Media Players

[Soundproof]

Mark,

For most of your listening, and particularly through earplugs, you shouldn't worry about the auto leveling. But if you're using your computer for playback through a main sound system, then the difference between having it on or off is telling. You would need good speakers/sound system to hear the difference, though.

[Mark]

Mark,

For most of your listening, and particularly through earplugs, you shouldn't worry about the auto leveling. But if you're using your computer for playback through a main sound system, then the difference between having it on or off is telling. You would need good speakers/sound system to hear the difference, though.

Well, that's okay, then. I don't use the PC as part of my (ridiculously dire) 'hifi' set-up, just as a place to create and store MP3s. I can re-rip or re-download any tracks that I'd eventually want to use as part of a 'good' PC/hifi system, so right now, my method suits just fine.

[tjguitar]

I should also mention that I use "Conexant HD Audio output" whatever that means. I'm  guessing that's my soundcard, but I can't seem to find that information??? I have an HP laptop with XP Media Center Edition.

I have a Bose "Companion3 Multimedia Speaker System". 

There's 2 speakers on my desk and a subwoofer on the floor. Here's a stock image, if anyone's seen the system. I don't think it is very new:


The subwoofer has a "Bass Compensation" on the back that has a + sign on the right, - sign on the left and a vertical line on the top of the dial.  Mine is very close to the minus sign.  Is that where it should be? I had a roommate who would have is bass all the way up pounding and it would sound annoying as hell...

TJ

[Mark]

A recent discovery made by myself and George is that, for those who use MediaMonkey to level the output gain of MP3 files to a target dB - say, perhaps, because you don't want to keep rummaging in your pocket for the volume control on your MP3 player; you'd rather all tracks played at approximately the same level - there are problems in store if they then try to play these modified files using iTunes.

Some files will output at the correct volume, others are impossibly quiet. I can only surmise that iTunes has difficulty knowing what to do with the little piece of output data at the start of each MP3 file: the information which tells any given DAP or media player how loud or quietly to play any given MP3 file.

This problem seems only to affect iTunes - all the players listed at the start of this thread will happily play back such modified files with no trouble. It can be fixed by burning affected files to a CD-R, after which they'll play back at normal volume.

Been meaning to update this thread for a while now.

I had a PM from 71dB a few weeks ago, explaining to me the possible cause of why some (though not all) tracks play quietly in iTunes. I'd imagined it had to do with output gain levelling in MediaMonkey. I was wrong.

Last night, I used a downloadable script for MediaMonkey which 'undid' all the levelling data in all my MP3 files. I then loaded up iTunes with all those files I knew played too quietly. Then, having discovered that the levelling data alterations were NOT the root of the problem, I did what 71dB suggested:

In iTunes you can adjust the volume of each track (-100 % ... +100 %) by selecting the track => Get info => Options => Volume adjustment.

I set all the tracks* to 0% (they'd been mysteriously reduced to -100% automatically by iTunes upon import ), and bingo, problem solved.

My thanks to Poju for helping to solve (at least, in part) this irritating issue.



*Highlight all/any affected tracks, then right-click (or whatever it is you Mac users do ), and follow the procedure above. It'll adjust all the tracks at once, instead of tiresomely going through each one by one.

[DavidW]

Hey Mark, try mp3gain instead for your gaining stuff.  If MediaMonkey can't even revert without a special script, you're using the wrong software.

[Mark]

Hey Mark, try mp3gain instead for your gaining stuff.  If MediaMonkey can't even revert without a special script, you're using the wrong software.

Yeah, I know - it sucks! Might return to MP3Gain if I can be bothered levelling nearly 3000 files for a second time.

Only thing that makes me nervous is that the last time I used MP3Gain, I had it running for almost two days solidly on about 60Gb of music files. It completely f**ked my HDD's read/write arm. I lost everything because the cost of data recovery was prohibitive at that time.

[DavidW]

Yeah, I know - it sucks! Might return to MP3Gain if I can be bothered levelling nearly 3000 files for a second time.

Only thing that makes me nervous is that the last time I used MP3Gain, I had it running for almost two days solidly on about 60Gb of music files. It completely f**ked my HDD's read/write arm. I lost everything because the cost of data recovery was prohibitive at that time.

I don't know if you saw, but this morning I was so sleepy, I misread your post and slammed you, and then you no wait Mark knows exactly what he's talking, I'm such a dumbass.  See I learned my lesson, don't check gmg before the morning coffee.

That mp3gain adventure sounded like wowza's!!  When you gain you GAIN.

[Papageno]

I use iTunes on my iMac which is connected to an antique Albarry Music amplifier set which has a pair of huge Rogers speakers connected to it.  The neighbours never complained...

[Siedler]

On mac: Itunes and VLC (for videos)
Windows: Winamp, Foobar2000, VLC and Media Player Classic

[techniquest]

Wow this thread got very techy 

Plus, I don't have iTunes (yes, I'm one of those seven people), and it works just fine for me.

I'm one of those 7 too! And long may it stay that way. I've gone of winamp so I'm going to try JetAudio, also use VLC for video when there are compatibility or codec issues with WMP or winamp.

[orbital]

I'm going to try JetAudio,

I have yet to find a format that jet audio does not play right out of the box. Plus it does not take over your system, if you tell it not to play certain file associations it really won't. A very good boy 

[Mark]

Plus it does not take over your system, if you tell it not to play certain file associations it really won't. A very good boy 

Ditto WMP. I've only ever experienced 'hijacks' with iTunes, normally when reinstalling or updating QuickTime. No idea why.

[orbital]

Ditto WMP. I've only ever experienced 'hijacks' with iTunes, normally when reinstalling or updating QuickTime. No idea why.

Particularly with midi files. When you see a midi file link and click on it it will open a new browser screen and try to play it with quicktime (most of the time quicktime will fail to open needless to say  )

ps  - Real player was notorious in that regard too. Thank God we don't need it anymore 

[Mark]

Yes, Real Player was a pain in the ***!

[DavidW]

Yes, Real Player was a pain in the ***!

Yeah I was about to say I only experience hijacking formats with evil Real Player, those bastards!

[sidoze]

For ultimate compatibility, I use VLC media player. Never had any codec problems with it.

http://www.videolan.org/vlc/features.html

thanks for this, I've been looking for a programme to play all DVDs on ever since PowerDVD stopped allowing me to change the region setting. It works well

[Tapio Dmitriyevich]

FB2K user here and part of the hydrogenaudio.org community. FB2K because I can do lots of things which I need to remote control the player (fb2k on a notebook is the beginning of my stereo setups audio chain here). But fb2k is definitely targeted against advanced users, as for lots of things you need to know the tagz language, which very soon ends in spaghetti code. I've grown up with fb2k. It's transparent and powerful in it's treatment of audio files metadata as well. 100 other reasons.

Another good player is xmplayer, very tiny, but efficient and way easier to handle for beginners. My recommendation besides Winamp.

I'm also one of the 7 users who don't want and don't need iBloat. No reason why I should install stinking apple bloat crap. itunes, quicktime, wmp, realplayer, all a great pita which has to be avoided.

[Mark]

I'd love Foobar, WinAmp and others more if I could select music by album art. It's the only reason I tolerate (note that word) WMP 11.

[Tapio Dmitriyevich]

Alright, Album Art is the only thing I don't need. This is a fullscreen screenshot of my notebook, which is attached to my stereo:



Beautiful enough No need for Album art. Honestly, I can't afford the time for album art, because that would mean a lot of work with fb2k.

[Mark]

Granted - a lot of unnecessary work for some. I just find it easier to navigate by album cover (saves having to work out which multiple recording is which).