Windows Media Player 11 best iTunes says writer
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/ZDM/story?id=1962880
Wow it took Microsoft "how" long to finally get it right. I like the feature where it finds and completes loading album artwork. I hope that's in iTunes next. I'll be looking forward to May 17th so that I can see if what he says carries weight or is he just blowing smoke.
Quote:
Apple has been amazingly successful at winning over PC users and infiltrating their machines via iTunes, but with Windows Media Player 11 (WMP 11), Microsoft says "No more."
The new release, launching Wednesday as a public beta download, beats Apple iTunes in many aspects. It acts as a repository and player for all your music, video, and images, unlike Apple's popular player. And while WMP 11 doesn't integrate with the iTunes Music Store, it also doesn't lock you in to one purchasing source. In fact, it integrates numerous stores including Napster, audible.com, Movielink, and MTV's new Urge service.
This release represents a major departure from the feel and navigation styles of WMP 10 and iTunes. With many other media players, you scroll through a list of files; WMP 11 lets you browse your library by cover. Some other players, like Yahoo! Music include the capability, but none do it as well. Bringing art to navigation makes the process much more appealing visually?your music collection no longer looks like a spreadsheet.
You'll also find the Word Wheel search technology Microsoft has implemented with Vista. Its speed is stunning?start to enter the first few letters of a track, album, or artist into the search bar, and the appropriate music will be waiting for you before you stop typing. Although iTunes has the same basic feature, seeing album art pop up is much more compelling than getting a list of tracks.?Continue reading
All Together Now
Navigation is also more unified than with iTunes, which still hasn't found a smooth way to integrate video files and podcasts into a general media library. With the Apple player, you use entirely different interfaces for the different media types. In WMP 11, though, the interface looks the same for all content types in all locations, so you browse, search, add, and delete photos no differently than music or videos. Searching for and editing content on portable devices works the same way as well. Windows Media Player 10 has a poorly integrated navigation system, so I'm pleased to see such a consistent one now.
During setup, the new media player searches your entire PC for compatible files and adds them to your library. If you're like me, though, you've got all kinds of cruddy audio files on your drive, and as happened with me, they'll end up in your library. I cleared out the whole list and started over, but on the second try, I specified the folders to be searched. The process wasn't as intuitive as iTunes' Add Folder command but was easy enough.
Once the player has built your library, the default view divides your music by album, with the artwork and artist info on the left, followed by track information. I love being able to browse by artwork, but in these days of Bit Torrents, indie music, and downloaded singles, large chunks of your collection will probably be missing such images. No worries: Half of my collection had no art, but when I started WMP the next day, Presto! It was magically there. Of course, if you don't want to browse by artwork, you can always use a simple List view.
In a few instances, WMP didn't find album art or had incomplete ID3 info, forcing me to search the database myself?a bit cumbersome, as I had to associate tracks to the album one by one. But as I did so, the software kept updating metadata, so most albums worked themselves out on their own. I was surprised by the depth of the ID3 catalog, supplied by All Music Guide. An album by my own band, Mere, automatically retrieved album art and ID3 info, despite having sold only 3,000 copies or so.
There was a hubbub a few months ago concerning privacy with the iTunes Mini Store because it phones home to transmit info about your listening (as do several of the popular players). For those with such concerns, the WMP 11 setup asks you if you'd like to disable the auto-connect capabilities, which are set on by default. At any time, you can turn off features that require connecting to the Internet.
The window layout is fairly straightforward. The familiar tree navigation, reminiscent of WMP 10 and iTunes, sits on the far left side and lets you select among views: Album, Artist, Song,, and others. Back and Forward buttons that look like those in Internet Explorer 7 reside at the top left and greatly simplify navigation.?Continue reading
Cheese and Other Features
The cheesy visualizations of the previous version remain?why, I don't know?and the equalizer is still just as hard to find. I was intrigued by the Display Lyrics and Captions option but wasn't able to get it to work, even when I chose ultra-poppy songs like The Beach Boys' "Surfin' USA," Michael Jackson's "Beat It," and Kelly Clarkson's "Since U Been Gone."
Windows Media Player 11 also includes easy-to-use ripping and burning features. You can compile and burn either audio or data CDs?you can even burn collections that span several discs. Very cool. I found the ripping options to be fairly extensive. You can rip to MP3, WAV, WMA (with several bit-rate options?full quality, variable bit rate, or up to 192 kbps). MP3 ripping maxes out at 320 kbps.
