Music/Media Player: FAST, FLAC and LAST FM support.

Patrick20

I've been using WMP for a while and although i like it, it doesn't support FLAC and Last.fm together. I then tried foobar2000 For about a month and I loved how quick it was and it did flac and lastfm. But i keep messing up settings without even knowing what i did and it was driving me insane. too complicated and only for serious enthusiasts. Then I went back and tried songbird, i forgot why i stopped using it, then as soon as i launched it i remembered. It took 1 minute just to open then it couldnt keep up with my fairly relaxed clicking. My laptop, which is fairly powerful, was having trouble with it. Then onto media monkey. I liked it but couldnt get the last.fm to properly work. a shame since it seemed like the perfect comprimise between light and functional. Then I tried winamp. It was just too slow. not as bad as songbird but still slow. I also didnt like the interface. Anyone got any suggestions on a media player that might work?

sorry for the grammer. Im drained at the moment.

bat999

Hi
VLC media player certainly handles FLAC files.
It looks like it has LastFM support too.
Explanation here:-http://cybernetnews.com/vlc-090-includes-lastfm-support/
VLC is a free download from www.videolan.org

tronator

Songbird has last.fm support and much more...

Donnie

tronator wrote: »

Songbird has last.fm support and much more...

I guess you missed...

Then I went back and tried songbird, i forgot why i stopped using it, then as soon as i launched it i remembered. It took 1 minute just to open then it couldnt keep up with my fairly relaxed clicking.

tronator

Donnie wrote: »

I guess you missed...

Must have been in the small print

I don't have any problems with it, starts in 3 seconds. Maybe one the extensions causes it. He could try to disable all unused ones.

All my music is laying on a NFS share and Songbird reacts very quickly...

googler

I've seen a plugin for WMP that allows it to play FLAC, I used it a while ago before I rebuilt my PC, so can't recall the name.

Google for 'flac plugin windows media player' or variations thereof.....

Patrick20

bat999 wrote: »

Hi
VLC media player certainly handles FLAC files.
It looks like it has LastFM support too.
Explanation here:-http://cybernetnews.com/vlc-090-includes-lastfm-support/
VLC is a free download from www.videolan.org

I've got VLC for films and use it to play audiobooks but Its not got the abilities of other players like album art and browsing tracks. If im wrong about this then great.

tronator wrote: »

Must have been in the small print

I don't have any problems with it, starts in 3 seconds. Maybe one the extensions causes it. He could try to disable all unused ones.

All my music is laying on a NFS share and Songbird reacts very quickly...

Its not just start time that bothers me. Songbird is still buggy as hell and completely unusable to me. Absolutely hate it. I would use Itunes before it. And that is something. :eek:

googler wrote: »

I've seen a plugin for WMP that allows it to play FLAC, I used it a while ago before I rebuilt my PC, so can't recall the name.

Google for 'flac plugin windows media player' or variations thereof.....

Yes I had that installed. Didnt play well with the LastFm plugin though. It wouldnt show the length of the track so it couldnt be scrobbled.

I might never find my perfect player

Patrick20

I decided to go back and give media monkey another look. Turns out I was unlucky on my first go. Its playing the flac, its responsive and the tracks are scrobbling to lastfm. looks like we have a winner. I'm also keeping foobar because if I knew how to configure it then it would win hands down. i'll try to learn it a bit at a time while im using media monkey

Tim_De_Baets

Patrick20 wrote: »

Yes I had that installed. Didnt play well with the LastFm plugin though. It wouldnt show the length of the track so it couldnt be scrobbled.

The WMP Tag Plus plug-in fixes this (just google it). After installing WMP Tag Plus, re-add the FLAC files to library. Their length will show up and they will be scrobbled by the Last.fm plug-in.