3pro decodes is better, and MAD mp3 decoder is miles better, but aimp2 is still by far the cleanest sound of all.

regards
socialoutcast

[socialoutcast]

Originally Posted by idfubar

It's too bad that AOL didn't handle the NullSoft acquisition well... Winamp is a really great piece of software!

You mean winamp used be a great piece of software? Winamp has been surpassed by other media players in terms of both sound quality and ease of use. The ease of use (usablity) of winamp is what keeps me from recommending it to my less than computer savvy friends and family.

[swingdjted]

What would you say is difficult about it?

[socialoutcast]

Originally Posted by swingdjted

What would you say is difficult about it?

Okay, I'll byte. The buttons are small enough that it can be hard to click on or even see unless you have an 800x600 resolution monitor. Navigating through menus can be hard to find things if you can find the menu, if you don't know how to use the right mouse button to get to the main menu and options. The equilizer isn't vary precise. winamp just doen't follow good interface design. I supposed one would have to find a really good skin to make up for that deficiency.

Though in it's deficiencies, I do like that winamp remains to be modular that way I can just drop in the mad mp3 decoder plugin.

-Why you might ask? because I demand nothing less than perfection when it comes to my audio and my coffee. Aimp2 all the way.

[swingdjted]

You can make the window larger or smaller if size is an issue. Either go to the options and select double size, or right click the lightning bolt, go to windows settings > scaling > 150% works for me, but you may have a different preference, so go with the % value that works best for you. You can change the size of the playlist entries and media library items too; let me know if you want to and I'll walk you through it.

The included equalizer is indeed limited, but most users don't equalize with winamp but with a separate program. Personally I prefer the sound to come out as originally intended (bypass eq or flat settings) anyway. I don't like to mess with the professional settings of a recording studio's trained sound engineer unless I'm trying to make up for speaker deficiencies. Besides, Winamp has seemingly countless equalizer plugins (<-- click if you want) that make equalizing far better if you want more control.

Menus are at the top of the main window, just like any other program, or you can access them by right clicking the lightning bolt. Very straightforward.

The interface design is likely what made it so popular - very easy to use, and very easy to customize. I don't think any other player out there can even scratch the surface in terms of customization to fit your wants and needs. Between modules, skins, plugins, library options, and different visualization features, Winamp is in a class of it's own in terms of being able to do exactly what you want while still being able to hide or disable bloat you don't want. I honestly know of no other player that can come close to competing with that.

[Warrior of the Light]

It's true. Sure you need to know where you have to be, but the same thing goes for every other program as well.
I'm not saying this because this happens to be winamp.com but with a lot of tools (especially iTunes) I don't have a clue of what will happen when I click on something.
The first time I tried to load my files to iTunes, it tried to re-encode some wma files I still had to aac. I told it not to, but what kind of person makes it default to re-encode lossy audio files?
I own the PC, it should only do what I want it to do. If a program can't do something in the way I want it, the program is at fault, not me.
What I personally love about Winamp is that it gives me complete control of how I want things.

[swingdjted]

Proprietary bullshit is what keeps me away from Macs and their programs as much as possible. Sure, I am required to use my Mac at work for certain things, but only when necessary, and I also have a PC at work that gets used most often. Aac is a format that I just don't want for that reason.

[rockouthippie]

mp3 is proprietary too, so I don't really see the point. ogg and flac escape the patent wars so far.

[swingdjted]

I try to use flac as much as possible, mostly for quality reasons, but the lack of the other BS makes it better.

[mattyday]

Old member here too - still using Winamp and loving it - even if iTunes has lured me away a few times :S

[swingdjted]

Winamp is what you want it to be. iTunes is what they want you to be.

[rockouthippie]

The main problem with flac is that the enclosure of metadata isn't handled very standardly. With todays nice fast computers, converting to mp3 from flac for your portables isn't a time issue like it used to be. With the size of modern hard disks, storing the larger flac files isn't an issue either. It's what I use for ripping. It wasn't always that practical.