Syncing and loading portable players is much, much, much easier than with WMP 10, and is as smooth as what any of the other services, including iTunes, offer. Surprised? So was I. Getting music onto a portable player using the previous version was a truly awful experience, but this one lets you hook up your player, then simply drag files and drop them into the right-hand pane. As the media player scans your library, a meter lets you know how much room the device will have left when the files are copied onto it. When you get close to the limit, just hit sync to actually transfer the files.
The iTunes transfer feature has one advantage?it loads your device as you drag and drop, but that's the only way it's better. And there's a trade-off ?WMP 11 lets you see what you're loading without switching views; iTunes doesn't. And with WMP 11's reverse sync you can easily get pictures or voice recordings off of your portable device and into your library. Still no iPod compatibility, though. If you've been holding your breath waiting for it, I'd exhale. It'll never happen.
As with music album covers, the folder view of photos shows the pictures in each folder in the form a virtual stack, with the top image visible. Clicking on a folder takes you inside. Clicking on an individual image blows it up to full size and starts a slide show of all the folder's images.
Microsoft still has some work to do before it launches Windows Media Player 11 for real. Metadata lookup could be faster, and the interface, while good, needs tweaking?for example, some of the buttons you use most often are too small. But this media player is a lot more fun to use than any other, and just as powerful. To check it out for yourself, go to http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmedia/player/11 (the link will be live on Wednesday, May 17th).
Apple has been amazingly successful at winning over PC users and infiltrating their machines via iTunes, but with Windows Media Player 11 (WMP 11), Microsoft says "No more."
The new release, launching Wednesday as a public beta download, beats Apple iTunes in many aspects. It acts as a repository and player for all your music, video, and images, unlike Apple's popular player. And while WMP 11 doesn't integrate with the iTunes Music Store, it also doesn't lock you in to one purchasing source. In fact, it integrates numerous stores including Napster, audible.com, Movielink, and MTV's new Urge service.
This release represents a major departure from the feel and navigation styles of WMP 10 and iTunes. With many other media players, you scroll through a list of files; WMP 11 lets you browse your library by cover. Some other players, like Yahoo! Music include the capability, but none do it as well. Bringing art to navigation makes the process much more appealing visually?your music collection no longer looks like a spreadsheet.
You'll also find the Word Wheel search technology Microsoft has implemented with Vista. Its speed is stunning?start to enter the first few letters of a track, album, or artist into the search bar, and the appropriate music will be waiting for you before you stop typing. Although iTunes has the same basic feature, seeing album art pop up is much more compelling than getting a list of tracks.?Continue reading
All Together Now
Navigation is also more unified than with iTunes, which still hasn't found a smooth way to integrate video files and podcasts into a general media library. With the Apple player, you use entirely different interfaces for the different media types. In WMP 11, though, the interface looks the same for all content types in all locations, so you browse, search, add, and delete photos no differently than music or videos. Searching for and editing content on portable devices works the same way as well. Windows Media Player 10 has a poorly integrated navigation system, so I'm pleased to see such a consistent one now.
During setup, the new media player searches your entire PC for compatible files and adds them to your library. If you're like me, though, you've got all kinds of cruddy audio files on your drive, and as happened with me, they'll end up in your library. I cleared out the whole list and started over, but on the second try, I specified the folders to be searched. The process wasn't as intuitive as iTunes' Add Folder command but was easy enough.
Once the player has built your library, the default view divides your music by album, with the artwork and artist info on the left, followed by track information. I love being able to browse by artwork, but in these days of Bit Torrents, indie music, and downloaded singles, large chunks of your collection will probably be missing such images. No worries: Half of my collection had no art, but when I started WMP the next day, Presto! It was magically there. Of course, if you don't want to browse by artwork, you can always use a simple List view.
In a few instances, WMP didn't find album art or had incomplete ID3 info, forcing me to search the database myself?a bit cumbersome, as I had to associate tracks to the album one by one. But as I did so, the software kept updating metadata, so most albums worked themselves out on their own. I was surprised by the depth of the ID3 catalog, supplied by All Music Guide. An album by my own band, Mere, automatically retrieved album art and ID3 info, despite having sold only 3,000 copies or so.
There was a hubbub a few months ago concerning privacy with the iTunes Mini Store because it phones home to transmit info about your listening (as do several of the popular players). For those with such concerns, the WMP 11 setup asks you if you'd like to disable the auto-connect capabilities, which are set on by default. At any time, you can turn off features that require connecting to the Internet.
