Tracking Down Great Software For You!
A few weeks ago I was introduced to a free media player called Foobar2000 by MetaMan. He gave me a link to a portable version (called FoobarRemix) that was put together so that I could try it out without having to install the application. For some reason I haven’t been listening to a lot of music lately, but when I did crank up the tunes I made sure to use Foobar2000. The result…it’s quite impressive.
At first glance it looks like a program that is way too simple since it even sports some “ASCII art” for some of the display items, such as the progress bar. My first reaction was that this was just whipped up real quick, but the real gems lie under the hood. Not only that, but the progress bars that I once saw as amateurish I now look at as stylish. I’m not quite sure why I like them now, but it probably has something to do with my inner geek coming out.
One of the things that really struck me as cool was that when I played a song it would actually retrieve the lyrics and display them on the screen while the song was playing. It would also highlight the words in a karaoke style as the song went along. Unfortunately it wasn’t able to retrieve the lyrics for all of my songs, but it was successful about 75% of the time.
The shock didn’t hit until I opened up the Preferences under the File Menu. In there was a wonderfully large selection of options that I could customize and tweak until the pitter patter of my heart was just right. It appears that the portable version that I was using already had all of the additional components installed, and therefore added an extreme amount of customizability to the application. There was even an XM plug-in installed that let me stream my XM Radio without needing to use Windows Media Player like I previously did…that’s what won my heart over.
The only downside that I found to the entire application was that it wasn’t skinnable. That didn’t really bother me because they let you customize fonts, background colors, and a lot of different aspects of the current theme. Not only that but I really warmed up to the existing color set that came with the application.
So below you’ll find the option to download Foobar2000 from the official site or you can give the portable version (called FoobarRemix) a shot. I highly recommend using the portable version because your experience will be a lot better with all of the components already downloaded and installed for you. In case you’re wondering I did monitor the registry while running the portable version and didn’t see anything being written to it, so it should be fine to take with you on your USB Drive wherever you go.
Download the Portable FoobarRemix
Official Foobar2000 Homepage
| Update: |
MetaMan pointed out that they have done a lot more to customize Foobar2000 which is why they renamed it to FoobarRemix. Here is his post on FoobarRemix which briefly mentions version 0.2 that they are working on to make it more aesthetically pleasing.
|
Thanks for the tip and portable version link MetaMan!
Thanks for the free publicity
. Really, though, I only use FoobaREMIX nowadays. I’m kinda lucky, though, because I get to use version 0.2 
. WinAmp, iTunes, and Windows Media Player have all been pushed to the back of my head. I’m listening to my music as I write this, and the little Foobar icon is tightly nestled in my system tray. And Ryan’s only found some of the many hidden features.
Foobar is undoubtedly my favorite media player. For videos, I use VLC Player
I use foobar2000 for music, and [bsplayer.org] 1.37 for videos.
Note: BSplayer version 1.37 was the last freeware version without ads. Newer BSplayer versions are shareware (Pro), and adware (Free). I will switch to another video player soon.
And [videolan.org] is not just a player, it is “the cross-platform media player and streaming server“.
Forum where they share their configuration includes screenshots.
[hydrogenaudio.org]
Here are a list of plugins for foobar2000:
[pelit.koillismaa.fi]
Place the plugins under C:\program files\foobar2000\components
Plugins i recommend:
[maroonspoon.com] – Display a moderately sized “popup†of song information when a new song plays.
[cherans.bol.ucla.edu] – Displays album art in a panel. (requires [music.morbo.org])
cool little package. my concern is this: i’m on a 2.4 ghz, 1 gb memory machine. i run autocad constantly for work. when i checked, foobar was taking up to 30% of my cpu time. that’s too big a footprint. i’ve been running it constantly for the past 5 hours or so and my comp has slowed to a crawl usually reserved for 4 o’clock.
in my mind, for the smallest total footprint with decent usability, you can’t beat trayplay.
still, i believe that foobar will be landing on my home machine soon after i get there tonight, thanks for the find.
That surprises me, I’ve been using Foobar and it’s typically around 5% to 10% CPU usage. Maybe it depends on the bitrate of the song or something.
Yes, I am puzzled as well. Foobar only ever takes up more than 5% when I start a new song, it then sinks back down into its normal threshold. Then again, most of my music is stored in 160 KBPS MP3s and 128 AACs and my computer runs a 3.2 GHz P4 with HT, but I only have 512 MB of RAM. Also, another machine I run it on has a 2.4 GHz Celeron, and while I have never checked the exact performance on that one, it does not seem to run much slower than my main computer.
Also, for the record, albumart and Columns UI are already installed.
I use WMP 11 for videos. It is fast, I didn’t have to install anything, and it works very well (not to mention it looks cool
).
quite odd. i just fired it up to check and it floated anywhere from 2 to 27%. haven’t had a chance to check it on my machine at home but will this weekend for certain.
still, looks like a killer app that will replace iTunes for me. thanks again for the tip.
While I find a lot to like about foobar2000, my favorite part is the sound when it is properly configured. I believe it is the only media player (free or commercial) that offers kernel streaming through an optional component called “Kernel Streaming Support”. The component “Allows bit-exact playback bypassing Windows kernel mixer.” In lay language, it makes the sound far more like your stereo than a computer. Add in another component, “Secret Rabbit Code”, set it’s output sample rate to 9600 (or higher). Then set the output data format to 32-bit and it pulls sound out of recordings like nothing I’ve ever heard before. It does take more processing power, but my ears believe it is worth it. There are other fun Digital Sound Processors (DSPs) you can use, all depending on your preferences. Hope you enjoy it as much as I have… Jim