Software to Manage Your Music/Media?

[McDougal]

@lestatar, what MM theme is that? I like it, much more interesting than the default Blue theme ......

[CrowdAds]

[kredig]

that's the "noir" skin by dreadm i believe...
for skins, just look on this page (imo the skins by dreadm and eyal are the best):
http://www.mediamonkey.com/wiki/inde...3.0_and_higher
or look at the MM-Skinning forum. there are some more skins out there. i prefer the M-Plexx. it's simple but still has some eye-candy.

[lestatar]

^ yup. Exactly so. I like the Noir themes quite a lot. I don't change my themes too much though - when I find one I like I tend to stick with it.

[McDougal]

Thanks guys for the info, now my MM is much more interesting looking :

[Lagoo56]

I couldn't get WMP11,MediaMonkey,Foobar or iTunes to organize my music properly and easy,so I had to do it all manually.I guess if no software works then I have to do it myself lol

[McDougal]

For some odd reason the date is missing in some of my album's tags.....guess I have to use MP3Tag to find/update the info again , oh well, lol.

@Lagoo56, right-clicking your music files and clicking "Auto-Organize Files" didn't work in MM? You have the Gold or Free version?

From people's experiences, what's the best FLAC-MP3 converter, MM Gold or Foobar2k? Foobar2k is just fine except the album art goes away , haven't tried MM Gold.

[lestatar]

^McDougal: Same prob with album art via foobar.

When I go from FLAC to mp3 always using foobar, I always convert first. I only dress up FLAC and mp3 files with tags and art AFTER conversion.

Issue solved.

[kredig]

did anybody try out musicbee yet?
imo it just looks like a mediamonkey clone with some nice plugins already on board.

[lestatar]

^ Hmmm, not yet, but will check it out now...Seems interesting at first glance. And FREE!

thanks for the reminder kredig...

[kredig]

no problem. i was looking for a simple player for my girlfriend (she really needs to get rid of itunes) and i thought she could like this program for listening to music

[Satellite_6]

MM doesn't seem as functional as foobar, just looking at the site. . .

[lestatar]

Hmmm, gotta admit, I am underwhelmed with MusicBee, kredig.

Visually, I am unimpressed with the interface - it seems a bit too flat, unpolished and not quite ready for prime time to me. Still, I will keep it around and play with it a bit but honestly, its not looking like MusicBee will find a permanent home on my machines any time soon...

[WalkGood]

Originally Posted by Satellite_6

MM doesn't seem as functional as foobar, just looking at the site. . .

You really can't tell without trying it, I use both and there's features of each that I really like. Also winamp is very nice too ...

[Satellite_6]

Hmmm, well I have Winamp and I like the interface but the EQ is kind of useless.
I just downloaded MediaMonkey. There are commercials everywhere and the EQ looks almost as useless. It reminds me of iTunes, bleh!

I think I'll stick to the seriousness of Foobar.

[WalkGood]

Originally Posted by Satellite_6

Hmmm, well I have Winamp and I like the interface but the EQ is kind of useless.
I just downloaded MediaMonkey. There are commercials everywhere and the EQ looks almost as useless. It reminds me of iTunes, bleh!

I think I'll stick to the seriousness of Foobar.

With winamp I've never used the EQ, only VST plug-ins like BBE, works great. On mediamonkey you need to learn how to remove them and add the good stuff. As I said before I use foobar for playback, ABX and some conversions ...

[skip252]

There's a Winamp.exe that's inside MM. The Winamp VST Bridge install there just fine. Once you get that there's dozens of decent to very good vst equalizers over at kvr. I doubt you'll find anything as good BBE but there's defintely some that are better than the built in EQ in MediaMonkey.

BTW don't discount MusicBee. There's a LOT more in there than a quick look can reveal. Like foobar2000 it can be just a simple PC side player or as powerful as you want it to be. An example would be that there's a secure ripper with AccurateRip support included in the base installation. Album art embedding from multiple sources is among the tagging options. It's the only other application besides Winamp I know that can see and manipulate the entire file tree of songs added to a mp3 player in MTP.

That just scratches the surface of what it can do. While it's definitely a work in it's progressed to the point that if I didn't have f2bk it would be one of the few other programs I would consider to manage my music. There's some funky, nonintuitive things about the UI I'm not fond of but I'd be able to work around most of them to gain the power and flexibility it offers.

kredig, like fooby2k it offers a portable installation that won't interfere with any of your current settings. If you don't like it the uninstall is very clean. I think that you won't lose anything by giving it a shot.

[McDougal]

MusicBee - reminds me of MM a little from looking briefly at site.

I'm curious...but I don't think I'll try it out. I like MediaMonkey best for playing/managing music (and sync my Fuze, iTunes to sync Touch, MM gave "iTunes Sync Required" message, very annoying).....Foobar is kinda ugly IMO, but great in terms of features and performance. I use it for converting and playing my FLAC albums.

On my PC I've got MM Gold (latest version), Foobar2000 v1.1.6, and iTunes 10.2.1, only opened when I want to sync something w/my Touch.

I've tried WinAmp, its nice, but I don't see any reason to have 4 media players on my machine.

[lestatar]

^ neither do I. But I am always on the lookout for something new.

MusicBee is indeed not so visually amazing. But skip252 makes some valid points, points which I need to dig into and see for myself. So, I will keep it around for a bit longer, if nothing else than to mess with it.

[kredig]

Originally Posted by WalkGood

You really can't tell without trying it...

seconed that

After a few days of playing around with music bee i have to say that i really like it. it is really simple to use but as said it has many "hidden" features which you cannot see on the first sight. like skip252 says: it can be a simple media player or a pretty powerful music manager.
you can even use plugins from winamp if something is missing...

doesn't every better music software offer a portable install?

[Lagoo56]

Originally Posted by McDougal

For some odd reason the date is missing in some of my album's tags.....guess I have to use MP3Tag to find/update the info again , oh well, lol.

@Lagoo56, right-clicking your music files and clicking "Auto-Organize Files" didn't work in MM? You have the Gold or Free version?

Well right now I have the Gold Version,before I was using the free one,which was a pain.I sort of like Media Monkey,but I still manually organize all my music myself since its easier to do now after organizing them all once.My problem with MM Gold is that the equalizer sucks,I like the preset rock setting on JetAudio alot better than the one on Media Monkey.I'm not used to messing with EQ settings to find the perfect one,I usually just use presets.The flat setting on Media Monkey makes my headphones suck but the flat setting on JetAudio is actually nice.