The window layout is fairly straightforward. The familiar tree navigation, reminiscent of WMP 10 and iTunes, sits on the far left side and lets you select among views: Album, Artist, Song,, and others. Back and Forward buttons that look like those in Internet Explorer 7 reside at the top left and greatly simplify navigation.?Continue reading
Cheese and Other Features
The cheesy visualizations of the previous version remain?why, I don't know?and the equalizer is still just as hard to find. I was intrigued by the Display Lyrics and Captions option but wasn't able to get it to work, even when I chose ultra-poppy songs like The Beach Boys' "Surfin' USA," Michael Jackson's "Beat It," and Kelly Clarkson's "Since U Been Gone."
Windows Media Player 11 also includes easy-to-use ripping and burning features. You can compile and burn either audio or data CDs?you can even burn collections that span several discs. Very cool. I found the ripping options to be fairly extensive. You can rip to MP3, WAV, WMA (with several bit-rate options?full quality, variable bit rate, or up to 192 kbps). MP3 ripping maxes out at 320 kbps.
Syncing and loading portable players is much, much, much easier than with WMP 10, and is as smooth as what any of the other services, including iTunes, offer. Surprised? So was I. Getting music onto a portable player using the previous version was a truly awful experience, but this one lets you hook up your player, then simply drag files and drop them into the right-hand pane. As the media player scans your library, a meter lets you know how much room the device will have left when the files are copied onto it. When you get close to the limit, just hit sync to actually transfer the files.
The iTunes transfer feature has one advantage?it loads your device as you drag and drop, but that's the only way it's better. And there's a trade-off ?WMP 11 lets you see what you're loading without switching views; iTunes doesn't. And with WMP 11's reverse sync you can easily get pictures or voice recordings off of your portable device and into your library. Still no iPod compatibility, though. If you've been holding your breath waiting for it, I'd exhale. It'll never happen.
As with music album covers, the folder view of photos shows the pictures in each folder in the form a virtual stack, with the top image visible. Clicking on a folder takes you inside. Clicking on an individual image blows it up to full size and starts a slide show of all the folder's images.
Microsoft still has some work to do before it launches Windows Media Player 11 for real. Metadata lookup could be faster, and the interface, while good, needs tweaking?for example, some of the buttons you use most often are too small. But this media player is a lot more fun to use than any other, and just as powerful. To check it out for yourself, go to http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmedia/player/11 (the link will be live on Wednesday, May 17th).
Wow it took Microsoft "how" long to finally get it right. I like the feature where it finds and completes loading album artwork. I hope that's in iTunes next. I'll be looking forward to May 17th so that I can see if what he says carries weight or is he just blowing smoke.
Comments
I've always liked itunes but always thought it could use some interface changes to make it a bit cleaner and nicer. And that video folder/panel/whatever where isgives video thumbnails of every video you have it just horrible, so that goes without saying.
confirmed.
The writer is a freakin' moron.
The "PC Magazine" should have given me all the info I needed.
"Sorry we can't be bothered to program this for the Mac here have a plug-in that doesn't work for our new file types but I'm sure you'll do fine." is the long and short of the WMA Mactopia site.
Make your decision but shiny and cluttered or simple, useful and easy to use - is your choice!
BENj
Apple has been amazingly successful at winning over PC users and infiltrating their machines via iTunes, but with Windows Media Player 11 (WMP 11), Microsoft says "No more."
The new release, launching Wednesday as a public beta download, beats Apple iTunes in many aspects. It acts as a repository and player for all your music, video, and images, unlike Apple's popular player (which provides access to all your music and video album art AND podcasts AND PDFs AND online movie trailers). And while WMP 11 doesn't integrate with the iTunes Music Store, it also doesn't lock you in to one purchasing source. In fact, it integrates numerous stores including Napster, audible.com, Movielink, and MTV's new Urge service (almost as many as Apple's iTunes Music Store which provides more songs than Napster and Urge put together (3 million) as well as Audible content along with the various Universities' repository content, government hearings and addresses, movie trailers, and TV shows from the many networks like ABC, Bravo, Comedy Central, CBS Sports, Disney Channel, ESPN, Fuel TV, FX, Jetix, NBA TV, NBC, Nickelodeon, Sci Fi, Showtime, SPEED, USA and ummm... oh yeh, and MTV themselves).
This release represents a major departure from the feel and navigation styles of WMP 10 and iTunes (with its use of an intuitive UI from Apple). With many other media players, you scroll through a list of files; WMP 11 lets you browse your library by cover. Some other players, like Yahoo! Music include the capability, but none do it as well. Bringing art to navigation makes the process much more appealing visually?your music collection no longer looks like a spreadsheet.
