| The Best of the Best Software MP3 Players |
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| Written by Tony Schirmer | |
| Sunday, 08 April 2007 | |
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Most people that own an iPod have converted to using iTunes for playing music, but is it a good move? We review the top 3 plays for your computer and show exactly who comes out on top. Apple iTunes Apple iTunes has only become popular since the release of the very controversial Apple iPod in 2001. iTunes is the standard mp3 player for all Macs now and comes bundled with QuickTime movie player. The latest version is 7.1. One very big advantage iTunes has over its competitors is the attached music shop in the actual program, which promotes the legal downloading of music as opposed to the alternative. I’ve also found the search function to be top notch, the best I’ve used in any media player.
Performance Memory Usage when idle: 5000K – 8000K Memory Usage when playing: 6000K-26000K Memory Usage when Searching: 23000K – 26000K CPU usage when idle: 0% constant CPU usage when playing: peaked 9% Start-up Time (to full functionality): approx 35sec Customisation iTunes is the most boring out of every player to date, no flashy looks, and there’s no way you can even change the colour of it. It provides little customisation options but it does give the option to sign in on your own personal account a very good feature, that’s only been found missing in action from almost every other player. There are plug-in applications that are available for the other players for something similar but none that come standard. Visualisation If you’re a visual person that likes to see flash effects and cool graphics, then iTunes is really not going to be your forte. For a company that prides itself on visual and audio modernism, Apple have really let everyone down in this department. The few settings iTunes have for visual enhancement are really a letdown after the good searching and online functionally. Streaming and Online Interaction The one place that iTunes is undoubtedly the leader in the field is online interaction. With features like online radio and podcast access, many users are neglecting all the other downfalls of the program. From buying music to TV shows and movies, this is really another world of online interaction. With the bundled QuickTime player, not only can you listen to all your favourite music, but see the videos, and buy the albums.
Overall Rating 3.5 stars - Best useability, Good performance and great online activity Winamp Winamp’s been a long time player in the industry, established even before mp3s became popular. It was always known for its low memory usage, high performance and high customisation, with users being able to completely change the look of the player to what they want. The latest version is 5.33 and it still holds true to the Winamp reputation, giving the end user the most unique experience for them. Performance Memory Usage when idle: 5000K – 8000K Memory Usage when playing: 6000K-13000K Memory Usage when Searching: 23000K – 26000K CPU usage when idle: 0% constant CPU usage when playing: peaked 2% Start-up Time (to full functionality): approx 2.16sec Customisation This is really what Winamp became famous for, back in the days of Sonique and media player, this really showed through. Today is no different; the complete versatility of the look and “feel” of Winamp really makes it stand out. You can get skins for just about everything you can imagine to suit you. If you decide to turn off the modern skins option, and go back to the basic skins, you really get a bare bone music player, which gives you that brilliant performance that your 200 MHz computer could run without a problem. Visualisation The use of AVS files for visualisation means that anyone with a math background can create a visualisation in minutes without the need for any programming skills. This meant you weren’t stuck with the boring standard visualisations like in every other type of mp3 player. This meant a large range of visualisation for the general public in a very short space of time, however running these visualisations still proves to be a task for even the most up to date computers today. Pixel doubling is a standard enabled option now, so every person can enjoy the visualisations without the need for a gaming graphics card and latest CPU’s. Compatibility Winamp was one of the first players in the world to support the AAC file format. AAC files give you surround sound music, not just stereo. Winamp supports pretty much every audio file you can think of, and video files. This is also compatible with the iPod, giving iTunes a run for their money. However it does have an issue playing WMV video files, which seem to be buggy if they’re played in anything but windows media player or windows media centre. Streaming and Online Interaction Winamp is only partially developed in the online world. It contains some great features like ShoutCast, which is Winamp’s live streaming. This was obviously not designed to compete with iTunes, instead of podcasts; you can have your own channel. And the subject categories for the channels are subjects like Law and science. Not anything like iTunes at all. However it is still fun to watch all the independent channels and see what people can do without a budget. Overall Rating 4 Stars – great useability, best performance and good online activity Windows Media Player Microsoft windows media player is the standard media player included with every version of windows. Performance Memory Usage when idle: 8000K – 27000K Memory Usage when playing: 16000K-30000K Memory Usage when Searching: 18000K – 28000K CPU usage when idle: 8% constant CPU usage when playing: peaked 14% Start-up Time (to full functionality): approx 2.02sec Customisation Visual customisation is versatile when using media player, it doesn’t take long to change the skins, and it can really give you a different experience. The downside about having skins on media player is that it doesn’t matter if you have a smaller skin or a larger skin, the performance isn’t drastically improved. The way Microsoft have made the skins system, it gives the programmer full range to do whatever he wants, similar to the Winamp “modern” skin base. This results in some really crazy skins where artists have versatility to do whatever they feel. Visualisation As with every windows media player, the visualisation is limited. There are a few preset ones and not more. I must say that the range is much more than Apples attempt though. Graphics cards seem to have it easy running these visualisations which can’t be said about the other two players. Compatibility Being the standard media player with Microsoft Windows, it plays every file type windows supports. Which is a big swag of them, and with new codec’s being incorporated into the media player everyday, it’s almost never out of date. This is close to the only player that plays WMV files properly, which is an upside to using it. Streaming and Online Interaction As opposed to other players, Windows Media Player doesn’t have a large online interaction within the program. Instead which is found really annoying by most users, the homepage is found on the media player itself, but as soon as you click a link it opens up your web browser for you to continue surfing. It really takes away from the Interaction with the program itself. The site is very handy and has a large range of content and music development on it , but again it’s not a part of the program itself.
Overall Rating 2.8 Star – good useability, but bad performance and limited online activity. Test machine  This was tested on a
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| Last Updated ( Tuesday, 24 April 2007 ) |