You'll also find the Word Wheel search technology Microsoft has implemented with Vista. Its speed is stunning (almost as fast as Apple's implementation in iTunes)?start to enter the first few letters of a track, album, or artist into the search bar, and the appropriate music will be waiting for you before you stop typing. Although iTunes has the same basic feature (plus the incorporation of Smart Album Playlists and their other appropriate navigation systems), seeing album art pop up is much more compelling than getting a list of tracks.?Continue reading
All Together Now
Navigation is also more unified than with iTunes, which still hasn't found a smooth way to integrate video files and podcasts into a general media library (unless you want to count the simple click of a button to toggle between the different methods of viewing the content in iTunes). With the Apple player, you use entirely different interfaces for the different media types (which is quite appropriate to the way a person searches and absorbs specific content). In WMP 11, though, the interface looks the same for all content types in all locations, so you browse, search, add, and delete photos no differently than music or videos. Searching for and editing content on portable devices works the same way as well. Windows Media Player 10 has a poorly integrated navigation system, so I'm pleased to see such a consistent one now.
During setup, the new media player searches your entire PC for compatible files and adds them to your library. If you're like me, though, you've got all kinds of cruddy audio files on your drive, and as happened with me, they'll end up in your library. I cleared out the whole list and started over, but on the second try, I specified the folders to be searched. The process wasn't as intuitive as iTunes' Add Folder command but was easy enough (maybe next time).
Once the player has built your library, the default view divides your music by album, with the artwork and artist info on the left, followed by track information. I love being able to browse by artwork, but in these days of Bit Torrents, indie music, and downloaded singles, large chunks of your collection will probably be missing such images. No worries: Half of my collection had no art, but when I started WMP the next day, Presto! It was magically there. Of course, if you don't want to browse by artwork, you can always use a simple List view.
In a few instances, WMP didn't find album art or had incomplete ID3 info, forcing me to search the database myself?a bit cumbersome, as I had to associate tracks to the album one by one. But as I did so, the software kept updating metadata, so most albums worked themselves out on their own. I was surprised by the depth of the ID3 catalog, supplied by All Music Guide. An album by my own band, Mere, automatically retrieved album art and ID3 info, despite having sold only 3,000 copies or so.
There was a hubbub a few months ago concerning privacy with the iTunes Mini Store because it phones home to transmit info about your listening (as do several of the popular players). For those with such concerns, the WMP 11 setup asks you if you'd like to disable the auto-connect capabilities (wow, just like Apple's iTunes Music Store, except it actually offers usable feedback), which are set on by default. At any time, you can turn off features that require connecting to the Internet.
The window layout is fairly straightforward. The familiar tree navigation, reminiscent of WMP 10 and iTunes, sits on the far left side and lets you select among views: Album, Artist, Song,, and others. Back and Forward buttons that look like those in Internet Explorer 7 reside at the top left and greatly simplify navigation.?Continue reading
Cheese and Other Features
The cheesy visualizations of the previous version remain?why, I don't know?and the equalizer is still just as hard to find. I was intrigued by the Display Lyrics and Captions option but wasn't able to get it to work, even when I chose ultra-poppy songs like The Beach Boys' "Surfin' USA," Michael Jackson's "Beat It," and Kelly Clarkson's "Since U Been Gone."
Windows Media Player 11 also includes easy-to-use ripping and burning features (just like Apple except that when they incorporated it they were acting as thieves, according to Steve Balmer - Silicon.com interview). You can compile and burn either audio or data CDs?you can even burn collections that span several discs. Very cool. I found the ripping options to be fairly extensive (almost as many options as what Apple provides, sans AIFF, AAC, Apple Lossless, etc.). You can rip to MP3, WAV, WMA (with several bit-rate options?full quality, variable bit rate, or up to 192 kbps). MP3 ripping maxes out at 320 kbps.
Syncing and loading portable players is much, much, much easier than with WMP 10, and is as smooth as what any of the other services, including iTunes offer (except Apple does offer more flexibility). Surprised? So was I. Getting music onto a portable player using the previous version was a truly awful experience, but this one lets you hook up your player, then simply drag files and drop them into the right-hand pane (now all they have to do is make it automatic like the iTunes true syncing experience or maybe even provide desktop integration like iTunes). As the media player scans your library, a meter lets you know how much room the device will have left when the files are copied onto it. When you get close to the limit, just hit sync to actually transfer the files.
The iTunes transfer feature has one advantage?it loads your device as you drag and drop, but that's the only way it's better. And there's a trade-off ?WMP 11 lets you see what you're loading without switching views; iTunes doesn't. And with WMP 11's reverse sync you can easily get pictures or voice recordings off of your portable device and into your library. Still no iPod compatibility, though. If you've been holding your breath waiting for it, I'd exhale. It'll never happen (that's to bad since 80% of the players won't work with it).
As with music album covers, the folder view of photos shows the pictures in each folder in the form a virtual stack, with the top image visible. Clicking on a folder takes you inside. Clicking on an individual image blows it up to full size and starts a slide show of all the folder's images.
Microsoft still has some work to do before it launches Windows Media Player 11 for real. Metadata lookup could be faster, and the interface, while good, needs tweaking?for example, some of the buttons you use most often are too small. But this media player is a lot more fun to use than any other, and just as powerful. To check it out for yourself, go to http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmedia/player/11 (the link will be live on Wednesday, May 17th).
Originally posted by hmurchison
http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase...gallery_01.asp
confirmed.
The writer is a freakin' moron.
The "PC Magazine" should have given me all the info I needed.
Looking at that I can't see why anyone uses Windows anymore. Wow, what an elegant interface... So logical and easy to navigate.
Otherwise, it would also be nice (and bust up any competition in that regard) if iTunes did implement the ability to interelate with other music services. That way, even if they don't have the amount of content now, the alliance is built for the future as a protective measure of when they DO have the content. B/C w/ Apple, if the allegance to iTunes is gone, they're basically fucked on a hardware level.
With that said, I wouldn't be surprised if Apple managed to copy WMP 11 with an elegant "View By Artwork" or some such command for viewing your library. Hopefully, though, Apple can be convinced to change its iTunes video integration (or an option of it) to simply launch QuickTime Player like it does in iPhoto.
at the end of the day, i love itunes, so i hope this improvement in WM11 will spur apple on to fix the few problems itunes has (e.g. video integration, interface customisation, playing music without the need for a library etc)
Originally posted by shady104
i DLed the beta...it sux! not easy to use at all! i love me itunes! lol
Yeah, double-clicking on a file is pretty hard.
But it seems to be in Microsoft's DNA that their answer, always always always, to making things "better" is "able to do more stuff in more different ways with more UI elements".
At least previous Windows interfaces seemed to reflect this. With the Vista UI stuff there's this real disconnect between the "cleaner" design elements and the usual proliferation of visual clutter.
It reminds of of a lot of CE design- an excess of pretty knobs and glowing things and displays and parts, to make the product look "cooler", without much thought to usability.
Actually, a better comparison might be between Sony's stores and the Apple store. Sony puts the emphasis on "fun destination video arcade lots of stuff" whereas Apple stresses clarity and simplicity.
Apple made some of these same mistakes in early iterations of OS X but has steadily been toning things down; MS appears to be intent on replicating all the excesses of 10.0 and then some.
Excerpts:
Microsoft and MTV say this integration of software and store offers an ease and simplicity to match iTunes. But if a week's trial of the service is any clue, Urge will have a hard time competing with such also-rans as Rhapsody, Yahoo and Napster, let alone Apple.
... its biggest problem: its integration into Windows Media Player 11. Not only does this new, Windows XP-only software promote Urge to the exclusion of other retailers, you can't shop at this store-- or even just play your Urge downloads -- in any earlier version of Windows Media Player.
But Windows Media Player 11 ( http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmedia ) isn't any old beta release; it's essentially a system upgrade, one that can be removed only with XP's System Restore tool. Nobody should install this kind of preview software lightly.
... It cleverly represents how many songs you have in a given category -- from one artist, in one genre, released in a particular year and so on-- by stacking these thumbnails on top of each other.
Aside from the way this redesign still places the play/pause/stop buttons at the bottom of the screen, as far as possible from every other control, this interface is a smart, creative way to organize a digital music library.
It's too bad that Windows Media Player didn't locate cover-art images reliably -- most of my library was illustrated with generic blank-CD icons. For every obscure indie artist's cover art that the program found, it missed two or three releases from big-name acts.
Apple needs -- and customers deserve -- vigorous competition. But that's not going to happen if the best Apple's rivals can manage is a combination of beta software of dubious reliability and a tie-in to a music TV channel that devotes most of its airtime to things besides music.
--B